- 19/06/2025
Documentary, The Victorian Slum S01E05 The 1900s
The Victorian Slum
The Victorian Slum refers to a historical reenactment series produced by Wall to Wall Media for the BBC, which recreates the living conditions of the Victorian East End of London. The series, which first aired in 2016, involves a group of 21st-century participants who move into a recreated Victorian slum, experiencing life as the poorest Victorians did during the 1860s to 1900s.
The show aims to provide insight into the harsh realities of poverty during that era, including overcrowded living conditions, lack of sanitation, and the challenges of survival through traditional trades.
The series has also been released on DVD and is available on platforms like Amazon.co.uk.
Additionally, the concept of the Victorian Slum is closely related to the series "Victorian Slum House," which features participants living in a recreated 19th-century slum for three weeks.
The show has been praised for its immersive approach to history, though some viewers noted minor anachronisms, such as the use of false eyelashes and lipstick, which were not typical of the period.
The Victorian Slum
The Victorian Slum refers to a historical reenactment series produced by Wall to Wall Media for the BBC, which recreates the living conditions of the Victorian East End of London. The series, which first aired in 2016, involves a group of 21st-century participants who move into a recreated Victorian slum, experiencing life as the poorest Victorians did during the 1860s to 1900s.
The show aims to provide insight into the harsh realities of poverty during that era, including overcrowded living conditions, lack of sanitation, and the challenges of survival through traditional trades.
The series has also been released on DVD and is available on platforms like Amazon.co.uk.
Additionally, the concept of the Victorian Slum is closely related to the series "Victorian Slum House," which features participants living in a recreated 19th-century slum for three weeks.
The show has been praised for its immersive approach to history, though some viewers noted minor anachronisms, such as the use of false eyelashes and lipstick, which were not typical of the period.
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LearningTranscript
00:00150 years ago Victorian Britain became the world's first industrial superpower and as the country
00:10thrived London the beating heart of empire became the world's richest city but this was a city
00:19divided for the first time geographical lines were drawn between those enjoying the nation's
00:25wealth in the West and those who weren't in the East this is the story of one poor community living
00:37in London's East End in the heart of modern Stratford a Victorian slum has been recreated
00:46and a group of 21st century people are moving in oh absolutely awful I'm just a bit dumbstruck to
01:00survive they'll have to work to keep a roof over their heads it's absolutely shattering
01:06and put food on the table I'm starving so it's making me a bit emotional to be honest
01:14and they'll learn firsthand what life was like you will call me mom for those at the bottom of the
01:21economic pile they were disabled they couldn't do it they didn't eat they didn't eat they died
01:25they'll live through five decades of turbulent history look at the newspaper and seismic social
01:34change I am proud to be an East End suffragette part of the people this is the story of how a
01:42quarter of a million slum dwellers in the East End changed our attitude to poverty forever this is the
01:52slum last time the house went up in the world wow oh fantastic really good this is more my environment
02:10but not everyone was so lucky my fears would be to lose the room it's not the most fantastic place but
02:19it's home poverty became a national issue one of the fundamental problems was low wages that even
02:26if people were working 70 hours a week they were working for a pittance and steps were taken how many
02:33beds are in here oh this is awful shut me down but for the residents this progress is threatening their
02:43way of life and some improvements had a downside so basically you've been painting all day to make
02:50him money not an extra 10 percent how child child just burning at us this 1900 and the residents are
03:03waking up to their last decade in the slum at the dawn of the 20th century we started for the 1860s working
03:11in the rag trade then we become a sweater actually getting immigrants to work for us it's like their
03:17own little shop and we're doing bespoke work the start of the 1900s it's a very exciting time but not
03:24all have seen such progress our position in the slum now has not changed one iota we still live on the
03:31top floor we're still the poorest they have lived through four turbulent decades including the longest
03:40oppression in modern times things however are about to change the queen's death though always a
03:49contingency comes as a shock the monarchy goes on yet all the same we appear to have lost in Victoria
03:56not only a personage but almost an institution the century seemed to belong to her the loss of Queen
04:03Victoria must have felt like the loss of all that she had built up in a sense and it must have been
04:10very difficult to imagine Britain being Britain without her the British Empire had lost its Empress it was
04:17the end of one era the beginning of another our residents are no longer Victorian they are now Edwardian
04:23Britain it's a very different portrait isn't it it says Queen Victoria's portrait was very austere and
04:31simple and this is very regal it looks like he's sort of showing off to the other nations of Europe
04:36well he was a playboy Prince wasn't he with the death of Queen Victoria in 1901 Edward the seventh
04:43inherited a nation amazed by scientific advances that promised dramatic improvements but Edwardian Britain
04:52was a nation divided a super rich 10 percent owned 90 percent of the nation's wealth in London alone
04:59around 30 percent were living in poverty across the nation millions were going hungry but a growth in
