Covid Britain: Discover the real north-south divide

WE were into week two of headlines about the north-south divide before I suddenly realised they weren’t talking about London.

It turns out the papers were referring to the mounting rancour between the south of England, lounging at home in Ottomanesque opulence throughout the Covid crisis, and the north, where the salt of the earth are being forced to scour the slag heaps for scraps to feed their whippets.

My confusion arose because, within the M25, “north-south divide” automatically evokes the no less stark and often just as rancorous cleft between the two halves of modern London.

In a reversal of the national poles, it is the north that sees itself as the epitome of culture, wealth and sophistication, while south of the Thames is viewed as proletarian, dangerous and – worst insult of all – boring.

How to account for this visceral split in a city divided by a river but also linked by no less than 35 bridges, even if half of them are currently said to be falling down? (Today’s picture is of Checkpoint Charlie at Tower Bridge, looking north).

As a cradle-to-dotage south Londoner, I must declare an interest at the outset. But I will nevertheless try to remain objective in my observations about the manifold imperfections of the north.

The dichotomy is deep and long-standing and goes beyond the scam of estate agents intent on bumping up house prices north of the Thames and luring punters south with the promise of more bang for their buck.

Just Google “north south London divide” and up pop 80 million examples of transpontine misunderstanding and invective.

Those north-bankers who occasionally deign to cross the Thames – most complain it makes their noses bleed – have a tendency to damn with faint praise, like the would-be buyer who confided in an online testimonial that she “never considered south London until I discovered East Dulwich.”

East Dulwich, as any south Londoner will tell you, has always been there and didn’t need some woman from godforsaken Brent or wherever to summon it into existence.

Hand on heart, I can attest that south London is intrinsically friendlier and more welcoming than that other London across the river. Even the most urban bits of it have more grass.

So whence the overweening sense of superiority and entitlement so evident in the north? Most south Londoners would agree with their provincial brethren about the attitudes of London’s insufferable and cosseted elites, while reminding them that such people tend to live in north London’s Hampstead and Islington, not in south London’s Peckham!

Perhaps they believe that living on the same bank as the relatively neutral territory of the City and West End makes them somehow more authentically London.

While we in the south may choose to cross the river for work or a night out, they seem to make it almost a point of pride never to head in the opposite direction.

I’ve known grown men baulk at the idea of a pub meet-up south of the river on the grounds “we’ve heard it isn’t safe”. Even these days, taxi drivers will turn down a fare to the Elephant and Castle on the unlikely grounds they’ve “never ‘eard of it”.

The reality is that the social and economic differences between north and south have probably never been narrower. Yet the old mutual prejudices persist, usually to the detriment of south London.

As a typical estate agent blurb would have it: “With Central London extending further geographically in the north than in the south, those looking for a truly urban environment – particularly young professionals angling for a city lifestyle – will no doubt opt to live in North London, with the more suburban south attracting families and established professionals looking for more tranquil surroundings.”

Where are they thinking of? Truly urban Wood Green? Tranqil, suburban Brixton?

I’ve set myself off now, so I’d better close before I end up alienating my north London friends.

In response to those who claim south London doesn’t really exist, I would just conclude with the words of one south Londoner: “London does indeed end at the river. Everything north of it is The North.”