Written by Les Levidow
Millions of people have been suffering the effects of UK neoliberal policies, especially post-2010 austerity, which aggravated the damage from the 1980s-1990s austerity programme. They have endured greater hardship and social fragmentation, alongside weaker collective agency to gain improvements, especially as a practical basis for hope. People’s deprivation and anxiety have led many to search for simple culprits, especially migrants, as demonized by Reform UK and more recently by the Labour government. More people have become disillusioned with the main political parties, as the Green Party notes, https://greenparty.org.uk/2025/04/08/green-party-to-appeal-to-disillusioned-voters-as-they-head-for-record-breaking-local-election-results/ Such negative feelings apply to the entire political system, leaving many with a weak incentive to vote at all.
What is a Green way to challenge austerity and Reform UK? This question was addressed at a Green Left webinar (03.04.2025). An adequate answer must begin by targeting the main culprits, namely: neoliberal policies have shifted political control and economic wealth to a super-rich elite, while intensifying scarcity and economic competition among everyone else. Those policies have legalized the theft of public goods and wealth extraction from them. The Labour Party overtly perpetuates those inequalities, and Reform UK in power would do likewise.
Many potential remedies have been promoted in Green Party of England and Wales policies, such as ‘Public Services in Public Hands,’ as in its 2024 election manifesto, https://greenparty.org.uk/about/our-manifesto/ Likewise the stronger proposals in the Socialist Green New Deal of the Green Left, http://londongreenleft.blogspot.com/2022/09/the-socialist-green-new-deal.html
However, effective remedies would depend on a strong collective agency to implement them, especially by shifting class power against neoliberal state institutions. When commending policies of Green Party, Owen Jones urged it to ‘pick some fights’.
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2025/jan/28/green-party-left-social-media-presence
Indeed, an effective opposition would escalate such fights against the Labour Party and Reform UK alike. More fundamentally, it must propose imaginative means to reverse capitalist theft and to take back collective control.
Neoliberal austerity: legalized theft of public goods
The term ‘austerity’ has served a long-time deceptive narrative. As a domestic analogy with national budgets, ‘austerity’ has implied moral frugal habits which save money to benefit the common good. This hegemonic narrative has disguised neoliberal austerity, which has worsened socio-economic inequalities, almost regardless of state expenditure.
According to its hegemonic narrative, this agenda has aimed to liberate ‘the free market’, as if it were a state of Nature. Such market liberation would supposedly bring prosperity, whose benefits would eventually trickle down to everyone. In the 1980s the Chancellor Nigel Lawson justified austerity policies as follows: “If it's not hurting, then it's not working.” Let us ask: hurting whom? working for whom?
In practice, the putatively ‘self-adjusting free market’ has depended on coercion, as Karl Polanyi documented over several centuries in his 1944 book, The Great Transformation. Coercion has two levels: Firstly, the state has been forcibly enclosing commons, turning public goods (including natural resources) into financial assets; they become capital seeking to maximise value for shareholders. Secondly, policy and investment changes have intensified workers’ competition for income, thus helping enterprises to super-exploit labour. Karl Marx called this ‘the dull compulsion of economic relations’.
Since the 1980s all UK governments have promoted neoliberal globalization as if it were an inevitable future. For example, ‘People say that we should stop and debate globalisation; you might as well debate whether autumn should follow summer’, declared Tony Blair at the 2005 Labour Party conference. His language conflated closer economic relations with a neoliberal form as if it were rooted in nature.
Neoliberal globalisation has subordinated government policy to international investment and currency markets; it has marginalised, off-shored or sold off (at bargain rates) traditional high-skilled industry. As the official narrative, austerity has promoted means to minimise the national debt, to minimise debt repayments and so to strengthen the national currency against foreign rivals. This has been a pretext for policies that strengthen capital over labour and limit democratic decision-making.
The dominant agenda has been privatizing or deregulating state enterprises and their labour protections. The boundary between public/private sectors has been blurred; the profit motive has pervaded public sector agencies as well as outsourced arrangements. Meanwhile the greater exploitation of labour extracts more unpaid labour, a hidden form of theft.
Such changes have been driving people into more unhealthy working conditions and causing systematic health damage, likewise greater stress in both paid work and unpaid care work, worsening mental health problems. All this damage has generated greater legitimate claims for disability allowances and Personal Independence Payments (PIPs), even more so given the inadequate or delayed NHS treatment for such problems. The damage has likewise generated greater need for social care, which has been increasingly outsourced or privatised since the Thatcher period.
Meanwhile the
state has continued funding or facilitating corporate welfare. In particular, privatization
has attracted global investment funds, especially to real estate and utilities
(gas and water), resulting in foreign corporate control. Fossil fuels still receive subsidies of around £10 billion
per year, including tax-free status for aviation fuel, https://lordslibrary.parliament.uk/oil-and-gas-industry-outside-interests
Thus, state finance drives even worse climate change.
