Monthly Archives: September 2024

Jeremy Corbyn: Austerity Is Labour’s Choice

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https://tribunemag.co.uk/2024/09/jeremy-corbyn-austerity-is-labours-choice

After 14 years of billionaires doubling their wealth, the political elite’s choice of starving pensioners and children shows austerity as a complete con job.

Image of Jeremy Corbyn MP, former leader of the Labour Party
Jeremy Corbyn MP, former leader of the Labour Party

Every day, my constituents make tough choices. Tough choices like deciding whether to heat their homes or put food on the table. Tough choices like taking out a loan to pay for this month’s rent. Tough choices like selling their home to pay for their family’s social care.

People are making tough choices because governments have made the wrong choices. We warned that Tory austerity would weaken our economy and decimate our public services. We were ignored, and the poorest in society paid the price. Austerity is not just a buzzword. It is the ongoing, brutal reality for millions of people who have been pushed into destitution. It is the face of desperation and anxiety of those forced into a spiral of debt. It is a freezing cold night for the record numbers of people sleeping rough on the streets. It is the graveyard for those left without vital support: more than 300,000 excess deaths have been attributed to austerity policies.

We often talk about austerity in terms of cuts to public spending, but that is just one side of the coin. By starving public services of resources, the government manufactured a convenient excuse for their privatisation. We saw this most acutely with the NHS: an underfunded public service does not just cause satisfaction to plummet, but the belief in the principle of public healthcare itself. Austerity was never about saving money (the UK’s debt pile increased every single year under the Tories). It was about transferring money from the poorest to the richest. Between 2010 and 2018, aggregate wealth in the UK grew by £5.68 trillion. 94% went to the richest 50% of households. 6% went to the poorest 50%. As child poverty was heading towards its highest levels since 2007, Britain’s billionaires more than doubled their wealth.

It was a political decision to defund, dismantle and auction off our public services. And it will be a political decision to repeat this failed economic experiment. ‘It’s going to be painful’, the Prime Minister told the nation last week, prepping the public for ‘difficult choices’ ahead. Did he get permission from the Tories to reuse their trademark slogans? Other ministers have gone one step further, indicating that they do not have any choice at all but to impoverish children and pensioners. Keeping children in poverty is unavoidable, apparently, if we want to restore the public finances. Scrapping the winter fuel allowance is a necessity, we were risibly told, if we want to stop a run on the pound.

It is astonishing to hear government ministers try to pull the wool over the public’s eyes. The government knows that there is a range of choices available to them. They could introduce wealth taxes to raise upwards of £10 billion. They could stop wasting public money on private contracts. They could launch a fundamental redistribution of power by bringing water and energy into full public ownership. Instead, they have opted to take resources away from people who were promised things would change. There is plenty of money, it’s just in the wrong hands — and we will not be fooled by ministers’ attempts to feign regret over cruel decisions they know they don’t have to take.

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Article continues at https://tribunemag.co.uk/2024/09/jeremy-corbyn-austerity-is-labours-choice

Continue ReadingJeremy Corbyn: Austerity Is Labour’s Choice

Chancellor’s ‘black hole’ claim ‘unnecessary and unhelpful’, says ex Bank of England economist

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https://news.sky.com/story/chancellors-black-hole-claim-unnecessary-and-unhelpful-says-ex-bank-of-england-economist-13213523

Andy Haldane

Former senior economist Andy Haldane told Sky News that Rachel Reeves’s comments earlier this summer had spooked consumers, businesses and investors.

The chancellor’s claim of a £22bn “black hole” in government finances was “unnecessary and probably unhelpful economically”, a former Bank of England chief economist has said.

Andy Haldane told Sky News’ Politics Hub with Sophy Ridge that Rachel Reeves’s statement in July was a “bad idea” because it generated a sense of “fear and foreboding” just when there was a new-found confidence in the UK.

Ms Reeves made the claim within weeks of taking office in what was widely seen as a warning that her first budget in October would be a painful mix of spending cuts and tax rises.

