I’m So Bored With the USA: “Hate to Say I Told You So”

 

“’Cause I wanted to Turn my back on the rot that’s been planning the plot”

 

 

Since I wrote “Beginning to see the Light – Background” in January 2021, inequality has been the prime focus of this and successor columns. Alongside inequality, I have monitored and featured the rise of hard-right politicians.

 

When considering Reform, our own hard-right mob, I have been steadfast in my view that the majority of Brits aren’t racist instead peoples frustrations and disillusionment caused by inequality and the cost-of-living crisis is being exploited by these parties to feed their own prejudices.

Now, a poll of 1,000 Reform voters, commissioned by Arden Strategies with JL Partners, looked at former Labour voters who had opted for Farage’s party in 2024, who could be tempted to back Labour at the next election. What they want is more focus on a “bills and blue lights”; a strategy to repair the NHS and deal with the cost of living.

Fifty-eight percent could be tempted back to Labour with more NHS investment, with 52% citing a reduction in hospital waiting lists as key, whilst 75% wanted more action to help with the cost of living.

In recent weeks Labour seem to have moved-on from immigration and being “Rerformlite”, to highlighting previous Reform statements about it being open to an insurance-based health model. Forty percent of those questioned said they would be less likely to support Reform if it proposed changing the NHS to an insurance-based model.

Also, the home secretary, Yvette Cooper, has criticised Reform for “continually attacking” police officers trying to tackle unrest and, more widely, the government has been trying to cast doubt on Reform’s economic competence

 

What they want is more focus on a “bills and blue lights”; a strategy to repair the NHS and deal with the cost of living

 

The report also found that there is a hardcore of support for Reform, with >50% of voters that backed Reform at the last election thought there was a chance they would not vote for the party next time, with 46% saying they were “absolutely certain” to vote for Reform again.

 

Other findings included:

 

• 40% would be less likely to vote for the party if it was seen to be too friendly to Putin and Russia,
• 80% said it was important to “stand up” to Putin,
• 60% felt it was important for the party to support Ukraine,
• 40% said it was important for the party to support Israel.
• 44% wanted to scrap the two-child benefit cap, there was division, while 34% were in favour of it,
• >50% supported the idea of a tax on wealth,
• 56% backed the idea of an annual 2% levy on those owning assets worth more than £2m.

 

Whilst I have long supported the idea of a wealth tax, it can be easily avoided. Typically, the uber rich are transient and could just move to a more beneficial tax jurisdiction.

Which is why the proposal for a 2% global tax on the wealth of the world’s billionaires, put forward by the Brazilian climate minister Ana Toni in July 2024 makes sense. It would affect just 3,000 of the super-rich, it would raise around $250bn (£195bn).

Unfortunately, there is little likelihood of a global solution with the US unlikely to cooperate. As for the UK, we have so few billionaires that the structure would need to be radically different.

Whilst progressive taxation is necessary, it doesn’t address a core problem in many economies: “when capital income outpaces labour income, redistribution may ease the symptoms of neoliberalism, but it leaves the underlying condition untreated”. The level of inequality we have is suppressing consumption, deterring investment and slowing growth, as a result it is economically unsustainable. Due to the lack of demand, we have become increasingly reliant on debt, speculation and asset bubbles to fuel growth.

 

‘The level of inequality we have is suppressing consumption, deterring investment and slowing growth’

 

In addition to tax driven transfers, we need policies that boost wages: full employment, stronger labour unions and public investment. Within this there maybe the need to be reconsider renationalising some industries.

Given all of the above you would think this plays to Labour’s strengths. But, this isn’t Labour as we knew it, this in Torylite Labour.

This can be seen in the governments mealymouthed efforts over Israel’s actions in Gaza, which is causing considerable friction amongst their backbenchers.

“We want action, and this is not action,”; “Is this it?”; “At what point does our basic humanity require us to take stronger action? Many of us think the red line was passed a long time ago.”

