There has been a surprising but welcome resonance to the various new year messages from leaders of the British labour movement. There is a consensus about the need to fight back against the Government's attack on public services and the welfare state. And recognition of the political fragility of the Con Dem coalition if sufficient public opposition is generated against their destructive policies.
TUC leader Brendan Barber states that: 'the TUC's March for the Alternative on 26 March promises to be one of the biggest events that we have ever organised, but local campaigns and protests that do not hit the national headlines could well make just as much an impact in those constituencies where there are coalition MPs with small majorities. The decision to cut the deficit in four years and to take £4 out of services for every £1 in tax was a political choice, not an economic necessity. Stimulating growth and progressive tax are safer and fairer ways to reduce the deficit. This is going to be a year when many people suffer, but it just could be the year when the campaign for change really gets going.'
http://www.tuc.org.uk/economy/tuc-18965-f0.cfm
Labour Party leader Ed Miliband says '2011 will be a year of consequences for Britain. Consequences that will be felt by hardworking families across the country. Consequences of the decision taken to reduce the deficit at what I believe to be an irresponsible pace and scale.... many people will wonder what they can do.
'Some will ask whether there really is an alternative to this scale of cuts. Still more will shrug their shoulders at casually broken promises and conclude politicians are indeed all the same. Labour's challenge and duty in 2011 is to be people's voice in tough times and show that these are changes born of political choice by those in power not necessity.
'To those who feel that politics as it is being practised is high-handed, remote and arbitrary, I also urge them to campaign and work with us. Decisions over school sport and in recent days, bookstart, were reversed because of the power of people arguing and winning their case. It shows that political change comes because people make it happen':
http://www.labourlist.org/ed-miliband-2011-will-be-a-year-of-consequences-for-britain
Seumas Milne writing in today's Guardian homes in on the political vulnerability of the opportunistic Con Dem coalition 'support for the coalition has now collapsed from 59% to 43%, backing for the Lib Dems from 23% at the general election to 8% in some polls, and Nick Clegg has become one of the most hated men in Britain as his party prepares to pay a savage political price in next May's elections' http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2010/dec/29/cameron-clegg-coalition-fragile-economy
Milne surveys the year ahead, 'everything from cuts in housing benefit and childcare support for those on low and middle incomes, to the abolition of the educational maintenance allowance and the slashing of basic council services will move from the realm of political debate to real life in the new year. Combine that with across-the-board tax increases, public sector job losses by the hundreds of thousands, falling real incomes and mounting unemployment, and the Treasury chief secretary, Danny Alexander, may yet rue the day he described this as "civilised".'
Chiming with the comments of Barber and Miliband Milne concludes that 'it's also wrong to think nothing can be done to derail this juggernaut....Trade unionists such as the new leader of Unite, Len McCluskey, who argue in favour of linking up with student and community campaigns are cutting with the grain of the real new politics. What happens on the ground will also feed back into parliament. But any successes in defeating this or that cut or privatisation are bound to be partial.
'To go beyond that needs Labour to offer a credible alternative for growth, jobs and tax justice. The future of the government will be decided by what happens to the economy in the next few months. If, as seems increasingly likely, its austerity programme halts or even reverses what is already the shakiest of recoveries, the prospect must be of either the biggest U-turn of all – or the disintegration of the coalition.'
