UK

BMA takes apart Rishi Sunak’s claim that strikes are to blame for NHS waiting lists with a single fact

Basit Mahmood

13 June, 2024 

Left Foot Forward 

“Rishi Sunak seems confused about his pay dispute with doctors."    

Rishi Sunak is continuing to face a backlash for his claim during the leaders debate on Sky News yesterday that doctors’ strikes were to blame for high NHS waiting lists.

The Prime Minister was forced to admit by Sky’s Beth Rigby yesterday that he had failed on his pledge to reduce the waiting lists.

“Yes it has”, Sunak said about waiting lists rising, however he insisted it was going down, but not before taking a dig at striking NHS doctors.

“It’s now going down, the plan is working, we’ve resolved the industrial action,” Sunak said.

He went on to say: “You had a question from a junior doctor earlier.. I think everyone knows the impact the industrial action has had”.

His answer led to boos from the audience and the backlash to his comments has continued.

The British Medical Association (BMA), has also condemned Sunak, pointing out crucially that waiting lists were already at a record high before any strikes started.

The BMA posted on X: “Rishi Sunak seems confused about his pay dispute with doctors.

“Strikes are NOT to blame for waiting lists, which were already at a record high before any strikes started.

“And junior doctors are NOT the only group in dispute, as he’s already been reminded.”

Basit Mahmood is editor of Left Foot Forward

Leaders Debate: Audience boos Rishi Sunak as he blames striking NHS workers for waiting list rises

Hannah Davenport

12 June, 2024 

Left Foot Forward 

Excruciating exchange as Sunak is confronted over rising NHS waiting lists

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Rishi Sunak was grilled by Beth Rigby about the Tory Party’s dire record on NHS waiting lists and, in an excruciating exchange, he was forced to confront the fact that he failed on his pledge to reduce the waiting lists.

“Yes it has”, Sunak said about waiting lists rising, however he insisted it was going down, but not before taking a dig at striking NHS doctors.

“It’s now going down, the plan is working, we’ve resolved the industrial action,” Sunak said.

He went on to say: “You had a question from a junior doctor earlier.. I think everyone knows the impact the industrial action has had”.

Following this statement audible groans and loud boos could be heard from the audience.

“So it’s the doctor’s fault,” Rigby said.

Rishi Sunak looked uncomfortable however went on to double down on his statement, saying that since resolving most of the industrial disputes, “what you’re now seeing is numbers coming down”.

To which Rigby replied: “I might have not done brilliantly at maths at school but I know that 7.2m to 7.5m is going up.”

Her response received laughter and applause from the audience.

“An NHS for people not profit” – Green Party co-leader rails against NHS privatisation in leaders’ debate

Chris Jarvis 

13 June, 2024 
 Left Foot Forward

Carla Denyer also called for more investment in the NHS

The first question of the second seven-way televised general election debate focussed on how political parties are planning to fix Britain’s creaking NHS and public services.

During the debate, the Green Party’s co-leader Carla Denyer criticised the role of privatisation in the health service and made the case for a publicly owned NHS.

Responding to the question, Denyer said: “The NHS is in crisis. And the Conservatives’ answer of a workforce plan doesn’t help when they’re refusing to pay healthcare workers properly. They’re pouring water into a leaky bucket because people are leaving the service for better pay and better conditions elsewhere.

“It also doesn’t help what Labour are proposing – opening the door to more privatisation in our health service. The answer is investment, and that’s why the Green Party is clear that we would make transformative investment into not only the NHS, but also social care which helps to take pressure off the NHS.

“The Green Party will always stand for an NHS for people not profit.”

The debate is being broadcast on ITV.

UK    

 Election debate: These are the four parties that said they want to cut immigration

Chris Jarvis 

13 June, 2024 

Left Foot Forward

They were asked to raise their hands if they think 

legal migration should fall

Representatives of Britain’s seven biggest parties have been participating in a general election debate on ITV. In one of the major moments of the debate, they were each asked whether they wanted to see migration to the UK fall.

The debate’s moderator – Julie Etchingham – said to the panel: “Please raise your hand if you think the net level of legal migration – that is the additional number of people coming to the country to work and live – needs to fall.

Labour’s deputy leader Angela Rayner, the Liberal Democrats’ deputy leader Daisy Cooper raised her hand, the Tories’ leader of the House of Commons Penny Mordaunt, and Reform UK leader all raised their hand.

The Green Party’s Carla Denyer, the SNP’s Stephen Flynn, and Plaid Cymru’s Rhun ap Iorwerth did not.

Following the exercise, Flynn branded the position of Labour, the Tories, the Lib Dems and Reform UK as reflecting “the Westminster status quo”.

