Month: March 2017

The Article 50 Letter Focussed on Economics and Security; But Theresa May Was Threatenening Us Not The EU!

In her letter to the European Commission formally giving notice of the UK triggering Article 50 to withdraw from the EU, Theresa May made specific reference s to two areas of policy, economics and security.  Linking these was widely interpreted as a veiled threat to ensure a more benevolent negotiating position from the EU countries.  While this may be correct it is far from the whole story. There was another audience – us! Economics and security go to the heart of the disastrous policies which this amoral government is intent on pursuing.

Focussing on economics and security as a combination (as opposed to say, social policy or the environment) is entirely consistent with Theresa May’s pursuit of the kind of autocratic neo-Conservatism I have alluded to in an earlier post.  The implicit threats of a ‘bonfire’ of red tape presents a real danger to the rights and conditions of working people.  This means that Sports Direct and JD Sports warehouse conditions will become the norm rather than the exception. Add this to Chancellor Philip Hammond’s threat turn Britain into an offshore tax haven, effectively ending the possibility of adequately funding public service provision and the scene is set for wage slave conditions and the return of the workhouse. May’s clever move was to present such a prospect up front in an attempt to gain misplaced patriotic support at the expense of individual rights, as I pointed out here.  The argument will be that we shall need to work in this manner in order to show the big bad EU that we can run a ‘successful economy’.  You can almost hear the rhetoric now; cutting red tape to unleashing the creative potential of plucky Brits in the ‘gig economy’ to thrash those Johnny foreigners in the EU! In reality the only things unleashed will be the size of the bank accounts for the likes of Philip Green and Mike Ashley.

Consider the second point of emphasis, security.  As a result of the events in Westminster Parliamentary attacks, Home Secretary Amber Rudd is already proposing breaking into encrypted messaging services in the name of ‘security’. This is in spite of the evidence to suggest that it was a lone wolf attack, the most difficult to stop using correspondence surveillance.  But the revelations from the CIA reveals that without strict and accountable line of authority such technology cans be used for more than just extremist terrorism.  There is nothing to stop future governments (also conceivably led by that nemesis of Human Rights, Theresa May) broadening ‘threat’ to include the EU itself if negotiations go wrong (as seems likely) or ‘environmental activists’ as has already happened in local instances. As I mentioned in a previous blog, Government can harness the natural instincts of people to gather closer together for protection.

The autocratic part? Aside from continued attempts to exclude Parliament from taking an active part in Brexit, todays white paper on the Great Repeal Bill makes specific reference to the Government taking ‘delegated powers’.  Even as it stands it is anticipated that up to 1000 instances of Ministers making alterations to statute while bypassing Parliament will occur.  The likelihood is that number will explode with ample opportunity for the Government to sneak through legislation which is only remotely related to EU separation.

Make no mistake, the Article 50 letter was as much for our consumption as for the EU Commission.  Brexit has provided the perfect opportunity for the Government to pursue its neo=Conservative policies.  But they were going to be pursued anyway. If Brexit had not happened another pretext would have been found.

A Sobering Reminder; There Is No Future in England’s Dreaming

God save the queen
She ain’t no human being
And there’s no future
In England’s dreaming.

God Save The Queen – The Sex Pistols.

On Thursday evening I was reminded that sleep and dreaming has been a recurring theme when describing England, more specifically Southern England. The trigger was Republic Birmingham’s second poetry evening. This event contained a twist as it started with a debut standup comedy routine from Pete, a new member of our group. Sadly, due to traffic congestion I missed the first part but the ease with which he took the interruption of my late arrival completely in his stride belied his inexperience. A unique and valuable comedy talent in the making.  Then on to the main event, Spike the Poet making a return visit to our evening. Once again he did not disappoint with an intelligent mix of humour, passion and biting comment on the farce of monarchy.  Some wonderful anecdotes by way of background to a few of the poems reflected the depth and complexity of human relationships in the modern world. Find out more about Spike on his Facebook page.

My contribution was next and eschewing my beloved Shelley I read a poem (abridged for length) by Chartist Gerald Massey. My choice,  Tradition and Progress, written in the mid 19th century, intertwines republicanism and anti-war protest with rage at the poverty experienced by many working people.  You can read more about Massey in an earlier post.

