Expose Broken Britain: Become a Guerrilla Guide
Do you ever feel like we are living in a dystopia straight out of George Orwell’s ‘1984’? Have you always rooted for the underdog? Are you more Lennon than McCartney?
If you said yes to all of the above, and are a confident self-starter, your cynical mind could be an asset to Guerrilla Tours UK.
We need outgoing and charismatic characters to acquaint tourists with the real truth about Britain. There’s a final test, after which you may need to stop reading. (Do not pass go, do not collect £200 per tour) Does a knot of political correctness twist in your stomach at the following question?
Do you have what it takes to narrate the story of Britain’s social concentration camps?
You’re still here? Weren’t put off by the sensationalist language? We salute you! Guerrilla Tours UK doesn’t hold back. But it’s important to note here, the reason for this is because we are championing social change, not because we want to scaremonger or create divisions (we wouldn’t want to infringe on the Daily Mail’s corner of the market).
The phrase “social concentration camps” is not ours, it was coined by the Fabian Society’s ‘In the Mix’ report on social housing. It’s a summation phrase of the theory that “spatial separation is embedded into our social housing culture. Estates are usually large and concentrated in particular areas. Most are served by poor infrastructure and detached from labour markets.” In laypersons terms, social housing is designed to keep the poor, poor.
The founders of Guerrilla Tours UK are all social science graduates, from Russell Group universities, we use rigorous academic research to inform our tours. We also have idealism in common. We believe our tours are the perfect antidote to unchecked nationalism. We hope they have the potential to turn the tide against the pernicious white saviour dialogue inherent among westerners who visit, and talk about, less economically stable countries (the Stacey Dooley and Comic Relief debacle anyone?).
93% of Brits who take our tours say they are surprised at the scale of poverty and deprivation at home, the other 7% leave, outraged, before the end of the tour. Normally, at the point they are told there’s a place known as ‘the baby in the bag estate’ in South Wales. Alas, you can’t win them all, some people ‘can’t handle the truth!’
We need tour guides who are passionate about the future of Britain’s economy, and stand for the many; equally, you will need to be as resilient as you are passionate to work for us. All Guerrilla guides research current affairs to keep their tours relevant. Dealing with the grim reality of recession, austerity, Brexshit and increasing ghettoization of urban areas, on a daily basis, can take its toll on your wellbeing.
But, it’s never boring. Only today we were rushing down to Hastings Harbour, to show our punters the line of people blocking the RNLI from saving refugees at risk of drowning after having crossed the channel. White people yelling, “We don’t want them here” knowing 27 people, including a pregnant woman, had died that same week in those same waters.
We narrated the horrible scene with a list of all the ways in which sanctions against refugees have tightened during the pandemic, many had no idea. Facts dropping like bombs:
The official resettlement routes for refugees have been systematically scrapped: The Syrian scheme, gone. The Dubs scheme, gone. The Dublin III agreement, abandoned.
No Afghan refugee scheme is up and running despite the worldwide attention the refugee crisis there has garnered.
There is no such thing as a visa that asylum seekers can apply for from their own country. They are only allowed to apply for asylum once they have arrived in Britain. So when the government talks about all the illegal refugees here, it’s hardly a surprise. It is by design, to criminalise.
At Guerrilla Tours UK you will be using your career to benefit others, while being paid above both the minimum and ‘living’ wage, because we operate a THRIVING wage system. We believe that a sense of satisfaction with one’s job can lead to increased perceived justice, a prominent humanistic indicators of thriving.
There has never been any evidence that a happy worker is more likely to become demotivated, but plenty to support the opposite!
How does it work?
At the heart of our tours lies the simple belief that if it’s ok to do it abroad, it’s ok to do it here at home. So, when TripAdvisor revealed British tourists highly rate favela tours in Rio, we decided to run tours of council estates. It made us uncomfortable, but we were prepared to sit with that feeling and use it to open difficult dialogues here, because charity might need to start at home.
We collaborate closely with The Trussell Trust, which operates 1,390 food banks across the UK and provided 1.2m food parcels to clients in 2017, compared to 41,000 in 2010. The partnership allows us exclusive access to foodbanks when narrating part of our ‘Broken Britain’ tour.
As a guide, you will establish an appropriate centre on your patch and allow your customers to take photos of the bleak interior, pose with willing clients (encourage them to ask first, but expect them to ignore you) and rifle through the contents of provisions comparing them to what they would have in their own cupboards.
This is a perfect opportunity to take pictures for the Gram and subvert the usual tourist depictions of Britain: The London Eye, Edinburgh Castle, Stonehenge, the view from the top of the Shard (with a cocktail in hand), or the pristine white cliffs of Dover.
Training?
Initial training will be done at our Cardiff base, with easy access to the Gurnos council estate, in Merthyr Tydfil, (featured in Channel 4’s ‘Skint’) where Guerrilla launched our first tours. We believe the success of this tour, which has had 6,358 bookings in the last year, can be replicated in other parts of the country.*
The Gurnos tour is a bread and butter example of what we do; a two hour walking tour of sites with enough debauched history to keep the clueless captivated, a level of notoriety to attract the ghouls, and so many failed government interventions that even the die-hard ‘everyone can work their way up’ types, find their convictions wavering.
Highlights include:
Visiting Penyfan Terrace and Forsythia Drive, the sites of the ‘babies in the bags’ findings from new homeowners. These roads are perfect spots to recount the harrowing tale of Ann Mahoney, who hid three of her stillborn children in bags and left them in the attics of her two previous homes. Ann, a former nurse, was 64 when the bodies were found and had been awarded “citizen of the year” numerous times because of her involvement in the community.
Comparing the social housing to the nicer area of privately owned houses on the edge of the estate. Asking social housing tenants, usually found hanging around in their pyjamas, what their experience of living there is like. Taking photos of the homes, with the most unkempt front gardens.
Capturing why Merthyr has been one of the unhealthiest places in England and Wales for 150 years by dropping in the shocking statistic that healthy life expectancy is only 58.8 years. Here we hit a sombre point, by revealing men who have been unemployed for six months, or more are, 40% more likely to commit suicide, deftly pointing out that even though the estate is home to 5,000 people there are 11 vacant and boarded up commercial properties. Depending on the tour group we may ask them to try to identify locals they think look vulnerable to ending up this way.
What now?
If this sounds like the right level of challenge for you, phone us and discuss a future at Guerrilla Tours UK: 029 2046 0583. Be prepared to pitch three potential sites where a Broken Britain Tour could horrify future customers. Remember, guerrillas use unconventional methods to challenge conventional power structures, do you have what it takes?
*It would be an advantage if you were based locally to Blackpool or Rochdale. 5/10 of the most deprived areas in England are in Blackpool, making it an ideal area to target and we are considering launching a “Three Girls Tour inspired by the 2017 BBC miniseries about the Rochdale child sex abuse ring.
Disclaimer: Guerrilla Tours UK does not exist, it is a figment of Kelly Keegan’s imagination and she will not read your job applications.