05:07trade union membership meant radical reform was in the air and this belief in people power even affected
05:14how people shopped meaning big changes for the birds oh look it's a cooperative store that's neat good
05:21it looks like it's well stocked doesn't it yes cabbage and watercress milk excellent oh we've even got opening
05:29hours but Tuesday nine to one that's a short day huh closed all day Sunday right let's see what we've got
05:36here oh my lord look at this it doesn't look much like a slum shop anymore does it no it not at all
05:45actually the cooperative society was the brainchild of Robert Owen a successful cotton trader who believed
05:52that business should give back to the community his ideas were picked up by a group of Rochdale weavers
05:59they started the first successful cooperative store by pooling their capital to sell high quality cheap
06:06produce to fellow workers who were no longer customers but became cooperative members sweets
06:13ah streets kids are gonna love that the co-op was a huge success in the north but in London with its
06:23transient population and greater competition it was harder to gain a foothold in the east end though
06:29the co-op did thrive with branches offering low joining fees and food sold in smaller quantities
06:36for the very poorest good morning the biggest change is probably the term the people themselves
06:43will have to pay a pound they're not allowed to just kind of march in and they will get a share of
06:52the profits you're going to be selling things cheaper no more cooking no more enterprise like that
06:58you're not going to be offering any tick nothing on the slate so everybody actually has to pay up front
07:04now I felt a lot of pressure in the 1860s and 1870s to provide that credit and be the financial base of
07:11the community and the power to make these life and death decisions of who gets credit and who doesn't
07:16is very difficult particularly as you're getting to know everyone I'm glad that we don't have to do that
07:22any longer the cooperative movement is really taking off across the country and indeed you're joining that
07:27merry throng of people and this scheme did make a difference it was estimated that the combination of
07:34dividends and lower prices that membership of the co-op provided was equivalent to a 10 to 15 percent
07:41wage rise while the birds familiarize themselves with their co-op store next door Russell has received a
07:49new order the 20th century brought in a tighter more tailored cut that is hard to pull off for
07:55Russell when he has to rely on Edwardian tools nothing it looks great you've had limited time to do it
08:04always do better always pushing to make stuff better better than it that they was done last time in the
08:1121st century Mandy is a working woman but the definition of success in 1901 is for women not to work
08:19she must stand by while it is not her but her husband who earns the money the wife would have
08:25been extremely grateful for what her husband would have done for her and her family I can only imagine
08:32how wonderful that must have felt she never likes relying on me do you ever not relying on me ever it
08:40kills me that I haven't got my own money I can't go out and earn my own money just really really frustrating
08:48and you know it Russell you know me sitting here playing the dutiful wife is not my thing
08:54all right to make sure his order is good enough to send out Russell calls in Andy the slums rent
09:03collector so he can check over the new suit on a real human being I feel very dapper to be honest yeah
09:12let's square the back neck a little bit on it but working men yeah in the 1800s will be more hunched
09:18over because they because they're always like sort of manual manual working and and stuff it'll
09:23have been more round back to okay where's the modern day man and most upright I mean to have a jacket put
09:29on that you know is fitted like this it actually makes you want to stand rather than slouch yeah it's
09:35better now it's actually something but someone's in it but it always does look better when someone's in it
09:38dummies never do stuff justice yeah she can't make her own money but Mandy still has plenty to spend
09:53in the bird shop marvelous so we need we need quite a bit actually okay we don't really have very much
09:59well if you join the cooperative every pound you spend in here yep well meaning you get a token for a
10:05percentage of that and every quarter you get interest on it and all the other things that
10:10the cooperative societies offered banks funerals days out in the countryside for the kids okay
10:17marvelous I have to put it in his name okay okay because you know we were not that equal yet it's not
10:25mr.mrs. it'll have to be mr. Harris what can I get you man can you just not put my name somewhere even if
10:30it's on the inside on the back on a bit of paper no he's the master of the house I'll get over it
10:38okay the house like many artisans would certainly have had enough for food and rent by the 1900s
10:46enjoy you later see you bye bye take care don't forget tell all your friends and colleagues about
10:52the cooperative movement we will do thank you their rise to relative wealth in the slum mirrors that of
10:58Mandy's ancestors who also thrived as East End tailors but the house prosperity does not extend to
11:07everyone the potters like many in the 1900s are living hand-to-mouth in a world without pensions
11:15unemployment or sickness cover despite turning their hand to a variety of jobs both on the streets
11:23and in the slum it's still a struggle to put food on the table the worst thing for me over the last few
11:34weeks has been the fact that the children have been hungry as a parent is my responsibility for
11:40them to be well fed and well nourished and I was failing in my role as a mother by not being able
11:47to give them the nourishment that they need the work of pioneering social reformers had begun to
11:53quantify the sheer scale of poverty and malnutrition groundbreaking studies have revealed that a
12:00shocking one in three of the population lived in poverty in the face of this damning data it was
