LABOUR SCREWS UP ON THE EU

LABOUR SCREWS UP ON THE EU

We humble Labour voters can forgive many of Labour's regular screw ups ; idealists are always a bit naive. But the screw up on the EU is dangerous and damaging.

The Euro-fools in our ranks are proclaiming a vacuous enthusiasm for a project which has been damaging to Britain because we entered on unfavourable terms snd totally unrepresentative of the attitude of the British people most of whom find the relationship unsatisfactory and want it changed in different ways. Even the CBI doesn't dare say its members favour Europe but rather that they prefer to stay in a "reformed" EU which of course we haven't got. Labour isn't even saying that. We're proclaiming the virtues of  Europe as it is warts, CFP, CAP, and Euro and all

This is plain silly and weakens Cameron's already pathetic negociating position Why don't we dare to say how we want it improved ? Or are we also enthusiastic about its high food prices, the rape of our fish stocks, the gaping trade deficit the growing cost of membership and the fact that the Euro has turned the Eurozone into the low growth high unemployment blackspot of the world?

We're also ignoring the fact that membership of the EU will pose problems for an incoming Labour government if it ever comes in. A country whose balance of payments deficit is now 6% of GDP cant afford a budget contribution already eleven billion pounds plus all the costs of the CAP and related projects which will put the cost of belonging over twenty billion across the exchanges

Nor can we ignore the fact that any attempt to rebuild and boost Britain's manufacturing industry,have an industrial policy,or support failing or new industries will be ruled out  by EU bans on aid to industry,or that its difficult to expand social provision education and housing if we cant control population inflows or that we can't boost demand by higher wages if mass immigration from Eastern £urope holds wages down and pushes social security costs up.

All this is so naive it's insane but the really pathetic part of our vacuous enthusiasm for a club that's messy and falling apart and damaging to us is the failure to understand some basic points;-.

First that they need us more than we need them because of the big trade deficit so the fear of them taking measures against us is wrong. Secondly all the grants that flow from Europe are are own money back with their costs taken out. W e are net contributors. 

Thirdly to bang on about the "benefits"we get from Europe in terms of workers and union protection etc give nothing that we can't do better for ourselves  .Fourthly fat cats are for Europe but ordinary people lost the power to control their own democracy and make their own decisions through their own government. Democracy is sovereignty

It's time Labour listened to the people not the fat cats, Euro-pensioners and vested interests. Most of all it's time that Labour stopped being naive.

The outing of Osborne

Sorry George but I have to break it to you that your day is done,your leadership chances are evaporating and you're increasingly being seen as what you are:,a prejudiced pillock rather than the modern Machiavelli you aspired to be

Couldn't have happened to a nicer chap but you brought it on yourself by the obstinate pursuit of idealogical policies which won't work:rolling back the state when only the state can defeat recession, cutting spending when it needs to be boosted,easing regulation when it needs t be tightened and putting all the sacrifices on the  poor to slash demand not the rich who caused the problem 

You've been helped by the Bank of England printing money and keeping interest rates flat  but even sop you've lost the country 15% of GDP growth we should have had, failed to reach your debt and deficit reduction targets  and hit those who most deserve help; the poor, the women,the north,the vulnerable

Even your efforts to distract attention from that appalling record have failed.The messy devolution proposals which are really an attempt to devolve blame for the coming social service cuts at the price of messing up local government, the HST whose cost will be enormous is an unneccessary sink hole for money,the agreement to build Hinkley Point is ruinous and the march of the makers is turning into a fighting rearguard action.

Time to go but probably for you time to change This Prime Minister just lets ministers get on with it  however badly they're doing it so you're probably safe even if you don't reealise the damage you're doing and have done to our country.

Whither Labour? A Blastfurnaceman's view...

Labour'd in  mess-not as big a mess as the pundits say but still not a cage of happy budgies. The mess isn't so much the problem of the sulkies  constantly complaining about Corbyn and capturing committee chairmanships. It's the wavering policy line.

John MacDonnell who's pretty good on most issues, and certainly well advised, first accepts Osborne's barmy balanced budget law (like legislating to say the earth is flat)then rejects it. The SNP oppose  May's surveillance state,(Theresa knows when you're watching porn). Burnham grovels before it. Corbyn knows a Labour government will be stymied by the EU but then rushes to support it. Harman pushes the party to support moderate austerity.Then it's left to the Lords to reject it

No wonder the electorate and I are beginning to wonder what Labour stands for. Apparently that's anything the government wants but not much of what was promised.