So what about the dreaming? The last item was a prose reading by Alex Simpson. He chose the last paragraph of George Orwell’s Homage to Catalonia which recounts Orwell’s experience in the Spanish Civil War of the 1930s. In my Orwell readings I had not got around to this book so the tract was fresh and had impact. Having returned to England Orwell despairs of the complacency he perceives, concluding:

Down here it was still the England I had known in my childhood: the railway-cuttings smothered in wild flowers, the deep meadows where the great shining horses browse and meditate, the slow-moving streams bordered by willows, the green bosoms of the elms, the larkspurs in the cottage gardens; and then the huge peaceful wilderness of outer London, the barges on the miry river, the familiar streets, the posters telling of cricket matches and Royal weddings, the men in bowler hats, the pigeons in Trafalgar Square, the red buses, the blue policemen–all sleeping the deep, deep sleep of England, from which I sometimes fear that we shall never wake till we are jerked out of it by the roar of bombs. 

From Homage to Catalonia by George Orwell

Orwell and the Sex Pistols are simply two of many, poet Philip Larkin a notable example, who have used sleep and dreaming imagery to describe the state of England.  With a ramshackle constitution, increasing intolerance, and a seeming acceptance of ever more authoritarian inclined politicians talking of Empire 2.0 we are still sleeping and dreaming – and jeopardising our future!

Give a wrong time, stop a traffic line
Your future dream has sure been seen through.

Anarchy in the UK – The Sex Pistols

Politicians Are Lying To Us – Terrorism Is Affecting Our Way of Life!

All right minded people were shocked by the events at Westminster last month (22nd March) where 6 people were killed. Despite the fact that for for much of the rest of that day only the bare facts were known, journalists and some politicians were willing to make extravagant assumption regarding the nature and motive of the attack. As more details emerged, however it became increasingly clear that terrorism was indeed the motive.

A few hours after the attack Prime Minister Theresa May appeared outside Number 10 to claim, as all leaders do, that the terrorists cannot win and nothing will change our way of life. She was not telling the truth and, moreover, I believe she was willfully lying.  Here are my reasons for this assumption and the dangers such lies conceal.

Firstly, look at what Theresa May wants to achieve, namely a removal of Human Rights. Fear of terrorism plays into a public sense of insecurity, an environment in which they are more susceptible to having their rights infringed in the guise of enhanced safety. The Investigatory Powers Act (known informally as the Snooper’s Charter) was passed into law last November giving the Government as much power as any authoritarian state. The reason? Counter-terrorism. But the technology could be used for any purpose as leaks from the US CIA clearly illustrate.

In a previous blog I pointed to a strong tendancy of modern authoritarian programmes to isolationism, termed the Retreat to the Citadel. Fear of the ‘outsider’ feeds directly into this narrative which is already heightened by the acrimonious debates surrounding Brexit, fuellung resentment and hatred toward immigrants. As a consequence, if a British Bill of Rights ever does see the light of day it must be pored over for any dilution of overall citizen rights along with any attempt to remove the rights of minorities. Moreover we must not accept the removal of rights from people who are labelled as being ‘not like us’.

What about out in the real world?  Just before Christmas it was reported that the City of London was planning on creating a ‘ring of steel’. Note that included in the plans were:

Manned checkpoints, rising street bollards and crash-proof barricades…

Manned checkpoints? To enter the City of London (note not Westminster, this is protecting the bankers)? Would £5m be spent on a dystopian series of emplacements defacing the city if it were not for the possibility of terrorism? Though just maybe terrorism is a convenient excuse, of course.

So let us see Theresa May’s words for what they are, empty platitudes. Let us be honest, society has been changed by terrorism and that has happened since the start of time. But the more long lasting and least tangible effect is what it is doing to our perception of ourselves as a society. The questions we ask ourselves are legitimate and profound, but we must not let politicians and the wealthy distort the answer for their own ends.

Buckingham Palace Repairs; Contempt for the Taxpayer and a Dereliction of Duty

BuckPalRepairThey say that memory starts to dim with age. So it is ironic that one of the oldest members of the House of Commons, Dennis Skinner, seems to possess his in full.  The same is true of SNP MPs, maybe something to do with the  invigorating Scottish landscape! But most MPs seem to be suffering from amnesia. The reason for this conclusion? The huge majority (by 408) in the Commons for increasing the Sovereign Grant for 10 years to a massive 25% of Crown Estate profit, effectively handing the Windsors and their courtiers over a third of a billion pounds extra for the repair of Buckingham Palace.

