Ten years on, what’s different about Bradford?

On that slightly overcast day when the Queen opened the new Midland Road stand at Valley Parade, distributed Maundy Money at the Cathedral and officially opened Centenary Square...

l Diana, Princess of Wales, was still alive; Prince Harry was too young to join the armed forces; John Major was Prime Minister; Bradford's Labour Group had an iron hand on both the Lord Mayoralty and the running of the district; Britain was not at war in Afghanistan and Iraq; the World Trade Centre was still standing; Bradford City were in Division One (today The Championship) with Stuart McCall 14 months away from coming back to Valley Parade from Glasgow Rangers; no demolition had taken place in either Broadway or Forster Square; Bradford Council still controlled education and housing; hi-tech electronics was still enjoying a boom in Bradford.

What a difference a decade makes. If outgoing Prime Minister Tony Blair was granted a single wish, the odds are he would want to turn the clock back to May 1, 1997, when New Labour won a famous General Election victory by a landslide (and I won £50 for correctly forecasting that Sir Marcus Fox would lose his seat at Shipley to Labour's whipper-snapper Chris Leslie).

Now it is impossible to try to imagine what life was like before Princess Diana's August Bank Holiday weekend death in Paris, which to this day continues to be the focus of a worldwide conspiracy theory. Terrorism was a difficulty, but not on a global scale: the world had yet to contract to a couple of digits: 9/11.

Arguably the Queen's popularity was higher during Thursday's visit to Bradford than it was ten years ago when Princess Di was stealing most of the headlines. Since then the Queen has notched up a golden anniversary as monarch and has survived yet another decade of cynicism about politicians. Also the deaths of the Queen Mother and Princess Margaret generated a good deal of sympathy for the Head of State.

Ten years ago the Conservative Party was disintegrating over the question of continued membership of Europe. Today, the Labour Party has lost Scotland to pro-European Union Scottish Nationalists, while the Scottish Parliament and the Welsh Assembly pass laws (on welfare for the elderly and prescription charges) that are the envy of tax-ridden England.

In 1997 people assumed there would always be a second mail delivery in the morning and that a modest terraced house in a nice area would not cost in the region of £250,000. They have even have assumed that Bradford Festival had a reasonable future.

This was one of the disappointing features of the last decade for Alan Carling, former Bradford University social sciences lecturer.

"We seem to be good at knocking things down in Bradford, especially as a result of ambitious top-down plans that promise the earth but deliver very little. We seem to be much less good at taking the best of what we have, preserving it, and adapting and developing it under changing circumstances.

"The fate of Bradford Festival is a perfect example. This was a bottom-up initiative that grew out of the peace festivals of the mid-1980s. When local enthusiasts ran it with the help of the Council, it thrived; when the Festival was privatised and commercialised, it died.

"I would love to see the rich vein of community endeavour in Bradford properly recognised and harnessed by the powers-that-be. We should build for the future on what we have, not on consultants' drawings of what might be," he said.

Three things stood out for him: the University's Programme for a Peaceful City; Bradford Community Broadcasting and Bradford City Supporters' Trust.

"The first brought people together to discuss the situation in the district in the wake of the 2001 riot and the Ouseley Report, in ways that were not happening via the official channels or the formal political process.

"Bradford Community Broadcasting built itself up over the same period so that it now produces a fully-professional level of output with a mainly volunteer staff. The Supporters' Trust was an initiative from the fans themselves that saved Bradford City from extinction, and now works closely with the club.

"There are many other examples from around the district of people working together as enthusiasts to change things for the better; but these are the projects I know best."

Buying a home has been promoted, along with consumer spending, to boost the economy and rake in record-breaking taxes for the Chancellor of the Exchequer (more than £21 billion in income tax alone in January).

Manchester-born playwright Michael Stewart moved to Bradford seven years ago because it was cheaper than Leeds and in spirit probably closer to his native Salford.

"I was able to buy a four-bedroom semi with a massive garden in Thornton for £50,000, which seems unbelievable now. House prices across the two cities have levelled out a bit, but there's still a massive difference. There's a good reason for this.

"Bradford politics and Bradford culture seems to be that of the pound shop during my time here. Buy a lot for next to nothing. Buy a pint for a pound, a double for a single, a bag of broken biscuits. I'm not against cheap products, but can this be good for the image of the city?

"Anyone who knows about buying and selling will tell you, if your USP (unique selling point) is we are the cheapest' - you have nowhere to go but down. Far better to build your USP around quality."

The late Jonathan Silver used to say that all the time; he built up Salts Mill by letting space to what he called "quality tenants", and people came in their thousands.

One of the most disturbing aspects of the last ten years has been the way the British National Party has get a foothold in what used to be the city with the most progressive record of race relations initiatives (I do not mean those wretched and misconceived racial awareness tests for head teachers that caused so much trouble in the early 1980s).

Michael Stewart has his own explanation for this phenomenon which, he thinks, flows from low collective esteem, frustration and civic cowardice.

"If we are to turn Bradford into a flourishing city once again, proud and confident, we need to accept it has low self-esteem and a big image problem. Bradford people are the salt of the earth. From the very first day I arrived I have been made to feel welcome.

"But the feeling of apathy is crushing the soul of the city. People are afraid to try, they are afraid to be honest, they are afraid to have passion. According to the council propaganda, Bradford is vibrant' and thriving'. It's not. It's full of segregation and frustration. The council is largely responsible for this. By over-funding one section of the community and ignoring the other, they have created a Petri dish for the bacillus of the BNP to grow and prosper.

"I want Bradford to reach its full potential as much as anyone, but it can only do this if it stops stumbling along in self-denial. I think this is how a lot of people feel, but rarely get the opportunity to express."

But they have and they do Michael. The T&A's website forum is full of candid, sometimes biting observations and remarks, as is the paper's letters pages. The universal influence of the internet is another factor of daily life which has radically altered the way we communicate since 1997, proving once again that knowledge can be used for both good and evil purposes.

Bradford also reflects the national divide that exists over religion. Many people here are devout, tolerant believers; but they see the surrounding world as relativistic, value-free, more influenced by secular politically correct attitudes than is healthy for a properly robust democracy.

Ten years on in 2017, after the London Olympics, perhaps after the present monarch is no longer Head of State, what will people be saying about the state of the nation and about Bradford, I wonder.