Let's be clear. When party members voted for Jeremy they were voting against austerity, against cuts ,against war and for the welfare state not the surveillance state.It's now up to the Parliamentary party to make that work rather than ditching it or sulking and giving the government the opportunity to do whatever nasties it wants

That means the new leadership having the courage of its convictions and the party trying to make the new left wing approach work rather than cowering from the predictable media barrage and desperately trying to look respectable and as Thatcherite as the next man.

It should work. Austerity is a failed and fading god. Concern about equality and fairness is growing and people want a clear alternative They need the opposition to oppose policies they feel are wrong but they need reassurance to tell them why .

But if it doesn't work then Labour always has the option of Corbyn choosing to stand down on age grounds paving the way for the prince across the water, Miliband D. because by then  everyone, left or right will see the need for a leader of stature who looks convincing and won't have to face the barrage of hostility and distortion Jeremy has. 

George Osborne Growth Blocker

OSBORNE : GROWTH BLOCKER

George Osborne has always been better at singing his own praises than he is at economic management tells us ( a thousand times and at excessive volume)that Britain is recovering thanks to his "long term economic plan"

Balls. The plan was to roll back the state to let the private sector grow. In fact cutting back the state damages growth and Osbore himself has become the greatest barrier to improvement. Let me explain why

1)    He's dedicated to slashing borrowing. Recovery demands that the state spends more than it's income to boost growth. That gap can only be funded by borrowing

2) Cuts in public spending hit those who need it most hardest Yet recovery requires giving more to those sections who  are more likely to spend it and boost demand than the rich to whom Osbore is transferring . Growing inequality reduces demand which comes from the people

3) Austerity boosts asset prices not earnings where recovery requires it to be the other way round. Rising house prices mean more  investment goes into mortgages rather than business so builders build only expensive housing . The best stimulus would be  building public housing for rent for those who cant afford to buy. Osbore refuses to do that On the contrary he's selling off housing stock and crippling building by housing associations and councils

4) Rebuilding a viable industrial base so Britain can pay its way in the world requires a degree of insulation and a competitive exchange rate. Osbore is the enemy of both with the result that we are dependant on pulling in funny money selling assets and building up a growing overseas debt leaving the UK very exposed to confidence collapse.

 5) Success requires public and private sectors to work together for the common purpose. Cameron believes only in lop-sided growth by a private sector which can't make it on  its own

6) Productive exporting industry needs  cheaper utilities but privatisation has increased the costs of  water, power, tele-communications so the privatised utilities can increase profits while local government reform has increased council tax on business

Unless Cameron has the good sense to transfer him to a department where he can do less harm (say the Foreign Office) Osbore will persevere obstinately down the wrong road stopping full recovery,ruining Britain''s prospects damaging the social fabric and, the only hopeful factor,ending  his own prospects of becoming leader . The Tories may be the stupid party but even they can recognise a mess when it begins to damage their electoral prospects as tis attempt to build a neo-liberal paradise surely will.

SUBMISSION TO CONSULTATION ON BBC

AUSTIN MITCHELL,former MP Grimsby Former presenter 24 Hours and Midweek.Former Chair All Party Parliamentary Media Group 

This submission is made on a priori grounds rather than answers for the specific questions posed .These  are for more expert evaluation by audience researchers programme makers and viewers.. The  issue should be decided on grounds of principle rather than niggling quibbles on side issues.

The central purpose of both the financial arrangements for the BBC and the charter renewal decisions  must be to defend and maintain the public service role of the corporation That public service role is defined in the charter.It should not  be  viewed as a requirement to do only serious public service and minority programmes. There is an important audience for these and the BBC provides more of them than any other organisation but if it becomes the only or main form of provision by the BBC audiences will fall This will then become an argument for reducing the licence fee on the grounds that the corporation is not serving all the people.

So let us be clear.The duty of the BBC is quality. That means the provision of  quality programmes of all kinds and the maintenance of high standards at all levels of provision and in all areas of competition.It follows therefore that the B BC should compete at every level whether it be news,current affairs,drama ,entertainment,24 hour news and political coverage  right down to internet news and information for mobile phones.

The basis of quality  is money  The basis of diversity is a wide pool  of funding from public revenues through advertising to subscription.There is a public responsibility to provide public money as we do through the licence fee for the following reasons:-

1) Pigs which swill in the same trough produce the same shit.Total dependence on commercial provision drives standards down to lowest common denominator level unless there is both effective regulation and  quality competition from a provider which is not commercially funded .

2) The pool of advertising revenues is not big enough to support the BBC or parts of the BBC like Radios 1 and 2 and BBC One as well as commercial television newspapers etc. .It is already being drained by Google and the internet taking more advertising revenue than ITV but producing little in Britain in return. If the pool had to carry the BBC as well it would lead to cheap jack telly all round 

3) It is surely the responsibility of the state to ensure that for the three or four hours all of us spend watching television in the day  we get the best quality not a deluge of  mindless rubbish  and tatty entertainment. 

