When is a job not a proper job? And can you get by in politics without having done one?

Apparently not, if my previous experience of writing online is anything to go by. Whatever I wrote, be it an argument for universal childcare or a fairer funding system for older people’s care, the most frequent comment was that my opinion was irrelevant since I had never done a proper job.

On the face of it, the commenters had a point. I have never stacked shelves at Tescos, or dealt with angry customers in a call centre. I have never been a street cleaner or driven a bus. I cannot claim to have come from a family of miners or dockers. My career path, if it can be given a linear route at all, has been predominantly academic and political. Put the words Cambridge, think tank and Progress on any CV and it will scream privileged, middle-class Blairite. I am the walking, talking stereotype of a NuLab politician and I worry about it. (more…)