Social Security or Welfare - loaded words

 

In the supplement to yesterday's Guardian, there was an article by Zoe Williams about the false "skivers v strivers" arguments peddled by Ian Duncan-Smith and other Coalition Ministers.

The comment was made that everyone now talks about welfare benefits rather than social security payments. I, too, did this in my piece the underserving rich earlier this week. Therefore, I have resolved that in future I will always refer to social secuity benefits.

Like most of the neo-liberal agenda and propoganda, talking of "welfare" as a derogatory term comes from the USA. It is used to demonise those who do not have a job or cannot work. It infers that there should be no sense that anyone should be entitled to financial support from the state. A few years ago, there was the abusive term "welfare mothers" applied to lone parents.

British politicians have anbandoned the historic term "social security", because it suggests that working people have an entitlement to benefits when they lose their jobs or become unable to work. The whole post war-settlement Welfare State, created by Labour, is being unpicked piece by piece.

I having heard that certain MPs, mainly Tories, are saying in private that they should have a 32% pay increase. As many people consider MPs to be skivers rather than strivers, I wonder how they would explain their sense of entitlement to their constituents?

The underserving rich?

How much longer will we tolerate the underserving rich?

 

I am dismayed that the Victorian notion of "the undeserving poor" is featuring in the current debate of the planned capping of welfare benefits. Even more sickening is that this slur is being made by millionaire Cabinet Ministers and the mouthpieces of the billionaire, right-wing newspaper proprietors.

 

Sadly, the whole "strivers not shirkers" rhetoric began when Labour started talking about "hard working families". Regrettably, this was taken from the same New Labour lexicon as "Middle England" and is just a code for the middle classes, designed to appeal to their prejudices. The underlying claim is that only professional, managerial and middle-income people - the Middle Class- are hard working.

 

Under the neo-liberal policies that have been pursued by governments since the 1990s, a virtual war has been declared on any sort of safety net of welfare benefits, through means testing and actual cuts. The post-war concept of universal benefits is a complete anaethema to neo-liberal politcians.

 

In today's world of tightly controlled media (controlled by the very rich and their apologists) there is no possibility of  a mature and rational discussion of the distribution of wealth, let alone the redistribution of it between rich and poor. I would throw in the concept of the underserving rich, and particularly their manifestation in the Cabinet of the Coalition Governement. How many of those currently on the Government's payroll are truly hardworking?  Is the inherited wealth enjoyed by many of the Cabinet actually deserved?

 

How does the practice of tax avoidance fervently pursued by the very rich, the use of tax havens and the off-shoring of their companies, make these individuals deserving. Of course they are all hardworking if we believe the lickspittle ring-wing press.

 

It puzzles me that supposedly 'progressive' Liberal Democrat Party supports this disgraceful state of affairs. I am at a loss to name one example of where their Ministers and MPs have reigned-in the malice of the Tories. Their collusion in the current round of benefit cuts is truly diabolical. I hope that they have signed their own electoral death warrant.

 

There is also the question of what the working classes can do defeat the Tories and Lib-Dems. A general strike by trade unions could force a change of government and policy, but this looks more and more unlikely by the week. The Labour Party is still in the hangover of the Blairite aspirational, fantasy politics. Ed Miliband's attempt to claim the "One Nation" tag is also a misjudgement, because the Tories always supported the rich man in his castle and keeping the the poor man at his gate. Labour Party members should start putting pressure on the Leadership to abandon their tacit support for the policies of austerity.

 

 

Vote Val Morris-Cook on 15th November!

I must admit that I have been less than enthusiastic about the elections for Police and Crime Commissioners (PCC). Personally, I would have preferred to see the retention of Police Authorities which were accountable via our elected councillors and county councillors. Cameron has branded them unelected and of not being sufficiently visible. So their powers has been put transferred to the PCC, whom will I assume set up their own structures.

