Poll of British White Working Class Shows 62% Think Things Have Got Worse Over the Last 10 Years

In response to BBC Two’s White season of programs, Newsnight commissioned a wide-ranging opinion poll to discover the views of the white working class. The poll suggests that 58% of white working class people think that nobody speaks out for people like them in Britain today.

The survey also suggests that:

In most areas covered by the survey the white working classes are more pessimistic about the future and more negative about the last 10 years than white middle class people.

On crime, 71% of the white working classes believe it has got worse over the last 10 years compared with 66% of middle class white people.

On housing, 80% of the white working classes say that people like them can no longer afford to buy homes in the area they live compared with 68% of middle class people.

Overall 62% of the white working classes believe that life in Britain has generally got worse over the last 10 years compared with 51% of middle class white people.

When asked whether they thought immigration into Britain, on the whole, was a good or bad thing for the country the survey suggests that opinion was divided between people from different social groups.

Fifty-two per cent of the white working class people questioned in our survey thought it was a bad thing (42% thought it was a good thing) compared with only 33% of white middle class people who thought it was a bad thing (62% thought it was a good thing).

When asked whether they thought new immigrants had put their jobs at risk the survey suggests that more than twice as many white working class people (27%) compared with middle class (13%) people thought it had.

Populus interviewed a random sample of 1,012 White-British adults aged 18+ by telephone between 29 February and 2 March 2008.

Source: BBC Press Office

Net News Publisher