De Menezes Murder: Lies Begin to Unravel17 Oct 2008Explosive testimony has been presented to the inquest into
the police killing of Jean Charles de Menezes, suggesting that
he was shot even though he was known to be unarmed. Evidence was given that the innocent Brazilian was killed despite
his not being clearly identified as a suspected terrorist. In
addition, officers involved have said that they were prepared
to kill de Menezes even without authorisation from commanding
officer Cressida Dick. Jean Charles was fatally shot two weeks after the July 7 bombings
in London, which killed 56 people and one day after an apparent
failed second attempt to detonate devices. He was reportedly mistaken
for Hussain Osman, one of the failed July 21, 2005, bombers. Anti-terror
officers pinned him to the floor of a London underground train
and pumped seven bullets into his head at point-blank range. Last week, a Special Branch officer revealed that he altered
his notes because they indicated that police shot dead Jean Charles
as he boarded a train at Stockwell tube station on July 22, 2005,
even though he was known to be unarmed. The officer, referred
to as “Owen,” was giving evidence on October 8. Owen was deputy surveillance coordinator in the Scotland Yard
control room during the surveillance operation that resulted in
the young electrician’s death and had made notes about the
day’s events on his computer. After he had given his evidence
at the inquest, Owen was asked for all his notes relating to the
shooting. He claims he logged onto his computer to change the names of
officers into the codenames given by the court to protect their
identities, but then deleted a paragraph in which Dick, who is
now deputy assistant commissioner of the Metropolitan Police,
had told officers to allow Jean Charles to continue his journey
because he was “not carrying anything.” The full paragraph reads, “Management discussion. CD [Cressida
Dick]: Can run on to tube as not carrying anything. Persuaded
by unidentified male amongst management.” It flatly contradicts Dick’s own evidence at the inquest
on October 7, the previous day, in which she claimed that she
ordered her officers to “stop” Jean Charles because
he was a “terrorist threat.” Owen says he deleted the paragraph because it was “misleading.”
He claimed he couldn’t remember if it was Dick talking although
he said it was probably her when questioned further. “I believe it was the commander but when I reflected I
couldn’t be sure, or whether she was saying this is what
we are going to do or this is one of the options. It was a woman’s
voice.” When asked if he realised he had committed a serious offence,
Owen said, “I have removed a line I believed was wrong and
gave a totally false impression.” He told the inquest he
had deleted more than he had intended because he was rushing to
an appointment. When asked if “management” had asked
him to make the changes, Owen replied, “No. I am sure of
that, sir.” Owen also made the startling revelation that he did not submit
the crucial paragraph to the Independent Police Complaints Commission
(IPCC) inquiry in 2006 or the health and safety trial last year
into the shooting, at which he gave evidence, “because he
wasn’t asked to.” Commander Dick also claimed she was informed “they think
it’s him” when Jean Charles left a building linked to
Hussain Osman and made his way to Stockwell station. Chief Inspector
Vince Esposito, a counter-terrorism expert advising Dick on the
day of the shooting, said he believed, “without a shadow
of doubt,” that Jean Charles was failed bomber Hussain Osman
and that a “critical shot” to the head was only administered
if a suspect was identified and was carrying a device. However, speaking at the inquest on October 10, “Pat,”
who acted as contact between Scotland Yard and the surveillance
team, reported he had said only that Mr. de Menezes was “possibly
identifiable with” the suspect. “I was always under
the impression that the subject had been unidentified,” he
stated. Another senior officer, Detective Inspector Merrick Rose, revealed
that he could not “recall” whether images of the real
suspect, Osman, were discussed at a dawn briefing before Jean
Charles’s death—begging the question, was a comparison
between the two men ever made? Dick denies that her instruction to “stop” Jean Charles
was an order to shoot to kill and that she did not say “at
all costs.” Mark Lewindon, now retired, was a detective chief inspector
in Special Branch at the time. He had told the inquest he had
overheard the order from Dick when she was speaking in the operations
room at New Scotland Yard. “It was said he shouldn’t
be allowed to get on the train and I think the words she used
were ‘at all costs,’ ” he said. Dick responded in her defence that “I would need to be
absolutely satisfied that this person posed a dreadful imminent
threat to members of the public before I would order a critical
shot.” “I was asking for what you might call a conventional—albeit
aware of all the risks—challenge from the firearms officers.” Subsequent evidence demonstrated that, whether or not Dick
was calling to make operational a shoot-to-kill policy, the police
involved had already been instructed to do just that. A tactical adviser and senior firearms advisor known as Trojan
84 made the extraordinary admission to the inquest that police
were prepared to take a “critical” shot without orders from their superiors. The inspector had been in charge of briefing the marksmen who
shot dead Jean Charles. Giving evidence in open court for the
first time, Trojan 84 said: “We felt that for any DSO [designated
senior officer] to make a decision about a critical shot was a
hugely difficult decision to make and maybe career-threatening. “In relation to the critical shot, the instruction would
come direct from the DSO but what I also mentioned was that if
we were able to challenge, but the subject was not compliant,
then a shot may be taken.” When Trojan 84 was asked if officers were prepared to take
the critical shot without authorisation, he replied, “Yes.” “It was my job to tell the team they would be supported
whatever decision they took because of the structures that were
in place.” Trojan 84 could only have conceivably issued such instructions
if they had been already laid down at the highest possible level—much
higher than the DSO Cressida Dick. The shoot-to-kill policy implemented against Jean Charles is
known as “Operation Kratos,” adopted in secret two years
earlier in high-level discussions between top police officers
and the government. Under its remit, a senior police officer is
on standby 24 hours a day at Scotland Yard, the headquarters of
the Metropolitan Police Service (MPS), with the authority to deploy
special armed squads to follow and, if deemed necessary, shoot
dead suspected suicide bombers. It is now clear that, without any clear identification or indication
of an imminent threat, the police were determined that someone
would die that day in furtherance of the so-called “war on
terror.” Moreover, even the limited safeguard of accountability to a
designated superior officer would not be allowed to interfere
with what was a political and not a security-driven decision. As the World Socialist Web Site insisted in the immediate
aftermath of police murder, “there was a deliberate decision
to kill, rather than arrest, de Menezes, taken at the highest
level of the police force rather than by the officers immediately
involved.” Jean Charles was shot in cold blood primarily in order “to
instill fear in the population and implement a shoot-to-kill policy
that had been secretly decided on by Prime Minister Tony Blair
and top officials two years previously.” The treatment meted
out to de Menezes sent out the clear message—first articulated
by Blair—that the “rules of the game” had changed. See Also:
Britain: Cousin of Jean Charles
de Menezes—“We fear another cover-up”
[24 September 2008]
Britain: No one to
be held accountable for police murder of Jean Charles de Menezes
[19 July 2006]
Police gun down worker
in London subway: another tragic consequence of Blair’s war
policy
[25 July 2005]
Can Ed Miliband deliver?17 Oct 2008Secretary of state for energy and climate, in a government that is approving new runways as fast as they can be proposed, is poised to sign off on new coal power and seems desperate to indulge in a bit of Cold War nostalgia by resurrecting nuclear power. That’s no recipe for an easy life. Ed Miliband‘s indication that he is supportive of moving the UK emissions reduction target from 60% by 2050 to 80% is a good start ? although it merely shows the government finally admitting that what environmentalists told them several years ago was right all along. But the real question is, can he deliver? Certainly, early indications suggest he faces exactly the same problem as former, non-cabinet, climate change ministers ? he has a room full of colleagues who do not believe it is practical to care about the environment in which we live, and he is stuck with the job of green-washing their half-hearted stabs at the issue. In the same interview in which he leaned towards the 80% target, Miliband lamented the “lack of faith” with which the green movement regards the establishment parties. He protests: “We are absolutely committed to 30% [EU-wide emissions reductions]. I want to be very clear about this. I am also very clear that if Britain is to play an important role in international negotiations, then we have to lead by example.” Our faith in the government is so limited because the actions of Labour ministers in real international negotiations demonstrate that these affirmations for the domestic audience are, charitably put, spin. As an MEP, I get to see up close just how far from all this concerned rhetoric the government’s behaviour really is. In March 2007, ministers agreed that the EU must unilaterally reduce its greenhouse gas emissions by 30% on 1990 levels if a future global climate agreement is reached. The European Council of member states’ leaders is now calling this commitment into question, as well as trying to undermine EU emissions reductions still further by allowing for a maximum of whatever targets they do agree to be met by offsetting abroad. The UK government is one of the most active on this last point. As for the precise policies, among many other worrying moves it seems the council is back-peddling on the “polluter pays” principle that’s supposed to underpin and incentivise emissions reductions via the emissions trading system; and to oppose the idea of ring-fencing money raised through emissions trading for climate-related purposes both at home and abroad. To cap it all, ministers have been doing their best to lock in their inadequate ambition, by making their agreements this week so detailed that they will claim no room for manoeuvre when it comes to negotiations with the European Parliament ? the democratically elected co-legislator. This is unacceptable and irresponsible, and will jeopardise the chances of having a deal in time for the Poznan talks. The UK has also been caught trying to wriggle out of EU agreements to increase renewable energy capacity ? essential not only for climate security but also our economic future. The target is for 20% of all energy consumption ? electricity, heating, transport and so on ? to be generated from renewable sources. Miliband has now joined the government’s effort to exclude aviation from that energy total, saying: “There is not a credible way of showing aviation can be driven by renewables.” Miliband is an intelligent man, so I can only conclude he is being deliberately misleading. No one is suggesting we can fuel aircraft renewably ? at least not yet. What we are saying is that aviation fuel must, as has always been foreseen, be included in the figures used to calculate what constitutes total energy consumption. Removing it would dilute the commitment, not to mention the political consequences of opening up the whole Pandora’s box of individual member states’ national targets. With this kind of twisting and obfuscation, is it any wonder that we lack faith in the government? If Miliband is going to make a success of his historic appointment to cabinet as the first climate change secretary of state, then he has to be straight with us, and straight with cabinet. He has to get through to his colleagues that business as usual is not only environmental suicide, but also economically unviable. We will not survive in the economy of the future without a world-class renewable energy sector, and Labour’s attempts to avoid attracting one do no one any favours. Strong policies that sufficiently incentivise wind power, for example, could result in an avoided fuel cost of ?20.5bn by 2020 across the EU alone and provide more than 500,000 jobs. We won’t solve the environmental and economic crises with inertia and spin. We need a green new deal: in other words, based upon the precedent of Roosevelt’s New Deal of the 1930s, we need the reregulation of international finance, an end to subsidies for coal and nuclear, and a major programme of public and private investments in renewable energy and energy efficiency, generating thousands of green-collar jobs in the process. We can make the transition away from fossil fuels and avoid a huge economic downturn at the same time. But it’s going to take a lot more than faith.