Chris Jarvis is head of strategy at Left Foot Forward

UK
How trade unions reacted to Labour’s manifesto

Hannah Davenport 

14 June, 2024 
Left Foot Forward


Labour’s pledges received praise, but also warnings that it hasn’t gone far enough for some leading unions  

Unions have taken Labour’s manifesto as a welcome change to 14 years of Conservative ‘destruction’ and attacks on workers’ rights, however it comes amid warnings that the party’s pledges must go further to address shortfalls in its offer to public services.

The GMB union said the manifesto “offers a vision of hope” referring to the New Deal for Working People as a “once in a generation chance to completely transform the lives of working people.”

Labour has committed to implement a New Deal for Working People, introducing legislation within 100 days, which would represent a massive change to employment law in the UK, if implemented fully.

Critics have pointed out that there is no mention of repealing anti-union legislation in the manifesto, although it’s a prominent commitment in the New Deal plan. The document is however a watered down version of the original 2021 document which has angered trade unions.

Labour affiliated union Usdaw, which represents retail workers, also welcomed the manifesto saying the “pro-business, pro-worker” document will deliver ‘desperately needed’ change.

But Unite’s General Secretary Sharon Graham has said Labour’s proposals are “not likely to be enough”.

Unite was the only affiliated union not to endorse Labour’s manifesto. It said ‘red lines’ were broken, specifically on Labour’s revision to promises on workers’ rights and banning new licences for oil and gas exploration in the North Sea without having a concrete plan for jobs.

“To fix Britain after years of Tory neglect is going to need more money and there are clear choices to be made. Whilst we all want growth and Labour’s proposed changes may move the dial somewhat – that alone is not likely to be enough,” said Graham.

However the UK’s largest union UNISON was more hopeful, with General Secretary Christina McAnea saying the manifesto offers a “clear plan for the future”.

She said it was “gimmick-free and “full of costed measures designed to make a real difference to people’s lives at work, at school or at home”. McAnea highlighted the manifesto promise for a fair pay agreement in social care and the pledge to create a national care service.

The Royal College of Nursing has praised the manifesto for making “strong commitments” to repealing anti-trade union legislation and improving workers’ rights, however the union said it didn’t go far enough in terms of investment in the nursing profession and services.

The RCN said it would seek negotiations ‘immediately’ this summer (if Labour win) to get greater reassurance on plans to retain NHS staff and for fairer pay.

On schools, the National Education Union welcomed the party’s commitment to education and securing economic growth, however it warned that there was “no indication.. that current cuts to education will be reversed”.

The union also noted that tackling child poverty should be a central concern for the next government and, while it welcomed Labour’s commitment to introduce free school breakfast clubs for primary school children, it urged the party to commit to removing the two-child benefit cap.

Promising to “hold Labour’s feet to the fire” over its commitment to strengthening workers’ rights, the Fire Brigades Union said “it will be our duty to ensure a new Labour government makes good on these promises within the first 100 days of taking power”.

Hannah Davenport is news reporter at Left Foot Forward

UK

Why the conspiracy of silence from our political parties when it comes to corporate greed?

Prem Sikka 

14 June, 2024 

Columnist Left Foot Forward 

Political parties stigmatise people for claiming welfare support but pay no attention of the spiralling cost of corporate welfare which is enriching shareholders and company executives

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Election manifestos of all political parties are out as the battle for votes intensifies.

Just like the Conservatives, Labour is planning to squeeze the sick, disabled and poor by cutting benefits though it is dressed-up in vague words. There is no plan to reverse the two-child benefit cap and lift children out of poverty. There is a commitment to “reviewing Universal Credit”, plan “to support more disabled people and those with health conditions into work” and allusions to new “Work Capability Assessments”. Labour has shunned new taxes on the rich or corporations and committed to reduced borrowing, the self-imposed fiscal rules will inevitably squeeze welfare spending. The Resolution Foundation estimates that Labour will need to impose spending cuts of £18bn on unprotected departments such as transport, justice and the Home Office. The real value of welfare payments won’t be maintained.

Of course, any political party can (re)examine public spending and consider welfare reforms but the consequence for individuals and households are not spelled out. All major parties are united in silence on the size of the corporate welfare programme, its effect on the public purse, taxes, household budgets, inflation and more. There is no plan to review subsidies, grants and handouts or protect households from profiteering by companies exploiting their dominant market position.

