All of us in lockdown are equal, but some are more equal than others

Attempts to celebrate the middle-class silver-linings of lockdown prove the grotesque abomination it has been for many people still has not been acknowledged.

Cartoon by Crid.

Many are reflecting on their 14-month sabbatical from society as the country attempts to return to something approximating normality. For some it has been a horror show, but others will mourn their lost silver-linings.

Take, for instance, the apparent resurgence in the indulgence of the written word, something which, if true, can only ever be a good thing. BBC News recently reported that Britain had rediscovered its 'love of reading’ during lockdown. Citing statistics from the Publishers Association, the article said that consumer book sales had grown by seven per cent. The bestsellers list included celebrity works by Richard Osman, David Walliams and Jamie Oliver.

The very same day, the national broadcaster informed us of research that suggests speech and literacy development in children has been seriously curtailed over the past year. The surveyed primary schools were almost unanimously concerned about the language development of their pupils and more than three quarters revealed that their September 2020 intake of children had communication skills below that of a pre-lockdown cohort.

These two seemingly contradictory stories can only be reconciled by acknowledging the two-tier society which lockdown has exacerbated.

More than half of those surveyed say that they will miss some aspects of lockdown. This is not altogether surprising given that many at the higher end of the socio-economic scale have benefitted from the halting of the stressful commute, which has been replaced by a much easier stumble from bed to laptop, as well as the enforced limiting of the national culture of long working hours.

For some, the displaced time has been invested in an absorption in the lives of roadside hillbilly zookeepers on Netflix; learning to bake banana bread; or reading the latest by Hilary Mantel. As Joel Golby put it in The Guardian: 'Take the commute away and that gives three extra hours in the day to watch The Greatest Showman on Amazon Prime again.’

If you do not particularly care about civil liberties, consider making and fulfilling social arrangements to be stress-inducing, and are protected from the economic savagery that has been unleashed in much of the country, there may even be a sense of regret akin to the melancholy felt on the final days of a pleasant holiday as we near the end of the (purportedly) final lockdown. 

At the other end of the scale, however, fellow citizens have been driven into poverty. That is to say nothing of the chillingly bleak outlook for the global poor (there were 150 million additional cases of child poverty by September 2020, according to Unicef).

Those in already precarious jobs have been hit the hardest by the shutdown of the hospitality and retail industries in the UK, and now face severe financial losses, even with the Treasury temporarily propping up some (though not all) of those affected. 

Research shows that women are overrepresented in this sector. Working class women were unlikely to be working from home during lockdown, and were much more likely to be key workers with a high level of social contact (or, if not working, likely made redundant or furloughed). They were also at a greater risk of experiencing psychological distress. 

Just five per cent of state school teachers said that all their pupils had access to a device suitable for home-schooling. A mere 26 per cent of children from working class households did more than five hours schoolwork per day, compared to over 40 per cent of those from affluent backgrounds. Parents reported that the second lockdown was even more difficult than the first – again, disproportionately so for the poor.

Bangladeshi and Black African Brits were more likely to experience mental health decline and financial hardship during lockdown, living off their savings, while contrastingly others were managing to accumulate more in the bank than they had before. Those classified as ethnic minority group members are more likely to be self-employed and so have had to face additional uncertainties about whether their incomes would even exist at the end of the multiple lockdowns.

The Publishers Association does not tell us who is responsible for the boom in book consumption. But it seems reasonable to imagine, based on the above, that this boom is not spread evenly across society, and that for many in the groups hit hardest by lockdown, ordering Fearne Cotton’s Happy or Joe Wicks’s Wean in 15 to read on the patio while waiting for a virtual meeting, will remain a distant pipe dream.

The BBC can celebrate a boom in book sales and claim it represents a miraculous new love affair with reading, but additional disposable income and recreational time have been disproportionately allocated and those written works are being consumed by a select few.

Attempts to cheerfully celebrate the middle-class silver-linings of lockdown prove the grotesque abomination it has been for many people still has not been truly acknowledged.