What went wrong in the capitalist casino?16 Oct 2008The great inter-war slumps were not acts of God or of blind forces. They were the sure and certain result of the concentration of too much economic power in the hands of too few men. These men had only learned how to act in the interest of their own bureaucratically-run private monopolies which may be likened to totalitarian oligarchies within our democratic state, They had and they felt no responsibility to the nation. These words are from the 1945 Labour manifesto Let Us Face The Future which brilliantly identified the very same crisis which is now described as a ?credit crunch? as if it were a mere hiccup in an otherwise wonderful neo-liberal globalised world which could be corrected with a vast subsidy from the taxpayers to put the Wall Street casino and its partners worldwide back into profit. It reminded me of the fact that when slavery was abolished it was the slave owners, and not the slaves, who received compensation from the government of the day. Perhaps more important ? and never mentioned in the media ? is that all the news we get every day and every hour is all about the bankers while presidents, prime ministers and other elected leaders of the world have been reduced to the role of mere commentators who are expected to supply taxpayers? money whenever it is needed to bail out the wealthy. Indeed, what we are watching is nothing less than the steady transfer of real political power from the polling station to the market and from the ballot to the wallet ? reversing the democratic gains we have made over the last century when we were able, increasingly, to use our votes to shape our economic future. Our 1945 manifesto made that clear in the very next passage following the quote above. This is what it said: ?The nation wants food, work and homes. It wants more than that. It wants good food in plenty, useful work for all and comfortable labour-saving homes that take full advantage of the resources of modern science and productive industry.? That was the policy that swept Labour MPs into power in 1945 and gave this country the National Health Service, the welfare state and a massive house building programme, made possible by elected local authorities who had the resources made available to them by the Treasury. Now, 63 years later, we are back facing a similar situation and we need to understand why it has happened if we are to see our way forward. We have been told every day by the media that we should put our faith in the market and that elected governments are the problem and not the answer and, for that reason, should not interfere. These ideas began to emerge in the political mainstream when Margaret Thatcher came to power and in 1994 ?new? Labour adopted them as the basis of its own approach which explains why she once described ?new? Labour as her ?greatest achievement?. Trade union rights are now more restricted than they were in 1906, wages have been held down and people have been advised to borrow and spend as an alternative ? which explains why the stock market has fallen and locked more and more people into debt, which is a subtle form of slavery itself. This is why so many people are frightened and frightened people can sometimes be persuaded to seek an answer by identifying an enemy who can be made a scapegoat for failure ? as Hitler did when he blamed the Jews, the Communists and the trade unions for the mass unemployment in Germany and set up a fascist dictatorship which led to the Holocaust and war. Hitler dealt with the unemployed by giving them jobs in the arms factories and the armed forces which led to the Second World War and the massive human cost it caused. Whatever the left does it must never respond by splintering into a mass of tiny ideological sects forever fighting each other ? for that way leads to failure, frustration and defeat. This is the time for co-operation across the left to tackle the problems that face us on a non-sectarian basis as we have seen in the Stop the War Coalition, the campaigns for trade union rights, civil liberties, pensions, nuclear disarmament, council house building and a fair tax system ? all of which require full trade union backing if they are to succeed. If the economic situation gets worse, as it very well may, we have also to be on the look out for the ?coalition? solution which could well be presented to us as the only way that these problems can be tackled, an argument that is being put forward now in America when George Bush, John McCain and Barack Obama rallied round to back the $700 billion bail-out that Wall Street demanded. That same argument was used by Ramsay MacDonald in 1931 when he formed a National Government which nearly destroyed the Labour Party in the general election when only 51 Labour MPs survived and, without the courage of Ernie Bevin and the TUC, it might never have recovered, as it did in 1945. I hope that the re-appointment of Peter Mandelson to the Cabinet in the latest reshuffle does not lead to that idea being re-floated as the best way to see us through the crisis for that could be the end of democracy ? allowing the European Commission to prevent the re-emergence of public ownership and control of the banks which many will now see as the best way forward. For the first time in my life, the public are to the left of a Labour government and common sense points us in a direction quite different from the one we have been following since 1979 when Thatcher set out to destroy the trade unions, cripple local authorities and privatise our public assets which we need now more than ever. In 1945, the nation realised that the problems of peace required the same intensity of commitment as the problems of war. And with the disastrous experience of Iraq and Afghanistan that argument, too, is beginning to register again and people are asking why we waste so much money on those illegal, brutal and unwinnable wars and on new nuclear weapons when people are losing their jobs and facing repossession of their homes. The case for peace and socialism is intensely practical and, put like that, will command wide public and electoral support as it did then, in 1945, and could again do now.
Civilian dead are a trade-off in Nato’s war of barbarity16 Oct 2008While the eyes of the western world have been fixed on the global financial crisis, the military campaign that launched the war on terror has been spinning out of control. Seven years after the US and Britain began their onslaught on Afghanistan to oust the Taliban and capture Osama bin Laden, the Taliban surround the capital, al-Qaida is flourishing in Pakistan and the war’s sponsors have publicly fallen out about whether it has already been lost. As the US joint chiefs of staff chairman Admiral Mike Mullen concedes that the country is locked into a “downward spiral” of corruption, lawlessness and insurgency, Britain’s ambassador in Kabul, Sir Sherard Cowper-Coles, is quoted in a leaked briefing as declaring that “American strategy is destined to fail”. The same diplomat who told us last year that British forces would be in Afghanistan for decades now believes foreign troops are “part of the problem, not the solution”. The British commander Brigadier Mark Carleton-Smith was last week even blunter. “We’re not going to win this war,” he said, adding that if the Taliban were prepared to “talk about a political settlement”, that was “precisely the sort of progress that concludes insurgencies like this”. The double-barrelled duo were duly slapped down by US defence secretary Robert Gates for defeatism. But even Gates now publicly backs talks with the Taliban, which are in fact already taking place under Saudi sponsorship. This is the conflict western politicians and media continue to urge their reluctant populations to support as a war for civilisation. In reality, it is a war of barbarity, whose contempt for the value of Afghan life has fuelled the very resistance that western military and political leaders are now unable to contain. In this year alone, for every occupation soldier killed, at least three Afghan civilians have died at the hands of occupation forces. They include the 95 people, 60 of them children, killed by a US air assault in Azizabad in August; the 47 wedding guests dismembered by US bombardment in Nangarhar in July – US forces have a particular habit of attacking weddings; and the four women and children killed in a British rocket barrage six weeks ago in Sangin. By far the most comprehensive research into Afghan casualties over the past seven years has been carried out by Marc Herold, a US professor at the University of New Hampshire. In his latest findings, Herold estimates that the number of civilians directly killed by the US and other Nato forces since 2006, up to 3,273, is already higher than the toll exacted by the devastating three-month bombardment that ousted the Taliban regime in 2001. And over the past year civilian deaths at the hands of Nato forces have tripled, despite changes in rules of engagement. But most telling is the political and military calculation that underlies the Afghan civilian bloodletting. “Close air support” bomb attacks called in by ground forces – which rose from 176 in 2005 to 2,926 in 2007 and are now the US tactic of choice – are between four and 10 times as deadly for Afghan civilians as ground attacks, the figures show, and air strikes now account for 80% of those killed by the occupation forces. But while 242 US and Nato ground troops have died in the war with the Taliban this year, not a single pilot has been killed in action. The trade-off could not be clearer. With troops thin on the ground and the US military up to their necks in Iraq and elsewhere, US and Nato reliance on air attacks minimises their own casualties while guaranteeing that Afghan civilians will die in far larger numbers. It is that equation that makes a nonsense of US and British claims that their civilian victims are accidental “collateral damage”, while the Taliban’s use of roadside bombs, suicide attacks and classic guerrilla operations from civilian areas are a sign of their moral depravity. In real life, the escalating civilian death toll is not a mistake, but the result of a clear decision to put the lives of occupation troops before civilians; westerners before Afghans. Dependence on air power is also a reflection of US imperial overstretch and the reluctance of Nato states to put more boots on the ground. But however much the nominal Afghan president Hamid Karzai rails against Nato’s recklessness with Afghan blood, the indiscriminate air war carries on regardless. Given that the US government spent 10 times more on every sea otter affected by the Exxon Valdez oil spill than it does in “condolence payments” to Afghans for the killing of a family member, perhaps that shouldn’t come as a surprise. But nor should it be that the occupation’s cruelty is a recruiting sergeant for the Taliban. As Aga Lalai, who lost both grandparents, his wife, father, three brothers and four sisters in a US bombing in Helmand last summer, put it: “So long as there is just one 40-day-old boy remaining alive, Afghans will fight against the people who do this to us.” That doesn’t just go for Afghanistan. Gordon Brown recently told British troops in Helmand: “What you are doing here prevents terrorism coming to the streets of Britain.” The opposite is the case. The occupations of Afghanistan and Iraq – and the atrocities carried out against their people – are a crucial motivation for those planning terror attacks in Britain, as case after case has shown. Now the US is launching attacks inside Pakistan, the risks of further terror and destabilisation can only grow. Senior Pakistani officials are convinced Nato is preparing to throw in the towel in Afghanistan. Both Bush and the two US presidential candidates are committed to an Iraq-style surge, though the number of troops being talked about cannot possibly make a decisive difference to the conflict – and in Barack Obama’s case may be as much about providing political cover for his plans for Iraq. But the strategic importance of Afghanistan doesn’t suggest any early US withdrawal: more likely an attempt to co-opt sections of the Taliban as part of a messy and protracted attempt to rearrange the occupation. It will fail. The US and its allies cannot pacify Afghanistan nor seal the border with the Taliban’s Pakistani sanctuary. Eventually there is bound to be some sort of negotiated withdrawal as part of a wider regional and domestic settlement. But many thousands of Afghans – as well as occupying troops – look certain to be sacrificed in the meantime.
