The Financial Times must be getting worried. In a larger font than it usually uses for its leaders, this august mouthpiece of British capitalism has a special full-length editorial on Brexit and the crisis in the British government.
“If parliament cannot resolve Brexit,” it thunders, “a new referendum is needed” (Wednesday January 23). We note that there has been no call for a national debate and referendum on the longest squeeze in workers’ living standards for generations, or in the disgraceful erosion of public services and the NHS. There is no call to arms over record levels of homelessness, low pay or poverty. The Financial Times speaks only for the interests of a tiny but economically significant section of the British population – those who own and control the bulk of private business, principally the biggest firms. But unlike the gutter press, it is a serious newspaper and its despair is revealing. It is further proof, is such proof was needed, of the depth of the crisis facing the British ruling class and its principle political representatives, the Conservative Party.
Referring to Theresa May’s so-called ‘plan B’ statement in the House of Commons this week, the Financial Times says that it “…showed she intends to press on with attempts to ram her agreement – with any minor concession she can extract from the EU on the Irish border “backstop” – through parliament. Her strategy appears to be to run down the clock as the UK’s March 29 departure date approaches, leaving MPs facing a choice between her deal, or no deal. A catastrophic crash-out is becoming ever more likely.”
After discussing the machinations now ongoing in parliament, including support for the FT’s preferred option – permanent British membership of the EU customs union – the editorial explores a way out for those Tory MPs and right-wing Labour MPs who might be listening. “A new election will change nothing”, it declares.
Here we beg to differ, because it may make little difference to the Brexit debacle, but a general election could threaten to make a significant difference to the balance of power, wealth and income in Britain. A Labour Government might in the end fail to carry out its policies and fulfil the aspirations of its members and supporters, but the very threat of a government that promises to govern “For the Many, Not the Few” sets the alarm bells ringing in the boardrooms of big business, as the FT well knows.
The Financial Times is arguing that the current political impasse should be resolved by an extension of Article 50 and a new referendum. Despite the risks of a second vote being “divisive”– and to that extent the newspaper is correct, in that the racism and xenophobia of the rabid Tory right would be pumped up to ever-higher levels – it suggests that there is no other way out.
“Ultimately, parliamentary gridlock over Brexit would represent a constitutional crisis of such a magnitude as to outweigh the pitfalls of a new plebiscite…if the people representatives cannot resolve the most momentous political issue in a generation, the people must once again have their say.”
Labour must put itself on an election war-footing
We have no wish to repeat the arguments we have made in previous editorials, but without doubt the most disappointing aspect of the Labour leadership’s role in the whole Brexit saga is its failure, while calling for a general election, to go onto the streets, in mass demonstrations and rallies, to campaign for one. It’s not as if the Labour Party is short of resources.
Labour should offer no support or succour to this Tory government, which is a continuation of the coalition from 2010 that has overseen the biggest cuts in living standards for decades and a decimation of welfare, education, the NHS and all the services upon which working class people depend. Labour should oppose a Tory Brexit that aims to reduce food standards, environmental regulation, wages and working conditions. Labour should opposed the completely false association of migration with the crises in education, health and housing. “Bring back control of our borders” has always been the battle-cry of racists and xenophobes and it is no different in relation to Brexit.
The entire Brexit project is based on an economic and political illusion that has no real bearing on the real causes of the insecurity, uncertainty and instability that millions face in Britain today. It is not membership of the EU per se that lies at the heart of the plethora of problems facing working class people. It is British capitalism, with its relentless drive to increase rent, interest and profit at whatever the cost to the majority of the population. And it is capitalism, inside or outside the EU, that socialists seek to do away with.
For two and a half years the Brexit debate has dominated British politics, while the relentless drip, drip, drip of cuts in living standards has gone on relentlessly. More headlines are given to fifteen desperate people trying to cross the Channel on a flimsy dinghy – the worst headlines, we might add – than are given to the fact that tens of thousands sleep rough in the coldest part of the year. The Labour Party has the resources and it has the membership to shift gear and transform the political debate.
Jeremy Corbyn, John McDonnel and the lefts on Labour’s NEC have to cut across the whole Brexit imbroglio with their own call to arms. The Financial Times might think a general election would “change nothing”, but millions of working class people think otherwise. Labour must put itself on an election war-footing. It must develop an urgent Action Plan to use the Brexit issue as an opening for a campaign for a general election.
Labour must organise rallies, demonstrations and events up and down the country, not just to call, but to demand a general election and an end to this miserable government. Whatever happens in parliament, whether or not Tory and right-wing Labour MPs follow the advice of the Financial Times editorial, the problems faced by working people day-in and day-out are not going to be wished away, either by Brexit or the lack of it. Labour has to demand an election now and must campaign for policies that offer a way out of the profound social and economic impasse faced by working class people.
January 23, 2019
