Reblogged from Michael Meacher MP:
Why is Labour so quiet and timid about the super-rich, those on more than
£3,000 a week, and the ultra-rich, the FTSE-100 bosses who now average $.4
million a year remuneration, or to put in more readily used terms, £86,000 a
week? There are 3 good reasons why Labour should open up a major broadside
against the very rich and the stratospheric rich. One is that it would be very
popular. The public hostility towards the bankers and their multi-million
bonuses (NB the outrage of some bankers reported a few weeks ago that they were
only being given bonuses of £4 million compared with the £6 million given to
some others) and the visceral hatred felt towards the greedy profiteering of the
Big Six energy companies are an open invitation to Labour to go over on to the
attack relentlessly and persistently, and not just because it would be popular,
but because it’s right. There is no justification for these obscene levels of
pay and remuneration appropriated by the wealth elite, it has nothing to do with
the national interest, it is no reflection of merit – it is simply a reflection
of their power in the market-place and their insatiable self-interest. That’s
why the public hates them so much and why they offer such a tempting target to
Labour on moral and ethical grounds and not just for funding reasons.
The second reason was spelt out forcibly by Cameron in the Guildhall last
month and by Osborne in the Commons yesterday. Cameron told the assembled
plutocrats that the Tories intended to shrink the State indefinitely and the
Autumn Statement yesterday put immediate flesh on that by announcing that they
would put an arbitrary (but low, and maybe steadily reducing) cap on benefit
into statute. They have already put caps on housing benefit which lead to
social cleansing and on the Social Fund, the last resort for those in desperate
need. Now they’re extending it across the board. Just as Thatcher’s (and
Blair’s) neoliberal capitalism – let the market rule, untrammelled – has hugely
boosted inequality in the economy, the Tories are now forcing through similar
measures in society. And the only way to stop them is to take them on where
their strength centrally lies – a government of the rich, by the rich, and for
the rich.
The third reason is that in the last analysis this isn’t about riches, it’s
about power. The super-rich are where they are, not because they’re worth it,
not because Britain needs them, but because they’ve secured a key alliance
between money and power. Their economic system, the de-regulated capitalism of
the last 3 decades, has effortlessly increased their own assets, diminished the
wage share, and weakened Labour’s capacity to resist through the trade unions.
Thatcher took on Labour’s power, first the miners and then at Wapping, and even
now the current Lobbying Bill is still trying to undermine the forces of the
Left. The Tories know what they’re about and go for it full-tilt. Until
Labour does the same, goes for the very wealthy and their seizure of governance,
Labour may win the election, but they won’t win real power.