Call for councils to demand new powers15 Oct 2008Today (14 October), Hazel Blears will invite councils to ?opt in? to the Sustainable Communities Act. 55 of the UK?s leading voluntary and representative organisations, from the Association of Chief Police Officers to the Campaign for Real Ale, have written to the leaders and chief executives of every council in England today, asking them to seize this opportunity. Their letter will be unveiled today by Unlock Democracy Campaigns Director at a special conference about the Act being held by the Local Government Association in Westminster. The Act enables councils and their communities working co-operatively to get government help to assist them in reversing the decline of local services, dealing with fuel poverty, protecting the environment and obtaining greater involvement in civic activity. As part of the process they will also be able to formally request specific powers, currently held by national government, to be devolved to them. Government then has a legal duty to reach agreement with councils and the Local Government Association on how it will help them. Welcoming Hazel Blears? invitation to councils, Unlock Democracy?s Campaigns Director Ron Bailey said: ?The Sustainable Communities Act could not have come at a more crucial time. The global economic downturn will have a huge impact on our local communities. The government?s own advisers predict that recession will lead to a rise in criminal activity. Local high streets are likely to be decimated as stores are forced to close. ?If local communities are to weather this storm, they will need far more autonomy than they currently have. Local people are the experts on the problems of their areas and the solutions to them. Yet currently they are at the complete mercy of the global stock exchange. The Sustainable Communities Act will give real power to local people to protect and revive their areas.? Director of Unlock Democracy Peter Facey added: ?The Sustainable Communities Act is a unique piece of legislation. It became law as a result of an unprecedented bottom up campaign and creates an unprecedented bottom up way of redressing the creeping centralisation of successive governments. People have never felt more alienated from those who make decisions that affect their daily lives. Councils must opt into the Act to begin the fight back.? Originally a Private Members Bill introduced by Nick Hurd MP, the Sustainable Communities Act became law last November with full support from the Government and the Conservative and Liberal Democrat front benches. Then local government minister Phil Woolas described it as one of the most significant Private Members Bills of the past 40 years and said it could change the face of British politics.
Historic coalition launches call for councils to seize opportunity to demand new powers15 Oct 2008Today (14 October), Hazel Blears will invite councils to ?opt in? to the Sustainable Communities Act. 55 of the UK?s leading voluntary and representative organisations, from the Association of Chief Police Officers to the Campaign for Real Ale, have written to the leaders and chief executives of every council in England today, asking them to seize this opportunity. Their letter will be unveiled today by Unlock Democracy Campaigns Director at a special conference about the Act being held by the Local Government Association in Westminster. The Act enables councils and their communities working co-operatively to get government help to assist them in reversing the decline of local services, dealing with fuel poverty, protecting the environment and obtaining greater involvement in civic activity. As part of the process they will also be able to formally request specific powers, currently held by national government, to be devolved to them. Government then has a legal duty to reach agreement with councils and the Local Government Association on how it will help them. Welcoming Hazel Blears? invitation to councils, Unlock Democracy?s Campaigns Director Ron Bailey said: ?The Sustainable Communities Act could not have come at a more crucial time. The global economic downturn will have a huge impact on our local communities. The government?s own advisers predict that recession will lead to a rise in criminal activity. Local high streets are likely to be decimated as stores are forced to close. ?If local communities are to weather this storm, they will need far more autonomy than they currently have. Local people are the experts on the problems of their areas and the solutions to them. Yet currently they are at the complete mercy of the global stock exchange. The Sustainable Communities Act will give real power to local people to protect and revive their areas.? Director of Unlock Democracy Peter Facey added: ?The Sustainable Communities Act is a unique piece of legislation. It became law as a result of an unprecedented bottom up campaign and creates an unprecedented bottom up way of redressing the creeping centralisation of successive governments. People have never felt more alienated from those who make decisions that affect their daily lives. Councils must opt into the Act to begin the fight back.? Originally a Private Members Bill introduced by Nick Hurd MP, the Sustainable Communities Act became law last November with full support from the Government and the Conservative and Liberal Democrat front benches. Then local government minister Phil Woolas described it as one of the most significant Private Members Bills of the past 40 years and said it could change the face of British politics.
The day the music died15 Oct 2008And we all know the real song
but we won’t sing along
‘cause our boyfriends and girlfriends
and parents will say
Don’t be a square, grow your hair and be happy
It’s not god that made you this way – So lift up your top
Lift up your top
Lift up your top, got to use what you’ve got
Try not to see anything but the fee
It’s all tongue in cheek anyway! ‘Our Daughters Will Never Be Free,’ The Indelicates, 2008 We have a very short window in which to start asking some crucial questions about wealth and gender. We have a short window, whilst the FTSE and the Dow and the Nikkei buckle and collapse, to commit blasphemy. To say that the very nature of financial markets, of patriarchal capitalism itself, engenders ideological violence against women – and by association, men – everywhere. Fact: markets will seek to maximise profits. Fact: sexism sells. The image of the cackling city boy stuffing his bonus into a hooker’s disembodied garter – just the leg showing, never the face – has become one of the icons of hypercapitalist success. However you wrangle the incentives, an economic model spawned and nurtured in an atmosphere of male privilege will seek to make money by selling women’s bodies back to them, by selling them to other men, by exploiting women’s work and by hijacking femininity as a saleable commodity and nothing more. I remember the first time I met Ginger Spice. It was four years ago, and I was standing at the reception desk in the acute anorexia wing of a London mental hospital. I was there because there was nobody but my receptionist to watch me and make sure I took my meds and kept my meal supplements down, wearing a floppy hat and a tracksuit that flapped on the bent coat hanger of my body, drawing slogans to keep me occupied. And Geri Halliwell walked by. She was there to see the girl in the next room from mine, a friend and a fan. And my first thought was how very, very tiny she was ? barely five feet three in massive heels, dwarfed by shopping bags and a bunch of violent pink crepe-wrapped roses. Tiny and fragile-looking, all desperate smile and thin hair bleached back to its natural pale strawberry-blonde, Geri Halliwell had been in the press all year, and still is, thanks to a much-touted recovery! from anorexia, bulima and other lapses in celeb inscrutability. Through the haze of numb, sour fear that dogged those hospital days I remember thinking: that?s Ginger Spice. That pale, frantic creature is the same girl whose posters I had on my walls, whose feisty, pumped-up pop smashes were the first singles I ever bought with my pocket money. That?s Girl Power, right there. There it goes. How sad, and how empty it all seems now. In 1996, we were told that anything was possible. Girls were powerful! Girls were sexy! Girls were marketable! You could be anything you wannabeed! Fast forward twelve years and the record is scratched and broken, the Spice Girls themselves bleached by years of pap-dashes into wasted, desperate husks of the energetic, ballsy girls we once thought we knew. We made ourselves into products again the instant empowerment was wrenched away from the feminist movement and assaulted with price-tags, we were consumed; we consumed ourselves. Femininity was for sale, and too much of it made us sick. Sick of ourselves, sick of our lives, sick of looking forward to another twenty years of hard sell until we could no longer pretend that we were young and available and found ourselves consigned to the scrap-heap with the computer shells, splitting bin-bags and acid-leaking fridges. The year I started eating again – really eating, not just subsisting on crackers and tea – the sub-prime mortgages broke and the markets began to deflate like a balloon at the end of a long party. Right now, a loaf of bread costs more as a percentage of the average wage than it ever has. Groceries are getting harder for everyone to afford. We can no longer stuff ourselves with impunity, but right now, right this second, I feel something I spent my whole life missing. I feel something girlishly blasphemous and slightly obscene. I feel full. Shopping, preening, starving, serving, fucking. Five key activities for my generation of young women under capitalism. We were born in the shadow of Thatcher and taught to prepare ourselves not for productivity, but for producthood. We do not remember living through anything but boomtimes, but for us, money is still something we will not win without the trappings of servility; we came to learn that nothing sells better, or faster, than our bodies, and the better and faster we could cash in, the happier and worthier our lives would be – There’s no better example of the pitfalls of unregulated capitalism than the strange case of the 22-year-old woman, known by the pseudonym Natalie Dylan, who is selling her virginity in hopes of financing her college education. She wants to be a marriage and family therapist. This transaction is “capitalism at its best,” according to the manager of the Moonlight Bunny Ranch in Nevada, which is brokering the deal. He made the point on a TV show last week on which we both appeared as guests. I argued this is capitalism at its worst. You’ve got a desperate woman (she was allegedly defrauded out of a hunk of cash by her no-good dad); virtually no safety net if you’re poor; gargantuan college fees, thanks to little government assistance or regulation; and the perfect storm of circumstances that makes a young woman think it’s OK to sell her body. Scary? Yeah. Does it have to be this way? No. It’s about the morality of the market. Marian Meed-Ward, Kingston Whig-Standard, Ontario 25.09.2008 Maybe I’m a little biased, being accustomed to a student lifestyle and still having no job to lose- but I say let it all come down. Let the markets crash, and let the ugly arrogance of a society rent by the gashes of commodified gender come tumbling with them. So what if the glittering future that was promised to us as long as we behaved ourselves like good little girls has vanished? We may have been trained as hyper-consumers, but we don’t have to live that way. Let it all come down. Let’s see the arrogance of the testosterone-stinking trading floors thwarted and the altars of deregulated markets toppled: we don’t need the old gods and their archaic laws any more. Now that governments have intervened with basic financial packages to has save us from utter disaster, we can breathe a little easier – but the ideology of Western capitalism will never be the same again, and its discourses of gender are open to decimation. Bring it all down.