The government, on the backfoot, justifies itself by pointing out that it has restored funding to the UN agency Unrwa, provided millions in humanitarian assistance, sanctioned far-right Israeli ministers and those who committed settler violence, and broken off trade negotiations with Israel.

However, it struggles to explain its export licensing regime, with >300 licences still in operation.

Also, we have been very timid over claims that Israel has broken international law. Taking the line that while the government believes it is “at risk” of doing so, it is up to the international courts to decide. The same reasoning is cited for avoiding the term “genocide” to describe the situation in Gaza.

 

“At what point does our basic humanity require us to take stronger action?”

 

I decided to research the Genocide Convention, which is supported by 153 states. The Convention prohibits various acts with the intent to destroy a specified group “in whole or in part” as such. The proscribed acts of greatest relevance to Gaza are “killing” or “deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part”.

To date, >57,000 Palestinians have been killed in Gaza since Hamas’s attack of 7 October 2023. A November 2024 study found that nearly 70% of those killed at the time had been women and children, also many male victims were not combatants. This far exceeds the 8,000 killed by Bosnian Serb forces in Srebrenica in 1994, which an international tribunal found to constitute genocide.

Moving on, some few weeks ago, the government published a consultation on deregulating chemicals. While most consultations last for 12-weeks, this one runs for eight, half of which covers the holiday period – it closes on 18 August. The intention is set out at the beginning: to reduce “costs to business”. This, as repeated statements by Keir Starmer make clear, means tearing up the rules.

The consultation proposes that a chemical which has been approved by a “trusted foreign jurisdiction” should be approved for use in the UK. There is no list of what these trusted jurisdictions are, ministers can decide, and can add to the list through statutory instruments, I.E., avoiding full parliamentary scrutiny. The proposal means the government would be able “to use any evaluation available to it, which it considers reliable, from any foreign jurisdiction”.

As an example, the US has a wide range of dangerous chemical products are approved for uses that are banned here and in many other countries.

The proposals, if affected, would see us diverge from European standards, meaning we are likely to break the terms of the EU-UK trade and cooperation agreement. Northern Ireland will be in an even greater quandary, as it remains in both the EU single market and the UK internal market.

This easing of regulations, usually associated with the beloved neoliberalism of the right has become a Labour hobbyhorse. Earlier this month, chancellor, Rachel Reeves, told financiers in her Mansion House speech that regulation “acts as a boot on the neck of businesses”.

 

‘This easing of regulations, usually associated with the beloved neoliberalism of the right has become a Labour hobbyhorse’

 

Before the general election last year, Reeves told an assembly of corporate CEOs: “I hope when you read our manifesto, or see our priorities, that you see your fingerprints all over them.” The dreadful planning reforms the government is now forcing through parliament were hatched, she told them, at a “smoked salmon and scrambled eggs breakfast” with corporate lobbyists.

I cant help but wonder if some of this brownnosing is based on Messrs Starmer and Reeves having half-an-eye on their next jobs. Given their inept handling of just about everything this might be needed sooner than scheduled.

 

As with any [great] showman, I have left the best to last…

 

Chancellor Reeves is considering overruling the supreme court over a £44bn car loan commission scandal after lobbying by some of the UK’s biggest lenders.

The Treasury is considering a contingency plan in the event that justices decide to uphold the entirety of last October’s shock appeal court ruling that customers may be entitled to billions in compensation. The plan is for the government to retrospectively change the law to cut liabilities for lenders.

Such a move would represent a huge intervention by the Treasury, and comes months after Reeves controversially tried to intervene in the supreme court case back in January, when the justices ruled that paying commission to brokers who arranged the motor loans, without disclosing the sum and terms of that commission to borrowers, was unlawful.

Rules on such payments are covered by common law: meaning they are set by judges through a series of court decisions, rather than by parliament. New primary legislation would give parliament the final word over the handling and disclosure of commission arrangements to borrowers.

The Treasury is concerned that the scandal is deterring investment, and dampening US appetite for UK company shares at a time when the City is desperate to revive the LSE.