This neoliberal agenda has generated financial gain for an ultra-wealthy elite, in turn helping them to finance political parties for favourable policies, as well as intensifying the state’s dependence on the private sector. This pattern has had continuity across UK governments since the 1980s: from Margaret Thatcher, to Tony Blair (‘my greatest achievement’, she said), the 2010 ConDem government, its Tory successors and now the Starmer regime.
The 2010 the ConDem government’s austerity regime imposed extra damage, in particular: Cuts in public amenities or their privatisation made access more dependent on individual income, thus worsening poverty.
Cuts in social welfare and social protection increased the burden of unpaid caring, especially for women. Neoliberal austerity has generated scarcity and thus envy towards others who supposedly get favourable treatment (like migrants and claimants), despite their vulnerability.
Neoliberal austerity has been promoted by many beneficiaries, e.g. private equity firms, hedge funds, billionaires and politicians who gain funds from the main beneficiaries. Moreover, many pension funds have sought to maximise profits and so help undermine the public good. For example, the higher-education trade union, UCU, has a pension fund (USS) which is a major shareholder in Thames Water, thus sharing indirect culpability for its theft and degradation of public assets. Improvements would need to come partly from trade union members demanding accountability for such investments.
Starmer’s regime worsens the problem
The Starmer regime has worsened these
structural oppressions which it inherited. In The
Manchester Manifesto, Greens Organize (GO) has said: “As
people yearn for more, this Government promises less; it fails to address the
underlying decay of the UK’s economy and public sphere”, https://greensorganise.uk/taking-the-fight-to-reform-launch
The Starmer regime is worse than a failure. It has been further degrading the UK’s public sphere. while making the economy even more predatory. Its greater state expenditure may seem to contradict austerity but complements its predatory role. Here are four examples:
1) Fake decarbonisation: Last year the government falsely promised decarbonisation by expanding renewable energy and investing £22bn in Carbon Capture Use and Storage (CCUS). This techno-fantasy will do little to decarbonise natural gas but instead will justify its perpetuation (or even expansion) for the foreseeable future, including fossil fuel subsidies. See our critique, https://greenerjobsalliance.co.uk/the-labour-governments-dirty-energy-technofix-must-be-contested-and-replaced/ The fake decarbonisation agenda increases corporate welfare and environmental damage, while pre-empting alternatives that could replace fossil fuels, especially if developed by energy workers in alliance with community groups.
2) Militarisation: In early 2025 the government announced a massive increase in military expenditure supposedly for self-defence from a Russian invasion into Eastern Europe. This pretext grossly exaggerates Russia’s capacity, in order to justify imperial war-mongering. This spectre justifies the carrot of new arms plants, as a plausible option for decent livelihoods in economically depressed areas. This economic blackmail aims to recruit entire communities into psychological and economic dependence on a permanent arms economy. Likewise, it channels a social malaise into fear of a foreign threat, promoting a cross-class nationalist political identity. Thus, a key agent of people’s oppression, the British state, is sanitised as our protector.
3) Predatory growth: As measured by GDP, capitalist growth has generally caused many harms including greater exploitation, inequalities and environmental degradation. The growth obsession perpetuates such harms. Inviting more foreign investment further offers public goods for sale and undermines public accountability.
As a local example: The 2017 London Plan emphasised ‘good growth’ and ‘levelling up’, thus acknowledging that some growth may be harmful or perpetuate inequalities. Now the Mayor has deleted such phrases in favour of simply ‘growth’. This reinforces long-time socially inequitable policies. In particular, ‘estates regeneration’ has meant demolishing buildings that could have been refurbished, rebuilding them and socially cleansing lower-income residents; this continues.
4) Greater repression: More resources are being mobilised for the state’s repressive roles, alongside stronger laws constraining protest, even verbal dissent. Together these measures further criminalize the inevitable resistance, https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2025/apr/03/protest-britain-activists-quaker-meeting-house
In those ways, the
Starmer regime has shifted the Labour Party from Tory-light to ultra-Tory. Its corporate-welfare policy worsens socio-economic
deprivation and inequalities. It marginalises
public-good alternatives, such as the renewable energy infrastructure necessary
to replace fossil fuels, house retrofitting with better heat insulation, and
better-quality social care. Such
alternatives could be funded by several means, such as a wealth tax and/or
public bonds paying a fair interest. They could be administered by participatory
vehicles, such as a Public-Commons Partnership (PCP), by contrast with Public
Private Partnerships (PPPs) or the private sector. Such alternatives are crucial to build a
realistic durable hope in a better future. Otherwise, widespread desperation
will be exploited more by the Far Right.
Countering the Far Right
Greens Organize (GO) has rightly said: “The only answer is a movement from the ground up. One that can mobilise millions of frustrated voters who have entirely lost faith in the political system, that can take on the far right – not pander to it.”
The Far Right is a broad category, including fascists such as the EDL. Our focus should be Reform UK, for several reasons. Its leadership represents the wealthy elite benefiting from the policies of the major parties and so has a vested interest in continuing those polices. Its racist agenda has recently set the national agenda, as the mass media have given it disproportionate attention.