12:06very hard to argue that the system was working and the champions of the poor had as well as statistics
12:11another powerful weapon photography it was 20 years earlier that one of the first examples of social
12:20documentary photography brought images of the poor to an influential and well-off audience
12:25by the 1900s cameras had become more widely available opening up photography to a new generation of
12:35enthusiastic amateurs put the hood over it for me all right I'm just gonna focus the camera I'm gonna
12:43take the lens cap off okay that's gonna let you on the light through the camera onto the photographic
12:48material at the back and that takes four seconds okay I'll count it down three two one nice and still
13:05if you can lean on something it might help with the growing interest people had in slum life amateur
13:11photography reached the East End three two one nice and there we go thank you very much thank you very
13:22much thank you very much thank you yeah it's covering it one local amateur photographer who knew the area
13:31and its people well documented the children of the East End slums with an intimacy and candor rarely seen
13:38before I'm introducing our slum children the descendants of slum dwellers to images of how
13:46their real ancestors may well have looked so these are genuine East End kids their photographs taken around
13:551901 by an amateur photographer called Horace Warner and he called them the Spitalfield nippers
14:01and he managed to photograph the East End children he had come to know with a familiarity that was well
14:13ahead of its time they're all wearing rags yeah look how skinny her arms are I know yeah obviously they're
14:21much skinnier than we are aren't they yeah I've got no shoes yeah I love the kids have no shoes I'd be a
14:28lot more miserable than this lot if I had to carry on living like this yeah but it is explainable why
14:34they have the faces that they do Horace Warner's images galvanized campaigners for social reform in
14:41the East End local organizations use them to highlight not only the terrible conditions these
14:46children had to live in but also their poor state of health these two are the ones who are best
14:52documented what age you think they're eight seven so there is Lizzie who's nine years old and Dolly
14:59who is 12 years old they're so did he's tiny they are compared to you they would have been the same
15:04age as me she was sick that's the thing is these kids would have been severely malnourished she doesn't
15:11look like she's alive though that 12 year old in Spitalfields at the time when these photos were taken one in
15:18five children did not survive into adulthood and amongst the poorest families Warner photographed
15:24the child mortality rate was as high as a third childhood back then wasn't what we understand
15:37childhood to pay they saw the kids as little workers rather than people that need to be nurtured and
15:42taught and loved and cherished and just making a set of skittles so the kids can you know have
15:49something a little bit more than just their imaginations to play with while they're here and
15:55obviously it sits a lot better with me and the kids in Edwardian times were actually given the chance
16:00to be children and you know get some education and learn that they can go out and have fun and play and
16:07I mean that's how you do learn is through imitation and play they learn everything that way
16:13hello hello what do you think this is skittles do you want to set them up yeah yeah okie dokie
16:26well they're all numbered and you can have these this is for you despite terrible poverty and malnutrition
16:32with more of them at school and less working full-time many Edwardian slum children did have more
16:39opportunity to play than their Victorian predecessors
16:42yeah that was a better one five oh that was unlucky that one the winners live 18 no 17 sorry
17:10Heather and Graham off to explore another local initiative the aim to bring the plight of the East End's
17:19poor to national attention they had a radical way of tackling the problem by changing how the well-off
17:26thought about the poor our slum dwellers are going to the original building to meet social historian Dr
17:32Lucinda Matthews Jones welcome to Toynbee Hall the first settlement house from the late 19th century
17:41established by Samuel and Henrietta Barnett in 1883 1884 to the central ideas that Barnett advocated was
17:50the idea of knowledge and understanding you need to know the poor and understand the poor to be able to
17:56actually remedy poverty the Barnett's plan was that university graduates from Oxford and Cambridge potential
18:04leaders of the future would live amongst the poorest communities to see first-hand the problems they
18:09faced if you look on the second floor these would have been settlement bedrooms so the idea was that
18:16you would go off to work during the day but the difference was is that your responsibility towards the
18:21poor was then matched by you then spending your afternoons and maybe even significantly your weekends
18:28in working with the poor in some way so did places like this make any difference at all I think they
18:34did on a national and local level they brought a group of individuals into contact with the working
18:39classes who might not otherwise have had that opportunity two men who spent time at Toynbee Hall
18:47liberal MP William Beveridge and Prime Minister Clement Attlee went on to become the architects of modern
18:54welfare reform while there Attlee worked with local boys clubs and debating societies an experience he
19:01said that changed his life these men played a huge role in the creation of the welfare state and really
19:08transformed ideas about how the state and involves itself in people's lives from cradle to grave for me I
19:16think their attitudes their approach to nations poverty would not have happened without institutions
19:21like Toynbee Hall it was that close contact and connection that really enabled them to understand
19:27and see poverty first-hand so with education and with somebody fighting your corner that that reform would
