Policies taken from the Labour party website (tuition fees not
on the website, but reported widely in the media recently), demonstrate that
Labour is not a party of the left by any discernible means.
‘We will balance the
books: getting the current budget into surplus and national debt falling as
soon as possible within the next Parliament.’
This is a fairly vague commitment, in that it could be that
by encouraging growth in the economy, and growth in wages particularly, the
national debt can be paid off by rising tax receipts (particularly from the
wealthy), without continuing the Tory cuts to public services. But Labour has
already said that public sector wages will be held down, and the minimum wage
raised only slightly (more of this later). They talk of no money for extra
spending, apart from some minor areas, so we must assume that they will
continue to cut public sector wages and spending, including jobs, services and
benefits. It is often termed ‘austerity lite’.
This is a continuation of the ‘triangulation’ tactics first
developed by Bill Clinton and the US Democrats and faithfully followed by the
New Labour governments from 1997 to 2010. The aim is to place the Labour party
slightly to the left of the Tories, but only slightly. Whether this will be as
effective in gaining voter support as in the past, is highly questionable since
the electorate appears to have had enough of this, with Labour leaking
support to the Scottish National Party north of the border, and to the Green Party in England. Both of these parties are seen as more authentic left
parties than Labour now.
‘We will freeze your
energy bills up to January 2017, saving a typical household £120 and an average
business £1,800. An incoming Labour government will legislate immediately to
make this happen.’
Considering the recent fall in the price of oil and gas,
which amounts to something like a reduction of £150 per year for domestic
consumers, this policy, timid though is it is anyway, has been superseded by
events. Will Labour now uprate this ‘freeze’ to £270 per household? Don’t hold
your breath.
‘Earned entitlements:
people coming here won’t be able to claim benefits for at least two years.’
Most immigrants to
the UK come here to work, not to claim benefits which are more generous in some
other EU countries. Indeed more UK nationals are claiming benefits in other EU
countries, than EU nationals claiming in the UK. Another piece of triangulation
from Labour, since the Coalition government has promised a similar policy and
Labour wants to look tough on benefit claimants. This is likely to lead to more
street begging and crime, rather than deter immigrants from coming to the UK.
‘We will increase the
National Minimum Wage to £8 an hour by the end of the next Parliament – to help
ensure that those doing a hard day’s work are rewarded for doing so.’
Without it seems even a trace of irony, a party that calls
itself ‘Labour’ trumpets a policy that is so pitiful in ambition it is pretty
much irrelevant. The National Minimum Wage (NMW) stands at £6.50 per hour
presently. The Living Wage (LW) is currently £7.85 per hour (£9.15 in London),
which even Tory Mayor of London Boris Johnson agrees should be the minimum. And
this aspiration of £8.00 per hour NMW is to be achieved over five years.
Taking a likely inflation rate (Consumer Price Index, which
doesn’t include housing costs) of 2% per year, would take the NMW to £7.15 per
hour, and this is not a cumulative calculation. Even a small rise in inflation
of above 2%, which is far from unlikely, will make £8.00 per hour by 2020 a
wage cut. Why on the earth the trade unions continue to fund the Labour party
is a complete mystery.
‘We will stop
employees from being required to work exclusively for one firm if they are on a
zero-hours contract.’
Wouldn’t a real party of Labour just abolish zero hours
contracts altogether? Not this Labour party, no. Instead this policy encourages
more zero hours contracts by freeing up workers to take on more than one
contract at a time. It is a return to the bad old days of On the Waterfront where dock workers queued on a daily basis to try
a find some work, just for that day. All the gains in employment legislation
since the 1950s are tossed away by the Labour
party of 2015.
‘We will cap social
security: addressing the root causes of welfare spending by getting 200,000
homes built a year and making tough decisions like scrapping Winter Fuel
Allowance for the richest pensioners and capping Child Benefit rises.’
A cornerstone of the Welfare State created by the present
Labour party’s forbears after World War 2, was the universality of the system.
These Labour leaders knew that if they were to get the middle classes to buy
into the welfare state then they had to able to see some personal benefit from
it. Means testing removes this benefit, making claimants feel stigmatised and
is effectively a return to pre war welfare policies where claimants had to
prove absolute poverty to claim. People were forced to sell their furniture and
belongings before receiving benefit. ‘Back to the future with Labour’ might
make a good election slogan for the party?
Tuition fees: Labour
pledges maximum cap of £6,000
This policy returns university tuition fees to the level of
the last Labour government (reduced from the present £9,000 per year). It is
the worst of both worlds in that it will deprive universities of the funding
they need, whilst having no discernible effect on the amount many students will
pay back. Students from wealthy backgrounds have these fees paid by their
parents so don’t claim these loans. For those from modest backgrounds who do
claim the loans, it still leaves a sizable amount to be paid back. Let’s not
forget that these students need maintenance loans too and if they do not reach
the levels of salary to trigger the pay back threshold, will never actually pay
the money back, instead the tax payer picks up the tab. For those that do pay
back the loans, they start working life with debts of £30,000 to £40,000 typically.
This policy makes little difference.
So there you have it, and Labour whines about losing support
to the Greens, who split the ‘left’ vote and will let the Tories in again. It is
Labour that is splitting the left vote, with not even very left policies, a mere
shadow of the party’s noble past.
But past it is.
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