The Summertown Walls and how These Reflect Class Divide in the UK

By Margot Ward, written when living in Oxford

The social structure of the UK has historically been governed by social class and status and the

divides between upper and lower classes continue to affect British society today. Whilst the

hierarchical class system has been revised since the industrial revolution (18th century), many of the

ruling factors which divided classes have now simply been replaced by others. For example, less

importance is placed on hereditary transmission of occupation but factors such as education now

play a more important role in dividing the population. This is not to say that family status and

political influence do not still have a large impact on an individual’s social position.

Despite The UK being a wealthy and generally forward-thinking country, the rates of poverty are still

alarmingly high. More than 1 in 5 of the UK’s population today live in poverty, 4.3 million of these

Brits being children. Poverty directly affects an individual’s opportunities as it deprives them of

certain facilities which are essential for potentially helping them out of poverty. Aswell as a

statistical divide between UK citizens there is also a large social divide. The notion of the

‘underserving poor’ came about in the 1950s/60s and is still used today. This concept describes

those who are believed to have bad moral characters (eg: laziness), which are the main cause of

their poverty and therefore they do not deserve or should not receive help. This is an extremely

dangerous notion as it upholds untrue stereotypes about those living in poverty and maintains class

divides in the UK, whilst those in need continue to be deprived of the help they need.

An example of this ingrained concept is the Cutteslowe walls in Summertown. These walls were built in 1934 and created a physical divide between the City Council’s Cutteslowe estate and the private housing developed by Urban Housing company. The walls were two meters tall and topped with lethal spikes, making them not only a physical but also threatening symbol of this class divide. Clive Saxton of the Urban Housing company was afraid that his more expensive/private housing would not sell if they neighboured the “slum*1 dwellers”. The walls meant those living in the Cutteslowe council estate would no longer have access to the same shops and facilities as those in the private estate or even be able to walk through the wealthier neighbourhood. This purposeful separation of the richer and poorer residence and Saxton’s reference to the poorer estate as a “slum” demonstrates the negative attitude adopted in regard to poverty. For many years the walls were a subject of conflict between Oxford city council (who wanted to bring the walls down) and the Urban housing developers. The walls even withstood World War two, despite the many attempts to have them removed for safety reasons. In 1938 the city council (against legal advice) demolished the walls with a steam roller but were forced to rebuild them after being sued by the Urban Housing company. This inflexibility on the part of Urban Housing company reflects the rigidness of social and class divides in the UK today. For example, according to a 2010 report by the Organisation of Economic Cooperation and Development Britain is among one of the worst countries for social mobility*2, showing us that 70 years later not many improvements surrounding social mobility and class divides have been made. The walls were finally taken down 25 years later (1959) after the city council purchased the land they stood on. Whilst these walls no longer physically exist the poverty levels in the UK today suggest the divides the walls represented are still present in British society.

The Cutteslowe walls are just one example of purposeful divides created to maintain social divide in the UK. Unfortunately, these divides are still maintained through the lack of support many children

in poverty receive, making it extremely difficult for them to move away from this poverty. As 30% of

children in the UK today live in poverty this stresses the importance of providing equal and

necessary support to these individuals to make sure quality of life can improve for future

generations.

*1 a dirty and overcrowded urban street or district inhabited by very poor people.

*2 refers to the shift in an individual's social status from one status to another. The shift can either

be higher, lower