English Labour's naked neoliberalism

I write frequently about English Labour’s complete betrayal of its working class roots and its embrace of neoliberalism, but it’s important to keep repeating this message. Scots who are being told they will get better governance from a Starmer administration are being badly misled. This was published in the Edinburgh Evening News on January 29th, 2024.

English Labour says the UK economy is growing at the slowest rate for two centuries. Could it have to do with austerity, Brexit, chronic underinvestment, rampant corporate profiteering and high interest rates? And if so, what will a Labour government do about it? 

Fresh from Davos, Rachel Reeves told a meeting in the City of London “every day, every month and every year of a Labour government, Labour will maintain its credibility with the markets and relationship with the City.” Labour has made clear that it will coddle and appease financial markets which means austerity, no public investment, increasing privatisation, no curbs on corporate profiteering and remaining outside the UK’s largest market.   

The UK is failing. The number of billionaires has more than tripled since 2010 from 54 to 171.  Just 50 families possess more wealth than half the UK population. This wealth concentration is the cancer eating away at the UK’s tattered social fabric. Politicians are increasingly reliant on money from wealthy and powerful vested interests and are obediently passing laws and policies that protect those interests. 

Meanwhile, real wages have fallen to 2005 levels. The Bank of England is irrationally keeping interest rates high even as inflation cools. This punishes borrowers, hurts small businesses, raises rents and prices, and erodes the spending power of poor and middle-income families. The rich grow richer, corporate profiteering gallops ahead, inequality worsens and the downward cycle continues. 

English Labour has forgotten what the post-war Attlee government achieved.  In 1946 public debt was 270% of GDP yet the government created the NHS, built thousands of homes and schools, invested in the railways and the mining industry, nationalised public assets, maintained full employment, paid off its debts and significantly grew the economy with no inflation. 

Only by ending the failing union can Scotland end the misery inflicted upon it by successive neoliberal Westminster governments and build a state that works for the Scottish People.