I say- do you have a spare hoodie I could borrow?

If you don’t get the reference , you probably didn’t grow up in the late 70s, but here’s White Riot by the Clash in case you thought what we’ve seen over the past three nights is anything new.

Riots in Britain happen in the summer; they are organised by older kids , involve young kids are condemned by politicians (“sheer criminality” repeats Teresa May) and generate reports to keep the House of Lords in rations for years to come. Every generation wants a riot of their own.

Any particular differences about this lot. Well the kids are better organised thanks to dastardly social media (I like the police references to uncorroborated reports on twitter – what do they want –  three copies in writing?). The police seem to have decided that they are subject to “health and safety” and can’t involve themselves in direct intervention. No doubt we are going to spend most of the rest of August watching CCTV footage and grassing up our children. Otherwise it’s business as usual.

• Politicians away on holiday
• “Told you so” ‘s from the Daily Mail
• Copies of the “Big Society” hidden at the back of the cupboard
• Reports that damage ” could run into millions” when it’s clearly caused hundreds of millions in direct losses – (not to mention the impact on 2012 tourism)

Nick Clegg‘s prescience last summer seemed alarmist at the time. The plot’s the same – slow economic growth leads to worsening lifestyles leads to  protests – testing the police – opportunistic looting. It’s no different from what happened in the early 1980s. Weirdly in 1985 I had just moved to London and was living off Railton Road in Brixton. I wasn’t involved but my street was full of the parents of those who were and the frustrations they had then are the same that we have now.

It seems that every so often the volcano of youth unrest blows, now is such a time. The best we can do is to make sure order is maintained. That means some proper parenting to keep the youngsters off the street and some effective prevention either from the police or the army.

Concurrently  there’s a global crisis kicking off over sovereign debt. David Cameron and George Osborne need to make that their prime responsibility this week – what we’re seeing on the streets is small beer by comparison with what we’ll get if we dont sort that economic mess out.

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