We are responsible for each other

And so to the theatre. I have been to see J.B. Priestley's brilliantly structured play about the interconnectedness of all members of society, 'An Inspector Calls', at the Alhambra in Bradford, surely the place to see it; we passed the large statue of the great man on the way to and from the theatre. Judging from the composition of the audience the play must be one of this year's GCSE set pieces. It was memories of it in the fifth form (or whatever they call it these days) that lured the elder Miss Epictetus into breaking her Shakespeare only rule; nothing could tempt the younger Miss Epictetus into breaking her 'I'm too cool to be seen with my dad' rule.

I suspect there is also a timely political imperative for this revival of this National Theatre production which was first put on in 1992. When I originally saw it many years ago it seemed an obvious riposte to the evils of Thatcherism; the fact that it was a play from the 1940s serving to highlight the backward looking nature of her pernicious philosophy. Fast forward to today and we find her disciples, born into a ruling class which the old bat herself could only envy from a distance, determined to take the UK even further back into the past; making the play's setting, 1912, even more relevant. Indeed, as others such as the legendary Keith Flett have pointed out, Jeremy Hunt's creation of the dispute with junior doctors appears to signal a wish to return to the Master and Servant act of 1823. Priestley's message is as valid today as it always has been.