Budget's "structural" deficit elimination con; create a Tahrir Square in London (after TUC demo on Sat 26 March); Very Democratic Socialism; AV referendum
Steve Wallis
forecast of £29 billion borrowing in 2015/16, up from the £18 billion
forecast apparently made in November (I missed that forecast then and
the BBC news yesterday didn't bother to report the new figure either).
Imagine my surprise when reading this morning's Guardian to find out
that Osborne claimed to be on course for eliminating "the structural
deficit" (ignoring the "cyclical" element which is higher during a
recession) the previous financial year, 2014/15, leaving scope for tax
cuts (or benefit rises, not that the Tories are likely to do this)
just before the 2015 general election! The £46 billion that year is
supposedly "structural".
Other forecasts by the supposedly independent Office of Budget
Responsibility estimate growth rising to 2.9% by the end of the
parliament. They can't have it both ways - if these growth figures are
reliable (most commentators think they're very optimistic), then we'll
be in a boom which surely should mean that the "structural" component
of the borrowing will actually be higher than £46 billion, rather than
£46 billion less!
But this slight of hand is nothing new - remember Gordon Brown with
his dodgy "golden rule", claiming that he was balancing the books when
he wasn't.
So this, it seems, is the Tories' master plan for the next election -
pretend the economy's doing well and bribe the electorate. But where
does that leave Labour, and the idea of waiting over four more years
and voting them in? All we'll have a choice of is Labour's "fiscal
stimuli" rather than the Tory/ConDem ones! And in the meantime,
there's massive cuts and redundancies, a two-year (at least) public
sector pay freeze (a big effective pay cut with inflation around 5%)
and attacks on pensions. Like with the poll tax, many workers won't be
able to afford to put up with such attacks, except perhaps by dropping
out of pension schemes altogether - no wonder many council workers are
accepting voluntary redundancy (but other jobs will be hard to come by
and there are big attacks on benefits for those who stay out of work).
All this means that there's even more reason to fight the ConDem
attacks, by going on tomorrow's national TUC demonstration in London
(on Saturday 26 March), occupying areas of London afterwards like in
Tahrir Square, and organising in your union for coordinated strike
action. This is the best chance to defeat these attacks, bring the
government down and possibly even trigger a socialist revolution
(reorganising society finally in the interests of ordinary, mainly
working class, people)!
I've included below a new newsletter that I finished writing
yesterday. If you're going on the demonstration, I'd particularly
welcome you printing and photocopying it to distribute, from www.PRsocialism.org.
Foundation for Proportional Representation-based Socialism
Website: www.PRsocialism.org Forum: tinyurl.com/PRsocialismforum
Newsletter 9 (23 March 2011)
"Budget for growth" - proof ConDem government can be forced to back
down!
UK Chancellor George Osborne delivered a budget on 23 March,
announcing small measures to boost growth, mainly helping big business
- including a 2% cut in corporation tax in April (encouraging them to
locate in the UK competing with other countries) and 21 "enterprise
zones" (if they locate in some parts of the UK competing with others).
What is remarkable is that Osborne predicted borrowing of £29 billion
in 2015/16, the year after the end of the parliament. Previously they
had said they would eliminate the deficit by the next election. Public
sector workers facing redundancy or a two (or possibly three) year pay
freeze and attacks on pensions can make them back down on those too!
26 March - create a Tahrir Square in London
Occupy Hyde Park / Trafalgar Square after demo
The demonstration on Saturday 26 March, organised by the Trades Union
Congress should be the springboard to a mass movement against the
ConDem coalition government's cuts.
Inspired by the pro-democracy activists in Egypt and elsewhere in the
Arab world, thousands of activists in Britain have indicated on the
internet that they will keep protesting in London for at least 24
hours after the demonstration ends in Hyde Park. Some plan to stay on
there; others to go to one of the points of a Pentacle at 5pm,
particularly Trafalgar Square. Camp out in London or stay up all
night, partying and discussing the way forward!
Coordinated strike action (perhaps starting with a one-day public
sector general strike escalating to all-out action) will be needed to
defeat the cuts, bring the government down and hopefully carry out a
revolution leading to a democratic socialist society.
For more information about direct action on 26 March, go to www.resist26.org
or www.battleofbritainmarch26.org.
Join the struggle for Very Democratic Socialism
The Facebook group at http://tinyurl.com/VDemSoc is intended to
discuss and work towards a very democratic form of socialism - in
which the government is elected by proportional representation, there
is workers' control of industry and there is an element of "direct
democracy" (whereby everyone in society can discuss and vote on
important issues, perhaps by referenda initiated by a petition signed
by some proportion/quantity of the electorate like in Switzerland).
Members of the group are free to make suggestions concerning how such
a future society would work, including the form of PR and what to do
when the government comes into conflict with workers' committees -
called "dual power" by Marxists (we advocate a permanent form of dual
power plus direct democracy or "permanent triple power").
Advocating a very democratic form of socialism is important to be
popular enough to win majority support (essential for a successful
revolution) and to avoid a counter-revolution if the masses regard
society as undemocratic afterwards.
Alternative Vote referendum - how should we vote?
There is a referendum on 5 May on adopting the alternative vote (AV)
electoral system in the UK. AV is not a system of proportional
representation. AV retains single-member constituencies from the
current first-past-the-post (FPTP) system but changes the marking of
ballots to '1, 2, 3' and so on in order of preference. If no candidate
gets 50 per cent of first preferences, the second preferences of the
candidate with the fewest votes are added to the other candidates'
totals. This process continues until one candidate has more than 50
per cent of the vote.
In a post on the Facebook group (see above section), Anna Chen pointed
out "the weakest candidates get their second preferences to count more
heavily than everyone else's." She also argued "AV encourages
consolidation of coalitions into two blocs and in the UK is more
likely to lead to permanent centre-right coalitions unless the Labour
Party and the Greens do a deal." In reply, Zack Murrell-Dowson argued
that parties "will have to appeal to more voters, not just a few
floating voters in a few floating constituencies. It will also mean
that people can vote for what they believe in rather than voting
against who they don't want in." He also argued "Imagine that I
support the Green Party. Under the present system, in my local
constituency voting the Green Party would be a wasted vote as a very
small minority of people vote for them, so I am not going to vote for
them. If I did, and it is a close race between the Labour and the
Conservative Party, by not voting for Labour, I would be helping the
Conservative Party."
Should we call for a YES or NO vote in the AV referendum? Should we
spoil our ballot papers, perhaps by writing "PR" on them? Or should we
avoid taking a position and leave it up to everyone's free will. Join
the debate on Facebook!
The above newsletter can be downloaded for printing, photcopying and
distribution (particularly welcome for the TUC national demo against
the cuts in London on Saturday 26 March - assemble 11am Victoria
Embankment) from http://www.PRsocialism.org.
--
Steve Wallis, Manchester, England
revolutionary...@yahoo.co.uk
http://www.socialiststeve.me.uk
http://facebook.com/socialiststephen - the main site I currrently use
for social networking
http://twitter.com/socialiststeve - my tweets are mainly on politics
or football (you don't need to join Twitter to view them)
http://www.revolutionaryplatform.net/newforum - my web-based forum
http://soundcloud.com/stephen-wallis - best site I know for music
http://youtube.com/user/galaxiasteve - for videos
http://myspace.com/galaxiasteve - for music and videos
http://bebo.com/SteveW519 and http://socialiststeve.multiply.com -
other social networking sites
http://www.revolutiondestroyed.net - my ongoing on-line autobiography
"Revolution Destroyed? Have I ensured that a world socialist
revolution will never happen?"