I would never use this column for political gain, even if my editor allowed me to, but in the interests of natural justice the weasel words we’ve heard from Westminster politicians this week cannot go unchallenged. Alan Johnston, Shadow Chancellor, caught the mood accurately when he poured scorn on many of the ‘members opposite.’  He juxtaposed the cheering and whooping as George Osborne spelled out the details the most savage cuts in public spending we’ve seen for generations.

These cuts, if implemented, will cause untold hardship among the poorest, and yet so many MPs flared their nostrils as they smelt ideological victory; by any standards that is sick.

Did you know that 23 of the 29 in David Cameron’s cabinet are millionaires? How many of them have ever been close to the homeless, the poor and the underprivileged? Do they ever sincerely try to understand why Britain’s sub-culture is detached from mainstream society? Probably not, so how can they honestly say, ‘We’re in this together’?

David Ennals, Secretary of State in James Callaghan’s Labour government in 1977 commissioned the Black Report. It was to be an enquiry into the causes of health inequality in the UK. Part of it looked at life in two parallel communities in Glasgow; Bears Den and Drumchaple. Now it so happens I know the area well, and on the occasions on which I’ve been there I’ve looked across an untidy field towards the council housing estate of Drumchaple. They’re less than a mile apart, but they’re a world apart; people in Bears Den on average live 15 years longer than their Drumchaple counterparts.

Why should that be? Well, that was Sir Douglas Black’s brief, and yet when the Report was completed, and delivered to Maggie Thatcher’s administration it was buried. Only 260 poor quality copies were ever published, and that over a Bank Holiday weekend in 1980. The report was full of inconvenient truths that called for action to help lift people out of poverty, but it was always going to be easier to label the poor as lazy; then it would be their own fault. ‘Get on your bike and look for work!’ they were told by Numbskull Norman – now Lord Tebbit – in his over-simplistic arrogance.

But hold on a minute. Am I saying that all poor people are industrious but unfortunate? And am I implying that the wealthy are so because they are hard working? No I’m not, but I am suggesting that for a bunch of millionaires to look upon those whose welfare benefits are about to be slashed and say, ‘We’re in this together brothers,’ is hypocritical in the extreme. And if Mrs Thatcher’s attitude is anything to go by, not only are they incapable of understanding, they don’t want to understand because compassion is thin on the ground.

The thing I love about the Christian faith is that our Father truly understands us. You could say that he understands us because he made us, but that wasn’t good enough for him. He wanted to leave no possible room for doubt that he knows and understands us; so he became one of us.

Your name is carved in the palm of his hand and it’s that degree of intimacy that is the source of our security as members of God’s family; he is up close and personal, he is with us as we pick our way through the hard times; he is in this together with us in a way that millionaire politicians might claim to be, but can never be.