Comment Is Closed15 Oct 2008MEDIA ALERT: INTELLECTUAL CLEANSING: PART 3 In Part 1 of this alert, we noted how journalists who threaten their employers’ interests – and the interests of their key political and corporate allies – tend to be unceremoniously dumped. We also described how the force of the law can be deployed to silence dissidents seeking to expose chronic media bias. In Part 2, we hosted journalist Jonathan Cook’s splendid analysis in response. Cook’s main point was that media managers rarely have to take such extreme measures because few journalists “make it to senior positions unless they have already learnt how to toe the line.” An interesting question arises, then, in the age of the internet: To what extent will these same ultra-sensitive media companies tolerate public criticism? For example, will they allow visitors to their websites to post material that is critical of their journalism, and perhaps even damaging to their interests? Last month, we tested the limits of dissent on the Guardian’s Comment Is Free (CiF) website. On September 20, we posted a message on CiF in response to an article written by Guardian journalist Emma Brockes. Brockes had commented wryly on Tania Head, a 9/11 survivor, “of whom it has been alleged that she was not on the 78th floor of the South Tower on September 11th as she claimed, but may have been in Spain at the time…” Brockes added: "But well below the level of mental illness a lot of low-level fakery is actively embraced and rewarded." (http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2008/sep/20/uselections2008.usa?commentpage=1&commentposted=1) We posted the following comment: “This is from the same journalist [Brockes] who wrote in October 2005: "’[Noam] Chomsky uses quotations marks to undermine things he disagrees with and, in print at least, it can come across less as academic than as witheringly teenage; like, Srebrenica was so not a massacre.’” In our post, we described Chomsky’s outrage at the suggestion that he had denied that the Serb killings of Bosnians at Srebrenica in 1995 constituted a massacre. In 2005, Chomsky wrote to us of Brockes’s article: “Even when the words attributed to me have some resemblance to accuracy, I take no responsibility for them, because of the invented contexts in which they appear… her piece de resistance, the claim that I put the word ‘massacre’ in quotes. Sheer fabrication.” Chomsky described his treatment by Brockes and the Guardian as "one of the most dishonest and cowardly performances I recall ever having seen in the media.” (See our media alerts: http://www.medialens.org/alerts/05/051104_smearing_chomsky_the_guardian.php and http://www.medialens.org/alerts/05/051121_smearing_chomsky_the_guardian.php) We were interested to see how these comments would be received by the Guardian website. In the event, our message remained in place for 48 hours but was then deleted. The site moderator explained in an email: “The article that Medialens replied to was about emotional fakery and its role in American political culture. The comment that was removed did not address this topic but instead raised a past journalistic error by the author.” (Email to Media Lens, September 23, 2008) In fact, while Brockes had discussed emotional fakery, focusing on “self dramatisation”, she had also written: “fakery no less shameless goes on every day in the political debate and the way we the audience internalise it. McCain flatly contradicts himself within the space of a single day.” Political fakery and self-contradiction were exactly the themes of our post, but it was deleted as “off topic” by the Guardian gatekeepers. Only a handful of comments had been posted in response to Brockes’s article. When we and one or two other people posted messages protesting the deletions, these were also deleted and someone called the Community Moderator shut down the debate, writing: “This discussion will now close, as it has mostly been off topic.” A final message appeared: “Comments are now closed for this entry.” The website shows five messages deleted alongside just nine posts remaining. Other posts had been removed altogether: http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2008/sep/20/uselections2008.usa?commentpage=1&commentposted=1 Self-Deceits Held In Common – Groupthink We have seen how the propaganda system is filtered by a range of carrot and stick pressures: professional training, selection for obedience, promotions and demotions, sackings, legal pressures, and the rest. The final piece of the jigsaw is much more elusive and mysterious. In his book Vital Lies, Simple Truths, psychologist Daniel Goleman examined the human capacity for self-deception. According to Goleman, we build our version of reality around key frameworks of understanding, or “schemas”, which we then protect from conflicting facts and ideas. The more important a schema is for our sense of identity and security, the less likely we are to accept evidence contradicting it. Goleman wrote: “Foremost among these shared, yet unspoken, schemas are those that designate what is worthy of attention, how it is to be attended to – and what we choose to ignore or deny… People in groups also learn together how not to see – how aspects of shared experience can be veiled by self-deceits held in common." (Goleman, Vital Lies, Simple Truths – The Psychology of Self-Deception, Bloomsbury 1997, p.158) Goleman concluded: "The ease with which we deny and dissemble – and deny and dissemble to ourselves that we have denied or dissembled – is remarkable." Psychologist Donald Spence noted the sophistication of this process: “We are tempted to conclude that the avoidance is not random but highly efficient – the person knows just where not to look.” (Ibid, p.107) This tendency to self-deception appears to be greatly increased when we join as part of a group. Groups create a sense of belonging, a “we-feeling”, which can provide even greater incentives to reject painful truths. As psychologist Irving Janis reports, the ‘we-feeling’ lends “a sense of belonging to a powerful, protective group that in some vague way opens up new potentials for each of them.” (Ibid, p.186) Members are thus reluctant to say or do anything that might lessen these feelings of security and empowerment. In this situation, even pointing out the risks surrounding a group decision may seem to represent an unforgivable attack on the group itself. This is ‘groupthink’. Individual self-deception, combined with groupthink, helps explain why journalists are able to ignore even the most obvious facts. In our September 16 Media Alert, we wrote that the Independent had devoted 153 words in the first two weeks of September to the flooding catastrophe in Haiti. By that time, 1,000 people were reported killed with 1 million made homeless out of a population of 9 million. (http://www.medialens.org/alerts/08/080916_not_very_interesting.php) In response, the Independent’s former Washington correspondent, now Asia correspondent, Andrew Buncombe, wrote to us: Dear Davids, Hello and best wishes. Hope all is well. Your latest alert about Haiti is as thought-provoking as ever but I think there are a couple of clear errors you’ve made that ought to be cleared up. Firstly you say The Independent did not report the hurricanes raging down on the country and that "the Independent has not mentioned Haiti since September 5. But the paper has at least helped explain its own prejudice". That simple point clearly is not true. Guy Adams filed on September 7 a page lead pointing out the chaos facing untold thousands.http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/haiti-in-crisis-after-tropical-storm-claims-more-than-500-lives-921716.html But beyond that you also claim "This indifference has led to an appalling level of non-reporting, not just of the latest floods, but also of the killing of unarmed civilians by United Nations forces (Minustah), the Haitian National Police, and death squads". You say a raid in Cite Soleil in July 2005 was reported only by a few US newspapers but that is not the case. The Independent reported on the raid and revealed evidence collated by Kevin Pina that unarmed civilians were killed. http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/peacekeepers-accused-after-killings-in-haiti-500570.html This was followed up in Feb 2007 by more details of civilians being killed by UN troops. http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/civilians-caught-in-crossfire-during-portauprince-raids-434723.html You’re correct in saying that Haiti does not get as much coverage as the US but your claim that the paper has not reported on Haiti, its problems and its ongoing challenges is not true. A simple search on Google for articles about Haiti over the last few years would quickly show that. Best wishes, Andy Buncombe Andrew Buncombe
Asia Correspondent
The Independent We replied on September 21: Dear Andrew Many thanks for your email. You’re right about Guy Adams’ September 7 article. For some reason, that wasn’t picked up by our LexisNexis search. We note, though, that the piece devoted 360 words to the disaster in Haiti. At the time we wrote the alert, that figure could have been added to the 153 words mentioning Haiti in the paper that month. That would have totalled 513 words for a 16-day period when perhaps 1000 people died and utter catastrophe befell the island. You write: "You say a raid in Cite Soleil in July 2005 was reported only by a few US newspapers but that is not the case." In fact we weren’t commenting on UK reporting in that section. We were describing research presented in Dan Beeton’s report on US media performance: ‘Bad News From Haiti: U.S. Press Misses the Story.’ We wrote: "... only a few US newspapers mentioned the incident. These mostly portrayed the incident as a successful UN attempt to eliminate gang members – reports of civilian deaths were ignored. "The US press has given similar treatment to atrocities committed by the Haitian National Police." We thought it was clear that we were referring to Beeton’s analysis solely of the US press, but perhaps we could have been clearer. It’s hard not to reflect on the deeper significance of your response. You’re right that the Independent devoted 513 rather than 153 words to the devastation of Haiti from September 1-16. But, really, so what? Would you be focusing on this tiny difference in assessing the Independent’s performance if you were not working for the paper? Wouldn’t a dispassionate, rational observer join with us in criticising the Independent’s appalling indifference to the disaster this month rather than arguing that "your claim that the paper has not reported on Haiti, its problems and its ongoing challenges is not true"? We did not argue that the Independent has "not reported on Haiti". We argued that its performance, particularly this month in offering a few hundred words – less than one word per death – was pitiful. We have a great deal of respect for you. But isn’t your response on this occasion an example of a kind of corporate ‘groupthink’? Best wishes David Edwards and David Cromwell It is painful for a journalist to be aware of both his or her employer’s shortcomings and his or her powerlessness to remedy them. As Daniel Goleman has noted, “when one can’t do anything to change the situation, the other recourse is to change how one perceives it.” (Goleman, op. cit, p.148) This, finally, is the key human trait that enables "brainwashing under freedom" – journalists are able to perceive as important only that which allows them to thrive as successful components of the corporate system. The price is high, as Norman Mailer noted: "There is an odour to any Press Headquarters that is unmistakeable… the unavoidable smell of flesh burning quietly and slowly in the service of a machine." (Mailer, The Time of Our Time, Little Brown, 1998, p.457) SUGGESTED ACTION The goal of Media Lens is to promote rationality, compassion and respect for others. If you do write to journalists, we strongly urge you to maintain a polite, non-aggressive and non-abusive tone. Write to Matt Seaton, editor of the Guardian’s Comment is Free website. Ask him why he rejected Greg Philo’s excellent piece.
