The Growing ‘Wealth-Poverty Gap’: The Way Affluence and Deprivation Now Sit Side by Side in England.
In Nunsthorpe, residents live in homes only a few metres from their wealthier counterparts in the adjacent Scartho. A 1.8-metre-high wall physically divides the two communities in Grimsby, Lincolnshire, blocking off paths and streets that once connected them.
“This is the divide between rich and poor,” said a resident, aged 37. “It has been there since I’ve known. I doubt they’ll bring it down because I suspect they’ll want to mix with us.”
A Stark National Picture
Analysis of official figures reveals how deep inequality often exists, sometimes across little more than a short distance of asphalt, a line of hedges or a wall. Decades of austerity and underinvestment mean a majority of councils now contain a locality ranking as one of the poorest in the country.
The geographical widening of deprivation has coincided with a significant rise in the quantity of locations where deprived and affluent residents end up as immediate neighbours. In 2019, only 65 of the poorest areas adjoined one of the wealthiest. That figure rose to 119 in the most recent data.
A Wall That Does More Than Separate Space
In Grimsby, the divide is the most pronounced in the country and starkly obvious. The barrier transcends being just a symbolic division; it causes tangible difficulties for daily routines.
- The school commute that ought to take a quarter of an hour become an sixty-minute detour.
- Reaching important services like grocery stores, educational facilities and employment centres is hindered.
- The area often sees antisocial behaviour, with instances of rubbish being thrown over the wall and other problems.
“People strive to have a nice house and nice garden, and then you live opposite that,” noted one local, motioning at the rusted metal wall.
Local Bonds Against a Backdrop of Hardship
Within a local community centre, workers stress that support transcends postcodes. “Your postcode doesn’t necessarily indicate your level of challenge,” explained chief executive Tracey Good.
Regardless of being placed in the lowest 10% for income, employment, education, health and crime, Nunsthorpe boasts a strong sense and sense of togetherness among its residents. By contrast, Scartho ranks among the least deprived 10% nationally.
A Similar Story: An Estate in Kent
This pattern is repeated across the country. The Stanhope area in Kent, a 1960s housing development, is in the most disadvantaged tenth of neighbourhoods in England. It is immediately adjacent by spacious houses built in the 2000s that sit in the top 10% for employment and living environment.
“They might have bigger houses, but here there’s a stronger community,” said a long-term resident, aged 63. “You’ll probably find a lot of people over there don’t even speak to each other.”
The financial gap is clear: an average family home costs about £275,000 on the estate, while across the divide equivalent homes fetch about £410,000.
Locals describe a palpable sense of neglect. “Our neighbourhood is neglected,” said holistic health worker Susan. “In this area our amenities have slowly been taken away, and the majority of the community problems here are related to financial hardship.”
The increase in these ‘deprivation divides’ presents a portrait of an ever more segregated England, where wealth and deprivation are frequently uncomfortably close neighbours.