The PCC powers involved are important: deciding the local police plan; setting the police budget: engaging with the local community; and the appointment/dismissal of the chief constable. You can see why the Tories are keen to vest these powers in people that are sympathetic or are actually Tory Party members. In my view, the underlying motive is to stop any resistance is cuts in the police service, which is one of the more bizarre austerity measures given the Tories' decades of 'tough on crime' posturing

I suspect that low turnout and voter indifference is key to Cameron's plans for gaining control of the PCCs. This is a dangerous and cavalier approach, as the ever opportunistic far-right have seen the chance to put up candidates. The thought of a far right candidate being elected is a terrifying prospect, and threatens recent advances in countering hate crimes against women, ethnic minorities and people with disabilities.

In Essex, we have the candidates of the main parties and independents. One independent, former police chief Mick Twaites, is being backed by the Lib Dems. I was amused the by the use of the old Sweeney catch-phrase "you're nicked" in Twaites' publicity, does he see himself as modern day Jack Reagan fighting the bureaucrats I wonder?

Of greater concern, is the candidate of the English Democrats. I know that they are a party of the right, but do not know how far over on the spectrum on right-wing politics they stand. Nevertheless, in this year's elections for Southend Borough Council several former BNP members stood as English Democrats. It is a truism that you can judge someone by the company that they keep.

I am fairly certain that I would not see eye-to-eye on many political issues with Val Morris-Cook. However, I believe that she is the best candidate to serve as PCC. As the ballot is on the basis of a supplementary vote, I urge everyone to cast their 1st vote for Val on 15th November. As for the 2nd vote, it's a pity Jack Reagan isn't standing!

                                                              Val Morris-Cook

A Future That Works

Why we are marching

20th October will see hundreds of thousands of people descend on London, Glasgow and Belfast in a unified show of strength against the government and its reckless austerity programme.

The PCS has been at the forefront of the unions calling for the TUC to organise these demonstrations to show that the opposition of the Trade Union Movement to the Government’s current policies has not gone away. For PCS members, it is our opportunity to express our anger over austerity pay; on paying more, working longer and getting less for our pensions; and job losses and our future job security.

In the Civil Service, and HMRC, we have faced a pay freeze since 2010. This will be followed two years of salary increases limited to 1%. On top of this there is the planned increase of pension contributions of 5.6% which is to be phased in over three years. Many colleagues are finding that they cannot make ends due to this onslaught on our living standards.

Austerity isn’t working!

Despite the savage cuts to the Public Sector, reductions in public services and pay restraint, the economy remains in recession. It is therefore the responsibility of trades unionists to call for a change in the economic policies of the Government.

The march for A Future That Works can be the moment when millions of working people can make their voice heard to the Government that their policies are failing and a new direction is urgently needed. The more members that attend the march and demonstration, the louder our voice is, the harder it will be for the politicians to ignore us.

Transport to London has been organised for supporters in Southend. You book a coach via the Southend against the Cuts website:

We need a future that works.  Will you join us?

Quantative Easing - who pays?

With hindsight, I wish that I had studied Economics at school or college. Perhaps I would now have a better understanding of the seemingly arcane theories and principles of the subject.

When I worked in the Basildon during the early 1980s, a number of my colleagues were Conservative supporters and, I believe, my team leader was actually a Tory Party member. One of their grievances against  James Callaghan's Labour Government was that they had "printed money", caused inflation and thereby damaged the economy. I was in a weak position to argue with them, but believed this was a Keynesian approach to create demand in the economy by increasing the supply of money.

I was a bit surprised when this policy was restarted by Alastair Darling, but now it was called "quantative easing". This seemed to be a break with the strict monetarist approach followed by New Labour since 1997. What was even more surprising was that George Osborne, then Shadow Chancellor, supported the policy. Did this mean that Tories now endorsed "printing money"? Apart John Redwood there seemed to be no wider criticism.

Today, I read in The Guardian that the Bank of England, and I quote, "will begin pumping a minimum of £5 billion n a month into City institutions to improve their liquidity". This a part of the response to the crisis in the Eurozone and to head-off a slump. As these "institutions" were responsible for creating the recession it seems a bit rich that they are now being bailed-out.

