It's around here? OK, cool.
Thank you.
So, why have you come today?
I've come because my granny told me to.
Because I've written a song about Jeremy Corbyn
and my granny thinks it's really good.
Take it away, man.
We are on our way to Labour Live,
the attempt to recapture the mix of music and Corbynmania that sprang up
at Glastonbury last year.
The event had been unfairly mocked in some quarters,
although they did need some help shifting tickets.
Good morning, Mr McCluskey.
Up to no good.
No, not at all, not at all.
Did you pay £35 or are you getting in for nothing?
I paid £35.
You did?
I did.
You're an early bird.
But I'm looking for a rebate.
Do you know why it's exciting?
It's because Labour is the only party
that's giving anybody any hope.
I feel people want to just have one unified opposition ...
People want just to come together and make something like this
to appeal to everyone no matter what their background, no matter what their differences.
Liverpool, it's fair to say, the Labour party's got that sewn up, right?
Yeah.
Why aren't more people voting Labour in other parts of the country?
Because they believe the rightwing media, they believe it when they say,
'They're all the same,
they don't do nothing for me.'
The mainstream media like to sneer.
There's a country out there to change.
Absolutely, quite right.
Get up to Walsall and get stuck in, you know?
Well, quite right, but you're talking to someone who's an activist so I do get stuck in.
Saying the media are out of it, what's next, what have you got to do now?
Well, I think ... to be honest, more of this, more that we can reach out to people
who are young, who maybe wouldn't vote otherwise.
I want us to take a massive selfie. Come together.
Yeah, I know we're together, but even closer.
Can't be overstated really, that this event sits in the middle of a political
atmosphere which is very very weird.
Nothing's solid at this moment in time, in this country.
See I was one of the Windrush that was going to be deported.
Were you?
They said I had no right of residency in this country
and I came here '59 when I was four.
So we don't know what's going to happen one day to the other.
I'm absolutely scared for her future.
She's got a university degree, graduated last summer
and is working in McDonald's.
I can't get a job.
I think Jeremy Corbyn's our only hope ...
of ever saving this country.
So much could be so much better in this country.
I don't want to live in a society that is building luxury houses and flats
to keep them empty that somebody can make a profit out of them.
While there are homeless people sleeping on the streets outside.
Unite to take on inequality and unite to bring on an election,
and unite for a Labour government.
We've been spending time in Walsall,
typical of the kind of town where Corbyn's Labour party seems to be struggling.
But where the austerity and poverty he talks about have hit hard.
Last time we were here, we heard about the Chuckery cafe.
This is it.
Are you all right?
Do you remember us from last time we were here?
I do remember you from last time indeed.
Shocked you've come back.
We are making a film about Walsall.
Why are you laughing?
Because I think Walsall's a lovely place, a really good, multicultural, diverse place.
Are you aware that it's having quite a rough time in various ways?
I've just dropped my wife into Walsall town centre
and you should have seen the amount of shut shops,
the amount of 'to let' signs.
That Walsall is a dead place.
My kids' school has got rid of every single level four teacher
and put brand-new newly qualified teachers in because they're on a cheaper pay level.
That's our future, this is this country's future.
So what are you gonna do?
What can we do? What can we do that is more efficient?
What can we do?
Vote for someone different.
My opinion is, no matter who we vote for, the cutbacks are going to happen.
But Jeremy Corbyn ... whatever you think of him, he's sincere.
Jeremy Corbyn is the kind of prime minister we need
but this government would never let him in tomorrow.
Never.
What, you think they'd fix the system?
Of course.
As people, we've lost all control of our country.
In general we've got no say on anything.
Did you vote in the European referendum?
Yeah, yeah.
Which way did you vote in that?
I think we should have stayed in.
You're a remainer?
And how did you vote?
I am a Brexiteer.
Oh, yeah?
Oh you voted for leave?
Yes.
I would say from talking to you, I thought it'd been the other way round.
But I am asking you about the world of five or 10 years to come
and a lot of people don't even know what's happening next week.
This is the second person we've met in as many weeks who has used this exact phrase,
'Nothing is solid.'
It's a feeling people share in very different places
and on very different parts of the political spectrum
which is probably why 'take back control' proved to be the winning slogan
in the 2016 referendum.
Do you understand why people voted for it two years ago?
I think people are fed up.
And I think they were voting ... it was just a protest vote.
And I think that's why they voted.
I don't think they understood the real issues.
I think it was inadequately explained to people.
They're killing our country.
We're killing our country.
I can't ... I am going to cry.
I can't believe what we're doing to our country, it's getting more racist,
the economy's nosediving,
people seem absolutely blind.
We've got to march, it's all we can do.