19:38come this innovative local initiative ultimately delivered real change for the entire nation
19:45back in the slum there has been a delivery oh look this is then let's have a look oh you open it here
19:59open it up what is that fish sturgeon I'm scared that's like a party that is whoa what's that
20:09in 1901 Edward ascended the throne on the death of his mother but just two days before his coronation he
20:23developed appendicitis and needed an operation Andy come out here mate the cooks in Buckingham Palace had
20:30spent weeks preparing a lavish banquet for his hundreds of guests so what were they gonna do well rather than
20:36throw it away they've decided to give most of it to the poor for your pigeons is this for us to eat
20:43yes mate that's one basket there's another basket here look and then in this is cream is that profiteroles
20:50fish fish chicken I'm actually dribbling I'm not big on monarchy but God save the king yeah mommy and nan yes we got some food from King Edward VII because he's poorly at his coronation lamb fish chicken poached pears
21:05started to rain we need to get it in come and look at this the new king insisted that the food for his banquet should go to the underprivileged he also contributed thirty thousand pounds to the wider celebrations throughout London where half a million poor were fed
21:17and so it was that it was the people of Whitechapel who sat down and ate Edward VII banquet and not the royalty or diplomats it had been originally intended for
21:32jelly
21:34let's get it inside just get out the right mouth wateringly fabulous
21:39that looks lovely
21:41yeah
21:43yeah
21:44yeah
21:45yeah
21:46yeah
21:47yeah
21:48yeah
21:49yeah
21:50yeah
21:51yeah
21:52yeah
21:53yeah
21:54yeah
21:55yeah
21:56yeah
21:57yeah
21:58yeah
21:59yeah
22:00heavy pigeons
22:03they're pigeons heavy Heather
22:09go there
22:10me and Luke can't sit on this
22:11okay that's five
22:13this is amazing I've never seen anything like this even in my 21st century life you don't see a feast laid out before you like this
22:20let me escort you to the king's party my dear
22:24anybody want beer
22:26is fabulous this feast we've got it's beyond brilliant i'm so excited really really excited
22:31there's a really really good um good spirits here tonight i didn't know i was going to eat today so
22:36it's great it's fantastic ladies and gentlemen attention for one minute i'd like to propose a
22:42toast his majesty the king only the king okay shall we eat then
22:46it'll be food that the victorian poor had never seen in their lives they probably looked at it
22:59and thought this is a dream wake up
23:06the chefs actually complained that the food was going to the poor
23:10they actually moaned because they prepared it for the king
23:13yeah it's decadence personified isn't it it's just absolute decadence to give it to people
23:20in the slums is actually a beautiful thing to do
23:26the king himself spoke publicly of the need to take vigorous action in clearing the slums which
23:32disgrace our civilization the coronation marked the dawning of a new era it reinforced the idea
23:42that this century would be one of real progress
23:52this belief created a new political mood the conservatives had been in power for 10 years
23:58but their government was now being threatened by a previously divided liberal party
24:03who by 1906 had united and with a more sympathetic view of poverty
24:08aimed to harness the poor and working class vote to unseat the government
24:14professor robert saunders is an expert on the politics of the period
24:19so the year is 1906 and it is election day more people vote in this election than at any election
24:26in the past more working class people voted than ever before
24:30the late 19th and early 20th century was a period of increased trade union activism
24:38strikes and collective bargaining creating an increasingly powerful and politicized working class
24:46these two great victorian political parties the conservative party and the liberal party
24:51are having to fight for your votes so this election really is about you
24:55whichever of these two largest parties managed to capture this working class vote would win
25:01the election was fought mainly on a single issue trade in the 1880s about 43 percent of all exports
25:10anywhere in the world come from britain to put that in perspective in 2016 the biggest trading power in
25:16the world is china which exports about 12 percent of the world's exports so britain is a trading superpower
25:24of a kind that the world has never seen in the 19th century great britain was the biggest exporter
25:30in the world but by the 20th century germany and america's growing economies had overtaken britain's
25:37triggering a rise in unemployment
25:39britain has been a free trading country since the 1840s the conservative party want that to stop
25:48we're going to put taxes on foreign imports we're going to shut out german steel and american
25:54manufacturing to protect your jobs the two most important props in this election are these
26:02the big loaf and a little loaf what the liberals are saying is this is the loaf of free trade
26:08under free trade bread is cheap so this is what you can buy for your family with your wages if you
26:14put taxes on foreign imports this is what you'll be able to afford the little loaf of tariffs you've
26:21got to have a job to buy that right exactly so that's the question which do you want do you want a job
26:27small but perfectly formed or take your chances maybe if you've got a job or not to buy the big one
26:31exactly to get their arguments across the parties employed innovative ways to reach voters bright
26:38colors and hard-hitting slogans were used to address the concerns of the working man making this the
26:44first election fought in a modern way so this is a conservative poster about tariffs the whole point
26:52of this it's not complicated it's colorful it's bright and it punches home a message you can see we've got
26:58the working man shivering in the cold as other countries come in and take his trade the idea is
