Diane Abbott

Robbing welfare to pay for military expansion

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https://morningstaronline.co.uk/article/robbing-welfare-pay-military-expansion

 Chancellor of the Exchequer Rachel Reeves meeting members of the military during a visit to Rheinmetall BAE Systems Land (RBSL) in Telford, Shropshire, for an announcement on defence funding, March 24, 2025

While promising massive housebuilding with ‘no fiscal cost,’ DIANE ABBOTT MP reveals the government relies on planning reforms alone rather than public investment, as military expansion becomes the only significant investment

IN POLITICS, one should never over-promise and then under-deliver. At the same time, overall policy should be grounded in something more than wishful thinking. It is highly regrettable that the Chancellor made both these errors in delivering her Spring Statement.

Before the statement, all the talk was of enormous sums that would become available for desperately needed investment. At the same time, there was a strong campaign to refute any idea that the government was pursuing yet another round in the failed austerity experiment of its predecessors.

In the event, both were untrue. The actual new investment is extremely small and is mostly directed towards military and security investment, which is a completely wasteful and dangerous diversion of resources. A somewhat larger sum is planned to be “saved” by yet further attacks on welfare.

In effect, more spending on the military is being paid for by more attacks on the vulnerable, the sick and disabled people.

The Treasury has itemised the sums which illustrate these dangerously wrong priorities. By 2029-30, they project that the annual total of capital investment will have increased by £4.6 billion. But most of this does not properly fall into the category of investment at all, because it is military spending. You cannot produce something else from bombs, bullets and missiles.

Once military and security funding are excluded, real new productive investment amounts to less than £1.9bn at the end of this parliament. It does not qualify as investment. In terms of impact on the economy or living standards, it is a trivial amount.

…

Military spending is the only significant area of government spending which is seeing any significant rise in government capital spending. It aligns with Trump’s policy and begins to meet his demands. But we know that he will come back for more. There is already talk of doubling military spending as a proportion of GDP to 5 per cent.

Now, and in the future, that can only come from cutting spending elsewhere. Of course, if the economy were booming, then increases in welfare, in spending on public services, in genuine public investment and even increases in military spending could all take place simultaneously. But no-one is suggesting a boom is likely or even possible.

In reality, the rise in military spending is only possible by restraining spending on public services and cutting welfare. This increased military budget is being paid for by sick and disabled people. The economy will not get the public investment it needs and living standards and public services will both remain constrained. These choices are morally, politically and economically wrong.

Diane Abbott is Labour MP for Hackney North and Stoke Newington.

Original article at https://morningstaronline.co.uk/article/robbing-welfare-pay-military-expansion

Keir Starmer says that the Labour Party under his leadership all feel a small part of Scunthorpe.
Keir Starmer says that the Labour Party under his leadership all feel a small part of Scunthorpe.
Keir Starmer confirms that he's proud to be a red Tory continuing austerity and targeting poor and disabled scum.
Keir Starmer confirms that he’s proud to be a red Tory continuing austerity and targeting poor and disabled scum.
Continue ReadingRobbing welfare to pay for military expansion

‘If government cared about security, it would end child poverty and pursue peace’

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https://morningstaronline.co.uk/article/if-government-cared-about-security-it-would-end-child-poverty-and-pursue-peace

 Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer speaks during a visit to BAE Systems in Govan, Glasgow, to launch the Strategic Defence Review, June 2, 2025

Anti-war campaigners warn Britain is on course to become more militaristic as Starmer unveils massive programme of new arms spending

BRITAIN is on course to become a militaristic society with a war economy as Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer unveiled his government’s strategic defence review today.

Sir Keir pledged that Britain is becoming a “battle-ready, armour-clad nation with the strongest alliances and the most advanced capabilities, equipped for the decades to come.”

And he unveiled a massive programme of new arms spending, setting the military budget to soar to 3 per cent of GDP over the next 10 years.

…

Arms monopolies shares soared on the news of the spending boost, which will come at the expense of welfare and overseas aid, with tax rises also possible.

Equally chilling was Sir Keir’s claim that society must be put on a war footing. “Every part of society, every citizen of this country has a role to play,” he said.

…

Sir Keir stressed that Britain was prepared for conflict. “We are moving to war-fighting readiness as the central purpose of our armed forces,” he said, with Nato the central commitment.

His plans were rejected by veteran left Labour MP Diane Abbott, who said: “It is not true that more military spending will boost the economy.

“It is a terrible waste when public services and our basic infrastructure need funds. It is a scandal when welfare is being cut.”

And former Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn argued: “If the government cared about people’s security, it would reverse cruel cuts, end child poverty and pursue an agenda for peace. Let’s fund welfare, not warfare.”

