Brexit as Class War

In the wake of Brexit, we were told the vote was a great revolt by the white working-class. We were told it was grounded in racist discontent with an out-of-touch metropolitan elite. The Leave vote was entirely composed of ill-educated, poor racists living anywhere between the progressive bastions of London and Scotland. It's worth asking what's wrong with this view.

Too much bile has been directed towards the working-class for voting the wrong way. It's as if europhilic liberals cannot bring themselves to look in the mirror and examine the Remain campaigns for any failing. And the EU is left beyond scrutiny. Instead the working-class is supposed to play the scapegoat for an incoherent and lacklustre campaign strategy.

There are no legitimate reasons to advocate Brexit, in this view, the vote is simply an expression of racism and ignorance. Importantly, the European political terrain is increasingly split between liberalism and nationalism with each side helping to constitute the other. This basic antagonism has dominated the entire EU debate and, in turn, shaped the way the working-class has been tarred by middle-class journalists.

My first reaction was to characterise Brexit as a "fuck you" vote. I still think it was, but not necessarily by people who have been left behind by globalisation. As Zoe Williams has pointed out, it was the Southern English middle-class that tipped the balance – not working-class Northerners. This should not be a surprise. Middle-class and elite votes play a major role in all elections, as they dominate the whole discourse, the media and political agenda.

No War Like Class War

By holding a vote, David Cameron hoped to resolve the tension within the ruling-class and his own party. He did not believe he could lose the referendum because he was so accustomed to winning on every occasion. There was no game plan for an exit. So when the men who had always won everything finally lost, they had no idea what to do – and they still don't. But this is not the fullest account of the character of the vote.

Although the ruling-class was thinking of its own interests, the middle-classes and the working poor were significant actors. The breakdown of the Leave vote in ABC terms of class, not necessarily the best analysis, it must be said, shows 10 million upper/middle-class votes and seven million working-class votes cast for Brexit. By contrast, the Remain vote was made up of 12 million upper/middle-class votes with around four million working-class votes.

Similarly, the base of UKIP is often wrongly described as working-class and eating into the Labour vote. Actually UKIP has primarily threatened the Conservative Party, and often overtook it in Labour constituencies because so few locals would vote Tory. The UKIP base is petty-bourgeois with some elements of the poor and the rich backing them. Nigel Farage may be the first ultra-rightist to lead a party based on a cross-class alliance.

So we find the narrative of a working-class revolt is somewhat inaccurate. As in most votes, the working-class was present, but key roles were played by elite interests and middle-class votes. This is not to diminish the role of the votes cast by working-class people. Certainly, the grievances of the working-class were a significant factor. But the fact that the Leave vote was a convergence of different class forces should not surprise us.

Likewise, the vote was not a case of total white flight, though it is mostly. Around 33% of Asian voters opted for Brexit, alongside 27% of black voters. Again, this is not to explain away the role of the racism. After all, you can still cast a vote to limit EU migration on the grounds that the system privileges EU nationals over migrants from other parts of the world. This is why multiculturalism did not prevent Birmingham from voting for exit.

In fact, Nigel Farage often made this Commonwealth argument against EU membership. The basic idea goes that the UK should become closer to its former colonies and not the small cluster of European states. This reveals more than a scintilla of colonial nostalgia is present in the kind of nationalism invoked by Brexit campaigners. The wish to "get my country back" can take a variety of forms. It harks back to a dead empire.

The Left and Brexit

Still, the key question for the Left is the role of the working-class. There are those on the radical Left, who made the progressive case for British withdrawal from the EU. Veteran agitators such as Tariq Ali and George Galloway rank in the Lexit camp. Many other socialists found themselves sympathetic to this argument thanks to the EU's austerity programme. Ultimately, the prospect of siding with Farage may have been too much to stomach.

Economist Paul Mason warned against a Lexit vote on pragmatic grounds: the timing was wrong, as the Left lacked a mass movement and leadership, to overhaul the status quo. One might wonder if the time is ever right. Others like John Pilger framed the Brexit vote as an "act of raw democracy" by millions of ordinary people. This repeats the idea that the working-class was in the driving seat and this vote was a "fuck you" to the ruling-class.