27:05the foreigner is driving you out of your job same what we're going through now right it's a very modern issue
27:10even if you're illiterate you can kind of see what's going on the guy in the sort of uncle sam suit
27:16haven't you the german looking character there with the election looming political debate gripped the
27:23country at all levels of society well it must have been a hugely exciting time for the working class to
27:30actually have a say in what happens to the country but if you've got a party coming up to you and saying
27:37vote for us you can have this big loaf of bread vote for it vote for them you have this little loaf of
27:41bread i mean that that's a no-brainer that is you know no brainer well it's so easy isn't it the big
27:46loaf you look at that that's what you want for your family hello hello you all right yes you're right
27:53what's going on we're discussing politics yeah man's talk really probably a little bit too highbrow to
28:02be honest for the lady you reckon yeah in whose opinion everyone's opinion in your opinion
28:09i haven't got the vote yet so your opinion yeah definitely are you sure fight fight fight i'll
28:18leave you to it because it absolutely disgusts me go think about some sewing or stitching or the like
28:25i'm gonna get it later ladies i've just heard the men they're talking about politics
28:31down there all right that's very silly dangerous fools fools i don't know
28:40with the election i think because it's the vote scene isn't it yes by all accounts shame we can't
28:45vote i know they're talking about who they're going to vote for what's going to happen and of course
28:51we don't have that right i may not care what they're discussing it's probably so boring that i'd
28:57rather be doing the washing up anyway to be honest but it's about the choice i choose to join
29:03in or not that for me that's an equal as an equal that's the thing it's whereas at the moment
29:10it's a not as opposed to i can if i want to that's the the difficulty that i have absolutely
29:17it was a self-fulfilling prophecy again wasn't it a self-fulfilling i assumption again just like
29:22keeping the poor dirty because they like to be dirty keeping women stupid because they are stupid
29:27but the other thing is women couldn't choose their own occupation either and it was only very strong
29:34forward-thinking you know really passionate women that actually started to do something something
29:42about that women were good enough to look after the home and yet they weren't seen as clever enough
29:52to think about who they would like to have rule the country on election day in 1906 women couldn't vote
30:02but men could and they did so in their droves
30:05i think the fact that there was 83 percent turnout means one thing and that's that the poor
30:15were desperate to voice their opinion and by voting that's exactly what they did
30:19while the men vote the women of the slum and james go to nearby victoria park to meet historian
30:36dr louise raw it was actually the first park in britain perhaps even in the world that was actually
30:43created for working people it also became incredibly important around the turn of the
30:48century for suffrage the campaign for votes for women three years earlier emmeline pankhurst founded the
30:56women's social and political union as a radical reaction to previous campaigns emmeline led the
31:03organization with her daughters christabel and sylvia they believed this new movement needed to be
31:08militant if it was going to succeed they became known as suffragettes during the same period women in
31:17the east end had become increasingly politicized sylvia pankhurst saw an opportunity she came to the east
31:24end and galvanized the activism of local women forming the east london federation of suffragettes
31:30the campaign the fight for suffrage becomes increasingly violent and bloody as time goes on this is all
31:39out war between women and the establishment the east london suffragettes hold a women's mayday here
31:48in victoria park and as they got to the gates of victoria park with a huge procession of women 50 detectives
31:57who'd been undercover disguised as market stallholders suddenly leap up from the stalls and attack them
32:03they drag this changed group of 20 women inside the gates of the park and assault them they're punched
32:10they're kicked they're hit with truncheons sylvia was dragged off by four detectors it took four big
32:17strong men to arrest one small woman she was thrown face down on the floor of a taxi cab and one of the
32:24policemen said to her i don't know why you just don't give up you're never going to get the vote
32:28but one of his colleagues said they will you know so she took a lot of comfort from that that even the
32:36police could see that the times were changing while the men are out voting the women of the slum
32:44and james commandeer the house taylor's shop to start their own east end suffragette group
32:50let me know when we win the vote and i might have fed up my needle by then
32:56not even being recognized as human beings must have been so terrible that to even get the moral
33:03substance to rise up against it just shows how amazing these women were
33:10i am proud to be an east end suffragette what do you think james great cool matchy matchy i think
33:21i would have been a suffragette because if i had a daughter for instance in that time
33:27i would have fought for everything if they weren't suffragettes then most of the women nowadays would be
33:34slaving still slaving in the kitchen they still wouldn't have the right to vote i think it's
33:39lovely that my son was so fired up about the suffragettes it i mean i'm glad it shows that as
33:44a 21st century family we have you know equality in our home
33:52but it would take several more years for the battle to be won
33:55the 1918 representation of the people act finally gave women over 30 the vote and in 1928
34:04this was extended to all women over the age of 21
34:10back at the slum the men have returned from voting
34:14so you've all voted i'd like to ask each of you how you voted and why i voted liberal because i wanted a
