In a back to the future moment, Work and Pensions secretary Liz Kendall came to the despatch box to channel her Tory predecessor Iain Duncan Smith.
The welfare cuts she announced yesterday are incredibly extensive. They target sick and disabled people in ways even the Conservatives didn’t dare. The changes will shut hundreds of thousands of people out of accessing lifeline Personal Independence Payments. Universal Credit’s health-related top ups will be slashed, and young people may become completely ineligible for some sickness benefits.
This is a government which will be remembered by history for two main things: austerity and militarism. Starmer’s entourage is so firmly wedded to the decaying capitalist system that it is prepared to hammer the vulnerable in innovative new ways. In parliament, the Tories couldn’t help but crow in approval.
Before/After Moment
Yesterday’s announcement is a before and after moment in British politics. It has been brought about partly because of the bigger, international before and after moment: Trump’s re-election and the subsequent dramatic change in the approach of US imperialism to the global inter-imperialist power struggle. After the shocking Oval Office bust up over Ukraine, Trump is demanding that US allies in Europe ‘pay their own way’ militarily.
Shaken out of their assurance that US imperialism would look after their basic interests on the continent, the European capitalist classes are preparing for the biggest increase in military spending since World War II. To fund it, they are pushing for a redefinition of the so-called ‘social contract’. What they mean by this is that they want to divert funds from public services, welfare and workers’ wages to support a massive ramping up of military spending.
Yesterday’s announcement is only the start of the attacks on working-class people. All government departments have reportedly been told to model 11% cuts ahead of the Chancellor’s Spring Statement. Meanwhile, despite Rachel Reeves’ fiscal rules supposedly being ‘iron clad’ when it comes to social spending, the magic money tree can apparently be turned on to pay for tanks and bombs. There is talk that Reeves could follow some of her European counterparts by relaxing government borrowing rules to fund military spending.
It is grimly significant that yesterday’s announcement coincides with the resumption of the Israeli regime’s genocidal slaughter in Gaza. Starmer has backed Netanyahu’s government to the hilt. He has mercilessly witch-hunted pro-Palestinian activists — and the left in general — out of the Labour Party. Yet this is what a world dominated by inter-imperialist conflict looks like. It calls for a massive stepping up of the anti-war movement, which should be linked to a fightback against austerity attacks on the working class.
We Need a New Left Party Now
There is almost no opposition to the government’s measures inside Parliament, save for a few principled left MPs such as Jeremy Corbyn and Diane Abbott. But these MPs are still not organised into a single parliamentary group, much less a coherent party. Some remain in Labour, some seek readmittance to the party, and some, like Corbyn, sit as independents.
Currently, there is no political organisation for working-class people which can give voice to an anti-austerity, anti-war, pro-working-class programme. This underlines how urgent it is that a new left party, rooted in the struggles of working-class people, is launched as soon as possible, something which is now being widely discussed within the labour movement.
It’s increasingly clear that, unless a new pole of attraction is created on the left, it will be Farage and Reform who reap the benefits of the anger and despair Starmer’s cutbacks will inevitably create.
The strike wave of 2023 showed workers are powerful when they are organised. The trade unions should respond immediately to this new round of anti-working class attacks. As a first step, a coalition of trade unions should call for and build a massive national demonstration against austerity. Corbyn and other prominent left MPs in parliament should add their weight to such a call, and link it to a plan to launch a new party.
Far from ‘getting people back to work’, the truth is a new round of punishing cuts, combined with the ongoing failure of the British economy to grow, will see the ranks of the unemployed further swell. The fact that nearly one million young people are now outside of education, employment or training is an indictment of an economic system which is failing in every way possible.
A new left party could bring together different campaigns and struggles and provide a democratic forum for discussing the way forward. We believe it should adopt a socialist programme — pointing towards public ownership and democratic economic planning as an alternative to the chaos of capitalism. If you agree, join Socialist Alternative today!