Not only is the working-class not in the driving seat, the sections of the poor which supported Brexit may well have done so out of nationalism. This does not mean there was no left-wing element in the Leave vote, though it is a fact that the Left was divided over the EU – which, at once, stands for freedom of movement and neoliberalism. Poor people fell on both sides of the debate too.

Yet the Lexit crowd wants to pretend that the working-class is vote was devoid of racism. This brings us to one of the classic fixations of the Left: if the working-class as a revolutionary agent, how is it that capitalism has not been overthrown? The easy answer is that it is deficient leadership on the part of trade unions and parties. While this may well be true, it does not rule out the possibility that the working-class is open to demobilisation, as well as reformist and reactionary politics.

If liberals are guilty of presupposing the inherent backwardness of the working-class, then a number of leftists can be criticised for claiming the working-class is inherently revolutionary or even communist already. The working-class has agency, and the potential for revolutionary agency, which means the choice is not between a unwashed xenophobic rabble and a red flag-waving proletariat.

Revolutionary Ideals

Obviously, class interests are not self-evident axioms. Classes are alive, they are not subject to test conditions, as they engage in the world and face changing social conditions. If working-class agency means anything, it means the ability to disagree and make independent choices. But this does not extend to the terms of the choice itself.

Even if the proletariat is not on the cusp of a great revolt, it is the Left that needs the working-class and, likewise, class politics is the only way forward for ordinary people. Left-wing ideals without class is a form of anti-politics. If a section of working people, or even a majority for that matter, are not mobilised by the Left, this would not vindicate those who say the poor are backward.

It is worth acknowledging that the main demand of Leave voters was national sovereignty, whereas immigration controls was a secondary concern. Not that this changes the fact that the dominant character of the vote was nationalist. Sovereignty is one of those few ambiguous demands backed by radical elements across the spectrum.

Nevertheless, the Left should not try to externalise racism from the working-class in a bid to save its own romantic view of the workers. The problem here is that it presupposes that the poor ought to have the right set of ideas in order for socialists to stand with them. In this sense, the constant yearning for a revolutionary agent collapses into its opposite.

This article was originally published at Souciant.

Brexit: The Fuck You Vote

In one of the most contested votes in British history, the UK has voted for the unknown. Many believed the fear of change would triumph over anger. This is a moment of profound emotion. The door is wide open and there is nothing out there, but darkness. The unknown is here. The old post-war certainties are dead.

Far-right parties in France and the Netherlands are talking about withdrawing. Brexit sets a precedent for the European Union and it's unclear if it will be the catalyst for a wave of change. The US fears it will be just that. No doubt the symbolic break is enough to inspire eurosceptics of left and right across the continent.

Even the murder of Labour MP Jo Cox by Tommy Mair failed to sway the vote far enough to prevent Brexit. Mair's fixation with Afrikaner nationalism in South Africa and American neo-Nazi movements was not enough to condemn him. Instead, Mair's violence was put down to mental illness. When asked for his name in court, Tommy replied: "Death to traitors, freedom for Britain!" Some began to compare Britain to late Weimar Germany.

Cameron, out!

As the news sank in for the nation, David Cameron presented his resignation. Next, Parliament will vote on the matter. The transition will take until 2018 even if there are no stalemates in negotiations. The Conservative Remain campaign only mustered 56% of Tory voters, while the Labour In campaign won over 70% of its base. Yet Labour MPs have tabled a no-confidence vote in Jeremy Corbyn. It's as if the Blair brigade feel their europhilia has been vindicated by this vote.

This is the first putsch against Corbyn. One hopes it will fail badly, as the party membership would back the left candidate in any future leadership election. The Blairites will want to throw him overboard and impose a leader of their ilk on the party. But this seems unlikely. If Corbyn is voted out, he could stand in a new contest. He may even win with a bigger mandate than in 2015. It's unclear if the right-wingers are aware of this possibility.