34:21a bigger slice of the the loaf the bread so you're a liberal voter yeah thank you i voted conservative
34:27because um i just think they're trying to protect the british jobs and um stop the invasion of the
34:34foreign foreign goods uh i voted conservative purely for same reasons as rust i voted liberal because as
34:40a shopkeeper i saw the opportunity to do what we call stack it high sell it cheap so it's all about
34:46free trade for you yeah so we've got a 50 50 split here two liberals two tories that was very different
34:54across the country because the result of this election was a liberal landslide it was the
35:00biggest massacre the conservative party has ever experienced in the general election they lost more
35:05than half of their mps the leader of the conservative party alfa balfour lost his seat so this was a
35:12wipeout and it was a particularly powerful anti-tory vote here in london lots of people thought that it
35:18was the government's fault that unemployment was so high that britain was losing jobs and the time for
35:23a change argument worked to the liberals advantage i mean now you now you see that the government had
35:29been in for 10 10 years there's a lot of unemployment and the slum just still in existence and the slum
35:35dwellers actually vote now so there's somebody just voted to get rid of the slums really if you've got
35:39people that are hungry that's what they're going to vote well i think they've been hungry for for
35:42years and years they now have a choice that they can stop that hunger they'll have that big loaf
35:47and that's the reason that you vote for that isn't it david lloyd george and winston churchill were part
35:52of this new liberal government once in power they began to build on ideas social reformers had pioneered
35:59in the east end to deliver a series of progressive policies nationwide that finally tackled the age-old
36:06evils of poverty free school meals old age pensions paternity benefits and national insurance the very
36:13things that were to become the pillars of the modern welfare state
36:20the government was making a difference the cooperative movement amongst others gave slum dwellers the
36:38chance to broaden their horizons even if it was only for a day this would just be a feast back in the 1860s
36:45and just to think that you can do this for fun and just for a day out it's amazing the co-op organized
36:53subsidized trips for its members these events provided the opportunity for many to escape the city for
36:59the first time ever as well as organizations like the co-op the children's country holiday fund arranged
37:09farm trips for east end children hope the weather stays nice
37:19the heads of toyneby hall and other social reform groups actively promoted the benefits of sending
37:24poor children to the countryside
37:39can you imagine how excited you would have been if you'd have been a real victorian
37:42it's not as dark as the slum is it the lovely sunshine don't see any rubbish around here do you
37:54look at the bluebells oh my god i love them beautiful
37:59do you think that victorian children would have been excited to do this
38:02yes they would have done very much they've never been to the countryside before they've never been on
38:06a train before can you imagine
38:11look at the horses look at the horses
38:12oh they're chasing us
38:17do not tread on the bluebells do not tread on the bluebells
38:22breathe that air with their new awareness of the appalling state of slum children's health
38:28the edwardians put great importance on the healthy properties of fresh air this looks like a nice
38:33spot right here underneath the oak tree getting poor children into the countryside was seen as more
38:39than just recreation a day out was regarded as beneficial to their long-term well-being lovely so
38:47nice nice being out right lovely i can't believe what the cooperative did subsidizing food holidays
38:54quite incredible quite innovative really it would have been the first time a lot of children had
38:58ever been outside the city or on a train even yeah for a child or adult from the east end slums
39:05this was another world i can imagine victorian children would have loved being able to come here
39:11not many people would have been able to get out of the slums and it would just feel amazing you'd feel
39:17so happy it feels that good not being in the slum i might not go back yeah do i live in the country
39:24rest of australia stay here be lovely and by 1916 a million whitechapel youngsters had had a taste of
39:31rural life outside the east london slums there are only really three colors in the slums and that's black
39:38gray and brown and here there's just every color you can imagine
39:54in response to the pioneering work of social reformers there was now a growing optimism about
40:00what could be done to eradicate the old problems of poverty and poor housing once and for all
40:06a series of ambitious building and slum clearance programs spread throughout britain in the first 30
40:12years of the century back from their picnic the slum dwellers have letters waiting
40:27the populations of the arab will be decanted over the coming weeks properties will be cleared of the
40:32contents destroyed and the fabric of the building rendered onto rubble this demolition plan means
40:39all must leave the slum the clearing of the old nickel slum and the building of great britain's first
40:46housing estate the boundary estate in nearby spitalfields was just the start of a nationwide
40:51initiative to replace the slums with something better and it continued for most of the 20th century
40:57what i'm liking this letter oh yes let me read the letter first i haven't seen that much money in
41:08ages what is it from i'm a solicitor it's all good what have you done before anything i don't know
41:14all right so it is with great pleasure that i write to you with notification of a compulsory purchase of
41:21your rooms and shop we have decided with the grace afforded to us by the london county council to offer