Big business funds political parties, hands consultancy jobs to legislators and its interests are deeply embedded into the political system. Ever since the 1980s, under the influence of business-funded think-tanks the state has been reconstructed. Instead of directly investing in new industries, such as information technology, biotechnology and aerospace, it has become a guarantor of corporate profits. Numerous publicly-owned entities, such as water, rail, mail, oil, gas and care homes, have been privatised at knock-down prices and eventually sold to foreign investors. This has been accompanied by outsourcing of public services, the private finance initiative (PFI) and corporate bailouts.

Banks are a classic example. At the height of the 2007-08 financial crash, the state suddenly found £1,162bn of cash and guarantees (£133bn cash + £1,029bn of guarantees) to bail out ailing banks. To assist capital markets and speculators it also conjured up £895bn of quantitative easing. In 2022, compensation of £120m was handed to investors in London Capital and Finance. Finance industry profits remain privatised and the cap on bankers’ bonus, which was designed to curb reckless risk-taking, has been scrapped. The economy is yet to fully recover from the bailouts.

Between 2015 and 2023 renewable energy sector received £60bn in public subsidies. Fossil fuel companies for the same period received £80bn. In return, the people don’t own anything. Companies keep the resulting assets and income streams.

In 2022-23, the energy price spike threatened to increase fuel poverty and bad debts of energy companies. The government could have acted to reduce profit margins of energy companies, but didn’t. It instead handed over £78bn to energy companies. British Gas increased its profits ten-fold. BP and shell more than doubled their profits. Under public pressure £39.9bn was recouped through windfall taxes on energy producers. The state is still committed to footing some £24bn of the cost of decommissioning oil and gas rigs through a variety of tax reliefs. Drax burns wood from forests to produce electricity and is contracted to receive subsidy of £10.4bn for the period 2012-2027. Oil giant Equinor could receive subsidies of £3.75bn.

The state routinely hands out hard cash to businesses which were privatised. Avanti West Coast managers famously referred to this as “free money” and “too good to be true”. In the last decade, privatised train companies have received subsidy of over £75.2bn. Labour’s manifesto promises to bring rail companies into public ownership. However that commitment only applies to passenger operating companies and excludes lucrative freight and rolling stock companies.

The government has given £500m to Jaguar and Land Rover for production of batteries for electric vehicles. £500m has been handed to Tata Steel and another £500m to Jingye Steel. The government has provided £5bn subsidy to telecom companies to persuade them to provide internet services to rural areas.

Bailouts, cash, grants and subsidies are not the only avenues of corporate welfare. There are 1,180 tax reliefs, but just 365 have official costings. Many are given to corporations to achieve some economic or social objectives but there is little monitoring. The Chancellor stated that Research and Development (R&D) tax reliefs had been subject to “abuse and fraud. In 2020-21, R&D losses due to error and fraud were £1.13bn. A former head of HMRC urged the government to scrap the “entrepreneurs’ relief”, costing £2bn a year, because it provided “no incentive for real entrepreneurship”.

In 2014, the government created the video games tax relief for games with “culturally British accreditation”. Companies adopted creative strategies to claim the relief. Games such as “Batman”, “Goat Simulator”, “Grand Theft Auto” and “Sonic the Hedgehog” could hardly be described as “culturally British” but received tax relief. James Bond films receive massive subsidies from the UK taxpayers, but the company behind it routinely declares losses and pays little or no corporation tax.

The National Audit Office noted that “there are too many examples where these reliefs either do not achieve their economic objectives or are subject to significant error and fraud, costing the Exchequer billions of pounds. … We have seen examples of tax reliefs where the costs have increased quickly … the government cannot know the cause if it has not carried out adequate compliance work to ensure only legitimate claimants received the reliefs”.

Corporate welfare programmes allow corporations to ride roughshod over workers and customers. Some 4.1m UK workers are in precarious jobs as the use of zero hour contracts and fire and rehire has proliferated. Real average wage is lower than in 2008. People use foodbanks, charity and social security benefits to make ends meet. 38% of the people on Universal Credit are in employment. Their wages are being subsidised by the public purse whilst corporate profit margins have soared.

Water companies have long been permitted to abuse customers. The pricing formula used by water regulator OFWAT guarantees real returns to companies each year. It takes no account of the quality of water or sewage dumping. Too many internet and mobile phone companies are increasing customer bills by the rate of inflation + 3.9% each year even though there is no real increase in their operating costs. It is a similar story at Royal Mail, which was privatised in 2013. At the time of privatisation, first-class postage stamp cost 60p and second-class 50p. Some 11 years later, the first-class postage has rocketed to £1.35 and second-class to 85p, an increase of 70%-125%. The frequency of mail delivery has declined. Royal Mail only meets 74.5% of its targets but that hasn’t persuaded regulators to curb price rises. The companies are effectively raising capital from consumers, whilst companies and shareholders own the resulting assets and receive returns.