4) Public funding, the root of the difference between the BBC and commercial competitors, must be at a level which allows quality to be maintained in all the areas of competition The best judge of the level of funding required has to be the BBC itself and not self appointed experts, outsiders who feel that the BBC should be restricted to narrower fields of provision and certainly not commercial competitors who want the field to be left free for them to boost their profits and audiences. By the same token the decision on what areas competition is most necessary an d where the BBC can provide quality competition to maintain  or improve standards is best left to the Corporation itself.That means the BBC must be more open and honest about how it spends its money and how much each service costs

To this end it is worrying that the enquiry team appointed to advise the minister is heavily loaded by representatives of vested interests,and critics of the BBC but does not include representatives of the Universities, the media studies field or actual viewers and that the minister himself has a history of  supporting Murdoch interests .No one ca have faith in media judgements made by anyone who could be portrayed as Murdoch's man

None of this is to argue that the BBC should be to indulge in imperialistic impulses and expand into areas where it cannot provide quality competition.Nor should it have have free licence  to waste public money. The big pay-offs for retiring executives  and the excessive fees paid to many presenters are a scandal which the BBC should never have sanctioned Yet the latter are also a product of competition particularly for talent witness the departure of Peston to ITV. Here we have a pattern of the BBC breeding talent only too have it lured away by ITV or Prime which indicates that the corporation is being responsible.

.The same holds true of football rights but unless the government is prepared to lay down pay guidelines and require a wider range of access to "national treasures" the only safeguard is a requirement to publish all top payments.By the same token the BBC should be fully open to the national audit office and the Public Accounts Committee. This is public money which should be safeguarded.

The licence fee is a clumsy (and now expensive)way of funding the BBC thiugh it compares well with the high subscriptions for Sky or Prime.It can hardly be made voluntary like them because subscriptions would be fall and the burden needs to be spread over the widest possible population. Yet it could be made easier by monthly payments through standing order or direct debits for those with bank accounts and  monthly stamps for those without

The only alternative I could envisage is a proposal made by the Fabian Society in the early eighties that the fee should be levied like the rats on all households and business premises. This is however a political decision but it is neither honest nor reasonable  to lump financing of free licences to the over 75s (which is properly a social security charge)and the costs of World Service (formerly paid by the Foreign Office) on to the BBC and then argue that the licence fee is too high.

Nor is it legitimate  to argue that parts of the licence fee should be creamed off for other purposes whether they be supporting our ailing local television stations, providing revenue for Channel Four  or any other purposes each of which should its own agreed funding rather than draining off money meant for the BBC and nothing b ut the BBC We should learn lessons from New Zealand where the licence fee was frozen, quality deteriorated and fewer specialised or public concern programmes were done and this was then used as an excuse for abolishing the ,licence fee altogether

Assuming that the licence fee continues, as it probably will, the base figure should be agreed in open and unpressured negociations with government and the  cases on each side published in advance for public debater rather than by the bullying approach adopted in 2010 and 2015. Once the basic fee is agreed it should also be increased in line with inflation on an annual basis for as ten year period to give the BBC predictable budgets. 

In these negociations the government must be required to publish its objections to the fee and BBC provision and the BBC must publish an honest analysis of the scale of cuts which would be made necessary by each level of the licence fee.so that the consequences of the agreed decision are made absolutely clear.  The most worrying part of the present debate is the unstructured slinging off at various parts of the BBC, the generalised complaints and the benefits of each service threatened.

As long as the debate is based on generalised grumbles,and sneers, the anxieties of competitors and the desire to cut public spending of all kinds on one side and exaggerated  fears about the undermining or even destruction of BBC local radio and TV (areas where competition is particularly valuable which are  of particular interest to MPs) the loss of BBC 4 (important for quality provision and minority programmes) or the slashing of internet news (invaluable to mobile  phone users )it is neither honest nor useful. This decision has to be rational and its consequences must be clear if the public is to have  confidence in either the proceedings or the final decision. 

  Austin Mitchell, Grimsby 5 October 2015

Classifying class

The prevailing mythology, aimed at taking the teeth out of the Labour Party is that class is dead. Evidently we're all classless now even if many of us don't know it. Society is more fragmented and pluralistic,jobs more diverse,class feelings dead. All that counts is economic differences of wealth and income and those who describe themselves as working or middle class are stuck in the past when both Labour and the Conservatives pose as one nation parties.

