2.I was referring to Helen's comment about "real work", not to experience in general and certainly not to trade union experience, which can often be an education in itself and the unions have encouraged members and especially union representatives to continue their education.
3. Let's look at the guy mainly responsible for the NHS, Bevan - it supports my argument :
[He] became a trade union activist: he was head of his local Miners' Lodge at only 19. Bevan became a well-known local orator ... In 1919, he won a scholarship to the Central Labour College in London, sponsored by the South Wales Miners' Federation. At the college he gained his life-long respect for Karl Marx. ... Upon returning home in 1921 - [he was mainly out of work until] In 1926, he found work again, this time as a paid union official... ... In 1928, Bevan won a seat on Monmouthshire County Council. With that success he was picked as the Labour Party candidate for Ebbw Vale ... The new Prime Minister, Clement Attlee, appointed Aneurin Bevan as Minister of Health, with a remit that also covered Housing. Thus, the responsibility for instituting a new and comprehensive National Health Service, as well as tackling the country's severe post-war housing shortage, fell to the youngest member of Attlee's Cabinet in his first ministerial position. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aneurin_Bevan
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aneurin_Bevan
How about the PM - Atlee - "In 2004, he was voted as the greatest British prime minister of the 20th century in a poll of professors organised by MORI."
He was educated at Northaw School, Haileybury and University College, Oxford, where he graduated with a Second Class Honours BA in Modern History in 1904. Attlee then trained as a lawyer, and was called to the Bar in 1906. [A bit like Tony's background. Of course general experience can be very important too:] From 1906 to 1909, Attlee worked as manager of Haileybury House, a club for working class boys in Limehouse in the East End of London run by his old school. Prior to this, Attlee's political views had been conservative. However, he was shocked by the poverty and deprivation he saw while working with slum children, and this caused him to convert to socialism. ... Attlee became a lecturer at the London School of Economics in 1912, but promptly applied for a Commission in August 1914 for World War I. [And the latter would have been quite an education - nothing like ordinary "real work".] After the war, he returned to teaching at the London School of Economics until 1923. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clement_Attlee
[A bit like Tony's background.
Of course general experience can be very important too:]
From 1906 to 1909, Attlee worked as manager of Haileybury House, a club for working class boys in Limehouse in the East End of London run by his old school. Prior to this, Attlee's political views had been conservative. However, he was shocked by the poverty and deprivation he saw while working with slum children, and this caused him to convert to socialism. ... Attlee became a lecturer at the London School of Economics in 1912, but promptly applied for a Commission in August 1914 for World War I.
[And the latter would have been quite an education - nothing like ordinary "real work".]
After the war, he returned to teaching at the London School of Economics until 1923.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clement_Attlee
Bevan was famously driven by his ferocious sympathy for people who did 'real work.'
Do you think that sympathy originated at the Central Labour College, or during his time as a trade unionist?
Likewise with Attlee, whose views were conservative in spite of his impressively broad academic education, and were only changed when he worked with and for people who did 'real work.'
In fact "real work" - cf TBG: "a white collar working class who do crappy menial office jobs - working in call centres, accounts, basic IT maintenance, salesandmarketing, training." - is likely to give you a competence in a few routine skills and very little general understanding of the world, while a GOOD academic education can quickly expand horizons and understanding enormously.
Clearly I was talking about much of "real work" today and its routine narrowness. Nor was I saying that education is the only thing that counts. In my reply to you I said that general experience is important and I noted that the experience Atlee had in the East End was very important.
Having "sympathy" is one thing, understanding what to do about it and how to operate in complex political situations at a national and international level is another. Clearly Bevan went beyond being sympathetic to workers, as no doubt most workers were, to get a broader education which included the study of Marx, which he thought very important. Obviously unions thought it was not enough for their representatives to have their hearts in the right place, which is why they sponsored the education of people like Bevan. Maybe it's because I'm a Londoner - that I moved to Nice.