Of course, if the Remain vote had won out, the Conservative government would have moved to impose new immigration controls and squeeze concessions out of Brussels. Tory eurosceptics have always been fighting for a privileged British position within a loose European confederation. This is the tradition to which David Cameron belongs. Much like Thatcher, the European question has blown up the Cameron premiership.

Unfortunately, this may mean the energy of all other political forces still fall within the nation-state. The Scottish referendum was an early sign of this, though the result was not independence. Instead we have Nigel Farage heralding an era of "British independence". It seems Project Fear was far more successful in queling enough Scottish voters into accepting the Union. But this is not the end of the line. The shockwaves of this vote will reverberate for a long time.

David Cameron wanted the referendum to consolidate his place in the history of British Toryism. He wanted to step down on his own terms before 2020. Instead, the vote has consigned Cameron to his proper place in history. Unlike Margaret Thatcher and Tony Blair, there was nothing seizmic about Cameron – but he filled a gap. The Cameron years have only enforced the past more vigorously. The hope is that his successor (whether it is Boris or George) will serve as an incompetent caretaker before a swift defeat at the ballot box.

What a state!

Meanwhile the liberal and progressive Remain camp has been pouring scorn on the Brexit voters online and in print. There are jokes of London seceding from the UK to rejoin Europe, along with talk of moving to Scotland. Not much mention of Northern Ireland or Wales. The rest of the country is deemed an insane hinterland of xenophobes. Naturally, Brexit inspires fear in the hearts and minds of liberals across the British Isles.

It's easy to see why, the Leave campaign has been egregious in its race-baiting and flag-wagging. Project Fear was in full swing. Nigel Farage played every card in the deck. This is why the vote spells the worst fears of EU nationals and non-British residents. It's unclear where the vote leaves EU migrants. They are vital to the UK economy, but this vote has thrown their rights up in the air. The new immigration controls could be far more restrictive.

By comparison, the Remain campaign provided thin, lukewarm gruel to its base. Most of the people who voted to stay, I suspect, either voted out of fear or dogmatism. The core of the Remain vote was pro-EU conservatives and liberals based in London and the South. It was a campaign based on muesli, quinoa and complacent smuggery. In the end, it wasn't enough to overcome the level of anger directed towards the status quo.

My grandfather will be celebrating his birthday this weekend. This may be one of the best birthday presents of his life. He lives in the Labour stronghold of Bolsover, where Dennis Skinner – the so-called 'Beast of Bolsover' – has presided as MP since 1970. Almost 71% of voters in Bolsover voted to leave, including Skinner himself. The Beast was close allies with Tony Benn, who was calling for a referendum as early as 1968.

Even my apolitical relatives turned out for the referendum. The narrative around immigration has certainly propelled forward the forces of reaction in this campaign. However, this is not the whole picture. A great deal of Leave votes were cast in Labour areas. Voter turnout was far higher in England than in the last general election. This does not mean the Leave votes came from Labour in reflection of a working-class rightward lurch.

On the contrary, the Conservatives were only able to muster 56% of the majority they won at the election (just less than 25% of the eligible electorate), whereas Labour drew most of its voters into the Remain camp. This would suggest the main source would have been non-voters, with some overlap from various parties, that's the 34% absent from the 2015 election. It looks like most came from the communities torn apart and left behind by the economic consensus.

It's as if the political class abandoned vast swathes of England. The Conservatives bulldozed through the trade unions, social housing, state education and now the NHS; while Labour took the working-class vote for granted. After 40 years of degradation, many working-class voters suddenly saw an opening to inflict a deep wound on the elite and its system. In other words, this is a "fuck you" vote. It is loud and clear.

This article was originally published at Souciant.

Brexit: Toxic Kingdom

Some of us thought this day would never come. Others prayed it never would. The long awaited referendum on Britain’s EU membership will take place tomorrow. The results will be out by Friday morning. Project Fear is still going strong. But it looks unlikely to settle one of the biggest divisions in UK politics.