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He said: “The black hole event was unnecessary and probably unhelpful economically.

“It’s one thing to reveal a black hole, if that indeed is what it is. But just leaving that to sit for three months I think was a bad idea.”

Asked what the government should have done, he said it was “much better to say nothing until you provide solutions”.

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https://news.sky.com/story/chancellors-black-hole-claim-unnecessary-and-unhelpful-says-ex-bank-of-england-economist-13213523

Continue ReadingChancellor’s ‘black hole’ claim ‘unnecessary and unhelpful’, says ex Bank of England economist

Oceana UK files legal challenge, calling recent oil & gas licences ‘unlawful’

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Oceana UK has moved forward with its legal challenge over fossil fuel exploration licences in UK waters, filing its case at the High Court. In response to the initial threat to take the government to court over the harm to UK seas, ahead of the election, the previous government stated that it would defend the decision.

Oceana and other members of the Ocean Alliance Against Offshore Drilling have now written to Ed Miliband, the Secretary of State for Energy Security and Net Zero, urging the new government to accelerate the UK’s move away from fossil fuels and concede Oceana’s case.

Oceana UK, who is represented by law firm Leigh Day, say the previous government’s decision to issue 31 new oil and gas licences in May 2024 was unlawful because it failed to consider the extreme impact of oil spills on marine life, as well as on several other grounds.

The letter – signed by Greenpeace UK, Friends of the Earth Scotland, Rewilding Britain, Oceana and others – highlights Oceana UK’s legal challenge to the new oil and gas licences, and asks that the Secretary of State ‘brings an end’ to the licences which overlap with several areas designated for wildlife.

It invites the government to concede the claim, which has now been lodged with the High Court, and signal a ‘clear departure’ from the reliance on fossil fuels, which it argues had been the case under the previous government.

Naomi Tilley, Campaign Lead at Oceana UK, said:

“These licences were issued with a shocking disregard for expert advice, as well as our seas, climate and future. With its commitment to end oil and gas licences, the new government has started down a world-leading path, and now it has a crucial opportunity to honour the spirit of that ambition, by calling time once and for all on these licences and the destruction and degradation caused by Big Oil running roughshod over our ocean.” 

Leigh Day’s Rowan Smith, who represents Oceana UK along with Carol Day, said:

“Our client is legitimately frustrated that advice from expert bodies set up to conserve the marine environment was effectively ignored; advice which condemns the plans for further licensing due to the damage drilling would cause to marine wildlife and the knock-on climate effects from the greenhouse gases generated when the extracted fossil fuels are used. We are prepared to argue, on behalf of Oceana UK, that the assessments on protected sites failed to properly acknowledge these issues. However, our client hopes that its letter to the Secretary of State, drawing attention to this case, will ultimately persuade the government to revoke these licences.”

Richard Benwell, Chief Executive of Wildlife and Countryside Link, who signed the letter, said: 

“New oil and gas licensing in and around Marine Protected Areas poses serious and even irreversible risks to marine wildlife and habitats and is utterly at odds with any common sense understanding of a protected area. It also means directly ignoring warnings from government scientific advisors who have strongly advised against fossil fuel developments in these sensitive sites. The government should withdraw licensing areas that overlap with Marine Protected Areas and regulate to end all damaging industrial activities in these critical areas for wildlife, including overfishing and fossil fuel industries.”

The claim will challenge the ‘Appropriate Assessments’ made by the former Secretary of State under the Conservative administration, arguing they largely ignored advice from independent government experts about the potential effects on sensitive Marine Protected Areas (MPAs).  

These bodies – the Joint Nature Conservation Committee and Natural England – advised that they could not conclude that the drilling will have no adverse effect on the designated sites. More than a third of the licences overlap with MPAs, which were established to protect habitats and species that are essential for ocean health.

Oceana UK also argues that the assessments were flawed in several other ways, such as ignoring the impact of potential oil spills and overlooking the significant impact of the climate crisis on both the marine wildlife and the wider climate.