The public purse is gouged by drug companies selling medicines to the NHS at inflated prices. For example, a pharmaceutical company charged the NHS £80 for a single pack of tablets that had previously cost less than £1. Another inflated the price of hydrocortisone tablets by more than 10,000% compared with the original branded version.

Companies are allowed to manufacture and sell deadly products certain to inflict disability and premature death. For example, tobacco, alcohol, ultra-processed foods and fossil fuels kill 2.7m people a year in Europe. Neither shareholders nor companies bear the social cost, which falls on society. The public purse funds social irresponsibility and effectively transfers wealth from people to companies.

The Public Accounts Committee reported that the government lost up to £28.5bn to fraud and error in procurement of personal protective equipment (PPE) due to lax checks and controls. A Treasury Minister resigned live in the Lords and accused the government of “arrogance, indolence and ignorance” in its attitude to tackling fraud. He added that banks handing out Covid loans “have been assisted by the Treasury, who appear to have no knowledge or little interest in the consequences of fraud to our economy or our society …Schoolboy errors were made: for example, allowing over 1,000 companies to receive bounce-back loans that were not even trading when Covid struck.”

Political parties stigmatise people for claiming welfare support but pay no attention of the spiralling cost of corporate welfare which is enriching shareholders and company executives. Public services are being cut to fund corporate welfare. Successive governments have failed to publish the full cost of corporate subsidies, grants and tax reliefs and there is considerable fraud. There is little monitoring to check that the handouts deliver the assumed economic objectives. As long as political parties are funded by corporations, there is little chance of critical scrutiny of corporate welfare programmes.

Prem Sikka is an Emeritus Professor of Accounting at the University of Essex and the University of Sheffield, a Labour member of the House of Lords, and Contributing Editor at Left Foot Forward.

UK

EXCLUSIVE: Vote share of two main parties hits historic low three weeks from polling day

Hannah Davenport

14 June, 2024 
General Election

Left Foot Forward 

Compass calls on Labour to reform the voting system 'no longer fit for purpose'

The combined vote share for the two main parties has hit a historic low for this point in the election race, analysis from Compass has revealed.

The progressive, cross-party campaign group compared vote share data from three weeks before polling day in each election since 1951, and found that the vote share for Labour and the Conservatives three weeks before polling day has dropped to a historic low.

Compass said the findings reveal a “deep discontent” from voters at the binary choice and argued that the voting system is no longer fit for purpose. It has called on Labour, should the party win the election, to introduce a voting system that better represents the changing, multi-party face of democracy in the UK.

Opinion polls from the four days leading up to and including June 13th 2024 put the combined share of Labour and Conservative votes at 60.8%. It’s a significant 10% lower compared to the previous lowest figure in 2005, which had the average vote share for the two main parties three weeks ahead of polling day at 71%.

It continues a trend in the long-term decline in vote share for the two main parties. In 1955 Labour and the Conservatives held nearly 97% of the vote. While the analysis shows that this has steadily gone down ever since.

Compass has argued for an end to the First Past the Post (FPTP) system which means the main battle in elections will always be between the two major parties, and means parties can win seats with as little as 35% of the vote.

A Compass spokesperson said: “The never-ending doom loop of First Past the Post locks voters into an abusive cycle where they are constantly forced to pick between two parties they clearly don’t have any enthusiasm for. But fewer and fewer are now doing so.”

The group is campaigning to elect progressive candidates who are committed to reforming the electoral system by introducing proportional representation, which Compass said was “the key to unlocking democracy.”

This general election Compass has secured more than 30 endorsements of PR-supporting candidates with its Win As One campaign.

Hannah Davenport is news reporter at Left Foot Forward

Politicians urged to save UK grassroots music venues and libraries, by urgently investing in the arts

Gabrielle Pickard-Whitehead 

15 June, 2024 

Left Foot Forward

'There comes a point where there’s no fat left to trim.'

Ahead of the general election, politicians from all parties are being urged to take action to help save the UK’s music and library sectors from a deepening crisis.

Small music venues are being decimated in Britain. In 2023, 125 venues abandoned live music, and more than half shut entirely due to financial pressure. Soaring utility bills and an average 37.5 percent hike in rent have put the surviving 835 venues at risk. During the same period, remaining venues typically secured profits of just 0.5 percent.

These alarming figures were gathered by the Music Venues Trust (MVT), a charity which represents Grassroots Music Venues (GMVs) across the UK. Its latest annual report found that the grassroots scene remains “significantly underfunded compared to other areas of culture”, despite contributing over £500m to the economy and employing almost 30,000 people.

