Dear Sir/Madam,
With the centenary of the Titanic's maiden voyage approaching it is perhaps not surprising that some anti-cuts campaigners are comparing the new Coalition Government's huge public sector cuts agenda to a re-run of the ocean liner's ill-fated journey.
Ninety eight years on, the aim today is not to cut substantially the time previously taken to travel from Britain to North America, but instead so the Government says, to cut entirely the projected public spending deficit of around £160billion per annum. Having achieved this by 2016, they then want to start paying back the £1.36trillion 'Sovereign debt' the Government themselves are currently predicting the country would owe to the World's banks and other 'investors', provided that is we stick with them at the helm throughout the 'voyage' and maintain at break-neck speed, the perilous course they have plotted to our collective economic rather than geographic destination.
Like the Captain of the allegedly 'unsinkable' Titanic, the Government arrogantly ignores the advice of others concerning the dangers of the route they are taking. In the case of the Titanic this was as late as the same evening of the ship's sinking, when those at the helm rather than taking heed of such warnings, ignored a wireless transmission from the Boston bound Liner Californian located less than ten miles NNW from the Titanic, which said the vessel had stopped and was surrounded by ice. The information was transmitted around 11pm, but this message was rebuffed by the Titanic, with the reply: "Keep out, keep out, I am working Cape Race."
The current Government appears to possess a similar reckless attitude in pursuing what increasing numbers of Economists are already saying is a latter day economic, rather than marine shipping, disaster bound course.
But this is hardly surprising really, since unlike the Captain of the Titanic, most of the current Cabinet have their own personal '£millions-in-the-bank' lifeboat immediately at hand to rescue their own economic skins should anything go wrong, and won't be amongst those going down with our present day ship 'The British Economy', on which most of us ordinary folk make up the passengers, whatever it might potentially collide with en route!
They also appear unperturbed about the potential political consequences of such an outcome either and that they might be subsequently reprimanded and fired for their poor helmsmanship and navigation leading up to such a sinking at a subsequent General Election. Rather than being based on public school boy arrogance and mutual self-belief that they a right however, this likely has more to do with the fact that they are trying to 'fix' the potential outcome of such beforehand too, whatever happens, by altering the electoral system and the number of Parliamentary constituencies to the advantage of themselves just to be on the safe side.
Those who have watched the film Titanic will also appreciate that the analogy doesn't stop with their respective disaster bound courses either, and that it will be the first class passengers who will once again get to escape on the wholly insufficient number of lifeboats in the wake of any disaster, and the second and third class passengers as in 1912 who will once again end up as the casualties in any sinking.
The new Coalition says there is no alternative to the course they have decided to navigate, but this is a lie. It is a lie because it possible to reduce the the public sector deficit without introducing ANY of the cuts in public services, state pensions and benefits the Government are proposing. This could be done as many have pointed out, by amongst other means, collecting the £120billion in taxes which are evaded, avoided or not properly collected from the ultra rich who effectively pay less tax on their incomes than most ordinary folk do on average earnings or less.
The Government could also raise a further £40bn from a Tobin Tax (now popularly called a Robin Hood Tax) on the financial transactions of the Banks and City speculators who got us into the economic mess we're currently in, in the first place. A 50% capital gains tax on the richest 1000 individuals on the Sunday Times Rich List, who saw their combined wealth rise by £79.9bn last year alone (i.e. by almost a third whilst most others saw their living standards decline or remain the same) would net just short of a further £40bn. All this is without the introduction of higher corporation tax for businesses in keeping with other countries in the EU and a Land Value Appreciation Tax which would bring in £billions more.
Additionally, since one of the greatest 'wastes' of public money currently is our paying millions of people to do nothing but to look for the little to non-existent decently paid work on offer, we could borrow money from the Banks we own at little to no interest, and use that to put people back to work building the Council and other social housing being cried out for by the homeless, investing in our public transport infrastructure, investing in marine and other forms of renewable energy production, insulating everyone's homes and making them more energy efficient, building a national water grid and a host of other economic measures all of which would potentially pay for themselves in the long run. This would raise the living standards, dignity and morale of millions of ordinary people, increase the state's tax take and greatly reduce its payout of JSA and other unemployment related benefits which currently cost the Exchequer in excess of £60bn per annum. It would also have a knock-on effect on our high streets giving ordinary people more to spend as opposed to the likelihood of less under the Government's cuts agenda.
The Coalition Government's cuts programme under the cover of the cynical slogans "we're all in it together", "working in the national interest" and the "Big Society approach" effectively lets the Bankers and rich generally off the hook and in particular from shouldering the entire burden of the economic mess they and the Capitalist economic system they champion, have got us into, by placing the burden instead on ordinary people who are painted as lazy benefit scroungers, cheats or alternatively as highly paid and pensioned public sector workers. The repercussions of it should they succeed, whether ideologically driven or not, and even should the Government's own economic predictions pan out entirely, (which would appear doubtful), will be to force the vast majority of us back to the social conditions and widespread deprivation of the 1930's before the NHS, the Welfare State and the public services the vast majority of us all currently rely on came into existence.
If those economic predictions don't pan out then the prospects are even bleaker and unemployment is likely to rise considerably. This in combination with the payment of reduced benefits will mean even less money being spent in the economy all round, a reduced tax take and increased outgoings for the state necessitating even greater cuts in public spending and/or tax hikes for those in work on middle incomes should the Government continue with its strategy of balancing the books by 2016 it is currently pursuing. The likely result of all that is not just a double dip recession such as even the likes of Vince Cable pointed to the potential danger of prior to the elections, but an ever downwards spiralling depression which might make even the 1930s look like a decade of comparative working class prosperity.
Ordinary people including the 52% of Lib-Dem voters who feel betrayed by the Party they voted for in May often on the basis of the slogan of "keeping the Tories out", need to form their own Coalition opposed to what the current Tory-Lib-Dem Coalition Government are wanting to do and which mimics the ill-fated 1912 voyage only today ALL us ordinary folk are the majority of the passengers. This anti-cuts Coalition also needs to urgently stage a mutiny and to take the ship's helm to avoid the possibility of a repeat calamity. Should we fail to do so then deathly cold waters await us.
Yours faithfully,
Stephen Hall
President Leigh UNITE 0523 Branch
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