The Sovereign Grant Act makes clear who is responsible…

Why is this shameful? In 2011 the Sovereign Grant Act was passed allocating Elizabeth Windsor 15% of the revenue from the Crown Estates.  Clause 11 of this Act, which can be viewed here states:

11. Maintenance of Royal Palaces and related land

The Secretary of State has no [my emphasis] duties under section 21 of the Crown Lands Act 1851 in relation to the maintenance of Royal Palaces and related land so far as they are maintained by Her Majesty out of the Sovereign Grant.

For avoidance of doubt Clause 13 (8) of the Act makes the situation perfectly clear:

Any reference to the support of Her Majesty’s official duties includes the maintenance of Royal Palaces and related land.

So why has the House of Commons forgotten this provision in the intervening 6 years? Clause 11 makes it clear that the Secretary of State has no business maintaining Buckingham Palace and Elizabeth Windsor is the de facto budget holder. There is no ambiguity here, she is responsible and must be held accountable for not doing so. She is in the same position as any other public body which has wilfully neglected to maintain its property.  If a Town Hall falls down or a Hospital collapses it may be in the public interest to allocate emergency repair funds but you can be sure that the Chief Executive and his/her staff would be held accountable. If Elizabeth Windsor has misused the money we have already given her, what safeguards are there that she will not misuse the extra allocation. So at the very least MPs should have refused the support until an investigation was made and arrangements were put in place for the Government itself to have organised the works. As it stands the Government will be virtually reduced to an monitoring role.

…so why is there no accountability?

Now consider the attitude of the November 2016 Report of the Royal Trustees on the Sovereign Grant. Section 4 specifically claims that there is an element of forward planning in Royal Household finances, up to 10 years ahead.  So it is surprising that there was no mention whatsoever in the Report for 2012-13 the first year of the Sovereign Grant. The current report states:

The works needed for the reservicing of Buckingham Palace have been considered as a separate, discrete element of the property maintenance 10 year plan due to the programme scope being substantially different to the other priorities for property maintenance investment in the period 2016-21.

Since there has been no major refurbishment since 1945(!) why was the appalling state of Buckingham Palace not mentioned as it must have been known?  Instead there is a complacent statement about future increases in the Sovereign Grant being used to make inroads on the backlog of repairs.

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Appeals for National Greatness are a Dark Delusion

Caricature_gillray_plumpuddingDonald Trump’s campaign slogan Make America Great Again has been enthusiastically adopted in a British context by UKIP and deployed in a modified form by Conservatives. But why should we be wary of this seemingly uplifting phrase?

Calls for National Greatness are Nothing New

Last week I blogged about the origins of the autocratic libertarian ideology of Donald Trump and Theresa May. In many respects their political kinship reflects the Thatcher/Reagan consensus of the 1980s but in a much more dangerous form. In fact the phrase Make Britain Great Again has a long history, one which coincidentally involves Britain’s first female Prime Minister.  It was used prominently by the Conservative Party in the 1950 General Election, notable for the first time Margaret Roberts stood for election as MP. They lost, though Roberts was to make her name famous as Margaret Thatcher.

Similarly, in the United States the idea that one person or family could ‘Make America Great Again’ long predates Trump. In fact neoconservatives such as David Brooks had been calling for it since the 1990s. Here is what he wrote in the Weekly Standard an outright neoconservative mouthpiece in 1997:

The national mission can be carried out only by individuals and families — not by collectives, as in socialism and communism. Instead, individual ambition and willpower are channeled into the cause of national greatness.

It is important to note that Brooks also mistrusted democracy, believing that it would destroy a sense of grand ambition and noble purpose unless accompanied by an aggressive imperialist foreign policy. He disdained what he called a concern with ‘radical egalitarianism’ with its concern for compassion and caring. Surprisingly, it did not actually matter how this greatness was to be achieved, (provided that it was not advancement of the individual):

It almost doesn’t matter what great task government sets for itself, as long as it does some tangible thing with energy and effectiveness. The first task of government is to convey a spirit of confidence and vigor that can then spill across the life of the nation.

National Greatness at the Expense of Rights and Compassion

Whether consciously or not, Theresa May has adopted the assertion of Brooks that it does not matter what comprises the ‘great task’.  This is what allows May, who opposed Brexit to enthusiastically embrace a Hard Brexit in pursuit of this shot at ‘greatness’.  Likewise this great national crusade comes at the expense of private concerns, of the promotion of a caring and compassionate society or fuzzy, woolly things such as rights!

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