How did it come to this? The reasons are political in the worst sense. David Cameron gave an ‘iron-clad pledge’ for a referendum on the Lisbon Treaty. He did so to throw some red meat to the hard-right. Yet this did not have the desired effect. UKIP continued to grow, feeding off of the resentment of lower middle-class Tory voters in particular. The Conservative base was under threat from an ultra-rightist outlier.

By 2014, the British press had bestowed ‘fourth party’ status on UKIP. The Conservatives lost two seats after Douglas Carswell and Mark Reckless defected. It looked like Nigel Farage would take Thanet South. But this was not to be. UKIP rapidly lost momentum despite winning 3.8 million votes in 2015. Farage was thwarted in South Thanet, Reckless lost his seat and Carswell clung on.

Yet the chasm over the EU in the Conservative Party has not narrowed. David Cameron could not ignore the votes lost to UKIP. He sought to placate Tory rebels and maintain the party’s support. This is why the referendum was called. There was no grand national interest in holding this vote. It wasn’t about democracy or security. It was about the Cameron legacy.

This has meant that the whole debate has been dominated by rival factions within the Conservative Party. Naturally David Cameron and George Osborne have led the Tory Remain campaign, while Boris Johnson and Michael Gove have positioned themselves as ‘renegade’ Eurosceptics. In other words, the national debate has been a bun-fight between the entitled sons of gentlemen.

Towards the fatherlands

The so-called ‘debate’ has been unbearably parochial. It’s either anti-migrant populism, or complacent liberal arguments for the status quo. Neither the Remain or Leave campaign offers a serious account of the EU. Nationalism is taking on the role of the opposition in European politics, as Slavoj Žižek argued years ago, while the establishment takes on the guise of liberal capitalism. This is what politics has become.

We’ve seen far-right parties make major gains from Austria, Switzerland and Hungary to Germany, France and Poland. Even Scandinavia has not been immune to this resurgent nationalism, we have only to look at the True Finns and the Swedish Democrats. The neo-fascists see Europe as a cultural theme-park lacking the vitality of nationalism. So they propose a rupture with the Whitehall consensus.

Meanwhile the mainstream looks increasingly decrepit. Conservative parties have become market liberal, while social democratic parties have turned from their traditional Keynesian policies and now stare death in the face. PASOK in Greece died on its feet, but its fate should send a message to every European centre-left party. SYRIZA filled the vacuum in its wake. But the defeat of the Greek radical Left poses a new crisis.

It’s unclear where the Greek people will turn. The Eurozone has become the means by which the EU core states (e.g. Germany and France) impose austerity on the periphery (Portugal, Italy, Ireland, Greece and Spain). The EU now resembles a neoliberal machine, much more so than the social Europe envisioned by Labour activists. There is a real danger that the opposition will rally to calls for a ‘Europe of fatherlands’.

However, the referendum will not dispel the threat of a fascist resurgence in Europe, nor will it abolish the intolerable economic conditions perpetuated by governments. Whether we stay or withdraw, the real battles will be fought after the vote. This is why the stakes are so high. And this is why the outcome will not settle the European question.

As Edward Luce points out in the Financial Times, Washington fears Brexit would be a catalytic moment for the EU, after which all smaller countries could leave. This could threaten the transatlantic alliance. A gap could emerge between NATO and European political economy. No wonder Obama came running to tell us to stay. Though Brexit would not sever the alliance on its own, it could be the catalyst for a break-up.

This would be a dream come true for Putin. The separation of Europe from NATO would mean Russia could maintain its own sphere of influence. Not that this would equal anything like the Eastern bloc of Soviet client-states. Russia cannot even exercise anything like the kind of influence it could in 1980. Nevertheless, Putin casts a long shadow in the minds of American and European policy-makers.

The Left and Brexit

Although there has been speculation that Brexit could throw the UK economy into disarray, it is debatable. For starters, growth in the UK has been lacklustre for years. It’s likely much of the country would not notice the difference between Osborne’s “economic miracle” and a recession. In short, working-class voters have little to lose. After four decades of Thatcherism, it’s understandable why working-class people are willing to take the risk of a Brexit vote.

