his is an odd, personal and polemical book about a big national subject. Stuart Maconie, the writer and broadcaster perhaps best known for his radio work, argues the case for the welfare state and public ownership. To do this he pits himself against those people who like to deride any kind of resistance to the free market as the unwanted intervention of the “nanny state”. People, he notes, who tend to have been brought up by “nannies”. It’s certainly a timely subject, given the increasingly polarised debate on the failings of privatisation, but it’s both too ambitious in scope – looking at health, education, housing, transport, the benefits system and even public libraries and parks – and too limited in perspective: namely Maconie’s own, and that of his well-known friends. Sign up for Bookmarks: discover new books in our weekly email Read more His teen years were in the 1970s and his basic thesis is that that period was “the last Golden Age for the benevolent state and the British working people”. It’s an era, he says, that has been traduced by populist historians (all flared trousers and football hooligans) and unfairly remembered for inflation, strikes and power cuts. In fact, he writes, much of this time was “bloody great”, and he cites his favourite films, music and literature from the 70s. It sets the scene for a rather nostalgic and sentimental approach to large fiscal, economic and social issues. In this rendering the halcyon days of prog and punk rock, of shining new towns and handsome municipal parks, were brought to a rude end by Margaret Thatcher. Everything went wrong after that. The NHS collapsed, privatisation wrecked the social landscape, and the reform of the benefits system meant no more working-class kids in popular music. What’s taken place since the advent of Thatcherism is a lot more complex than this book allows “Where have all the Erics, Joes, Bills, Georges and Brians gone that formed the rock elite of the 60s and 70s?” Maconie asks, sounding very much like a man in his late 50s. Perhaps into other forms of music that seem more relevant to them. He complains about the advent of Hugos and Orlandos in indie rock, but fails to mention the Stormzys, Skeptas or Professor Greens of grime and rap. Advertisement In any case, what’s taken place since the advent of Thatcherism is a lot more complex than this book allows. Take the NHS. In the glory days of the 1970s, when hospitals were apparently wonderful (and life expectancy was about 73 years), spending on the NHS was between 3% and 4% of GDP. Nowadays (with life expectancy at 81 years) it’s almost 8%. Could the NHS be better? Very definitely, but not by clinging to a romanticised past, which is where Maconie fixes his rose-tinted glasses. In the closing chapter of the book he visits Norway, which he holds up as an alternative to the British model. He fails to note that healthcare is not free in Norway. Imagine the uproar if a British politician suggested paying for GP visits, as they do in dreamy Norway. Right at the close, Maconie touches on a subject that I suspect was lurking all along beneath his invective: the growing social and political emphasis on individuality and identity. He has a point, in particular when he writes that, for all the ideological talk of self-empowerment, “the state is there for you when you do not feel proud or sexy or empowered”. However, this sometimes charming but ultimately scattershot book is less a critique of the cult of the individual that has flourished in recent decades than a well-meaning example of it. • The Nanny State Made Me: A Story of Britain and How to Save It by Stuart Maconie is published by Ebury (£20). To order a copy go to guardianbookshop.com. Free UK p&p over £15