What is the state? And what's it ever done for you?
More than you think.

The state houses us, educates us, employs us, protects us on the street and in the wider world. It is the country we created together, and a part of our national identity. However, in recent years there has been a systematic and covert attack on the state that has turned us all against it - the government have depleted funding and resources, and mounted an ideological assault on the public sector through the media.

Toynbee and Walker travelled around Great Britain gathering the voices of the people who make up the state: nurses and patients, teachers and parents, policemen and civilians. This book is your chance to hear their side of the story.

The story they tell is one of dismemberment across our nation state: a fragmented NHS, a reduced police force, divided schools and a vulnerable military. In Dismembered, it becomes clear that this attack on the state is an attack on each and every one of us, for our peace and productivity as a country depend upon a strong state.

DISMEMBERED lays bare the deliberate dismantling of the public sector and its consequences. Our post-Brexit well-being and prosperity are now at stake.

Polly Toynbee and David Walker have co-authored Dogma and Disarray: Cameron at Half-Time, Unjust Rewards: Exposing Greed and Inequality in Britain Today, The Verdict: Did Labour Change Britain? and Better or Worse: Did Labour Deliver? Polly Toynbee is a columnist for the Guardian. David Walker is a contributing editor to the Guardian Public and former director of public reporting at the Audit Commission.