Peak Injustice

Introduction – After the Peak of Inequality Part 1: The politics of hope 1. On Corbyn 2. Would you let Johnson drive your daughter home? 3. Misrule Britannia: Brexit is the last gasp of empire 4. The curve of inequality and the Brexit Way 5. Everything, almost everywhere, is slowing down 6. So, how did we end up with this government? 7. Finland, a summary of how much better it can be 8. Osborne, Johnston and Starmer: Let them eat growth? 9. A Tale of Three Elections: Sweden, Italy and England 10. What the UK in 1922 and 2017 had in common 11. Conspiracy Theories: Bus gates and open minds 12. Are things about to get better? 13. Persuade Sunak to join the Patriotic Millionaires Part 2: Poverty, Destitution and Happiness 1. Who spends more wisely: Individuals or government? 2. Dying quietly: English suburbs and the stiff upper lip 3. The Wreckers who tore British society apart 4. Comparing inequality in Beijing and London 5. Austerity, not influenza, caused the UK’s health to deteriorate 6. The Income Shock of 2020, the fall after peak inequality 7. The Roundabout – class hate in England 8. Why Finland is still the happiest country 9. Most people in the UK now share Robert Owen’s views 10. The long shadow of the cost of living emergency 11. The crises combine: austerity, cost-of-living, jobs and pay Part 3: Levelling across housing 1. Our Museum Future 2. When everyone you know buys art 3. The Revival of Two-Party Politics 4. Short cuts on homelessness 5. Who still dies young in a rich city 6. How to Solve the Housing Crisis 7. Public spending in the UK Europe 8. House Prices: welcoming a crash 9. Houses, not homelessness 10. A Letter from Helsinki 11. Truss and Autumn 2022 12. Labour and levelling Up Part 4: Eugenics and the fear of too many people 1. The Blank Slate – Toby Young and Social Mobility 2. Writing off the student debt 3. Defending free university tuition 4. Examining the genetic influences on educational attainment 5. When racism stopped being normal 6. School enjoyment and later educational achievement 7. Brexit and Britain’s Radical Right 8. Decarbonising economies is like denuclearising weaponry 9. Capitalism and Global Income Inequality 10. About Our Schools 11. The birth of Baby 8 Billion 12. History Repeating Part 5: how austerity undermined our public health 1. Mortality improvements stalled in England 2. Geographical inequalities in health by occupation 3. The Brexit vote, declining health and immigration 4. Homelessness and public health 5. Why life expectancy in England and Wales is ‘stalling’ 6. The cuts and poor health 7. Things fall apart: The British Health Crisis 2010-2020 8. How many were dead by Christmas 9. The Decimation of the NHS 10. Slowing down and returning to normal 11. Falling down the global ranks 12. How austerity caused the NHS crisis Part 6: Fear, the pandemic and turning points 1. First graphs of a global slowdown in COVID-19 deaths 2. Where the coronavirus death rate is heading 3. COVID-19 spreads differently from SARS 4. Why coronavirus death rates won’t fall as quickly as they rose 5. Why death rates did not rise directly with case numbers in 2020. 6. Why coronavirus rates rose in some areas of England and not others 7. Is the cure worse than the disease? The most divisive question of 2020 8. Why COVID-19 was more severe in the north of England in autumn 2020 9. The City of Oxford and the Pandemic in 2020/21 10. It’s not going away: a real debate about the best way to live with COVID 11. The never-ending pandemic 12. The end of great expectations: The pandemic inquiry 13. From the Pandemic to the Cost-of-Living Crisis 14. Why the UK’s covid-19 inquiry is right to look at policies since 2010 15. Coronavirus and the coronary heart disease epidemic Part 7: How the elite respond to change 1. Inequality and Oxford 2. Dyslexia and The Problem with pride 3. Oxford Housing and the Survivor Syndrome 4. Kindness: A new kind of rigour for British Geographers 5. The University of Oxford: a changed Institution? 6. The Stones of the University of Oxford 7. Economics and compassion 8. Generational change in British academic Geography 9. Talking geography in the public realm 10. 10 suggestions for the new government of 2024/25 Conclusion