I know that the Bank of England can effectively "create" money, but the question is who will pay back these vast amounts?  I think we all know the answer, the working classes will face a generation or more of austerity policies for bailing out the bankers.

Labour National Executive Committee Elections

It is perhaps one of the few occasions, as a Labour Party member, when I can vote for socialist candidates in knowledge that there is a more than a fair chance that they will be elected. The continuing success of the leftwing Grassroots alliance, means that the Party machine can never completely expunge the views of the Left of the Party. This year, there is a very strong slate of candidates in the NEC elections for constituency representatives: Ann Black, Ken Livingstone, Kate Osamor, Christine Shawcroft, Darren Williams & Pete Willsman.

Of course to counter this there is a right-wing slate comprised of an uber-Blairite, a right-wing trade unionist and other similar career-minded individuals.

The NEC elections are important in that the rights of members in the constituencies are often steamrollered by the Party machine and it is imperative that we elect representatives who will speak out in defence of internal party democracy.

Without hesitation, I recommend that all Labour Party comrades vote for Black, Livingstone, Osamor, Shawcroft, Williams & Wiilsman,

Is it time to UNITE?

I have been a member of the Public & Commercial Services Unison (PCS) since it was founded in 1998. I did not vote for the merger that formed PCS, due to anti-democratic terms of the merger and the likelihood that the approach and policies of the then very right-wing CPSA leaders would be carried forward into the new union.

The election of Mark Serwotka as PCS General Secretary began the era of the activist led union that we have today. This very nearly did not come to pass, as the outgoing General Secretary mounted a coup to unseat Mark and take the union back to the days of right-wing domination. The coup ultimately failed, and since that time PCS has grown from strength to strength. In recent years, we have taken the high ground in the fightback against the Government’s austerity policies, dragging the TUC and more reluctant unions along behind us.

The PCS has been the most vocal opponent of the Government’s plans to slash public service pensions. The strike on 30^th November 2011 saw the largest number of public sector trade union members out on strike in a generation. Sadly, on 19^th December 2011, the TUC and UNSION leaderships took the decision to accept the Government’s ‘Heads of Agreement’ for public sector pension schemes. Seemingly, the PCS was left alone abandoned by our allies.

Moving forward to 2012, PCS balloted its membership for a national strike on 28^th March, and this was presented on the basis that the action would be taken with other unions. Despite, receiving a commanding majority for the action, PCS’ National Executive called off the action as no other unions were prepared to take national strike action on March 28^th. I, and many other colleagues, felt this was a mistake and to some extent undermined PCS strength as an independent trade union able to pursue its industrial aims on its own should it need to do so. A period of gloom was ended with a successful strike on May 10^th.

Earlier this week, Mark Serwotka addressed the PCS Revenue & Customs Group Conference on the way forward for our pension and other campaigns. I felt that there was a subtext to his comments, which could be interpreted as moving towards a merger with UNITE. He said the pension dispute cannot be won by PCS taking action alone and without the support of other unions. The PCS is now, due to job cuts in the Civil Service, losing both members and subscription income. This means the Union must review its spending and how it undertakes the task of representing members. The threat of privatisation and the introduction of private sector providers to undertake Civil Service, means a further decrease in membership. However, this could be prevented by recruiting the workers in those companies into PCS. We would need the help and experience of unions that organise in the private sector, and guess who that would be – UNITE.

The National PCS Conference has debated a ‘closer working’ agreement with UNITE. In my experience, ‘closer working’ is a preliminary stage before a formal merger. Union mergers have often been driven by financial pressures. In principle, I am not opposed to a merger with UNITE. I would be concerned that PCS’ culture of being an activist or membership led union is at risk from the hierarchical and possibly autocratic set up of UNITE, in which most of the power and decision making is in the hands of National and Regional Full Time Officers.