…

https://morningstaronline.co.uk/article/if-government-cared-about-security-it-would-end-child-poverty-and-pursue-peace

UK Labour Party government ministers Keir Starmer, Angela Rayner and Rachel Reeves explain that they are partners complicit in Israel's Gaza genocide. The UK has provided Israel with arms, military and air force support. They explain that they don't do gas chambers but do do forced marches, starvation, destroy hospitals, mass-murders of journalists and healthcare workers.
UK Labour Party government ministers Keir Starmer, Angela Rayner and Rachel Reeves explain that they are partners complicit in Israel’s Gaza genocide. The UK has provided Israel with arms, military and air force support. They explain that they don’t do gas chambers but do do forced marches, starvation, destroy hospitals, mass-murders of journalists and healthcare workers.
Elon Musk urges you to be a Fascist like him, says that you can ignore facts and reality then.
Elon Musk urges you to be a Fascist like him, says that you can ignore facts and reality then.
Continue Reading‘If government cared about security, it would end child poverty and pursue peace’

Cuts to welfare and aid go hand-in-hand with the war drive

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https://morningstaronline.co.uk/article/f/cuts-welfare-and-aid-go-hand-hand-war-drive

DIANE ABBOTT MP points out the false premises used by Rachel Reeves in the Spring Statement

THERE is a liberal cliche that the first casualty of war is the truth. In reality it is usually the working class, the poor, disabled people and ethnic minorities.

Typically, they face more pressure and exploitation, longer hours, higher prices or charges, they get less state support and face greater discrimination all as part of the war effort. Or, more accurately, the war effort is used as the excuse to implement long-desired changes which increase exploitation and discrimination of all kinds.

That is what it is happening now.

To give just one example, both the Chancellor and the Secretary for Work and Pensions separately have said many years ago that we should be tougher on welfare than the Tories.

But it is only now, against the backdrop of the Ukraine war and the rhetoric of rearmament that that they are finally able to realise their ambitions.

Tory commentators are amazed and admiring about the depth of the cuts to welfare. One called Rachel Reeves the new George Osborne

This is true across the board. So it seems strange that many on the left are currently unwilling to link the war drive with the attacks on welfare and the cuts to international aid.

…

Article continues at https://morningstaronline.co.uk/article/f/cuts-welfare-and-aid-go-hand-hand-war-drive

Continue ReadingCuts to welfare and aid go hand-in-hand with the war drive

Justice Secretary slammed for interfering in judicial independence

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Justice Secretary Shabana Mahmood during the official opening of HMP Millsike – the new Category C jail in Yorkshire which will deliver 1,500 prison places, March 27, 2025

JUSTICE Secretary Shabana Mahmood was slammed for interfering in judicial independence today after she blocked new sentencing guidelines designed to reduce racial disparities.

Rebuking the minister, left MP Diane Abbott said there have been multiple reports highlighitng how black and ethnic minority people are treated unfairly by the justice system.

She said: “There is a reason why the Sentencing Council is independent. It was made a statutory independent body to avoid even the appearance of ministerial interference.

“This is not the United States. Our political system, our judicial system, are entirely separate.”

…

Article continues at https://morningstaronline.co.uk/article/mahmood-interference-slammed-abbott

Continue ReadingJustice Secretary slammed for interfering in judicial independence

‘There is nothing moral about cutting benefits’

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Keir Starmer explainst the moral case for cutting disability benefits. He says work will set you free.
Keir Starmer explains the moral case for cutting disability benefits. He says work will set you free.

https://morningstaronline.co.uk/article/there-is-nothing-moral-about-cutting-benefits

Starmer under pressure over cruel plan to slash welfare budget

… KEIR STARMER came under pressure from MPs across the Commons over his cruel plan to cut benefits today.

Labour announced on Tuesday that it will slash £5 billion from the welfare budget by the end of the decade.

In the Commons, Labour’s Diane Abbott told Sir Keir to stop pretending his cuts were moral.

“There is nothing moral about cutting benefits for what may be up to a million people,” she said.

“This is not about morality, this is about the Treasury’s wish to balance the country’s books on the back of the most vulnerable and poor people in this society.”

Colum Eastwood from the SDLP told the prime minister of a constituent “who needed help, she had a disability. It meant that her children have to cut up her food, they have to help her wash between the waist, they have to supervise her when she goes to the toilet.

“Under the Tory welfare system we were able to get that lady on PIP. Under the Prime Minister’s new proposed system she will get zero, nothing.

“And after 14 years of the Tory government — and many of us wanted to see the back of them — can the Prime Minister answer one question – what was the point if Labour are going to do this?”

Green co-leader Carla Denyer urged a wealth tax instead of cuts, a policy quietly supported by many Labour MPs.

“We have a deeply unfair, unequal economic system where vast numbers of people are struggling yet billionaires are getting richer and richer,” she told Sir Keir.

“Does the Prime Minister really think that the way to tackle this is to put the onus onto older people, children and now sick and disabled people rather than on the shoulders of the super-rich with a wealth tax, those people who could most easily afford to pay?”

…

Article continues at https://morningstaronline.co.uk/article/there-is-nothing-moral-about-cutting-benefits

Keir Starmer confirms that he's proud to be a red Tory continuing austerity and targeting poor and disabled scum.
Keir Starmer confirms that he’s proud to be a red Tory continuing austerity and targeting poor and disabled scum.
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 says pensioners can freeze to death and poor children can starve and be condemned to failure and misery all their lives.
Continue Reading‘There is nothing moral about cutting benefits’