Back to main newsfrom the Durham Miners' Gala - 'We say: Never again'
Sat 18 Jul 2009
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These are challenging times. But they are socialist times. They are times which should give all of us on the left renewed confidence in our values. Free-market fundamentalism has failed and lies in ruins all around us.
Unrestrained capitalism - whether you call it Thatcherism, neoliberalism or even Blairism - swept away the once-great coalmining industry in Britain.
Now we see the same problems in almost every industry, in almost every part of our economic life, from car factories to the high street.
Today, the only safe job is a debt collector and people are angry. People are waking up to the fact that life does not have to be like this.
They do not see why bankers should be bailed out while working people go to the wall, losing their jobs, their hard-won pay and conditions and even their homes.
They are also angry at the politicians who have feathered their own nests while turning a blind eye to the damage that the City of London and the bonus-drunk brigade were doing to our communities.
So we have a new challenge today - it is no longer enough just to say that capitalism isn't working too well. Even the Financial Times is admitting that.
Our challenge is instead to give expression to that anger and spell out a visionary and practical alternative.
Let us pause to reflect on the scale of the crisis. Workers are joining the dole queues at the rate of over 100,000 a month.
The young are worst affected. Those of us who can remember the 1980s can see the spectre of another "lost generation" before our eyes.
Skilled jobs and modern factories are under threat or are already closing down - and we know that if they go, they will not readily return.
Governments around the world have spent trillions of dollars to prop up the banks.
But they are saying, including our own Labour government, that we are going to have to pay back this debt in cuts to our public services down the line.
Employers are already applying putting pressure to freeze or cut wages and worsen other conditions, such as pensions. Yet on the other hand we have seen little sign of the bankers responding to public outrage and curbing their own excesses.
It is obscene that state-controlled bank RBS is now looking to pay its new boss nearly £10 million. Such greed has no place in our society.
It is an indication that the people at the top who have benefited from 30 years of casino capitalism are not going to let go lightly. They want just to reflate the punctured tyres of the market economy with taxpayers' money before taking us all for another ride.
We have to say: "Never again!" Never again rip-off privatisations. Never again light-tough regulation for the bankers with draconian anti-union laws for working people.
Never again a tax system that lets a hedge fund billionaire pay tax at a lower rate than the office cleaner. Never again watching housing costs soar while blocking councils from building new homes.
More than ever we need an economy which works for working people - and it is our movement and only our movement than can deliver.
We need action to save jobs, whether that is lobbying and campaigning or direct action, to stop factories closing.
Second, we need a determination to save public services from cuts. Health, education and welfare must not be held hostage to pay for the City's greed.
If debt needs to be brought down, then let the burden fall on those who created the problem.
Third, we need to stand for social justice. This crisis should be a signal to reduce inequality, not see it widen further as workers have their wages frozen or cut.
But we need to do more, because when we talk about "recovery" we are not just talking about getting ourselves out of this recession in the interests of our members.
We must also be talking about a recovery in the spirit and strength of the labour and socialist movement. The opportunity is there - the entire ruling elite is discredited.
People do not just want to see this crisis ended. They want to hope that their children and grandchildren will not have to face exactly the same problems in 10, 20 or 30 years' time.
They want secure and stable communities with a range of fulfilling jobs. They want a much narrower gap in incomes, with speculation and gambling for profit ruled out.
They want decent publicly run public services, without the Treasury axe hanging over them from one year to the next.
They want equality for all at work, with strong trade union rights and an end to exploitation.
And they want balanced growth that recognises the need to produce and consume differently if our planet is to survive.
We have to say not only that these demands are reasonable and just, but that we cannot secure them through the present system, based on the domination of private ownership.
These are old truths for those of us in the labour movement and we must broadcast them loud and clear.
Twenty-five years ago the Tories and their class tried to destroy the spirit of the miners - and where are they now?
Nicolas Ridley, Sir Keith Joseph and others dead and buried. Thatcher herself in a twilight zone.
And here we are, 25 years later with the spirit of the miners as strong as ever, because what the bosses' class fails to understand is that spirit courses through our very veins - it stands for decency and dignity, fairness and justice, community and, above all, solidarity.
These are values that they simply have no concept of. These are the values that stand us apart and make us strong.
This is why they failed to destroy the miners.
How do I know? Because I see before me an army of miners - from our hospitals and schools, from our factories and town halls, from our docks and construction sites, from our roads and railways.
A vast army bound together by a common cause to create a better world.
There are times when our hearts are heavy. But our heads have never bowed.
And on this, the 50th anniversary of the Cuban revolution, let me leave you with the words of Che Guevara, who when asked how long must the struggle continue replied: "Hasta la victoria siempre" - until the final victory.
That is the task that lies before us, to pass on the spirit of the miners from generation to generation. We have a world to win for peace, freedom and humanity.
Len McCluskey is Unite assistant general secretary.
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