Separate figures from the Night Time Industries Association (NTIA) show that the UK has lost five nightclubs “every week” in 2024 so far.

Ahead of the forthcoming general election, the MVT has launched a ‘Manifesto for Grassroots Music,’ setting out steps that need to be taken to stop the closure of more GMVs, which are currently running at one per week.

The report calls for the abolition of VAT on GMV tickets and a review of the business rates paid by venues in the sector. It is also asking for a £1 grassroots investment contribution from every arena and stadium ticket sold to support grassroots music, venues, artists and promoters. The £1 levy from every arena and stadium ticket sold for events over a 5,000 capacity was suggested by the recent Culture, Media & Sport Select Committee recommendations as a potential solution to the UK’s dwindling number of small-scale music venues.

The move would mimic the French system where there is a centralised pot of about €200m (£172m) that venues, artists, and promoters can apply for, which is funded by a levy on the gross value of tickets sold at big venues.

Urging politicians to act now, Sophie Brownlee, External Affairs Manager at Music Venue Trust, said:

“The Manifesto is being delivered to every prospective MP in the country with the request that they come out in support of it as part of their campaign to be elected.

“Music communities across the country will also be asking the candidates where they stand on the future of live music in our towns and cities. The time to act is now.”

The Greater Manchester mayor, Andy Burnham has spoken out in support of the proposed plan, including the £1 levy and the VAT cut.

“Music Venue Trust has been instrumental in supporting UK grassroots venues. I’ve seen many of my favourite bands in some of these spaces, and they play a key role in the night-time economy and music scene of Greater Manchester and the wider UK.

“I fully support the recommendations published by the Culture, Media & Sport Select Committee including the introduction of a levy and a targeted VAT cut to halt the rising tide of closures. However, it’s clear that urgent action is needed to support venues and the talented artists playing them,” he added.

Alongside music venues, the fate of Britain’s libraries has also been raised as we approach the general election. Since the Conservatives came to power in 2010, council budgets have been increasingly stretched, with successive central governments cutting grant funding. Since the onset of austerity, council spending on libraries, culture, heritage and tourism, has reduced by almost £500m, as the latest review from County Councils Network (CCN) found. Facing increased financial pressure, local authorities have regularly seen libraries as an easy place to make savings. In the last 14 years, spending on libraries has fallen by almost half (47.9%) since 2010.

“For the last 10 years libraries have had to do more with less,” says James Gray, marketing and advocacy manager for the charity Libraries Connected. “There comes a point where there’s no fat left to trim.”

The challenges UK libraries face was highlighted at the Manchester City of Literature’s Festival of Libraries 2024. The annual event celebrates Greater Manchester’s 133 libraries. The five-day programme of arts, culture, information and technology is supported by Arts Council England and includes a series of talks with high-profile advocates of libraries and literacy.

Actor Christopher Eccleston was among the speakers. Addressing an audience at Stockport Central Library on June 13, Eccleston shared his passion for libraries and books and highlighted some of the challenges libraries face, including funding cuts. He noted how Britian needs to proper arts funding system in place like the French and he hoped that there will be more change of getting arts on the agenda with the new government.

“As an actor, words are the tools of my trade. When I was growing up in Salford the local library provided a vibrant lifeline to the wider world. Libraries feed people’s interests and passions and provide access leading to connections being forged,” said Eccleston.

Caroline Kelly, the festival’s Creative Director, said the objective of the festival is to let people know that libraries are free and for the people. She told Left Foot Forward:

“These vital community spaces offer so much more than just books. They provide free internet and anything from music gigs, poetry nights, drama classes, yoga sessions, murder mystery, history, business advice and access to the arts. Libraries are such an essential service that should not be cut or underfunded, especially in these times.

“Maxine Peake and Chris Eccleston, who both spoke at the festival, said they would not be where they are now with their local library whilst growing up.”

Actors Imelda Staunton and Olivia Colman have also called for urgent political support for the arts in light of research by Equity suggesting funding in the UK has dropped by 16 percent since 2017.

“I want to see all parties promising much more on the arts. They are not just a ‘nice to have’, they are essential to the thriving, confident country we all want to live in,” said Staunton.

Gabrielle Pickard-Whitehead is a contributing editor to Left Foot Forward

Almost 70,000 sign Stop Arming Israel campaign, as ministers come under increased pressure to act

Gabrielle Pickard-Whitehead 

Yesterday
Left Foot Forward

‘We’re supporting this important case because of the UK’s refusal to abide by its international legal obligations and suspend arms transfers to Israel.’

Newly released government figures show that between the Hamas attack on October 7 and May 31, the UK issued more than 100 arms export licences to Israel.

