City has been betrayed by these makers of disaster

Aug 3 2007 by David Charters, Liverpool Daily Post

PEOPLE on the streets felt betrayed yesterday; ordinary people, proud to call themselves Liverpudlians, who have always had faith in this city.

They had entrusted their faith to others, expecting these men and women to serve them well because they, too, surely shared the same beliefs and the same hopes.

In common language, betrayal is the sense felt when you have been let down by people in whom you have placed your trust.

The news that “they” had cancelled the Mathew Street Festival finally fired the doubts which had been suppressed for a very long time.

And there was anger among mothers and fathers, who buried their ancestors here and are watching their sons and daughters mature into the Liverpudlians of tomorrow.

For “they” had damaged our most precious asset, the legacy of the Beatles.

Of course, many good and true Liverpudlians resent the way the Beatles have dominated the culture of a city, which has given the world scientists, healers, prime ministers, musicians, engineers, dramatists, poets, sculptors, explorers, painters, sailors, actors, theologians, comedians, philanthropists, philosophers, architects, industrialists and brave soldiers.

But these loyal citizens know in their hearts that the global popularity of the Beatles is crucial to the regeneration of Liverpool. Some romantics have called it a renaissance.

They weren’t calling it that in the pubs last night. Liverpudlians have vituperative words for the makers of disaster.

Five years have gone since the city was designated the 2008 European Capital of Culture. “That’s a lucky break,” we thought then. It comes immediately after the 800th anniversary of King John granting the port a Royal Charter. That means we will have two years of celebrations, festivals and cultural events – a double opportunity to show the world why we are such a great city.

Yet doubts soon rose. Decent, loyal, highly-educated Liverpudlians, whose souls belong here among the stories, the songs, the books and the paintings, thought they were being ignored.

It was them and us again. Strangers were in charge – men and women on fancy salaries, carrying their job titles around on the lapels of expensive suits, as they glided from meeting to meeting, drinking coffee, eating biscuits, planning strategies and patronising local people. What have they really done?

Well, they have lost the Mathew Street Festival for one thing.

Perhaps they just don’t understand how harmful that is to Liverpool’s image, here and abroad. Maybe they have never felt the emotion known to millions of us each time we hear George Harrison sing Here Comes the Sun, his song of summer hope and optimism.

They can point at the new skyscrapers and the shops being built and say they are part of the cultural regeneration. Certainly they will help restore some prosperity to certain parts of the city. But in international terms they are nothing compared to Mathew Street.

Every city has skyscrapers and shops. Only Liverpool has the Beatles.

So many of us, seasoned in local culture, could have helped and advised those in charge, if we had been asked. But we have been ignored, dismissed as people who don’t “sing from the same hymn sheet” as them, or are “not on message”.

But our hearts are in the right place. Historians, musicians, painters, sculptors, community workers, radio presenters, and writers are among those who cannot understand why they have not been involved more in Liverpool’s cultural preparations. We have wanted to shout at them, “Some of us have a bit of culture, you know, a little talent, as well as you. Come and listen to us!”

Now, I fear, it is too late. Spectacular incompetence has combined with a profound insensitivity to the needs and desires of the people in this grand old city.

On August 28 we are 800 and they have ruined the party. This has exposed a raw nerve.

Liverpool is famed for its black humour but this is a joke too dark for laughter.

Even so, we will survive.