Listening to Any Questions this afternoon ( a repeat of last night) I was encouraged in the discussion of the Illegal Migrants Go Home vans that Paul Boateng said very clearly:  "It's important that the law is enforced and upheld". 

However I was puzzled by Isobel Hardman's statement that the go home message: "reminds me of the 1970s graffiti slogans".

Isobel Hardman is clearly not old enough to remember the 1970s.  Nor does there seem to be any photographic evidence of "go home" 1970s graffiti.  Certainly not on Google Images.

Such graffiti may have existed. 

But there do not seem to be any photographs (and you would expect there to be photographs - were the photo journalists of the Guardian not doing their job in the 1970s?). 

And if there are no photographs, and Isobel Hardman is not old enough to remember the period in question, how can we be sure that the graffiti existed?

Isobel Hardman's claim to be "reminded" of the 1970s graffiti is all the more inexplicable when seen in the context of her comment on 8th April 2013:  "Impressed by the number of my peers who, born in late 80s, possess extraordinary powers of memory when it comes to Thatcher's time in power."

The 1970s were no doubt a horrible decade.

But we should not damn the decade with the "racist" epithet if there is no real evidence.