Mind the Gap, By Ferdinand Mount

A traditional High Tory of principle and intellect, Mount merited a loud cheer when in 2004 he first published this eloquent lament over rising inequality in Britain. He wrote with sympathy about "the civilisation of the working classes" and cooly raged against the assault by politics, media and commerce on its many virtues.

Five years later, the gulf of wealth, health and expectation between the rich and poor (in hopes as well as assets) has only widened, as a gloomy preface to this edition notes as it indicts the recent "daylight robbery" by shameless bankers . Honourable candidates should make Mount's arguments a focus of their election campaigns.