The so-called ‘Lexit’ argument – for a left exit, as it were – has a great deal of appeal. The European Union is not democratic, nor is it open to any pressure short of an international mass movement. It is a thoroughly right-wing project and may not be open to reform. This is why Tony Benn, Dennis Skinner and Jeremy Corbyn were all of the left Eurosceptic tradition. But this isn’t the 1970s.

Today the contemporary Left is split. Typically, you have the liberal crowd who are reflexively pro-EU, but you also have Jeremy Corbyn and John McDonnell arguing for staying and fighting for a different kind of union. Unsurprisingly, Momentum and a host of activists in the party base support this manoeuvre. Indeed, the Labour Party is, by a clear majority, for Britain remaining an EU member. Corbyn could never win that fight.

So the mainstream Left has no real presence on this issue. Instead, the radical leave campaign has been relegated to activist circles. This has contained the central division to the Tory Party. In one sense, this means the balance of forces are conservative whether the UK leaves or stays. But the vote could spell civil war for the Conservatives. The best case scenario may be a close call, where Cameron is ousted and policy is left paralysed.

Notice that even this hypothetical scenario limits the question to Britain. What Europe needs is an international movement capable of challenging its institutions. The problem is that the Left is still reconstructing itself at the national level. If the Left cannot do so, then Europe may be doomed to continue on the same track.

This article was originally published at Souciant.

Reaction to Scotland's No vote.

So the votes are in. Scotland has voted 44.7% for independence and 55.3% to remain within the United Kingdom. Voter turnout was close to 87% in a display of participation greater than we have seen in any recent election. The EU elections in May drew 33.8% of the British electorate out of their homes to the local voting booth. It’s standard in UK general elections for turnout to be almost twice as high as in EU elections. Consequently, the protest vote looms large in one and not the other (at least usually this is the case).

It was said in the run-up to the referendum that Alex Salmond couldn’t lose either way: if it’s a ‘yes’ then Scotland becomes an independent state, if it’s a ‘no’ then Scotland will win more powers. Originally the proposed referendum was to include three options, not just yes or no, but the option of maximal devolution would have been on the table too. This led many to suggest Salmond was really pushing for greater powers. If Salmond was aiming for independence then this might not be the end of the story, as we have seen in Quebec where there have been two referendums on independence. The major issue for Whitehall is how they can prevent such an occurrence in the British Isles.

No wonder then David Cameron has raised the West Lothian question. He speaks of a ‘devolution revolution’ for the English and not just Scotland, Wales, and Northern Ireland. Endless bifurcation has its appeal to international capitalism as each entity can be picked off, its economy chiselled and its workforce disciplined. The appeal is to English parochialism, the same mobilising force behind UKIP, Powellism, and the EDL, can be seen as a move to strengthen the rightward trend of British politics through coalescence and triangulation. Boundary changes would have to be made in any large-scale constitutional shake-up in a country where such questions have been held-off for far too long. So devolution may not necessarily result in an automatic Conservative stranglehold in Westminster.

Decentralisation in a neoliberal world would suit Cameron and his party just right. The Conservatives are facing inexorable decline, having only increased their share of the vote by 3% in 5 years against the Brown government. It’s highly unlikely for any governing party to increase its share of the vote, even if you have the Liberal Democrats as human shields. Meanwhile, the Labour Party lacks any vision or impetus to stand up for its traditional social base. The bet may not be for a rejuvenated Tory Party, that fight may have already been lost. It’s not just that the social democratic model is rotting before our eyes; the old Toryism is going the way of the dodo too. In that regard, what is left but to fall back on the trilateral consensus and devolve the Union into a morass entrenching austerity.

