ABSTRACT
Lifelong learning needs to be seen as a vital part of attempts at the regeneration of British society. After fifteen years of malign neglect came five years of rather timid government. That timidity is not surprising. An inexperienced collection of ministers were full of good intentions about repairing the damage visited on the country by the Tories as they underfunded public services or privatised where they could. Only later were those good intentions matched with a full realisation of the extent to which that underfunding had affected the very fabric of society. After its many efforts between 1997 and 2002 New Labour then braced itself to be more energetic in its efforts to revitalise the public services.