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This Is What Denial Does14 Oct 2008This is nothing. Well, nothing by comparison to what’s coming. The financial crisis for which we must now pay so heavily prefigures the real collapse, when humanity bumps against its ecological limits. As we goggle at the fluttering financial figures, a different set of numbers passes us by. On Friday, Pavan Sukhdev, the Deutsche Bank economist leading a European study on ecosystems, reported that we are losing natural capital worth between $2 trillion and $5 trillion every year, as a result of deforestation alone(1). The losses incurred so far by the financial sector amount to between $1 trillion and $1.5 trillion. Sukhdev arrived at his figure by estimating the value of the services – such as locking up carbon and providing freshwater – that forests perform, and calculating the cost of either replacing them or living without them. The credit crunch is petty when compared to the nature crunch. The two crises have the same cause. In both cases, those who exploit the resource have demanded impossible rates of return and invoked debts that can never be repaid. In both cases we denied the likely consequences. I used to believe that collective denial was peculiar to climate change. Now I know that it’s the first response to every impending dislocation. Gordon Brown, for example, was as much in denial about financial realities as any toxic debt trader. In June last year, during his Mansion House speech, he boasted that 40 per cent of the world’s foreign equities are now traded here. “I congratulate you Lord Mayor and the City of London on these remarkable achievements, an era that history will record as the beginning of a new golden age for the City of London.”(2) The financial sector’s success had come about, he said, partly because the government had taken “a risk-based regulatory approach”. In the same hall three years before, he pledged that “in budget after budget I want us to do even more to encourage the risk takers”(3). Can anyone, surveying this mess, now doubt the value of the precautionary principle? Ecology and economy are both derived from the Greek word oikos – a house or dwelling. Our survival depends upon the rational management of this home: the space in which life can be sustained. The rules are the same in both cases. If you extract resources at a rate beyond the level of replenishment, your stock will collapse. That’s another noun which reminds us of the connection. The OED gives 69 definitions of stock. When it means a fund or store, the word evokes the trunk – or stock – of a tree, “from which the gains are an outgrowth”(4). Collapse occurs when you prune the tree so heavily that it dies. Ecology is the stock from which all wealth grows. The two crises feed each other. As a result of Iceland’s financial collapse, it is now contemplating joining the European Union, which means surrendering its fishing grounds to the Common Fisheries Policy. Already the prime minister Geir Haarde has suggested that his countrymen concentrate on exploiting the ocean(5). The economic disaster will cause an ecological disaster. Normally it’s the other way around. In his book Collapse, Jared Diamond shows how ecological crisis is often the prelude to social catatrosphe(6). The obvious example is Easter Island, where society disintegrated soon after the population reached its highest historical numbers, the last trees were cut down and the construction of stone monuments peaked. The island chiefs had competed to erect ever bigger statues. These required wood and rope (made from bark) for transport and extra food for the labourers. As the trees and soils on which the islanders depended disappeared, the population crashed and the survivors turned to cannibalism. (Let’s hope Iceland doesn’t go the same way.) Diamond wonders what the Easter islander who cut down the last palm tree might have thought. “Like modern loggers, did he shout ‘Jobs, not trees!’? Or: ‘Technology will solve our problems, never fear, we’ll find a substitute for wood.’? Or: ‘We don’t have proof that there aren’t palms somewhere else on Easter ? your proposed ban on logging is premature and driven by fear-mongering’?”(7). Ecological collapse, Diamond shows, is as likely to be the result of economic success as of economic failure. The Maya of Central America, for example, were among the most advanced and successful people of their time. But a combination of population growth, extravagant construction projects and poor land management wiped out between 90 and 99% of the population. The Mayan collapse was accelerated by “the competition among kings and nobles that led to a chronic emphasis on war and erecting monuments rather than on solving underlying problems”(8). Does any of this sound familiar? Again, the largest monuments were erected just before the ecosystem crashed. Again, this extravagance was partly responsible for the collapse: trees were used for making plaster with which to decorate their temples. The plaster became thicker and thicker as the kings sought to outdo each other’s conspicuous consumption. Here are some of the reasons why people fail to prevent ecological collapse. Their resources appear at first to be inexhaustible; a long-term trend of depletion is concealed by short-term fluctuations; small numbers of powerful people advance their interests by damaging those of everyone else; short-term profits trump long-term survival. The same, in all cases, can be said of the collapse of financial systems. Is this how human beings are destined to behave? If we cannot act until stocks – of either kind – start sliding towards oblivion, we’re knackered. But one of the benefits of modernity is our ability to spot trends and predict results. If fish in a depleted ecosystem grow by 5% a year and the catch expands by 10% a year, the fishery will collapse. If the global economy keeps growing at 3% a year (or 1700% a century) it too will hit the wall. I’m not going to suggest, as some scoundrel who shares a name with me did on these pages last year(9), that we should welcome a recession. But the financial crisis provides us with an opportunity to rethink this trajectory; an opportunity which is not available during periods of economic success. Governments restructuring their economies should read Herman Daly’s book Steady-State Economics(10). As usual I haven’t left enough space to discuss this, so the details will have to wait for another column. Or you can read the summary published by the Sustainable Development Commission(11). But what Daly suggests is that nations which are already rich should replace growth (”more of the same stuff”) with development (”the same amount of better stuff”). A steady state economy has a constant stock of capital maintained by a rate of throughput no higher than the ecosystem can absorb. The use of resources is capped and the right to exploit them is auctioned. Poverty is addressed through the redistribution of wealth. The banks can lend only as much money as they possess. Alternatively, we can persist in the magical thinking whose results have just come crashing home. The financial crisis shows what happens when we try to make the facts fit our desires. Now we must learn to live in the real world. www.monbiot.com References: 1. Richard Black, 10th October 2008. Nature loss ‘dwarfs bank crisis’. BBC Online. http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/7662565.stm 2. Gordon Brown, 20th June 2007. Speech to Mansion House. http://www.hm-treasury.gov.uk/2014.htm 3. Gordon Brown, 16th June 2004. Speech to Mansion House. http://www.hm-treasury.gov.uk/1534.htm 4. Oxford English Dictionary, 1989. Second Edition. 5. Niklas Magnusson, 10th October 2008. Iceland Premier Tells Nation to Go Fishing After Banks Implode. http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601087&sid=azZ189JG.1S8&refer=h… 6. Jared Diamond, 2005. Collapse: how societies choose to survive or fail. Allen Lane, London. 7. Page 114. 8. Page 160. 9. George Monbiot, 9th October 2007. Bring on the Recession. The Guardian. http://www.monbiot.com/archives/2007/10/09/bring-on-the-recession/ 10. Herman E. Daly, 1991. Steady-State Economics – 2nd Edition. Island Press, Washington DC. 11. Herman E. Daly, 24th April 2008. A Steady-State Economy. Sustainable Development Commission. http://www.sd-commission.org.uk/publications/downloads/Herman_Daly_think…
Turning a crisis into an opportunity14 Oct 2008The government has been consistently behind the curve on the banking crisis and the chancellor’s statement this morning demonstrates that it is missing the chance of turning this crisis into the opportunity of a generation to lay the foundations for transforming our economy. In his interviews so far today the chancellor has insisted on an arms-length role for government and on returning the banks to private control as soon as possible. At a time when many British taxpayers will be losing their jobs and homes they are being asked to subsidise the banks in the bad times, simply to allow them to return to the profiteering role which caused this crisis. Taxpayers will want to know what they have got for their money. Under public pressure, the government has been forced into placing some limited and temporary constraints on executive pay and bonuses ? and may appoint some non-executive directors. Not a lot for 500bn of public money. The government has drifted into majority or sizeable ownership of individual banks without any coherent strategy about how to use its shareholding. Let us be clear, the banks which the government has taken into part-nationalisation would have collapsed entirely where it not for government intervention. The billions invested today surpass even the most generous estimates of the banks’ worth. The chancellor seems oblivious to the unprecedented potential the government now has to lay the foundations for transforming our economy. To give the taxpayers a return for their investment, the government should insist on an entirely restructured banking system and a new set of economic priorities for our financial institutions. The taxpayer, through the government, should now be forcing through an agenda with control of the board: offering full transparency and stakeholder democracy for customers and the workforce. There should also be a no-redundancies guarantee for bank workers to match the no-loss guarantee to depositors. A new lending strategy of these nationalised banks must prioritise tackling the worst effects of the recession. We need to promote employment through investment in major public works schemes to meet the UK’s needs. We urgently need a major programme of investment in renewable energy generation to tackle climate change. Likewise we need a national programme of council house building to tackle existing housing need, and to provide a safety net for those struggling to pay rent and mortgage costs as the recession deepens. Such infrastructure investment would also mean large-scale job creation to arrest the rising unemployment levels. This would be a rights-based bank system, guaranteeing: • bank workers and customers the right to a say in how their bank is run; • a right for the taxpayer to see investment that benefits their community; • a right to a secure home. These are the opportunities the government is missing on behalf of the British public. The public will also not look kindly if the government continues to refuse to assist local councils affected by the Icelandic banking collapse. The damage to essential local services by a forced round of cuts would be immense. As taxpayers are paying for this bail-out, it should be their interests that now become the focus of a programme of major structural reform in the banking sector.