As for the Scottish National Party, it was once the case that the left-right coalition (which composes the SNP) was set to break apart once they had achieved independence. It looks unlikely that will be the case as long as Scotland remains within the UK. Salmond will try to maintain the public services and welfare provisions in Scotland for as long as he can. Additional powers may help this, or hinder this, it’s difficult to foresee. It still is the case that the SNP is not a socialist party, it isn’t even a republican party, and it was willing to accept NATO, as well as international free-trade agreements, and the vanity projects of Donald Trump. I can see the ultra-left in Scotland pinning the blame on the SNP for not being pure enough and Salmond will rebuke this with the language of pragmatism.

This post was written as an immediate reaction to the outcome of the referendum on Scottish independence. It will be reproduced at Souciant later.

Nick Clegg has Only Himself to Blame.

Some of you may have tuned in to the LBC debate between Nick Clegg and Nigel Farage on the European union. This spectacle was hosted by reactionary lard-arse Nick Ferrari. It was everything one would expect. Nothing outside of the oscillation between mainstream liberalism and nationalism came up and this debate can largely be understood as a sign of the rightward trend of British politics over the last four decades. Liberal internationalism and conservative nationalism feed into one another, their relationship is dialectical, both oppositional and complimentary, and ultimately, they spiral into the same downward trajectory. It's no coincidence that the Liberal Democrats signed up for the Coalition with a party torn over Europe and he now finds himself poised against UKIP. For the Conservatives, Nick Clegg is the canary in the mineshaft and little more.

It must have been a disparaging experience for Liberal Nick. No longer a sponge sucking up all those disenchanted votes Nick Clegg stood as the establishment figure with his old place usurped by Nigel Farage of all people. Of course, the underdog status of UKIP is a falsehood. Nigel Farage railed against the bankrupt establishment, which Clegg now embodies so thoroughly, all the while UKIP stands in necessary relation to the status quo. He was probably expecting reason to triumph over reaction. He littered his phraseology with references to 'dogma' and appealed to common-sense. Bad moves by definition in this kind of debate. I don't know how he could have expected it to have gone his way. Without any grounding to maneouvre on economic and domestic policy (where he is wedded to Conservative policy-makers) the only issue of contention was going to immigration. That is hardly a threat to the Conservative Party. And of course UKIP has no interest in combating neoliberalism.

Outside of conventional politics the demagogue sets himself and poses as raising the real questions, the dangerous questions, to which the Establishment then reacts to preserve itself. As with Romania we find that the UKIP lot are playing this game again. The real issue that the people in countries like Romania and Bulgaria are fleeing from social conditions produced by neoliberal globalisation cannot be raised. Should we repair the damage? Now that's a dangerous question! It would only mean that the level of immigration would be based on the free movement of people, rather than on economic desperation. The Lib Dems can't make such a point because they've accepted the neoliberal model prescribed by Brussels, Whitehall, and Washington; while the only criticism UKIP may wage is that this hasn't gone far enough in tearing through all forms of state-ownership. This is why a key issue was never mentioned, namely the EU-US free trade deal currently being implemented by stealth.

The Liberal Democrats emerged from the consolidation of gains for a third party after the founding of the Social Democratic Party from the right-wing MPs who abandoned Labour. The loss of 10% of their MPs helped to secure Labour's defeat and a victory for Thatcher in 1983. So you can see how far the Party has come since helping to divide up the voters for Thatcherism thirty years ago. They have now graduated to joining those forces they helped deliver Britain to in the 1980s. This is the stinking filth of the body of liberalism: inaction, hot-air, and endless compromise. It's clear the trilateral consensus are not only complacent in the face of the nationalist reaction to the rapid internationalising trend of capitalism. We see this quite well demonstrated in Ukraine where a coalition of neoliberals, conservatives, ultra-nationalists, and oligarchs, have seized power only to wrench the country into the orbit of the European Union and open it up to the IMF prescription for an economic miracle.

Meanwhile here in Britain we find UKIP is looking to force the Conservatives further and further to the right as it condemns the EU. Clegg doesn't deserve our pity for his pathetic belief that if he just said the right words the audience would dutifully nod their heads for him. He was asking for the kicking he got.

