Screen grab of members of the House of Lords looking up during a protest in the chamber after protesters calling for the abolition of the unelected chamber started shouting, singing and throwing leaflets, March 20, 2025
PROTESTERS disrupted proceedings in the House of Lords today [yesterday]to demand the abolition of the unelected chamber.
They threw leaflets, shouted and sang from the public gallery during the demonstration at noon.
The House was adjourned for a short time as the demonstrators were escorted out.
Protester Lucy Porter, 50, a primary school teacher from Leeds, said she was “campaigning for a house of the people.”
On the Lords, she said: “It’s a symbol of everything that’s outdated.
“We don’t have a functioning democracy in this country.”
The leaflets, apparently modelled on an album by the Sex Pistols punk band, had written on them: “Never mind the Lords here’s the House of People.”
On the other side it stated: “Aristocrats and oligarchs: Out. Posties, mums, nurses and neighbours: In.
Chancellor of the Exchequer Rachel Reeves during a meeting at Downing Street in London with regulators. She is expected to use the meeting to announce more detail on how the Government will cut the cost of regulation by a quarter and set out plans to slim down or abolish regulators themselves, March 17, 2025
CHANCELLOR Rachel Reeves is set to announce a huge new programme of spending cuts as unemployment rises and anger at Labour’s assault on disability benefits mounts.
She will use her spring spending statement next week to unveil a fresh austerity programme as the government continues to rule out tax rises on the wealthy as an alternative.
Despair is turning to anger among backbench Labour MPs and trade unions at the government’s course, which is already seeing Labour plunge to record lows in the opinion polls.
Ms Reeves’s death-wish economics come as official statistics showed joblessness increasing, including among young workers.
Unemployment is up by 0.1 per cent, with a youth unemployment rate of 12.9 per cent.
Commenting on the figures, Public and Commercial Services union general secretary Fran Heathcote said: “The labour market figures today highlight the cruelty of the government’s reforms to disability benefits.
“Unemployment is rising, and the wider measure of underemployment is now at 4.75 million with only 816,000 vacancies in the economy — meaning there are already nearly six people chasing every vacancy.
“Those figures exclude disabled people currently deemed unable to work or with only limited capacity for work.
“The reality is that the government’s proposals will not help disabled people off of benefits and into work, but off benefits and into deeper poverty.”
Keir Starmer says pensioners can freeze to death and poor children can starve and be condemned to failure and misery all their lives.Keir Starmer explains the moral case for cutting disability benefits. He says work will set you free.
Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer during a reception to celebrate St Patrick’s Day at 10 Downing Street, London, March 19, 2025
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[T]he Starmer-Reeves agenda is entirely dictated by the needs of finance capital, mediated through the Treasury and the military.
There is no question, of course, of arms spending being affected by this renewed austerity — on the contrary it is slated to carry on rising for the next decade. Critics of the welfare cuts should not be reticent about making this connection.
Trying to protect spending on services without challenging this renewed militarism hands the Starmerites a free pass by allowing a key argument to go unchallenged.
Starmer’s priorities have a mounting number of victims. Again in Commons questions, Northern Ireland social democrat Colum Eastwood identified one, a deeply disabled constituent able to access benefits under the Tories but now facing destitution as her personal independence payments are withdrawn.
Eastwood then asked the key question. Given all that — what is the point of Labour?
It is a question millions across the country, including many who voted Labour last July, are now asking. This is governance in the interests of capital, not labour by any stretch.
The left in Labour must transition from protest to action against the government if there is to be any positive answer to Eastwood’s question. Issuing statements is not enough if Starmer and Reeves can continue to count on votes in Parliament and canvassers in the country for their anti-worker programme.
Absent that fighting approach, the logical conclusion must be that something new, articulating the values of socialism, is needed.
Keir Starmer, Angela Rayner and Rachel Reeves wear the uniform of the rich and powerful. They have all had clothes bought for them by multi-millionaire Labour donor Lord Alli. CORRECTION: It appears that Rachel Reeves clothing was provided by Juliet Rosenfeld.Keir Starmer commits to play the caretaker role for Capitalism through the “hard times”.