The grounds of the claim argue that the then Secretary of State:

  • Failed to consider the impact of oil and gas industry accidents (including oil spills and discharges) on MPAs and their conservation features. 
  • Failed to consider the ongoing impact of the climate crisis on the marine environments set to be impacted by these licenses, and failed to consider the full climate impact of the licensed activity, including scope 3 emissions (indirect emissions, such as from the use of the extracted oil and gas).
  • Relied on a flawed assumption that only 50% of licensed drilling will actually take place.
  • Failed adequately to assess the cumulative impacts of the licensed activity on the relevant sites.
  • Failed to pay due regard to the advice of the JNCC and Natural England in relation to the matters raised by several of the grounds above.
Continue ReadingOceana UK files legal challenge, calling recent oil & gas licences ‘unlawful’

UNRWA Says 6 Workers Among at Least 18 Killed in Israeli Strikes on Gaza School

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Original article by Brett Wilkins republished from Common Dreams under Creative Commons (CC BY-NC-ND 3.0). 

Mourning Palestinian men carry the body of UNRWA staffer Yaser Abu Sharar after he was killed in an Israeli strike on the Nuseirat Refugee Camp in Deir al-Balah, Gaza on September 11, 2024. (Photo: Abed Rahim Khatib/Anadolu via Getty Images)

“This school has been hit five times since the war began. It is home to around 12,000 displaced people, mainly women and children. No one is safe in Gaza. No one is spared.”

The United Nations relief agency for Palestine said Wednesday that six of its workers are among the at least 18 people killed in a pair of Israeli airstrikes targeting a U.N. school in the Gaza Strip where thousands of forcibly displaced Palestinians were sheltering.

The United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA) said the Israeli strikes on one of its schools, located in Nuseirat in central Gaza, resulted in “the highest death toll among our staff in a single incident” since Israeli forces began bombarding the strip following last October’s Hamas-led attack on Israel.

“Among those killed was the manager of the UNRWA shelter and other team members providing assistance to displaced people,” the agency said. “Sincere condolences to their families and loved ones. This school has been hit five times since the war began. It is home to around 12,000 displaced people, mainly women and children.”

Victims of the strikes included women and children.

Earlier on Wednesday the United Nations said the school had been “previously deconflicted with the Israeli forces.”

“No one is safe in Gaza. No one is spared,” UNRWA stressed. “Schools and other civilian infrastructure must be protected at all times, they are not a target.”

Responding to the attacks, U.N. Secretary-General António Guterres said on social media that “these dramatic violations of international humanitarian law need to stop now.”

Israel is currently on trial for genocide at the International Court of Justice, a U.N. body. International Criminal Court Prosecutor Karim Khan is also seeking arrest warrants for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant, and three Hamas leaders—at least one of whom, Ismail Haniyeh, has been assassinated.

Over the past 341 days, Israel’s assault on Gaza has left more than 145,000 Palestinians dead, maimed, or missing, according to Palestinian and international officials. Nearly all of Gaza’s 2.3 million people have been forcibly displaced, while Israel’s “complete siege” of Gaza has starved and sickened millions of Palestinians, dozens of whom have died of malnutrition, dehydration, and lack of medical care.

UNRWA says around 200 of its staff members have been killed in more than 450 Israeli attacks on agency facilities since October. More than 500 Palestinians have been killed while seeking shelter under the U.N. flag.

Responding to Israeli claims—reportedly extracted from Palestinian prisoners in an interrogation regime rife with torture and abuse—that a dozen of the more than 13,000 UNRWA workers in Gaza were involved in the October 7 attack, numerous nations including the United States cut off funding to the agency. Almost all of them have restored funding as Israeli lies have been debunked.

Bucking this trend, U.S. President Joe Biden in March signed a bill prohibiting American funding for UNRWA.

Original article by Brett Wilkins republished from Common Dreams under Creative Commons (CC BY-NC-ND 3.0). 

Continue ReadingUNRWA Says 6 Workers Among at Least 18 Killed in Israeli Strikes on Gaza School