Ok, it's a problem, so what are you going to do about it?

Ding was on about broken Britain the other day, he was in my neck of the woods too in Gillingham, didn't get to know about it either until too late, then again we're not on speaking terms really, more on him ignoring what I want and me ranting at his cast iron personality problems.

Sky. 

David Cameron has said the teenage boys torture case in South Yorkshire must be considered as part of what was "going wrong" in society.

The Tory leader insisted that such cases could not be treated as individual and unrelated to the wider world.

Speaking at a community centre in Kent, Mr Cameron said: "We have had rising violent crime and I think it's wrong to say that each of these incidents come along and somehow there is no connection to what is going wrong in the rest of our society."

Mr Cameron, who was launching the latest chapter of the Opposition's draft manifesto, acknowledged that the problems went back decades.

He cited the cases of Jamie Bulger, Baby Peter, Damilola Taylor, Garry Newlove and Ben Kinsella, as well as the Edlington torture incident.

He said: "On each occasion, are we just going to say this is an individual case?

"That there aren't any links to what is going wrong in our wider society, in terms of family breakdown, in terms of drug and alcohol abuse, in terms of violent videos, in terms of many of the things that were going wrong in that particular family?

"I think we should ask these questions."

He said the issue had to be addressed responsibly and he was not trying to blame any particular party or government.

"This has been going on for decades," he said.

"But do we have a problem in Britain with violent crime?

"Do we have a problem with some aspects of what's going on in childhood? Do we have a problem with our care system?

"Yes, we do."

He went on to say there had been "incident after incident since 2004" and suggested that not enough had been done quickly enough.

"So, I think it's right to raise it in a responsible way and it's right to have this debate."

 Well he's right to raise the debate, though if he even dares to come out with a typical "Lessons have/will be learned" comment he'd better beware.
I suspect we're all pretty much aware that there's a problem with the underclass that has been created by successive governments in the name of either profit or social engineering. Families rather than being a constant tend to be far more fluid, which isn't to say that there aren't very good single parents out there who bring up their kids to be respectful and honest, because there are. No the problem lies to an extent with the creation of a society where there is nothing for these kids to aim for, education has been both devalued and put out of reach for these kids, there's nothing practical for those whose skills don't lie in academic pursuits, they then discover that many jobs need a degree to even get your foot on the short list so they give up. They also learn that there are few consequences of when they do break the rules, least ways not until they do something extreme as in the cases of  Jamie Bulger, Baby Peter, Damilola Taylor, Garry Newlove, Ben Kinsella and the Edlington's. Then all of a sudden the book is thrown at them and the various pressure groups come out of the woodwork and blame the parents/society/the government etc.
When I grew up, there were youth organisations all over the place, voluntary affairs mostly run by people who cared enough to get involved. These have all gradually withered on the vine, the final straw was the CRB checks needed just to get close to working with kids, though the malaise had set in years ago. Now if there was something for the youths of today to get involved with in the evenings, or even at school that took them out of their general society, taught them a few skills, a bit of self respect and discipline then it might be a start. Not that I'm advocating any Hitler Youth organisation, just that it should be easy to set these things up without the state interfering in every aspect from insurance to paedo checks. Another thing to do that would help would be the removal of no win no fee legislation which again has hamstrung youth groups as well as councils and businesses, yes gross negligence should be legislated for, but trips and spills? You could also start by totally removing state control from education, bring in streaming, same sex schools (because boys learn at differing rates to girls) get men involved at primary level education.

Most of all give our kids a sense of pride, an aim and a focus, teach them honour and respect, right and wrong and give them a future, jobs, security and a belief that a life spent doing nothing is no life at all.
It will take generations, it's likely to be heartbreaking at times, but it's worth doing.