2010 Election: Wish List.

Change, please...

With the 2010 General Election approaching at a frankly nauseating pace marked by vacuous slogans, meaningless publicity, dull debates and mediocre comments by "professional" parliamentarians. I think I speak for all British people when I say it is truly "exhilarating" to choose between three political parties  which are almost identical, when I can just walk down to the shop and choose between dozens of different chocolate bars. It is a testament to the decline of democracy and political pluralism, that the right to vote has been reduced to a method of maintaining the status quo and avoiding the "greater evil". In a sense, it is a conservative system, to vote against a certain party in the hope of maintaining the dominance of one party. Cynicism is rife and idealism is rare, what is left is the prevailing ideology that is thriving in an atmosphere of discontent. Nevertheless,  because of the overwhelming "exhilaration" of this upcoming election, instead of covering the last debate, I have decided to type up a list of policies that I am for and would vote for.

1. A real dedication to decreasing the gap between the rich and the poor. Methods of accomplishing this include: progressive taxes, raising the minimum wage, setting a maximum wage, the redistribution of wealth etc. Though, this kind of dedication may deter investors and drive corporations out of the country, which is why it should be enforced through the European Union. A region as large and profitable as Europe would be too valuable to lose for any corporation. Another great policy in this area would be the 'Robin Hood' tax, that would see a 0.05% tax levied on the transactions of the banking sector. The money from which could go a long way to eradicating poverty and saving the environment.

2.  Subject major foreign policy decisions to referenda, specifically invasions that the US government might try to drag us into. So that the government requires the support of the majority of the population to go to war. This might have prevented the invasion of Iraq in 2003 and it has the potential to stop future unnecessary acts of aggression. As we would not be rushing off to kill anyone sitting on a sea of black gold any time soon, it is fair to say that Britain might lose it's status as lieutenant to the American government.

3. Prepare to resolve the 'Pensions Crisis' without fobbing off pensioners onto unstable private pension schemes, which are subject to the chaos of the stock market and will give working people a stake in undermining their own interests. There remains the options of raising taxes and increasing immigration. These are not popular options, especially with the more reactionary sectors of society who feel that immigrants only come to Britain to take jobs and benefits. Regardless of such woes, a combination of the two remaining options could function to resolve the crisis.

4. A rational drug policy based on scientific research and evidence, not petty moralising on the dangers of "permissive society". This would include the legalisation of cannabis, as there is no scientific evidence that supports the assertion that cannabis is more harmful than tobacco and alcohol. Whereas, harder substances can be prescribed to addicts as part of rehabilitation programs. In the Netherlands a similar policy has decimated the market for heroin and has reduced the number of heroin addicts in recent years. Sadly, something tells me that Richard Littlejohn and his friends on Fleet Street would love this one.

5. Proportional representation, so that we the people might actually be able to elect political parties which represent us. One downside being the major parties, that agree so much with one another, will have to "tolerate" competing parties and that it could slow down the political process. But the inefficiency of democracy does not justify the kind of democratic deficit we have endured for so long. Another downside would be the unsettling possibility of fascists gaining seats in Parliament, as parties like the BNP win the votes of the neglected classes. Though, this is a reason to focus on integration and class issues rather than avoid reforming the political system.


The problem with the brand of "democracy", currently set in the cement of Parliament, is that it is somewhat conservative in practice. Those who vote often do so to prevent someone worse than the incumbent from gaining power. The aim is not to engineer change on any scale, but to hold onto the "lesser evil" for as long as possible. It is as if there is something missing from the political system, something substantive, something radical. Among the major parties, Lib-Lab-Con, the old political dynamic of Left and Right has been abandoned. The Left has been quietly marginalised and the Labour Party is regarded, by the right-wing media, as the established left-wing party of Britain. Today there is only the Right, presented in conservative and liberal forms by the major parties. Perhaps, this is indicated by the fact that we tend to vote on grounds of "lesser" and "greater" evil. What we need is a major party that unambiguously supports progressive causes which a majority of the population support already.