NOSTALGIA is big business these days, but easily the most unexpected manifestation of the 30th anniversary of punk rock's so-called Summer of Hate is Tory leader David Dave' Cameron's apparent hijacking of the ultimate anti-Establishment anthem, the Sex Pistols' Anarchy In the UK.

It seems Desperate Dave has abandoned his Hug-A-Hoodie initiative in favour of bemoaning Britain's tearaway youth after a summer of violent crime perpetrated by children that culminated in the killing of 11-year-old Rhys Jones in Liverpool.

Obviously Dave thinks Anarchy In the UK will bring him a late summer hit to halt the anarchy in his own party that has seen his closest advisors arm him with duff information about hospital closures.

But while his outrage at Rhys Jones' death is no doubt heartfelt, what right does he have to turn a child's murder into a political point? Perhaps he thinks such attacks on the government will generate enough fear among voters to make them believe he can do better.

Now he has turned his attention on another easy target, the entertainment industry which he says must be more socially responsible and show less "extreme, casual and callous violence". It wasn't a rap album, a horror DVD or an action video game that killed Rhys Jones - it was a gun. Possibly fired by someone as young as 13.

Britain has its share - probably more than its share - of social problems, but anarchy isn't one of them. Quite the opposite. Many of our country's woes are institutionalised in a system that repeatedly lets down the very people it is there to support.

Our schools produce record numbers of A-level passes and commentators casually tell us exams are too easy. Student loans are sold off to private enterprise to administer and collect. Degrees are effectively available to purchase for the price of enrolling on a course because educational establishments cannot afford to fail students - it would be commercial suicide.

The welfare system remains notoriously impenetrable and in the workplace employees are treated with ever greater contempt by their paymasters. Parents, we are told, no longer know how to be proper mums and dads.

So, the Tory leader lurches to the right and would scrap the Human Rights Act while stuffing even more miscreants into our already overcrowded prison cells. That'll show 'em.

Here's some nostalgia for you Dave. I'm only four months older than you and even I can remember a time when people felt a kind of collective responsibility for one another, when public service counted for something, common sense prevailed, policemen could use their discretion and we weren't cowed by fear into hiding in our over-priced homes.

But, just as punk rock mesmerised a generation of kids 30 years ago, so too did the creed of greed spouted by Dave's predecessor Margaret Thatcher as she proclaimed "There is no such thing as society".

Labour wasn't working then, she said - and Dave reckons it isn't working now - but the lessons of history are well learned so let's not fall into the trap of believing any of their kind will save us.

Cameron's talk of Anarchy In the UK sounds pretty vacant to me. No fun. No future.