Launch of the Environmental Project at St Matthew's Possilpark

In his book The Good Society Kenneth Galbraith, the Harvard economist, writes these words: There is the inescapable fact that the modern market economy accords wealth and distributes income in a highly unequal, socially adverse and also functionally damaging fashion. Galbraith knows better than most how good the market economy is at generating wealth, but he is concerned at the way those who benefit from the system refuse to address the damaging effects it has on the most vulnerable members of society. Most unprejudiced thinkers today would acknowledge the failures as well as the successes of the global market economy. At the meeting of the Anglican Consultative Council in Dundee this week we have listened to harrowing descriptions of the effect of the global economy on the poor of the Third World; but we also have to acknowledge that the Third World is with us in the midst of the developed world. Few people today argue for the complete abolition of the capitalist system. Increasingly, however, they are calling for a candid acknowledgement of its failures. 'We created the thing,' they say, 'so why can't we learn to modify or correct it?' And we have started to do this in certain areas. We have learnt about the cost to the planet of unregulated industrial activity, so we no longer tolerate businesses that pollute our rivers and destroy the quality of the air we breathe. So far, however, we are uncertain about how to respond to the effects of the global market economy on the human environment. We could make a start by acknowledging that the system that has made most people in this country more prosperous has plunged a significant proportion of our fellow citizens into poverty and despair.

One of the undisputed facts of the history of human industry is that change in the methods of production always has a disproportionate impact upon the most vulnerable in society. History, like nature, seems to be indifferent to the pain it causes the weak. Think of the way the industrial revolution chewed up and spat out generations of the poor, before we learned how to protect them from its worst depredations. The paradox of our time is that it is the death of heavy industry that is now devastating the poor. In a recent essay, Professor David Donnison claimed that in Scotland we are in the midst of a massive social disaster, and Glasgow is its epicentre. He writes: 'Nearly three fifths - 58% - of the most deprived postcode districts of Scotland are in this city. 37% of Glasgow's households with children in them have no-one in a paid job, and 27% have only one adult.' Poverty is heavily concentrated in and around Glasgow, but other cities have their share, including prosperous Edinburgh. Much of this is the consequence of global economic changes, coupled with the closure of pits and defence industries. Heavy industry has been replaced by the knowledge economy, and we are only now trying to catch up with its consequential impact upon the poor and ill-educated. And, as if that were not enough, social change has combined with the economic revolution to destroy the cultural cohesion of the most vulnerable sections of our society. When the culture revolution of the 1960s met and married the economic revolution of the 1980s, there was created a potent instrument of social change that has transformed the social landscape of Britain, and its most devastating impact has been upon young, ill-educated workless males. The institutions that once gave them a motive for responsible living, such as holding down a tough, demanding job with its own culture and honour, and presiding, however clumsily, within a marriage and family that was the primary context for the nurture and socialising of children, have largely disappeared, and with them the main ways the human community traditionally disciplined and integrated what the Prayer Book calls 'the unruly wills and affections of sinful men'. This shattering of the structures that once gave the poor significance and purpose has created a breeding ground for despair and alienation. Whenever I refer to these facts in certain circles someone inevitably points out that no-one in Britain is starving today, because absolute poverty has been eradicated. That may be true, but minority poverty has a cruelty that is all its own. When most people were poor, as they were when I was born here in 1933, there was a camaraderie and cultural cohesion in belonging to the working class that gave them a strength and pride that transcended the structures that excluded them. But in a society where most people are prosperous, and the poor are a minority whose culture has disintegrated, the pain and anger they feel is heightened.

It is the mark of a humane society to acknowledge this pain and try to tackle the factors that produce it. Because the British Government has acknowledged that the endurance of poverty in a prosperous society is a scandal, we are currently embarked upon an ambitious programme to tackle the human tragedy created by the revolutions of our time. We have acknowledged that the system that benefits most of us has had the unintended effect of excluding many of our fellow citizens, so that we are working to correct that tragic imbalance by policies and projects designed to counteract the effects upon the poor of the revolutions of our time. We know that they lead shorter and less satisfying lives than the rest of us; that their health is worse, yet they are less well served by the health service; that many of them go through the education system with little benefit, so they are heavily handicapped in their attempts to find work; and we know that they are more prone to those devastating addictions that are such a feature of our complex society. All of these characteristics are found here in Possilpark, which has been rated by the Government as the most deprived community in Scotland. The project we have opened today is a good example of the way we are beginning to tackle poverty in our society. St Matthew's has secured money from the Glasgow City of Architecture and Design initiative, which has been supported by the European Regional Development Fund. The project has also been sponsored by the Scottish Arts Council. All of these initiatives are helping the regeneration of this Priority Partnership Area. The way back to justice, the way back to the good life for all our people, has to begin by giving them hope. That is why I am delighted that we have created this place of beauty in the heart of Possilpark. The tree I planted is a sign of hope, but it must be more than that: it must be a sign of our determination to work for a more just and equal society.

When the Irish poet W B Yeats was an old man he feared that the gift of poverty had left him. He had once thought that his poems came to him from outside himself. Then he realised that they had come from his own heart, so he must go back there and start climbing out of despair. The poem he wrote to express this insight ends like this:

        Now that my ladder's gone
I must lie down where all the ladders start
In the foul rag and bone shop of the heart.

We are doing something like that today; we are building something from the human heart, 'where all the ladders start'.