The Cosh - Stiff Little Fingers

Everything is turning upside down in this town

The crime rate’s rising up as employment swoops down

Kids can’t trust their parents to protect them no more

And if you’re Black or Irish you just can’t trust the law

Winos on the corner with no hope and no plan

Kids on five quid drug deals waiting for their man

Estates in states of chaos, hatred scrawled on the walls

The men of law and order writhe about on the floor

No one dream of living, those hopes lie on the rocks

Your newly detached haven is a cardboard box

And it seems, and it seems

Someone’s used the cosh

And the country’s on its knees

Old folk freeze to death in flats

Where damp streams down the walls

Poll tax bailiffs scream unheard in countless council halls

Plans for new development that never cure the mess

Benefits that won’t be paid unless you’ve an address

And no one dream of living, those hopes lie on the rocks

Your newly detached haven is a cardboard box

And it seems, and it seems

Someone’s used the cosh

And the country’s on its knees

Our Welfare State’s collapsing

And no one seems to care

As long as money’s being made

And profits there to share

Buy into a service that belonged to you and me

Soon you’ll find our country is the UK pic

And no one dream of living

Those hopes lie on the rocks

Your newly detached haven is a cardboard box

And it seems, and it seems

Someone’s used the cosh

And the country’s on its knees

Down on its knees, down on its knees

Someone’s used the cosh

And the country’s down on its knees

Down on its knees, down on its knees