The problem with any fiction set in the future is that it will be measured against the reality when the real time described has passed. Indeed, this is sometimes all that is debated – even if not, it can skew how the work is regarded. 1984 and Brave New World, to name arguably the two most famous, are more often seen (and criticised) as prophecies than as fully rounded novels.

Benefits, begun in 1976 and published in 1979, will therefore have to undergo the same fate. It takes the world as it then was, lumbering towards a social security crisis and conflicted in its attitude towards women (offering child benefit but withdrawing and then reducing the amount after pressure from male-dominated trade unions), and moves forward to the early 2000s, stopping at several points on the way.

The author, Zoe Fairbairns, has written a new introduction for the reissue, making many interesting points about this subject. Some subjects (whatever happened to the promised wealth from North Sea Oil?) have been sidelined by history. One of the main threads she comments on is the perceived similarity between Isabel Travers, seemingly benign promoter of populist conservatism (via FAMILY, of which more in a moment), and Margaret Thatcher (Conservative leader when the book was written but not yet Prime Minister) – and I can see how that came about, especially in the 1980s.

Reading the book today, a different set of connections emerges. The FAMILY movement has elements of the Big Society, mixing comforting messages of a return to some ancient “normal” strengths with a drastic reduction of any supportive functions of the state. And in its ability to provoke a mixture of abhorrence and attraction in the population and to cross race lines in its activists whilst also pulling in racist votes, it foreshadows UKIP. Most presciently, and most worryingly (to me, anyway) is the combination of all state support to one Benefit, which can then be withdrawn from recalcitrant citizens. Universal Credit?

The story is told through the perspective of several women. First there is Lynn Byers, a journalist happily married to Derek, academic and sympathetic to feminism, who is unsure whether she wants children. Through her friend Marsha she becomes involved with a women’s collective squatting in a deserted tower block at the end of the street. Consciously anarchistic in its organisation, it is challenged by Posy, who wants more organisation and activism.

In society at large, FAMILY sees the true liberation of women revolving around respect and value for their role as nurturers. This contains feminist principles and is attractive to many voters. A battle for the hearts and minds of the public begins between the Collindeane Tower feminists and a FAMILY- dominated coalition government.

Relationships are broken as the battle lines are drawn. Marsha’s partner, David Laing, becomes a hardliner in the government as she moves into a relationship with Posy. An extreme strike by mothers is met by a government backlash, and the deteriorating social situation is used as a step to ever more authoritarian measures. A European-led experiment goes horribly wrong and Britain is left to pay for its belief that motherhood is an “insurable risk”.

I urge you to read this book. It is powerful because it describes the road to the dystopia rather than simply using it as an established setting – and at every stop along the way there is an acceptable argument for going on the route. Zoe Fairbairns excels at showing the ambiguities in politics of class, gender, medicine and/or multinationalism, and lets the true horror of where this can lead unfold inexorably.

Any faults? Those of any book of ideas, really, as exposition outweighs the more personal side of things. The relationships are there, and can pack an emotional punch (no spoilers, but the fates of Judy and Posy are very moving, as is Lynn’s story as the human core of the novel), but drop in between the descriptions of society’s tectonic shifts as time passes. That said, I can think of no other way to have structured this book, and such “faults” are nothing compared to its virtues.

“Benefits” is at least as important as it was in 1979, arguably more so, and needs to be read widely and seriously. Hence, five stars.

Benefits is an excellent feminist sci-fi book.

The story is riveting, stunning and compelling: the British government from the 1970s through the new millennium tries to "manage" its women using many of the typical tools of government: money, policy, social stigma -- and finally through medical control. A few strong personalities get involved to bring about chilling changes. Though written in the 1970s, the threat of such an event happening is very real and modern.

My only complaint is that development of the female characters is limited. In the decades in which the story takes place, the ideas and actions of the women -- especially the feminists -- remain stagnant, stuck in the mid-1970s. Government evolves, men evolve, but women don't, and hindsight of the modern reader sees a great disconnect in that lack of evolution. Even when I read this 25 years ago, I wondered how women could fail to evolve through time.

Do other readers of science fiction find this a universal issue throughout the genre, where later readings of beloved science fiction stories suffer in modern light?