The figures, which were disclosed by the business department in response to heightened parliamentary scrutiny, found that out of the 108 licenses issued, 37 were classified as military and 63 as non-military, which may include telecommunications equipment intended for use by the Israel Defence Forces (IDF).

The data shows that during the period, no arms export licence application was rejected or revoked. In December, April, and May, three separate decisions were made by ministers to reject calls to suspend arms to Israel. Ministers claim that such decisions are consistent or in line with legal advice.

But multiple campaign groups and international bodies claim that Israel’s use of military equipment in Gaza, which has killed more than 36,700 Palestinians since October 7, risks breaching international humanitarian law. Two leading human rights organisations, Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch, have announced their intention to join a judicial review claim regarding arms sales. This claim has been initiated by the Global Legal Action Network and Al-Haq, a Palestinian human rights group.

Sacha Deshmukh, Amnesty International UK’s chief executive, said: “We’re supporting this important case because of the UK’s refusal to abide by its international legal obligations and suspend arms transfers to Israel.

“There’s a mountain of evidence showing that Israeli forces are committing war crime after war crime in Gaza, going back well before last October.”

Yasmine Ahmed, the director of UK Human Rights Watch, said that the right way to approach Israel’s commitment to “comply with IHL [international humanitarian law) is not by reference to Israel’s subjective interpretation of its compliance with IHL, but by an objective interpretation of what IHL actually requires.”

Oxfam has accused the UK government of being complicit in the catastrophe in Gaza by continuing to sell arms to Israel. The charity has written an open letter to the Trade Secretary and Foreign Secretary, urging the government to stop arming Israel.

“Together we are urging you to immediately halt arms licences and exports to the Government of Israel. This is just one crucial step towards helping to secure a permanent and immediate ceasefire for all Palestinians and Israelis,” the letter states.

The open letter, calling for an end to arms sales, and for an immediate, permanent ceasefire, has been signed by almost 70,000 people.

On June 3, activists dropped a banner from Westminster Bridge calling on the Labour leader Keir Starmer to commit to ending arms sales to Israel, if he becomes prime minister.

Palestine Solidarity Campaign Director, Ben Jamal, called on Starmer “to make clear if he takes international law seriously. If he does, then the course of action is clear – a Labour government would end arms sales to Israel.”

“No ethical or principled government would continue to supply arms to a genocidal state,” said Jamal.


Gabrielle Pickard-Whitehead is a contributing editor to Left Foot Forward

Opinion
This is how you can put Palestinian rights on the agenda in the general election

Peter Leary

14 June, 2024 

LEFT FOOT FORWARD

Palestine Solidarity Campaign are asking parliamentary candidates to stand up for Palestine

Next month, people across Britain will go to the polls to elect a new parliament and government. Before they do, many will be sizing up the candidates to see who will best stand up for their values. Millions of people care deeply about human rights and the principles of freedom and justice and stand in opposition to racism and institutionalised discrimination. They expect the same standards from political representatives. An urgent new intervention launched by the Palestine Solidarity Campaign (PSC) aims to help voters to make an informed choice.

This General Election has been called at a moment when Palestinians are confronting one of the darkest moments in their history. More than 37,000 Palestinians in the Gaza Strip having been killed in what the International Court of Justice (ICJ) has accepted as a plausible case of genocide. The prosecutor of the International Criminal Court (ICC) is seeking arrest warrants for Israel’s Prime Minister and Defence Minister alongside Hamas leaders, for crimes against humanity, including the use of starvation as a weapon of war. It also comes in the wake of an unprecedented series of massive mobilisations including fifteen major marches so far in London.

This year, Palestine will be an electoral issue to an extent that Britain has never seen before. Opinion polls have consistently pointed to overwhelming support among the public for a ceasefire in Gaza, as well as meaningful actions to hold Israel to account such as a halt to arms sales. Unfortunately, public sentiment has largely been ignored in Westminster. Too many politicians still make excuses for Israel’s horrific violence. In November, the only occasion that MPs have voted on a motion calling for a ceasefire, just 125 out of 650 were prepared to insist on an end to the killing.

To address this democratic deficit, PSC is calling on its supporters to use a new online tool to write to the candidates who are standing in their constituency. In conjunction with our Palestinian partners, we have drawn up a set of concrete actions that we are asking parliamentary candidates to commit to if elected. Politicians in Britain have a moral and legal responsibility to end their complicity, take steps to prevent genocidal acts, and use their influence to bring Israel’s violence to a stop. Alongside supporting an immediate ceasefire, an arms embargo, and the restoration of British funding to the aid and refugee support agency UNRWA, we are asking prospective MPs to commit to halt all moves to enhance trade with Israel and implement an immediate ban on trade with illegal Israeli settlements. We ask that they support the work of the international courts to hold Israel to account for violations of international humanitarian law and protect our right to advocate for Palestinian rights through protest, boycotts, and divestment. We will publish candidates answers in full on our website to assist voters with their decision.

