22nd October 2022
Kier Starmer – pleasing the markets not enough
The chaos in British ruling circles took another turn towards pantomime this week, with Liz Truss emerging from under her desk to resign as Prime Minister and the will he, won’t he speculation about the possible return of Boris Johnson. The fact that Johnson’s last stint ended ignominiously and that he is still under investigation for misleading Parliament, barely seems to be touching the radar. Add to that his mishandling of the pandemic, presiding over the highest death rate from COVID 19 in Europe, and any rational person would not rate his chances highly.
However, Tory MPs and the membership at large, if 160,000 members can be described as large, do not do rational. Otherwise, why elect Johnson in the first place? Why go on to elect Liz Truss as his replacement? Why even contemplate Johnson’s return?
The main driving force for Tory MPs is to retain their seats in Parliament. They will not vote according to anything resembling conscience or principle, anathema to Tory MPs anyway, but purely out of self interest. With a General Election little more than two years away the Parliamentary Conservative Party will be looking to the candidate who can best please the markets, the real power behind the British economy, and who can best translate the current mess into a recovery narrative which can be sold to the British public, in the face of the ongoing economic crisis.
Johnson has won elections before, many will think he can win them again.
Other hats are likely to be in the ring, with Penny Mordaunt and Rishi Sunak being the main potential contenders, alongside a possible return for Johnson. Whatever the uncertainties currently swirling around the party of the ruling class there are some certainties which the majority of the country can be sure will take centre stage.
The crisis in social care continues to deepen, with a shortage of 300,000 staff nationally and hospital beds taken up with many who are medically fit but cannot leave, due to the lack of availability of care packages. The squeeze on public spending is set to continue which will mean little respite for the NHS in real terms and none for local government, traditionally at the sharp end of Tory spending cuts.
Between 2010 and 2020 councils did most of the heavy lifting in terms of public sector cuts with a £15 billion real terms reduction in their budgets. The Local Government Association (LGA) estimate that,
“Spiralling inflation, increases to the National Living Wage and higher energy costs have added at least £2.4 billion in extra costs onto the budgets councils set in March this year. Since then, inflation has risen further.”
The LGA go on to point out that, if nothing changes, “councils are facing a funding gap of £3.4 billion in 2023/24 and £4.5 billion in 2024/25.”
Massive figures for sure but how do they translate in terms of real services to communities? The day to day work of emptying bins; filling pot holes in roads; providing arts, library and sports facilities; addressing social care for adults and children; and tackling homelessness, all become threatened once more.
Chancellor Jeremy Hunt, the last roll of the dice by Liz Truss, has already indicated that public spending cuts are coming. Whether or not Hunt survives in the Treasury makes no difference. The Tories are not going to tax the rich, nationalise the energy sector, railways or mail services to make them more efficient, or impose any constraints on the gambling activities of the City of London. They are not even going to cut the basic rate of income tax by 1p!
While inflation ramps up to 10.1% and energy bills soar for the winter, there can be little doubt that for many people who leads the Tory Party and, for that matter, who is Prime Minister is nothing more than a sideshow. The party of the rich, for the rich, run by the rich, will continue to do what it must to keep the rich in their positions of privilege, while the majority struggle to make ends meet.
Calls for a General Election are growing but it is hard to see why the Tories would concede this, unless they are set on political suicide, based upon current poll ratings. That can only mean that mass extra parliamentary action is more important than ever, to support the growing wave of strike action against meagre pay offers, to resist the looming cuts in public services, and to pressurise the Labour Party into taking a more radical stand in defence of the working class.
As things stand the manifesto of Labour going into a General Election could be summed up in one line, ‘Anything to please the markets’. When it comes to the crunch that will not be good enough. What is needed for the benefit of the working class is not pleasing the markets but radical action to transform the economy towards investment in health, homes, schools and jobs.
It will mean ditching the wasteful spending on Trident submarines and redirecting that money into socially useful investment, creating more jobs than nuclear submarines or warheads ever could. Doctors, dentists and decent homes over weapons of mass destruction; a better starting point than ‘anything to please the markets.’
Avanti Populo 