Secret Papers Reveal Tony Blair Sold Out to Big Tobacco14 Oct 2008Tony Blair personally ordered an exemption for motor racing from a tobacco sponsorship ban after Labour received a secret 1m donation from Bernie Ecclestone, the Formula One boss. New documents released under the Freedom of Information Act show he demanded a change of policy within hours of a meeting with Ecclestone on October 16, 1997, and his aides went on to blur the truth. The affair was the first sleaze scandal of the new Labour era. At its height, Blair feared the episode would end his premiership and went on television to defend his reputation, saying he was a ?pretty straight kind of guy?. The new documents expose the extent to which he was the driving force behind plans to exempt F1 from Labour?s manifesto pledge to end tobacco sponsorship of sport, pushing a reluctant Department of Health into agreeing. Before Ecclestone?s 1m donation, Labour had planned a universal ban. Tessa Jowell, a health minister at the time, emerges as having had serious reservations about the move. But a Whitehall memo written on October 31, 1997, states: ?The prime minister has made clear his wish to see a permanent exclusion for Formula One from the scope of the tobacco advertising ban.? The documents show how mandarins warned Blair that he could be misleading MPs over the sequence of events. At the height of the scandal, the Tory MP John Maples put down a written parliamentary question asking when Blair told Frank Dobson, the health secretary, of his plans to exempt F1. A briefing note to the Cabinet Office outlining possible responses to the question reveals that the date was October 16. It also reveals Blair ordered Jonathan Powell, his senior aide, to ring Jowell to discuss the issue that evening, shortly after meeting Ecclestone. However, the note suggests Blair wanted to name October 29 as the date, to be consistent with his previous public claims that the decision was not taken until two to three weeks after the crucial meeting with Ecclestone. Civil servants warned: ?The draft reply is strictly true in terms of the final decision . . . but critics could argue that the answer was disingenuous in that the prime minister?s views had been clearly conveyed by the telephone call on October 16.? The papers also suggest No 10 set out to mislead the public, via the media, about the prime minister?s role in the affair. A briefing note for Alastair Campbell, then Blair?s press secretary, offers guidance ?to dispel the notion that the F1 approach was dictated by the PM alone, after meeting Ecclestone?. Blair defended the plan for a dispensation on the grounds that the ban could lead to big job losses in Britain?s motor racing industry. However, it has emerged that the then Department for Trade and Industry (DTI) cast doubt on this claim. A memo from the DTI to the health department, sent in November 1997 when the government was still trying to decide how to implement the ban, says: ?We believe it is unlikely that if F1 should leave the UK there would be an immediate effect on the industry as a whole.? The episode took place before political donations had to be publicly declared. For days, Labour refused to reveal whether Ecclestone had given money to the party. As the controversy raged about whether government policy had been influenced by a donation, Gordon Brown, who knew of the gift, found himself denying all knowledge in a radio interview. He was later reported to have returned to the Treasury in anguish, claiming his credibility would be ?in shreds? if anyone discovered he had lied. Tracking the donation January 1997: Ecclestone donates 1m to Labour May: ban on sports sponsorship by tobacco companies announced October: Blair has private meeting with Ecclestone November 5: government announces proposals to exempt F1 from tobacco sponsorship ban November 7: government asks advice on donation from standards watchdog November 11: Labour returns donation
The storm is just starting to blow14 Oct 2008Gordon Brown is being feted as the ?master of the universe?. Stock markets yesterday were delirious with joy, making record-breaking, stratospheric leaps as governments around the world bailed out the banks. Right-wing Tory newspapers joined in unalloyed praise for the bankers? government. Is the financial storm over then? Er, no actually. So far, sums approaching 2,000 billion (= 2 trillion) of taxpayers? money have been committed by the governments of America, the UK and Europe to the bankers? bail-out. Central banks are pouring ?unlimited? amounts of US dollars into the global financial system in what will prove yet another failed attempt to prevent the mother of all meltdowns. How can we be so sure? Yes, 2 trillion sounds a lot, but the collecting bucket is effectively bottomless. This unimaginably large sum of money is dwarfed by a series of other giant hot-air balloons of fantasy finance queuing to burst in the background whilst Brown?s Punch to the bankers? Judy struts temporarily in the foreground. Among the balloons is the market in credit default swaps (CDS), a way of trading in risk. It began life in the mid-1990s and, largely because it has always been unregulated, and appeared to offer the possibility of reducing, or at least sharing risk, it attracted a great deal of interest. The simple version of the story goes that a swap enables an organisation making a loan to a customer to insure against the customer defaulting on payments by establishing a private contract with a third party, paying a kind of insurance premium. It can?t be called ?insurance? because that would make it liable to regulation. You wouldn?t want to call it ?protection? either. People might think you?re a gangster. The market grew very fast. Most major organisations are now caught up with each other in a lacework of interconnected contracts. Ok, so how much are we talking about? It?s difficult to be precise, because all the trading is in unregulated contracts hidden from public view. Nobody really knows. Data from the International Swaps and Derivatives Association (!) show that at the end of June, the CDS market had a notional value of $54 trillion. That’s the same as the planet’s 2007 GDP and nearly four times the value of all shares traded on the New York Stock Exchange. Other estimates puts the figure nearer $65 trillion. So what is the chance of this particular balloon bursting? It already did. On Friday, Moneyweek put it like this:
When one side of a trade defaults, it starts a chain reaction that raises the risk of others losing money. That’s called ‘counterparty risk’, and is partly what has spooked investors into selling off assets and lenders into curbing credit. The collapse of Lehman Brothers has had a particularly big impact. Lehman wrote more than $700bn-worth of CDS. Now it’s gone bust, investors who had taken out these CDS have been left without the insurance, so they’re having to buy more, even though prices are now rising because of the general turmoil. Initial results of the auction to determine the value of CDS on Lehman Brothers showed banks, hedge funds and other sellers of protection facing losses in the area of 90.25% of the insurance they sold. The CDS market is only 10% of the global derivatives market, which covers all contracts taken out to minimise risk. This is the mysterious, unregulated world of futures, forwards, options and swaps. According to the Bank for International Settlements, the notional amounts outstanding at the end of 2007 totalled about $550 trillion on contracts privately traded between parties. As the global recession deepens, the number of parties unable to fulfil contracts will grow rapidly. Is the storm over? It?s only just beginning to blow!
Shell ‘wins’ Iraq gas contract14 Oct 2008Oil giant Shell has recently won the Big Oil race to become the first major oil company to gain access to Iraq’s energy sector since the 1970s. With no competitive bidding process, the Dutch-British multinational has ‘won’ a $4bn contract to process and market natural gas with the South Gas Company in Basra. The deal has been conducted in secret, leaving important information about the terms and authorship unknown. This secrecy has meant the contract was not subject to any public scrutiny or debate. Platform co-director Greg Muttitt surmised that “a country under occupation has introduced an oil policy that is favourable to western oil companies. The [US] State Department has already admitted that it has advisers working on oil policy and there is a likelihood they may have drafted the Shell contract.” However, attempts to gain control over Iraq’s oil fields have not gone so well. As Corporate Watch reported last year (www.corporatewatch.org/?lid=2912), an oil law permitting de-facto oil privatisation was drafted under pressure from Big Oil, the US and UK governments, their consultants, and the IMF. It was presented to the Iraqi parliament in May 2007 and was expected to pass quickly. However, Iraqi and international opposition to transferring oil sovereignty to multinational oil companies has helped create a climate in which the Iraqi parliament has been able to resist the extreme pressure by US and UK governments and the has not been passed to date. So the big oil companies and governments are busy finding other avenues to the eventual prize of control over Iraq’s vast oil fields. These avenues include discussing, preparing, and now bidding for contracts such as Risk Service Contracts (RSCs). While usually offering companies less in terms of long-term control over production and revenue than the prized Production Sharing Contracts (PSCs), they can nonetheless be written to be very similar to PSCs. The ‘devil’ is in the detail with these complex agreements, details which have not been disclosed. What is certain is that, if secured, they will represent a radical departure from traditional Iraqi ? and indeed international ? oil policy. Risk Service Contracts, for instance, would still put private companies in charge of oil fields that are currently run by the public sector. Even the rejected draft Oil Law prescribed that those oil fields already producing oil would be run by the Iraqi National Oil Company (INOC). But this policy was reversed in June 2008 when the government announced that oil companies would be invited to bid for RSC contracts on six fields which collectively produce over 90% of Iraq’s current oil. They also offer far more control and profit to the oil companies than in any other major oil-producing country. They grant INOC a mere 25% stake, paltry in comparison with the average 80% demanded by the Libyan State Oil Company for new exploration contracts, for example, or with Nigeria’s National Petroleum Company, which is regarded as one of OPEC’s members most friendly to western companies, with a 55% stake in onshore projects. These PSC-lite versions represent a desperate attempt by Big Oil to combat the resistance and to get their foot in the back door to Iraq’s massive oil reserves. At the same time, the US administration is battling to ratify the Status of Forces Agreement (SOFA) in order to maintain the occupation beyond the end of 2008, when the UN Mandate expires. Rumours are circulating in Baghdad that this agreement will also include provisions allowing for the privatisation of the oil fields. While any agreement will not have the detail or the binding force of the Oil Law, the strategy seems to be to prolong the occupation to retain the political dominance to eventually get the privatisation they have been fighting for. Of course, these attempts need coordination. On 13 October, 2008, Iraqi Oil Minister Hussein al-Shahristani will meet with representatives of 41 international oil companies in London. This will be the formal launch of a round of bidding for some of Iraq’s largest oil fields, with the aim of signing long-term contracts in June 2009. The Iraqi Oil Ministry claims these deals will be for risk service contracts ??? in theory, a significant improvement over PSCs. But with such secrecy, it is impossible to know what the Iraqi government is signing away. What we do know is what the US and UK government, and Big Oil want, and the force ??? enabled by prolonging the occupation ??? that they will use to get it. For more details, see Greg Muttitt’s recent articles at: www.carbonweb.org/showitem.asp?article=332&parent=39, www.niqash.org/content.php?contentTypeID=28&id=2230&lang=0 and www.carbonweb.org/showitem.asp?article=333&parent=9.