Although we expect the impact of Gaza on the election to be especially strong in some places – urban areas, university towns, and seats with a higher proportion of Palestinian, Muslim and minority ethnic voters – right across the country there has been sustained action in support of Palestinian rights in recent months.

Israel’s current campaign of genocidal violence against the Palestinian people in Gaza is built on the foundations of decades of violations of Palestinian rights by Israel in which successive British governments have been complicit. Palestinians have the inalienable right to self-determination, including the right to return to their homes, and to be free from ​​discriminatory laws and racial domination. Any suggestion that, alone among peoples facing oppression around the world, Palestinians should be singled out and denied the right to appeal to people of conscience for support is wrong and must be rejected. With the election drawing near, we are urging all parties to demonstrate support for human rights and international law.

From the huge and historic London demonstrations to the smaller protests in towns and cities, from Penzance to the Orkney Islands, hundreds of thousands – like millions around the world – have taken to the streets to call for a ceasefire and justice for the Palestinian people. Now, we are taking the demands of that movement into the heart of this election campaign. In every single one of those places there are voters who will be looking closely at how candidates respond to our questions as they make up their minds about where to put their cross on 4 July.

You can use PSC’s online tool to write to candidates in your constituency here.

Check your previous MP’s record on standing up for Palestinian rights here.

Peter Leary is Deputy Director of Palestine Solidarity Campaign

Image credit: Socialist Appeal – Creative Commons

SPANISH STATE

After the European elections: reassembling an ecosocialist project

STATEMENT BY ANTICAPITALISTAS

TUESDAY 11 JUNE 2024, BY ANTICAPITALISTAS

The results of the European elections are a snapshot of the balance of forces and the current situation: the extreme right is advancing on a European scale, the parties of the extreme centre continue to retreat, but maintain their relative positions, the left remains in last place. After the rise and capitulation of the forces of the anti-neoliberal left that emerged after the 2008 anti-crisis mobilizations, the pendulum has swung and a situation of reaction is emerging.

These European elections have been marked by the rise of militarism and the EU’s support for genocide in Palestine. Undoubtedly, there have been strong mobilizations in support of the resistance of the Palestinian people. These are encouraging, but what predominates politically is the re-articulation of a strong neo-colonial consciousness.

The extreme right is growing on the basis of the policies of closed borders, racism that divide the working class from above, unifying the identity-based reaction in Europe. Between the war in the East and the fear of what comes from the South, Europe is retreating into a second-class imperialist policy and the constant degradation of living conditions and partial freedoms within the states. This preventive counter-revolution is the product of the failure of the left forces, which set the dynamic in the previous cycle. Let us not forget this: if we forget it, we will believe that this situation is inevitable. It is a difficult situation, but it is a product of politics: it is not magic.

The Spanish state is no stranger to this dynamic, albeit with a number of particularities. On the one hand, the restoration of the two-party system “with crutches” on the right and left is confirmed: the hegemony of the PSOE on the left, the consolidation of the PP on the right. Vox remains, but it has competition on its right, the platform “Se acabó la fiesta” of Alvise, a small neo-fascist gremlin, capable of combining hatred of migrants and misogyny, with the cult of figures like little Nicolás.

The left, subordinate to the PSOE but not part of it, lost hundreds of thousands of votes: Sumar won three seats and Podemos won two, albeit with percentages that a few years ago would have been considered, by those who celebrate them today, as synonymous with marginality.

Having briefly outlined the map, we at Anticapitalistas would like to raise some questions for debate:

 The rise of the extreme right is resisted by fighting the material, cultural and political factors that make it possible for these ideas to spread, not by adapting to them. But ideas are not fought with ideas alone: they are fought with social force. In these elections, the abstention rate was 50%, which partly indicates the disaffection of an important sector of the population with the political system. It is not a question of measuring everything in electoral terms: it is the absence of the most exploited and oppressed sectors from the political scene, including people of migrant origin, that determines this situation. Without “depassivising” the political situation and generating organizations that serve as fertile soil to seed a new situation, the far right will continue to use the systemic interstices to advance.

 The extreme right does not propose a change of political model, a break with the liberal regime, but rather the radicalization of its most harmful features for the popular classes. In this sense, the extreme right-extreme centre binomial feeds this dynamic in which the middle classes and their moral panics impose a political dynamic based on the downward defence of their relative positions in the world system in crisis. However monstrous and eccentric its ideological forms may be, this is at the heart of all reactionary politics.

