By Phil Frampton, member of Manchester Withington CLP
Keir Starmer’s alarming response to the Covid disaster has been to call for a Government Public Inquiry. As almost all those in politics can see from the fate of the 2014 Historic Child Sex Abuse and 2017 Grenfell Fire inquiries, such bodies are a mechanism for kicking issues into touch and out of public scrutiny until the establishment feel safe to hold their heads up.
With the prospect of a second coronavirus wave this winter, plus a Government heading for a calamitous no-deal Brexit, this country is heading for unparalleled economic and social disaster. CBI representatives have pointed out that with the economy already nosediving, a second wave and a no-deal, we will be heading for ground zero.
This government is paralysed by its incompetence and focus on profiteering. They can escape to their second homes abroad. Meanwhile, the overwhelming majority of this country’s people will be left to cope with chronic food and drug shortages, deaths of loved ones, a collapse of health services, mass unemployment and wage and benefit cuts.
The government has shown it cannot be trusted with workers’ health and lives. Even while Covid is still killing over 2,000 people each week, tens of thousands of people are still left at risk by government failure to replace the type of cladding that caused the Grenfell tragedy. The “refusal” to adequately protect or even listen to “essential” workers has been a startling reminder of Grenfell.
Government makes the right noises
As with Grenfell, as soon as they get the chance, this government, while making noises to protect people against Covid, are busy trying to open the way to their business friends getting back to profit, irrespective of safety. They declared returning to school was safe…and were forced by teaching staff revolts and parental disbelief into abandoning that mantra. Now they want to abandon the 2-metre distancing rule and soon they will abandon the (admittedly farcical) quarantining for those entering the country (except those who come via Ireland).
Workers, their families, and their organisations want to understand how our communities can be safe. We need to understand why at least 50,000 more lives have been lost in this country than in Germany. We need to understand what actions could be taken to better protect workers, their families and the population as a whole, with an ongoing release of action plans precisely to avoid a repeat of a second wave of the virus. If this pandemic follows the path of the 1918 Spanish flu, then the next wave could be at least twice as severe.
I recently gave a Webinar talk to a group of Bristol Labour activists regarding Bristol in the 1970s. It included a discussion on the St Pauls Riots.
The trouble began in the city on April 2nd 1980 when police conducted one of their many and frequent heavy-handed raids on the Black & White Cafe in St Pauls, the area of Bristol with the highest concentration of Afro-Caribbean people. Housing conditions were some of the worst in the city. The community had experienced racist policing for years, with Police increasingly using the SUS stop and search laws to harass Black youth.
At the same time, white support for the fascist National Front was growing, as was racial harassment on the council estates. Many whites looked upon St Pauls as a no-go area, whilst many in the black community considered the city centre at night to be a no-go area for their community.
Police raid lit the blue touch paper
That April police raid lit the blue touch paper of years of discontent. Hundreds of black, and soon after white, youth came onto the streets to battle the police, initially driving them out of St Pauls with 12 police cars damaged, Lloyds Bank and some shops gutted and 19 police officers and journalists taken to hospital. The police later returned in greater numbers and by April 4th the “uprising” had been quelled, with 130 arrests, none of which led to convictions.
The Tory then Home Secretary, William Whitelaw, refused to call a public enquiry, expressly on the basis that it would “lead to criticism”, i.e. expose the racism, of the police.
Part of the socialist response was to press the Bristol Trades Council into organising a labour movement inquiry into the events, their causes and a programme of action. The Trades Council set up a People’s Inquiry, which, though it included bishop’s etc, played a useful role in establishing an alternative narrative to the racist Tory media narrative of the time.
In my view, all progressive workers’ representatives and organisation should be joining with progressive Labour Party representatives and organisations, and community groups to establish independent labour movement Covid response inquiries in their areas. Such bodies could also enlist the support of radical academics and research groups who have demonstrated their readiness to employ their skills to assist with protecting our communities.
We need a truly public inquiry
Today, social media and mass access to online face-to-face communication offer an opportunity for a truly public inquiry with people able to send in testimonials and “attend” and be involved in hearings. This technology also offers the means by which ongoing interim reports could disseminate proposals for immediate actions and, interactively, organise support for those taking action.
This should be a TUC initiative but sadly the TUC has restricted itself to calling for a government enquiry. However, that does not exclude trades councils and trade unions from fully engaging and they should be called on to play a leading role in the creation of independent inquires.
There is a huge well of frustration and anger at all levels of the population, as reflected in senior scientists establishing the Independent SAGE. A bold initiative with a clear direction can not only draw new layers around the worker’s movement but also demonstrate the key role of the movement as the country’s voice of sanity and with the capacity of moving society out of danger.
The lessons of the Covid Response will not be academic but provide a base of action for responding to the continued and future Covid threat.
June 13, 2020
