-->
Just over a year ago Labour
leaders Jeremy Corbyn and John McDonnell issued their instruction to Labour
councillors that in the face of cuts to government funding of local authorities
that they should set legal budgets - in effect implement cuts. This
was accompanied by talk of leading a mass movement of councillors against
austerity and the cuts. At the same time many independent
activists and some from smaller left parties, including the Greens, had joined
Labour or Momentum seeing it as the only way to oppose austerity.
The campaign never materialised
but the 'legal budget' edict disarmed critics of Labour council cuts. The
impact of cuts can be clearly seen in terms of closure of youth
provision, closure of libraries, the increase in pot-holed roads in many city
areas as well as the crisis in social care and the out-sourcing and
privatisation of services. Many activists who would have been in the
forefront of campaigns are now involved in the debilitating internal
Labour and Momentum struggles.
At the time a Green Left
colleague wrote LINK
No doubt JC & JM feel
that they “have no choice” as 95%+ of their councillors support this approach.
But it does undermine those trade unionists and campaigners actively arguing
for them to stand up to the Tories. It implies there is no choice, when of
course there is a choice. Labour has over 100 Councils. If Labour nationally
opposed the cuts and organised some or all of its councils to refuse to
implement them, there is absolutely no way the Government could send in
Commissioners to run them all. It would provoke a huge national debate on the
cuts and local democracy, and have the potential to force the Government to
back down partly or wholly. As it is, right-wing Labour councillors are
tweeting the letter to attack anyone on the Left campaigning against the
cuts.
In the end, the problem with the
JC letter is that it completely understates the scale of the attack on local
government and local democracy. This is not “business as usual”, a few nasty
cuts etc. This is a once in a lifetime, permanent dismantling and
shrinkage of the local state, a huge extension of privatisation of local
services and an undermining of local democracy itself - there is little point
in having locally elected councillors if their job is (from Nicholas Ridley’s
famous quote): “to meet once a year to hand out the contracts”.
The only silver lining in the
letter is its appeal for councillors to support local campaigners (even if this
is clearly contradictory to their councillors supporting cuts budgets!) and to
be organising mass campaigns against local government cuts. This gives an opportunity
to campaigners to point out that Labour councillors are only doing one half of
the message from the JC letter, and not the other.
Michael Calderbank, of Brent
Central Labour Party and a Momentum supporter responded:
Well, yes, I tend to agree with
your Green Left colleague. But in order to have dictated terms to local
councillors, JC and JMc would have need there to be a mass campaign against
local cuts. At long last they are trying to kick the Labour LGA into actually
running a political campaign - all too often it's as though Labour councillors
have forgotten they are members of a political party and just presented
themselves as competent and compassionate administrators, powerless to do
better in the circumstances. Frankly it's no good claiming to be an
anti-austerity party in opposition whilst going along with it where we're in
power.
Soon Brent Labour will be
selecting candidates to stand in the 2018 local election and the candidate's
stance on cuts will be a test for those who joined Labour in the Corbyn. One
current anti-Corbyn councillor has already announced that he will not stand
again and will move out of Brent. Those elected will have been left a legacy of
cuts to be implemented in their first year:
|
Source
Brent Budget Scrutiny Report
|
Bristol Green Party, in a city
facing damaging cuts again this year, yesterday returned to the need for a
national campaign LINK:
Greens are warning
that the £92 million cuts forced on the Council by the Tory austerity programme
will devastate public services across Bristol. The Greens are calling upon
Bristol’s Mayor to take a leading role in opposing national austerity alongside
other cities, networks, unions and progressive parties. They have also put
forward an alternative vision for local government financing, including calls
for a return of unallocated business rates to local government and for Bristol
to receive its fair share of infrastructure spending.
Leader of the Green
Councillor Group, Charlie Bolton said:
Further cuts to the
council will destroy many of the public services we all rely on. Services for
older people, those with disabilities, our young people and children will all
be slashed. Local traffic schemes that keep our children safe as they walk to
school, well-loved library services and the parks that provide the ‘green
lungs’ for our city will all be affected.
But it doesn’t have to be like this. These cruel cuts
to our services are a choice that is being made by this Tory Government – to
dismantle our public services instead of raising money by closing tax
loopholes, reforming our finance system, bringing good growth to our economy or
increasing tax for the top 1%. Essential public services are being abandoned,
yet Government remains committed to the soaring costs of replacing Trident,
building a new nuclear power station at Hinkley Point and developing the HS2
vanity project.
Molly Scott Cato,
MEP, Green Party Economics Spokesperson and Green Parliamentary Candidate for
Bristol West said:
We know austerity is
a downward spiral. As you cut the state you reduce job quality and tax revenue,
leading to less money available for investment, which in turn cuts the state
still further. It’s time to say loud and clear that austerity has failed and
that we value our public services and believe they should be properly funded.
Tony Dyer, Green
Party Local Government Spokesperson and Green Parliamentary
candidate for Bristol South added:
Many of our cities
are being disproportionally affected by Tory cuts. Bristol has already suffered
three times more cuts than neighbouring authorities. The 10 Core Cities outside
London are all run by Labour. They are home to almost 19 million people and
contribute more than a quarter of the combined wealth of England, Wales and
Scotland – so why aren’t we seeing more vocal opposition to this latest unjust
assault on our services? We call upon Bristol’s Mayor to take the leading role
in opposing national austerity alongside other cities, networks, unions and
progressive parties.
Figures from the
Institute of Fiscal Studies demonstrate that cuts have not been shared equally
across the country LINK