Worse, the main parties imitate its racist policies. Why? All main parties support the neoliberal policies causing people’s deprivation and anxiety. So, they need scapegoats, especially through racist scare-mongering about immigration and resentment against benefits recipients. Such a Labour Party cannot effectively counter Reform UK.
Reform UK attracts people with diverse or confused ideas, many warranting political engagement. How to engage them? It is necessary to acknowledge people’s deprivation and anxiety about the future, at the same time as to assign blame, namely: For several decades a wealthy elite has robbed public goods, turning them into private financial assets. Companies have super-exploited their workers, variously disguised (through outsourcing, self-employment, zero hours contracts, etc.), as means to extract more profits, i.e. unpaid labour.
All this has been facilitated by the two major parties. Reform UK will do likewise if it gains the opportunity at local or national levels. Its main slogan has been, “Broken Britain Needs Reform” with a narrative obscuring what broke Britain’s public goods. For example, it advocates NHS privatisation, euphemistically called ‘independent health provision’, along with tax relief for private health insurance; all this would benefit its billionaire sponsors. It promises, “Once and for all, we will take back control over our borders, our money and our laws” – but of course not the economy, which will continue serving a wealthy elite, https://assets.nationbuilder.com/reformuk/pages/253/attachments/original/1718625371/Reform_UK_Our_Contract_with_You.pdf?1718625371
As a Greens Organize video says, our problems have been caused by a wealthy elite flying over us in private jets, not by migrants coming in small boats across the Channel, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bgu5HpwDYDs
Our problems have been caused by an exploitative system, whose political supporters include Reform UK.
Taking back control: example of water companies
To counter austerity and the Far Right, a slogan could be: ‘Reverse the theft of public assets and take back control’. A crucial means is bottom-up collective action of many kinds, alongside a community support base for workers’ rights.
Such a community is not ready-made. It requires creating communities of resistance. Such action needs to combine grassroots activists from many groups: trade unions, community groups, water action, fuel poverty, disability, etc. New community organization will be necessary to defend and create commons, beyond the state and capitalist markets. Such initiatives are essential to push or bypass the state, which otherwise will continue its collusion with predatory neoliberal practices.
Although campaign slogans are necessary, they gain political force only through an action-learning process. Activists need to try out new mobilisation strategies, discuss their strengths and weaknesses, evaluate results, and then draw lessons for more effective action.
Water companies provide an example: For decades, profit extraction for shareholders has blocked or delayed necessary improvements. How to reverse this plunder of public goods? In March 2025, Clive Lewis MP proposed a Water Bill authorizing large penalties that could help bankrupt and so nationalize water companies if necessary. https://www.independent.co.uk/climate-change/news/government-clive-lewis-bill-water-meg-hillier-b2723458.html
In response, Meg Hillier MP warned that this outcome would create difficulties for public-sector pension funds as significant shareholders. Hillier’s riposte highlights a systemic problem beyond a wealthy elite, implicating millions of people.
Over the past couple years, anti-pollution protests (such as River Action) have been demanding that the government reject the companies’ request for higher water rates and instead nationalize them. The Citizens’ Arrest Network meanwhile used whistleblowers’ information to prepare legal documents for prosecuting the Thames Water CEO. When they visited the HQ with police officers to arrest him (18th March), he quickly resigned https://x.com/CitizensArrestN
Of course, the company can recuperate this minor setback through a new CEO. A major advance needs a political diagnosis of corporate theft, as a basis to demand and force a reversal. Staff have been trying to solve the problems, despite structural obstacles from decades of plunder and degradation, as depicted in the BBC documentary, https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m00284vn A solution needs workers’ collective power, mobilising their knowledge and skills to lead improvements, even to take over the management. In other words, effective politics must go beyond simply making demands on a neoliberal regime.
Electoral strategy: build unity to replace the Labour Party
The above agenda can gain public credibility for solutions by contesting corporate theft, while promoting collective control through a workers’ and community mobilization. Likewise, by defending benefits payments and migrants’ rights as crucial for everyone’s welfare.
This applies to both the Green Party and independent Left-wing parties. They ideally would cooperate through joint demands – as they already do in some places. Given the rising popular distrust (even hatred) towards the Labour Party, we should avowedly seek to replace it, especially in working-class communities. Otherwise. Reform UK may do so.
Green Party branch websites should display the publicity from their issue campaigns and electoral campaigns. This has several reasons: so that potential supporters will be attracted, and so that everyone can compare strategies, especially for explaining local successes.
For an electoral strategy: Don’t compete with independent Left-wing candidates for the same Council seats. Instead agree to allocate them according to the best prospects in each place. Even better, campaign for each others’ candidates, or agree a joint ‘Independent’ candidate, as has been done in some Council wards. These steps can help to build the necessary unity. We need to learn from these experiences in order to strengthen future efforts.
Biographical
note:
The author
joined the Green Party of England and Wales and likewise the Green Left in 2014.
He is author of the book, Beyond Climate Fixes: From Public Controversy to
System Change
The publicity
webpage has blogs linking class struggle with climate justice,
