Rowan Williams on gay rights, welfare handouts and the break-up of Britain Dr Williams spoke of his concern about "spiralling" differences between rich and poor and quoted a string of left wing economists. But he went on to warn of the dangers of dependence on the state. "A mutual taking of responsibility pushes back at a passive welfarism, a passive statism as some people call it, an assumption that the state is a the provider of solutions, the solver of problems," he said. "We may bridle as I sometimes instinctively do at the way "welfarism" is used in a derogatory sense these days, because the achievements of public welfare have been enormous. Yet there is some substance to that suspicious use of welfarism. There is a problem about dependency, there is a problem about assuming somebody else resolves the problems and there is certainly a problem about centralised state provision as the solution to everything. And those who have recently from both left and right pointed out that welfarism is not good news for those who want a mutually responsible active, creative community have not been wrong. Praising the Welsh co-operative movement, which he described as a brand of socialism, he went on to criticise an "obsession" on the left with the state as a solution to problems. The Fabian element has often won because it often sees that central planning is bound to be more effective than anything and we have learnt from our mistakes in that way. Earlier, addressing teenager he spoke about a fixation with identities which he said amounted to saying: "This is who I am, these are my rights, I demand that you recognise me." "Identity politics, whether it is the politics of feminism, ethnic minorities or sexual minorities, has been a very important part of the last 10 or 20 years because before that I think there was a sense that diversity was not always very welcome," he said. We are now beginning to see the pendulum swinging back. Identity politics is all very well but we have to have some way of putting it all back together again and discovering what is good for all of us and share something of who we are with each other. He added: "Once we start saying this is my identity and that's it I think we are in danger of really fragmenting the society we belong to." He also admitted that he felt Welsh before British and spoke of the possibility that Britain could break apart as Scottish and Welsh nationalism grows in importance. "I think it is important that whatever happens to the future of Britain, the nations of these islands, we remain communities that are willing to work for and with one another," he said. Britishness is a mosaic anyway.