Finance, politics, climate: three crises in one14 Oct 2008Many observers describe the turmoil in financial markets in 2007-08 in terms of a “domino effect”; others find metaphors drawn from “chaos theory” more appropriate. The chain-reaction element of the first and the patterned disorder of the second offer some grounds for making sense of these extraordinary and still-unfolding events. They are also useful in suggesting that since what is happening goes far wider than the financial sphere, so must the “imaginative” ways of capturing it. Indeed, a crisis that is so important and wide-ranging – even systemic – is every citizen’s concern, and efforts to think through (far less to solve) it cannot be left to the bankers, traders and politicians who did so much to create it. If this is so, a good way to imagine the current near-collapse must also relate the financial hurricane of 2007-08 to other, concurrent troubles: in democracy and sustainability, for example. This brief article considers this theme by employing another metaphor: the “suit of cards”. The metaphor started life in a set of scenarios for the future of the planet in SustainAbility’s report Raising Our Game (2007). The first three depict outcomes in which society and the environment either win or lose: ? diamonds, which we describe as “a domino-effect world, in which, instead of Adam Smith’s invisible hand, our invisible elbows knock over a series of economic, social and environmental dominoes” ? clubs, where we foresee “a world [where] elites learn how to use environmental sustainability as an excuse for denying the poor access to their fair share of natural resources” ? spades, where “(democratic) societies open out higher living standards to growing populations” but where “ecosystems are progressively undermined, with most governments unwilling to take the political risks of asking voters to make sacrifices in favour of the common good” ? hearts, a world in which “demography, politics, economics and sustainability gel. It is the future that the Brundtland commission pointed us towards way back in 1987”. The systemic signs This framework leads us to ask questions of democracy itself: ? can it drive the transition towards more sustainable patterns of production and consumption? ? are growing democracy vs sustainability tensions in prospect? ? can the peoples of the world (soon to be 9-10 billion) vote their way to a sustainable future? ? are the time-scales of democratically elected governments appropriate for delivering sustainable development? The political world is full of evidence that can be used to argue both for and against the notion that democracy is necessary (or better than other systems) for sustainable development. The lengthy and lively United States presidential competition, for example, has offered the unprecedented and hopeful spectacle of the three main candidates for the presidency (Hillary Clinton, John McCain and Barack Obama) left in the race engaging an unusually high proportion of citizens in debate on some of the great issues of the day – and in acknowledging the vital importance of global climate change. At the same time, much of the overall campaign has been conducted via point-scoring, attack ads, media and campaign concentration on stray remarks and surface details – reflecting how modern democratic conduct can sideline environmental issues at the very moment when they should be central to the debate (see David Shearman, “Democracy and climate change: a story of failure”, 7 November 2007). In such contradictions, democracy – as it currently works – and the financial turmoil of 2007-08 share more in common than it might first appear; in particular, the underlying problem of what might be called connecting system-crisis to system-change. The credit-crunch and the broader financial seizure the world is living through have parallels with the constriction of democracy. There were almost too many early-warning signs to count – from past experience of asset-bubbles and the sudden collapse of once-venerable institutions to the sheer opacity of new instruments of “casino capitalism” and the vast sums of debt they involve. The record of democracy’s surface messiness and superficiality, and of the financial world’s poor credit-ratings and oversight reveals the difficulty society has at addressing large-scale, serious, systemic problems that operate often in an imperceptible and gradual way (see John Elkington & John Lotherington, “Can democracy save the planet?”, 21 April 2008). This is equally relevant to what might be happening in relation to climate change and to the cascade of environmental, economic and social impacts likely to follow in its wake. It could be that climate change will present the ultimate test in this respect. Will the response to this emergency replicate the pattern of delayed and incoherent response to political and economic difficulties? There have been many early-warnings: the international scientific community is almost unanimous in its assessment of the risks of accumulated greenhouse-gas emissions in the atmosphere and humankind’s role in putting them there. The conclusion – that it is vital to avoid a 2 degrees Celsius increase in global mean temperatures, for the developed world to move towards a zero-carbon economy, and to make big cuts in CO2e emissions beginning no later than 2015 – is settled and inexorable. The signs of movement towards these goals are, at best, mixed; in the sustainability arena as much as in the political and financial, awareness of system-crisis does not translate easily into a momentum for system-change. Three in one The fourth scenario in SustainAbility’s Raising Our Game report – one where politics, economics and sustainability and demography come together in the most viable and equitable way possible – seems in its system-wide elements the only coherent foundation for moving towards this urgently needed breakthrough. The process, as we envisage it, will be rough and difficult, especially in its early stages. It will need the rich world to develop a much greater sense of accountability and urgency than it has displayed to date – and that includes finding greener ways to help emerging markets increase the health and economic security offered their citizens, or leave them to trade short-term development needs against long-term planetary health. The dilemmas of environmental sustainability, as of political democracy, will remain whatever solutions are reached to the current financial breakdown. The world’s leaders even at this stage do not yet see the economic troubles as so deep a crisis as to force them to reach for a new framework, to do the completely unexpected. The way forward is to seek creative and intelligent ways to ameliorate current problems; see this crisis in relation to concurrent democratic and climate-change ones; invest in the future as if every global citizen depended on it; and formulate a strategy to reshape economic life in the direction of political and environmental sustainability.
A dead end for the EU?12 Oct 2008Since the 1980s the main strategy adopted by the leaders of the European Union has been to pursue market-based economic integration to the increasing exclusion of other, political or social, initiatives. The hope has been that the emergence of a powerful integrated economy would provide a foundation for eventual steps towards greater political unity. At first this strategy seemed to enjoy considerable success – reforms aimed at consolidating Europe-wide markets and at reinforcing competition did give an important impetus to institutional development, especially with the successful introduction of the euro and the European Central Bank. Meanwhile, the collapse of the Soviet bloc permitted an eastward expansion of the EU, which has helped bring its membership from 12 states at the time of the Maastricht Treaty in 1992 up to 27 today. There are signs, however, that the drive for market-based integration is losing momentum. In particular, the Lisbon strategy, which set ambitious targets for economic growth through market-oriented reforms, is now widely seen as a failure. And the EU?s consistent sacrifice of social objectives to the overriding priority of market-led economic integration has tended to deprive it of popular support and political legitimacy. The rejection of the Reform Treaty in the Irish Referendum, which blocks institutional change in the EU, is the latest evidence of this. It is argued here that it will be very difficult for the EU to change direction and to start to correct the democratic and social imbalances of its structures and policies. But such a correction is nevertheless indispensable, because if these imbalances are not corrected the whole integration project will become increasingly fragile and increasingly exposed to populist challenges. The four freedoms Many commentators have identified the key imbalances in the EU. Sometimes they have referred to ?negative? integration (the removal of barriers to market exchange) running ahead of ?positive? integration (common policies and institutional construction). The terminology used by Fritz Scharpf is more exact: he speaks of ?market creation? running ahead of ?market correction?, because he recognises that many active, ?positive?, measures are indeed necessary to integrate markets.[1] The point is that there seems to be little concern, at EU level, to prevent or compensate for the adverse social consequences of market processes. Essentially the same point is often made in terms of a ?social deficit? in the EU. In the sphere of economics and market competition, hard and fast rules are laid down; clear legal entitlements and obligations are established; member state interventions are decisively constrained. In the social sphere, however, there are declarations of principle, and the non-binding ?guidelines? which emerge from the ?open method of coordination?, but few effective initiatives. The imbalance is structural and guaranteed by the EU?s budget, which is so small as to rule out any effective redistributive measures. To many observers, the frequently mentioned ?democratic deficit? is closely related to the same imbalances. The way decisions are made in the EU strengthens executive power as against the power of legislatures. This is because the Commission, the EU?s executive, controls the policy agenda; and the Council of Ministers, the key decision-making body, represents member state governments. The European Parliament, although it has been more ready recently to challenge the Council and the Commission, cannot counterbalance their power. It has legitimacy problems of its own because most voters choose candidates in terms of national, not European, politics and because turnout in European elections is now very low, having fallen continuously from 63 per cent in the first European elections in 1979 to 46 per cent in 2004. In the absence of effective Europe-wide political parties and social movements, business lobbies have even more influence on EU-level decisions than on those taken by member states. The clearest and most convincing explanation for these imbalances and ?deficits? is that put forward by Phillipe Schmitter.[2] The main features of the EU as it actually exists, although they do not inspire any strong allegiance from European citizens, are in fact tremendously advantageous to corporations active in Europe. As the basis for market integration the EU confers four rights, the ?four freedoms?, on all economic agents: rights to move goods, services, capital and labour anywhere in its territory, without obstacles at the frontiers between member states and without hindrance from member state authorities. These are justiciable rights, which will be upheld not only by the EU?s Court of Justice but by national courts as well, so that if a corporation is prevented from exercising its economic rights it can usually obtain a remedy from the courts in its home country, even against its own overnment. At the same time, a central responsibility of the Commission, as the EU?s executive, is to safeguard the integrity of the markets based on these four freedoms, and to propose legislation to remove any remaining obstacles to free exchange and any new barriers which may emerge. These policies and legislation on the internal market are completely within the competence of the EU; decisions are by majority voting in Council and Parliament; member states cannot veto these decisions. Of course it is normally corporations rather than individuals which exercise these freedoms; essentially they guarantee that corporations are free to do business throughout the territory of the Union. One way to understand the ?four freedoms? is to refer to Marx?s account of the capitalist process. This begins with money in the form of capital, which is then exchanged for the goods or commodities that constitute the means of production, and for labour power; the production process then follows, in which labour services are performed, giving rise to the outputs which constitute the commodity product; finally, the sale of these outputs restores the original money capital, now augmented by profit. The four freedoms mean that no barriers to any phase of this process can be erected by any member state or at any national frontier. After nearly sixty years of increasing economic interdependence, the commercial, industrial and financial interests linked to market integration are immense. These interests are by no means all opposed to those of ordinary citizens; on the contrary, they usually serve the interests of citizens as consumers and employees. But it is crucial to note that the four freedoms are in practice exercised by corporations, and generally by the larger corporations, which are most likely to be active in more than one member state. This means that corporate Europe is deeply committed to the EU and to its continuation in its present form. Social Europe The positive assertion of economic rights is indispensable to the Europe of the corporations. But the absence of positive social rights and of integrated regulations and interventions, together with the absence of a unified tax structure, is almost as crucial. Most of these issues remain firmly within the competence of the member states: each of them is free to determine its own social policies, to finance them with its own taxes, and to regulate business activity in order to protect consumers, workers and the environment (although economic interventions at national level tend to be either inhibited or prohibited by the competition rules of the EU). This state of affairs establishes regime competition among the member states and makes possible regime shopping by the corporations. And it should be noted here that the EU is, at least for corporations, an open economic space: US, Japanese and indeed virtually all corporations in the world are free to establish themselves in any member state and then to conduct business on the same basis as European corporations. Thus the regime competition associated with the EU is global in character – member state governments strive to attract investment and employment onto their own territories by cutting corporate taxation, deregulating business activities and making labour markets and employment law as ?flexible? as possible. This process does not always become a ?race to the bottom? – there is usually significant resistance within the member states – but it limits redistributive policies and impairs the social control of business activity. It was not always thus. In the early years of the European project some powerful employers, particularly in Germany, sought to tighten regulatory standards and improve working conditions in other member states. They were concerned to avoid ?social dumping?, competition from other member states based on lower employment standards or looser regulation. Today, the larger German corporations take a different view – they are much more likely to use their increasing presence in other countries to press for lower standards in Germany rather than the other way round. A dramatic example last year was a demand by Siemens for a longer work week from its German employees, without any increase in weekly wages, under the threat of a move to Hungary. Today the trade unions still sometimes