41:28you compensation to the sum of two guineas it has come to our attention that you have risen to become
41:33considered as part of the artisan classes and so may wish to apply to take an apartment in the newly
41:40reconstructed estate wow that's good we trust this is all in order your humble and obedient servants
41:47wow we're not the lowest of the low anymore it's accounting 20 30 40 50 60 70 100 110 126 pounds
42:02it isn't knowledge we've we've done well
42:06compulsory purchase was part of the slum clearance program even though they did not own their rooms
42:13slum dwellers were compensated for their loss of accommodation and loss of earnings for tailors
42:19like the house this would have provided a golden opportunity to get out of the slum and build a
42:24better life from my ancestors point of view this is what they would have wanted they wanted they
42:28would have wanted to have moved out there would have been an element of sadness to leave people
42:32but actually the life of your family and what you want to do for them must have had to have trumped
42:38everything really for many skilled tailors like mandy's ancestors this was a major step on the road
42:46to prosperity of those evicted from the old nickel slum 86 moved less than half a mile away setting up
42:54new shops and continuing the vibrant east end rag trade but while slum clearance was a positive move
43:02for society as a whole it didn't always help the individual i don't usually get letters with money in
43:13it's either going to be very nice or very bad isn't it
43:21we've decided to offer you the sum of a guinea in compensation this will help you find new
43:26accommodations it is unlikely that you would be successful with your application to move into the
43:30newly constructed apartments so you should assume you'll move away from this area it's permanent
43:36we will not enter into negotiations with respect to this matter that's disgusting
43:42i mean they're literally just destroying their life now aren't they what's that going to get you
43:48two nights in the cheapest dankest darkest horriblest guest house that the city's got to offer or
43:56a tent
44:03sleeping bag
44:07and that's what you've left to live on
44:12they really did just knife them in the back didn't they
44:16the slums being knocked down someone like myself would have been told that you know you're not
44:21welcoming the area anymore go find the life somewhere else but one guinea is it's not enough
44:27to start a new life is it let's be honest for someone with andy's disability losing their place
44:32in the slum would most likely force them into another slum nearby unable to get a job doing manual labor
44:40begging or street trading would be their most likely source of income
44:43it has come to our attention that a bird has been taken over by the eastern east london cooperative
44:53society and so you are no longer considered eligible for compensation for this oh great
45:00we have however decided to offer you the sum of a guinea in compensation for your room
45:07but this was not the end of shopkeeping for those in the bird situation the cooperative did help
45:14members set up a new branch when a store closed in the 20th century the movement was expanding
45:19and so could accommodate more branches giving the chance of a fresh start outside the slum
45:25we will talk to the cooperative and we want to set another store up somewhere in this relatively
45:33not not too far away because if they're going to redevelop this area they're going to have a lot
45:37of workers come in maybe we would have been really thankful that we had actually started working for
45:42the cooperative stories but for families like the potters the future would have been less certain
45:48we have decided to offer you the sum of a guinea in compensation this will help you find new
45:52accommodations the demolition of the slum in my view wasn't to help the poorest of the poor
46:01and it was just to almost make the country look as if it was doing something for the poor it is unlikely
46:13that you would be successful with your application to move into the newly constructed apartments
46:19and so you should assume your move away from this area is permanent basically they're making you homeless
46:26aren't they they were just really thrown out given a measly compensation and expected to find their
46:34own homes so to me that wasn't helping the poor at all in the slum the potters would have been street
46:42sellers after eviction their predecessors would have had to sell what they could on the street and
46:48hopefully make enough for rent in a nearby slum as the century progressed and their trade union
46:54strengthened costamongers fought for their collective rights and some thrived
47:03slum clearance and the building of new housing estates continued well into the 20th century
47:08so these changes affected generation after generation of east end families before they leave
47:15andy graham and heather are visited by former slum residents who moved out in the 1950s and 60s
47:22and still remember their old way of life betty were you considered where you lived as a slum area no not
47:29really because remember you're born and bred to it when i was a child i knew i lived in a slum my
47:36family were costamongers in chapel market eslington at the back of our garden wall and we were run along with
47:43rats my young brother one day had a fishing hook and fishing line put some bread down the rat hole
47:50and he caught a rat oh i mean i've seen them run about when we took the wallpaper down there was
47:57millions of bugs behind you remember the bed oh yeah i had three children there living up there with no
48:05water and stuff like that yeah three children were born and you used to bring a tin bath in to have a
48:12bath and your slots and stuff you had to put in a bucket yeah and take right the way down in fact
48:18the old man who used to live on in one room on the front uh used to use his bucket for everything
48:27he came out one day and opened the door and the bottom of his bucket fell out
48:33do you think it was worth the destruction of the slum and the community to allow people to get a new