 Social democracy, in the Spanish state, but also in other countries where it governs such as Germany, has encouraged, like most others, the war and border regime in which we are immersed. Without a real redistributive policy or major reforms to offer, its formal defence of liberties proves impotent or complicit in the face of fundamental democratic and social setbacks. In the Spanish state we know this well, first with the PSOE-Unidas Podemos government, now with Sumar: they have not been able to repeal the gag law, the racist policy continues, the legal and defensive frameworks of the working class have not been strengthened, public money is transferred to big business, relations with the genocidal state of Israel have not been broken.

 The big absentee in the public debate in these elections, at the programmatic level, has been the question of the destructive exhaustion of the capitalist system expressed through the ecological crisis. Green reformism seems exhausted, both in its alleged aesthetic freshness and at the ideological level, since its main task is to mediate between civil society and business in the field of capital accumulation. The left that denounces the most harmful effects of capitalism does so with the superficiality of those who refuse to explain the root causes of the enormous crisis underway. The construction of an ecosocialist political force is an imperative necessity in order to have an in-depth programme that denounces war, colonialism and the degradation of liberal “democracies” and, at the same time, allows us to provide ourselves with an alternative to the whole system, even if it is a minority today.

 The so-called Spanish left has disappointed many people with its results. From our point of view, electoral results are important, but they are not the central issue. The point is that they no longer represent any focus for radical change and transformation, they are groups whose methods, programmes and interests are alien to any proposal for profound change. Without a militant proposal aimed at building struggles and structures of popular organisation, they limit themselves to being propagandists for their electoral apparatuses, with the sole aim of governing with the PSOE. Without a programmatic horizon aiming at the ultimate goal of systemic change, their reformism is impotent and sterile. Without the honesty to engage in self-criticism, the effects of its policies are the spread of cynicism, sectarianism and weariness. And it burns many honest people who see them as a lesser evil and live trapped in the despair and impotence of politics without a horizon.

 Our priority is to continue and deepen the work of militant recomposition, implementation and promotion of struggles, reassembling our political project from an ecosocialist perspective, always open to collaboration with other sectors or sensibilities with which we share perspectives and objectives. Of course, from our point of view, elections are an important moment of political struggle and it is a real problem that there are no electoral options linked to forces that aspire to be revolutionary, internationalist, ecosocialist, feminist and anti-capitalist. We will not give up on tackling this task if the conditions are right. That said, in the short and medium term, we take on a series of tasks for the next phase, linked to further strengthening our organisation and popular movements.

 In the short term, it is necessary to continue to keep alive the pro-Palestinian mobilization, which has been on the streets for months with demonstrations, encampments, actions, etc. Because an electoralist and opportunist left, which only uses tragedies for election campaigns but does not commit itself in a militant way, building and sustaining broad movements, can get a few MPs, but will never be able to contribute decisively to the liberation of the working class and the oppressed. Palestine must remain our priority.

 Continue to work to build a big movement against war and capitalist austerity, putting militarization, colonialism and border closures at the centre of public debate. We seek to bind ourselves to the task of rebuilding grassroots movements, breaking with electoral parasitism and the logic of delegation, seeking the broadest unity in the field of trade union, neighbourhood and territorial struggle, from political independence, but without sectarianism of any kind, maintaining the balance between the firmness of principles and openness towards our class and its real expressions, seeking partial victories but fighting with the horizon of the ecosocialist revolution always present.

 Our aim is to build an ecosocialist and confederalist force capable of tackling the electoral question, and we believe that territorial experiences must be strengthened in this sense. No more big speeches about “winning”, we refuse to do it through personalist models or grandiloquent speeches without ambition, which only feed our own interests. We are in a moment of fight back and we must be able to nurture programmatic clarity and firmness. Projects that can be minority projects (although now, despite their self-promotion, the whole of the left to the left of the PSOE is also a minority), that are not subject to electoralist logic, totally independent of the official left, but open to people who want to fight a on all terrains against the ideology and programme of capital and that address the whole of the working classes. They should be a focus of resistance to a system guilty of genocide, misery and fear, whose only way out is to maintain itself on ecological disaster, authoritarianism and war.

Despite the current impasse, the global eco-social crisis will continue; to group together and fight, to discuss strategically, not to give in. That is why our analysis ends with Gramsci’s well-known, but no less necessary, phrase: “Organize yourselves because we’ll need all your strength.”

11 June 2024

Translated by International Viewpoint from Anticapitalistas.

P.S.

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• Anticapitalistas

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