Reality is different.You'd have to be blind or David Cameron to think that a society which has become less and less equal and generated such extremes of wealth and poverty is one nation and classless. The simplest division is the best.There are in fact three broad classes namely:-

The toppers, A small arborial  group at the top of every tree This includes the famous one percent plus the top professionals, executives and politicians all characterised by wealth and or incomes much greater than they need,by power an d in some cases privilege

The stake holders who have through job, property education and income a stake in society,large in some cases, small in others

The Deprived. Those at the bottom who struggle financially from day to day and week to weak, who have no real stake,live in rented property and, when employed low paid casual employment with no security.

The boundaries between the three are blurred but the differences are clear Stakeholders have  control over their own destinies, the deprived very little.The toppers can leave the country and take their money with them The stakeholders enjoy a better and more settled life and the deprived sit on the fringe of everything.The toppers are few, the stakeholders far more numerous and the deprived  perhaps as numerous as a fifth or a third of society.They're poor,most relatively ,some absolutely.

That's the new sociology Q.E.D

.

The great change of recent decades has been that the differences, once eroding have grown sharper the distances greater , the deprived more numerous and rising out of depravation more difficult.Globalisation  threatens the   jobs  of the deprived with immigration outshoreing and mechanisation.This means that we are no longer one nation felling and acting together but groups pulled apart mainly by the fact that the stakeholders who once felt confident and secure now feel threatened and interpret the deprived as a threat, different people from them who have failed through their own inadequacies. Indeed some even see them as to be blamed for their state because they've lost the will to work and become conditioned to a life of idleness by benefits and welfare. Idleness is a choice not an imposition So cutting benefits is an altruistic gesture to he,p them.

Which is Labour's problem. It has the support of the deprived but they are also more demoralised less political and less likely to either organise or vote because they don't see politics as a way of alleviating their condition. Labour can reach to the stakeholders  but only by appealing to a diminishing sense of altruism and concern and its efforts to do this are hampered by the identification many stakeholders have come to feel with the Toppers.

It's an illusion for there is a wide gap of wealth and power between them but many have come to see the prospect of more progressive taxation and higher top rates as a threat to them ,a competitive exchange rate as a threat to their holidays and  their accumulation of  possessions ,a big building programme as a threat to their house prices and help for the deprived as a tax on them. 

That's Labour's problem.  The new society  makes it far harder for the party to reach up than it is for the Tories to reach down It's harder to sell policies of national regeneration and equality (as distinct from fighting poverty)because they inconvenience the stakeholders.Much easier to sell populist policies like rising house prices,an overvalued pound and cuts in benefits and public spending which impose the pain on someone else even if they perpetuate the long decline. 

CORBYN: THE HORRORSCOPE

The pundittieri aren't sure what to make of Jeremy. After the worst receptioon given to any leader since Aethelred the Unready they had to  give his conference speech a grudging thumbs half way up while quibbling that part of it was written in the eighties. Having to accept that he's installed and hasn't put his prick in a passing pig's head for two weeks they now have to turn their attacks to the future and claim that there'll be a revolt led by Tristram Hunt's hair stylist in weeks, then chaos as the PLP votes against his every policy  and support's Cameron's crazy plan to bomb more Syrians (preferably in Calais to save drone time) as well as the most expensive nuclear plant in the world. Finally they assure us he won't last until the election while hedging their bets by saying if he does he can't win.

Labour Party members wondering if they should commit suicide now or take a pick axe to Corbyn's head shouting "No to Trotsky and Junker" should wait because the lads are only writing what their bosses want them to.They don't really mean it 

They assume that Osborne economics are going to work and lead to the steady growth necessary to pay off the deficit and cut taxes. They won't unless Osborne steals some of Labour's programme  like a big build of social housing  and a national investment bank. By their failure to regulate the banks and finance Osbornomics could  lead to another crisis like 2008

They assume that Corbyn won't grow to the job when in fact he's already making the transfer from permanent oppositionist to leader compromising on policies to hold the party together.

They assume that the refuseniks will either go into a permanent sulk and alienation  or opt for wrecking when in fact the threat to their careers will lead them to comp[romise and Labour won't tolerate disruption

They assume that an alternative leader is available Yet those who stood against him then sulked have busted their own flushes and the new electoral system is unlikely to elect a Brutus if Caesar is assassinated. Labour isn't an Australian party which likes regular spills. We tend to be loyal to our leaders.

They assume that if the rank and file get more power over policy it will be too extreme for the voters. In fact the rank and file want to be heard not to control. It's still up to the PLP to moderate policy to suit the electorate though they will have to be less cowardly conformist and deferential to Tory policies in the vain efforts to make themselves respectable

Conclusion;-the pundits and the media should bide their time and stop hatching their chickens before they've even laid the eggs.Wait and see is better than shout and hope