Perhaps we can further rig the situation so the value of shares never goes down. Whatever happened to risk? To caveat emptor?

 

‘a closet-Tory auditioning for her next job’ ‘Really, she is beyond stupid’

 

I have long been convinced that, as Chancellor, Reeves isn’t up to the job. She has been running scared from the very beginning, has made a series of misjudged decisions, and seems to be a closet-Tory auditioning for her next job.

In “Big Mouth Strikes Again”, I expressed my dismay in her “Leeds reforms”, which are designed to allow bank to increase risk, speculation, and revisit the GFC.

One comments of the car finance scandal highlighted her priorities and just how out-of-touch she is with the electorate and the cost-of-living. When she previously tried to intervene in the supreme court case, she warned the justices to “avoid conferring a windfall” to consumers.

Really, she is beyond stupid. We have been ripped-off by financiers, it isn’t a windfall it is redress. All it proves is she doesn’t care about the majority, only her next job, which can’t come soon enough!

Reeves and Starmer should take note, or it’s the early bath for them!

 

Starmer’s Labour is no longer the party of the left, but that mantle might be assumed by the new party being created by Jeremy Corbyn and Zarah Sultana, which vows to “build a democratic movement that can take on the rich and powerful – and win”.

In a joint statement, they touched upon themes that will appeal to a broad section of the electorate: 4.5 million children are living in poverty in the sixth richest country in the world; giant corporations making a fortune from rising bills; a government that says there is no money for the poor, but billions for war.

They promise to fix these injustices with a mass redistribution of wealth and power, taxing the uber rich, and standing up to fossil fuel giants that put profits before the planet.

There will be no privatisation of the NHS, and energy, water, rail and mail will be returned into public ownership.

Also making a return, is a council-house building programme.

The statement finished, saying: “It’s time for a new kind of political party. One that is rooted in our communities, trade unions and social movements. One that builds power in all regions and nations. One that belongs to you.”

Messrs Reeves and Starmer should take note, or it’s the early bath for them!

 

 

“You’re laughing this time Next time you might be the one”

 

This week’s survey which covers the intention of electors that have defected from Reform to Labour should make good reading for the Labour party. Unfortunately their concerns seem more akin to what labour was rather than what it has become.

Messrs Starmer and Reeves are a shambles of a Tory tribute act.

In fact, the return of James Cleverly to the Tory front bench could signal more trouble for Labour as, unlike his Tory contemporaries, he makes some sense. He also understands that the Tory party must stop aping Reform by pretending there are easy answers to difficult problems. The party had to be honest about the need for, and the challenges of, delivery. The key lines in his lecture came at the end: “We don’t need a revolution. We need a restoration – of competence, of delivery, and of trust.”

Unfortunately, as I have tried to portray in the article the government is devoid of all three!

Cleverly’s return raises an important broader question for the Tory party; is it an attempt to move away from a concentration on working-class voters in the so-called red wall of Labour seats where Reform UK has established itself as the main contender? Or does it instead imply a renewed focus on more middle-class voters in the so-called former “blue wall” where Ed Davey’s Liberal Democrats have swept so many Tories aside?     

Either way it is difficult to see a way back for Labour. I really do think the debacle they are creating is becoming impossible to recover from.

Reform are clearly the leaders today, but I think Jeremy Corbyn’s new party’s ideas are in-line with the real concerns expressed by the electorate.

Perhaps his time is now?

Lyrically, we start with The Hives and ““Hate to Say I Told You So”, but I did! We end with Wah! and “Story of the Blues”. For those not acquainted with the song it was released in 1982 when UK unemployment was rampant and tells the story of receiving your P45. Make note Messrs Starmer and Reeves.

Enjoyment might be closer than I thought.

Philip.   

 

@coldwarsteve

 

 

Philip Gilbert is a city-based corporate financier, and former investment banker.

Philip is a great believer in meritocracy, and in the belief that if you want something enough you can make it happen. These beliefs were formed in his formative years, of the late 1970s and 80s

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