Will I come to your house and stick stickers all over your door and your window?
This is the storming of the Winter Palace moment.
Why aren't you breaking in and smashing things up?
Someone's got to pay to have all of that cleaned off.
If I come and stick it all over your house, how would you like that?
So, don't do it again, yeah?
It's a very big march this and, unlike previous anti-Brexit demonstrations,
this one has a very clear point.
We demand a people's vote.
They want another referendum.
There's another sort of activist movement now on the block.
The Corbynites are not the only ones.
You would probably rightly say that a lot of people here would go:
'Fuck the people in Walsall who want Brexit.'
And the people in Walsall: 'Fuck the people of London who don't want Brexit.'
And those two positions, the only solution is leadership that understands
the damage that has been done.
And we're not getting that?
We're nowhere near that.
When political parties are fighting between themselves and having inter-party fighting,
we're not being represented.
Who are you gonna vote for in the next election
whenever there is one?
If Labour does what they should do and become a proper opposition,
then yes of course, I'll vote for Labour.
Otherwise, I don't know, I feel lost.
I want to give you a hug.
I'd love a hug.
It's time we took this back to the streets, and the lanes, the towns and the villages.
The meadows and the squares of this country.
It is time for you to decide!
With national politics increasingly dominated by Brexit,
and internal party battles, problems in towns like Walsall
are only getting worse.
Good morning, a Wolverhampton head teacher says he's exasperated … Budget shortages
have led to the cutting of 14 staff in a school with 300 holes in the roof.
Local people have mentioned schools cuts so we've come to meet a Walsall head teacher
trying to make some noise of her own.
Millfield primary serves a disadvantaged part of Walsall
with a creative imaginative model of education.
Well done. That's lots today.
[She] went straight from dancing into a meeting.
We are heading for a £200,000 deficit year after next.
So we need to cut.
So no speech and language.
I think we are probably looking at things like the minibus, the outdoor outer side of things
which is what we're all about.
I can't bear to get rid of it.
Children that come into nursery
sometimes have very poor speech.
We purchased speech and language provision
and it's had amazing results but we can't afford to do that next year.
It's 10,000 so we just have to suck it.
That's heartbreaking.
It's absolutely heartbreaking.
Well, I've only been here 50 minutes and to be honest I find it quite upsetting.
We've got a teacher that works with us that deals with outdoor education as well.
I mean, if she had to go the whole nature of what we do would change.
It's here that the essential tragedy of England in 2018 really hits home.
This is the kind of deprived place some people call Brexitland.
Here's a school doing it's utmost to change children's life chances
and it's being cut to the point that it can only offer the education basics.
You've seen the big sign they put up?
Yes, I can see that.
How do you feel about it?
It's going to affect the children, you know what I mean?
Tell me more.
Like in the immediate future ... to the area what might happen ...
So, to the area, it's gonna go downhill even more than what it is now.
The kids are gonna get even more rattled than what they are already
once we got around here.
You know what I mean, they're just going down and down
there's nothing for them these days.
They keep putting them down.
What keeps you getting out of bed every morning?
My kids.
That's what keep you going is the kids otherwise you wouldn't bother.
Half of them round here are already topping themselves
or jumping off the flats up the top.
Yeah, it's a nightmare around here, well people are struggling and when like
The benefit cap?
Yeah, well it caused me and my partner to split up.
I was falling behind with bills, I was lending off everybody,
I got myself into big-time debt.
You've had a rough time.
Yeah.
I have but I just have to cope with it …
I was going to ask you, there's a certain sort of person
that no matter how good or bad things are, they'll tell always you it's crap, right?
I wouldn't. If I'd have come round here 10 or 15 years ago
and said to you how is Brownhills doing?
It was buzzing. It was brilliant. Yeah, we had the market, we had more shops.
People was a bit more get together, help out more ...
When did it change?
When the market left.
When was that?
About 10 years ago.
When the recession happened?
Yeah, about 10 years ago, yeah.
Completely changed like, so everyone struggles now
It's a big fix to be fair.
We're all screwed, aren't we?
There's quite a few of us that felt the same way, you know what I mean?
Looking ahead, do you think someone might come to the rescue?
Not for this school individually but this is a national problem.
I am hoping so.
Hope so, yeah.
Anyone spring to mind?
No.
How would you describe Boston?
Sometimes I feel it's a good city,
sometimes I think it's worst place in the world, I don't know.
I'm pleased I'm not young.
It just seems nothing's fair about anything.
God, what hope if we're all fighting each other,
and aren't the people pulling the strings?
You cannot fight if you don't have ammunition.
Now it's about how bad you want it, do you know what I mean?