By Rhys Jameson
The Tories continued commitment to Neoliberalism cannot be faulted. Not content with driving down wages and conditions for the working class, they have now introduced their great innovation of “fire and rehire” into the very heart of government itself. With four Chancellors in four months, three Home Secretaries in two months and now our third Prime Minister in three months.
Although the new PM may not be attending the Sharm El-Sheikh climate change conference, no one can question his green credentials, after this recycling of old Tory rubbish. This merry-go-round of governmental personnel was necessary, we are told, to create stability and security and to reassure the markets that Britain would be able to pay its debts in the wake of Truss’s mini budget.
Black holes are normally restricted to science fiction, but now, thanks to Truss and the Tories, we have a £40bn one in government finance. The run they caused on government bonds, when the sharks of international finance sensed blood in the water, has created a higher yield to investors on UK government debt that now includes what the Telegraph has called a “muppet premium.”
The Financial Times calculated that this extra interest payment amounts to a quarter of the overall yield — £16.8 bn in extra public spending over five years; money that could have been spent on desperately needed health care or social services. Truss never actually handed out money to the rich, she was only intending to, but it will still cost us dearly, at a time when many are struggling to heat their homes or put food on the table. The government will be intensifying the squeeze on us to meet the increased interest payments and to think in her youth there were schools who overlooked Truss’s true potential to make an impact.
We can’t really call that an election
How can we explain the sudden elevation of Sunak to the office of Prime Minister? We say “elevation”, because we can’t really call that an election. He might well have won the nomination process of Tory MPs, but he definitely lost the election of Tory members and as for the public, well, we had no say at all.
The only way we can even try to explain what happened is to put it in footballing terms: it’s as if an unfancied second-division team managed against all expectations to win the FA Cup. But then even, after convincingly beating a top Premier League team in the final, they were then forced to renounce their FA Cup win after objections from UEFA, that the European glamour clubs won’t want to play them in the Europa League. Pressure would be brought to bear on the English FA to rerun the Cup Final and invite the runners-up and two beaten semi-finalists to compete again and rather than playing actual football matches have the pools panel decide who should really have won. That just about sums up Rishi’s elevation to PM.
The economic situation was far too urgent for a delay of 56 day full Tory leadership election campaign; this time it was all over in a weekend, with even Johnson, not a man known to forgo his holidays, jetting back to compete. Still, 56 days is a lot quicker than most people can get a GP appointment these days, after the havoc the Tories have wrought on the NHS.
The actual process that unfolded seems to have loosely followed the plot line of an Agatha Christie murder mystery novel, with all the credible suspects, those possessing the motive, means and opportunity to be the new Prime Minister gathered together in the drawing room of a stately home on a Sunday evening.
Away from the waterfall into calmer waters
One by one, their personal integrity, reliability and political records are gone through thoroughly, until, having eliminated those who would be impossible, whoever remained, no matter how improbable, must be the new PM. The capitalists could not tolerate any further uncertainty and they were desperate for a safe of hands to steer Britain away from the waterfall and into calm waters, so they took matters in hand and appointed Sunak. The capitalists have no real commitment to democracy; it was just the most economic method of decision making and rule in the past but, when it stops producing their desired results, it stops being useful.
So now we have Sunak, the richest member of Parliament elevated to the highest office in the land, to head a government of the rich, by the rich, for the rich. We should not forget that he is also Britain’s first person of colour to be PM and we should not pass by this historic milestone without comment. He is clearly an inspiration to BAME youth, the living embodiment of the fact that no matter your race, creed or colour, providing that you are obscenely rich you can achieve anything in life.
While for most Asian and Black people in this country they are three times more likely than average to be living on less than 60% of the average median income, Sunak is a multi-millionaire. He is from what might be termed the “double migrant” community of East African Asians. Amrit Wilson, an author and member of the South Asia Solidarity Group, explained in The Wire, “These Indians were the middle strata between the Africans and the British when they left.
“While some were very badly off when they came to Britain, many were middle-class businessmen and professionals who had been doing very well for themselves and some were able to bring over their capital. They were also ambitious, pushy and acquainted with urban ladders of ‘success’. This profile was very different from that of a migrant from rural India…”
More skeletons in Sunak’s cupboard
Although Sunak was the best of a bad bunch as far as the capitalists are concerned, and looking at his competitors’ baggage of dirty laundry, he still comes with more skeletons in his cupboard than you would find in an average mausoleum. Just to mention his green card and his fine for partying during the Covid lock down, his appointment shows just how far standards in public life have fallen.
Of course, that is not to mention his unexplained rise from the humble upbringing: from the son of an NHS GP and Pharmacist to vast wealth, more than twice that of the King himself, despite his seeming inability to even use a debit card. Privilege has propelled Sunak to the top of the Tory Party as the first BAME PM, but like Barack Obama in the USA, his ethnicity will not be the decisive factor in his class outlook.
The BAME working class produces some of the most dedicated, hard-working and self-sacrificing members of the labour movement and unity is the bedrock strength of the working class. The working class was privileged to be propelled by the leadership of Jayaben Desai in the Grunwick dispute. The events that followed from that contributed enormously to raising the level of respect shown to immigrant workers, many of them women – especially by their colleagues in the existing workforce.
Sunak’s austerity agenda comes on top of twelve years of attacks on jobs, pay, and conditions, at a time when the trade unions are already mobilising, and the working class is awakening and flexing its muscles. The issue is not who resides in Downing Street, but the bankrupt capitalist system that they defend.
Sunak the Prime Minister is supposed to be solving the problems caused by Sunak the Chancellor of the Exchequer. Some of you are going to have to go without food and some of you are going to have to go without heating and some both, but don’t worry, that is s sacrifice that Sunak, as your PM, is willing for you to make.