48:40property or do you think that maybe part of london was actually killed off when that happened i think
48:46if they'd have refurbished them yes that would have been the big mistake not refurbishing all those
48:52is because they were wonderful old houses they created an atmosphere and when they got rid of
48:57them and moved us into new flats the life was completely different now but for many leaving
49:03the slum was the escape they'd always dreamed of i took it from my tower block these tower blocks
49:11were marvelous i was on the top story on the 23rd floor wow wow the view was beautiful there was a
49:20playground for the children yeah no problems whatsoever in the 1950s and 60s alone two and a half million
49:30people were rehoused to begin a new life
49:50graham
49:58it's the resident's last day in the slum
50:09okay down the minutes to the shower scrunchie to clean yourself with chisel i think you're all right
50:15and you priority number one is shave that stuff off your face i know it's going vile things is
50:23like a bear i thought keeping the mustache though
50:28not if you want to live with me you don't you can decide
50:31people leaving the slums because they've been demolished a sense of excitement for those that have
50:48somewhere to go obviously anxious there's lots of anxiety i should imagine sense of loss of the friends
50:55they've made and that they may never see again but you know time has to move on things change at least
51:02i don't have to make these beds anymore i'm gonna miss it are you hmm tell you what i'm not bread and
51:12butter near enough every day i turn into a slice of bread and butter burgers
51:19mmm bread and butter
51:22mmm
51:23some people have a last supper we have a last breakfast cheers cheers
51:32well this is the last time hopefully in my life that i will have to
51:38get water from a bucket to have a wash and uh yeah i won't miss that
51:46are we going to miss this room do you think uh i don't think we'll miss this room i'm not really
51:54going to miss it at all the victorians must have been so so strong to live the life that we've lived
52:01every single day but they did and they changed things and that's why our life is now easier
52:08so it was through their endeavor and courage and spirit that got all that for us
52:31the most striking thing for me in going through this experience was understanding
52:36how people view poverty and people who live in poverty
52:43looking at the root causes is the most important thing you know before you start pointing a finger
52:49people or writing things off as is unsolvable just look at the facts just look at the root cause
53:00they were strong people but i think anybody put under duress and stress
53:05and pressure is hard they have to be
53:11if there was one message i think the modern world can learn from the victorian slum
53:16is don't let it happen again you ready
53:22yeah
53:24because the millions of people that had to live like this were better than that
53:28i really wanted to know would i have been mentally strong enough physically strong enough to have
53:49survived in from 1860 to 1910 but no matter what i do i cannot replicate what these guys and gals went
53:59through i'm proud of what i've done but i'm even more proud of the guys that came before me
54:06you hear about kids going to school and a slice of bread and butter and that's what happened it really
54:17did happen in the east end you know those streets and you think my god these people really struggled
54:23i think that's what people are missing is hope that they can have a better life
54:28because you give people hope they'll work for it whereas if they've got no hope they just
54:34fall into misery
54:39my slum experience has been just the time of my life like one minute i was happy one minute i was sad
54:46well i mean i just didn't know what to do anymore so it's just been such an amazing experience
54:52bye workshop i miss this place i've never worked this hard in my life and i didn't think i had it in
55:01me there was something that told me that i needed to show that i can work in order to make my parents
55:08proud because they didn't know i had it in me either i'm sure the victorian kids had that as well
55:14they had that feeling that they wanted to make their parents proud and show that they had the
55:18work ethic and they had the resilience to make it through i'm going to be sad because you know the
55:28slum is my home it's been my home for a number of weeks now i've made it as as homely as i possibly can
55:34and i feel quietly fond of it it stinks and it's disgustingly dirty but i'm fond of it
55:39i miss home but i know i'm going to miss this place ready yes i wanted to learn more about my family
55:49my ancestors i wanted to walk in their shoes and know how it felt russell wants to learn more about
55:54his trade have we achieved that we so have the residents are coming together for a final meal
56:12your man oh this is nice lovely wow a little bit of something special for the last day right
56:23we have game pie apple pie bagels mandy just for you jolly jolly deals
56:32i'd just like to say thank you to everybody my family and i came here to learn more about our
56:40ancestors and to attempt to live a little bit like them to understand them better and i believe
56:47we've been able to do that but we've had some dark moments along the way and without you guys around
56:54the table um i don't think we'd have been sitting here today
57:11friends in the slum friends in the slum
57:14the story of the urban poor doesn't end with the residents departure
57:37the efforts of social reformers radical campaigners and even photographers did succeed in triggering
57:45real improvements for slum dwellers but it would take two world wars and a depression before we saw
57:51the birth of the welfare state
57:56today there are still areas of the uk which grapple with low wages or a lack of affordable housing
58:02and though we have left victorian levels of poverty behind we still struggle to find solutions
58:12to these age-old problems
58:16come on ready
58:32so
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