contest social dumping but the theme is no longer of interest to employers. The suggestion here, that the absence of any real social Europe is essential to the way the EU functions, contradicts the rhetoric of EU leaders, which makes much of the ?European Social Model? and continues to insist that there are profound differences between European and US varieties of capitalism. There has indeed been a ?social dimension? to European integration from the very start in the 1950s. But the social content of integration has been considerably attenuated over the years since the Maastricht Treaty. The refusal of the largest and richest member states to expand the EU budget is one reason for this: although the accession of new member states formerly in the Soviet bloc has greatly widened the disparities in income within the EU, there are no significant resources available for redistribution. In the early 1950s the European Social Fund had the realistic aim of compensating those who lost out from the integration of coal and steel industries: in the event, mostly Belgian miners, who received reasonable pensions and severance payments. Today the Fund is little more than symbolic. The notion of a ?European Social Model? is an abstraction from the specific social models of individual (Western European) countries. There are indeed some family resemblances among these models, but they are also very different, and the EU has little influence over them, since most aspects of social policy remain very firmly in the hands of the member states. This situation is in part a response to the success of the EU in the economic sphere; the member states have given up most of their responsibility for economic policy – the competition rules and the four freedoms prevent most interventions to strengthen their economies; and, for those that use the euro, monetary policy is centralised in the ECB and there are tight limits on taxation and public spending. This makes member states guard their control over social policies very jealously. In an economic emergency these are the only instruments available to them. In recent years the EU has sought to influence, without controlling, these member state social policies through the ?open method of coordination? – a series of discussions among policy communities resulting in non-binding recommendations to governments. This does not seem to have had much effect on policy practice, but it is interesting that one theme pushed by the Commission in such debates is the ?modernisation of the European Social Model?. This is code for the partial privatisation of pension systems, which has for some time been a priority of the Commission, as of the OECD and other international bodies. In fact the national character of Europe?s social models calls into question the Commission?s claim that the social situation in the EU is preferable to that in the US. It is certainly true that there is much less inequality in the EU than in the US, if we make the comparison with the US one country at a time. But if we take the EU as a whole the reverse is the case: the US is much more egalitarian than the EU: although there are sharp regional disparities in the US, there is nothing that begins to compare with the gap between, say, Lithuania and the Netherlands, or between Slovakia and Denmark. The US has limited but effective mechanisms for regional redistribution in the working of the Federal income tax and the social security system; there is nothing comparable in the EU. While most Europeans take their own country as their frame of reference, it is logical to make comparisons between the US and individual countries; but if one ceased to do so and started to take a Europe-wide view, then the EU would be seen to be marked by extreme inequalities. Thus the claims made for ?Social Europe? depend on the non-existence of a European society.[3] ?Flexicurity? and the retreat from labour market regulation The account of the EU given here so far is of a simple dichotomy: the economy and the rules of the market are controlled by the Union; social policy by the member states. The sphere of employment regulation and labour market policies is an intermediate zone – member states defi ne their own positions, but subject to some general standards promulgated through EU directives, and to non-binding recommendations. This probably corresponds to the market logic of the integration project: if member states had a completely free hand they might use labour market policies to interfere with the working of competition; on the other hand, a centralised labour market policy at EU level would be very unwelcome to the big employers, who much prefer regime competition. In any case, an important body of EU labour law has gradually emerged, and, although stronger measures might be desirable, it has worked to strengthen employee rights and to sustain working conditions in member states where national employment law is weak. The main fields concerned are health and safety, gender equality and the rights of workers on ?atypical contracts? – such as agency workers, part-time workers or those on fixed-term contracts. However, the Commission seems recently to have changed its position on labour market regulation.[4] Several recent initiatives indicate that, under pressure from the employers, it is now seeking to dilute existing employment regulations and to intensify cross-border competition in labour markets. Examples of this shift include proposals to weaken the working time directive and the posted workers directive (which accords workers temporarily sent by their employer to another member state at least some of the employment rights which have been established in that state); and there has also been an attempt – so far blocked by the European Parliament – to deregulate employment conditions in enterprises providing services in other member states (this was one aspect of the Bolkestein draft directive which was strongly resisted by trade unions). This general change in position is confirmed by recent policy documents from the Commission, on the ?modernisation? of labour law and on ?flexicurity?. This last term denotes in principle a supposed reconciliation of ?flexible? labour markets and economic security for employees, but its main practical implication seems to be a drive to weaken standard labour contracts, in place of previous attempts to strengthen the protection of employees with non-standard, ?atypical? contracts. Thus in employment regulation – one of the few spheres where a genuine European level social policy might be said to exist – the current trend is to reduce standards and to intensify competition among workers. The Lisbon agenda The priority given to economic objectives by EU leaders, however, is very far from achieving the dynamic economic results which they promised. Although the Lisbon Agenda – which was meant to guide the EU through the first decade of the new century – took as its slogan ?the knowledge-based economy?, it was essentially a business oriented programme, heavily influenced by the dot.com boom in the US, which was at its height at the time. A generally deregulatory approach could, it was believed, permit Europe to match or surpass American performance in business start-ups and productivity. The absurd objective was to make the EU ?the easiest and cheapest place to do business in the world?. The Lisbon Agenda did make a nod towards the ?European Social Model?, but social policy was clearly subordinated to market-led integration; the contributions of social policy would be to promote skills and increase employment. A central thrust of the strategy was to build integrated financial markets in Europe, which would resemble their US models as closely as possible. Financial integration was not in itself an irrational goal, but the uncritical enthusiasm with which it was pursued threatened to replicate the worst features of the US financial system without significantly accelerating European economic development. (The recent preoccupation of the branch of the Commission responsible for the internal market has been to argue for an integrated EU mortgage market – again along US lines; this policy at least seems unlikely to survive the current fi nancial turmoil, which is rooted in US mortgages.) Very soon it became clear that there was no chance of achieving the ambitious targets of the Lisbon agenda for output and employment growth.[5] On the one hand the conservative macroeconomic stance of the European Central Bank, and of several member state governments, especially that of Germany, did not permit the kind of expansion which was envisaged. On the other, the collapse of the dot.com bubble made it clear that the immediate potential of the new technologies to accelerate economic development had been greatly exaggerated on both sides of the Atlantic. Thus the priority given to corporate interests in the EU by no means ensures rapid development even in the private sector: the public investments and interventions needed to reduce uncertainties, lower external costs and ensure sustainability are neglected in its key strategy. And in their absence, its largest economies have been close to stagnation for over ten years. Treaties, constitutional and otherwise The failure of the EU to secure the relatively minor changes to its rules and functioning which were included in the draft Constitutional Treaty illustrate its continuing loss of legitimacy. The two electorates who rejected the treaty in referendums were those of France and the Netherlands, countries which participated in European construction from the start, and where there was in general considerable support for it. Objections to the Treaty were of two types, although they often overlapped. Firstly, there were political concerns about the lack of democracy in EU structures, both as regards the balance between EU powers and those at member state level, and regarding the preponderance of the executive in EU decision making. (There are sharp differences, however, among those with such objections: for some, often but by no means only on the right, the necessary response is to decentralise power to the member states; others believe that a larger measure of centralised power would be acceptable on the condition that it be exercised in a more democratic way.) The second main objection – by those most concerned with the subordination of social needs to economic objectives, usually on the left – was that the Treaty gave constitutional status to the present economic rules of the EU – that is, to the four freedoms, as well as to the extremely narrow and restrictive macroeconomic regime centred on the European Central Bank. Repeatedly the Treaty called for ?free and undistorted competition? – limiting the scope for interventionist economic policies at both EU and national level. It gave only the most minimal and grudging recognition of the need to exempt public services from the rule of market forces, and required, wherever possible, open competition to provide such services, as well as stating that EU interests must not be seriously affected by public service provision. It eliminated long-standing safeguard clauses that have allowed member states to control capital flows in emergency situations. When ratifi cation of the Constitutional Treaty was blocked by the Dutch and French referendums, the EU faced technical diffi culties, in that it had included certain changes to its procedures that were necessary to deal with the big increase in the number of member states. Some minimal, essentially uncontroversial, revisions to the existing Treaties would always have been necessary to deal with this issue, and with the need to organise common actions on emerging issues such as global warming. But the ?Reform Treaty? that is proposed as a replacement (sometimes known as the Lisbon Treaty) goes far beyond such revisions. Its takes a different form from the Constitutional Treaty, in that it amends rather than replaces previous EU Treaties.[6] But the content of the two Treaties is – in the view of those who drafted them – virtually identical. The hope was that, by presenting things in this way and by giving up the expression ?constitution? (as well as by dropping reference to a few symbols such as the twelve-star flag and the Ode to Joy), the Treaty could be presented as a relatively minor change, hardly needing to be endorsed by referendum. In many member states (including the UK) this seems to have been the outcome, but this tactic failed when the Irish referendum rejected the Treaty. This situation reflects the political problems of the EU in two ways: firstly in the dogmatic refusal to alter the substantive policies of the Union in the face of both policy failure and popular discontent; secondly in the attempt to evade that discontent by procedural methods which narrow and restrict public debate. Strength and fragility of the EU An early head of the European Commission, Walter Hallstein, remarked that the European Union (or at that stage, Economic Community) was a creature of law. He spoke truer than he knew, for in the 1950s European law was only certain to prevail when all six of the then member states were agreed that it should do so. Thus the law would be enforced against corporations or individuals, but when states had serious differences these were nearly always resolved by political negotiations rather than by litigation. This situation changed only slowly up to the 1980s. But then member states became increasingly sceptical about economic interventions at national level, and increasingly willing to accept market outcomes. This meant that they were ready to accept a much more legalistic version of European construction, in which the competition rules of the EU nearly always prevailed, even when this required changes in member state policies. This strengthening of EU law, which relates above all to the four freedoms, is, as pointed out above, very much in the interests of the large corporations, since it means that they can buy, sell, produce and invest wherever in the EU they choose to do so; and that if any member state government tries to prevent them they will have an effective remedy not just in the EU Court of Justice, but usually in the national courts, including those of the member state concerned.[7] This situation is the basis of the strong support given to the EU by corporate Europe; and the wealth and influence of the corporations in turn strengthen the EU. The same interests, however, tend to discourage any strong initiatives beyond competition and market integration, since centralised policies on taxation, employment conditions or social provision would be very unwelcome to the corporations. It is not suggested here that there is a complete opposition between the interests of the corporations and those of the citizens; but the interests of citizens, both collective and individual, are often much wider than those of the big enterprises. Yet the way the EU is presently organised, and the way it functions, work against these wider interests and prevent their effective expression. This dominance of corporate interests and of the competition rules which underpin them, is, however, extremely fragile. There are now twenty-seven member states, and only consistent good behaviour by every branch of government in each of them preserves the smooth working of the EU. If one member state court refused to enforce EU law, if one member state parliament refused to write an EU directive into national law, or if one government defied the EU rules in a determined way, the Union would be faced with a political crisis. Obviously some such challenges could be overcome by putting pressure on the country concerned, but this would be more difficult if the issue mobilised public opinion against the EU, if the country concerned was a large one, or if more than one country was involved. And the working of EU rules, both as regards open markets and competition and as regards interest rates and often tight constraints on public spending, is often so harsh as to make this kind of revolt always possible, and in the long run probably unavoidable. Indeed there are already cases where EU law has reached its limits and solutions have had to be sought in political compromise. Germany, for example, repeatedly violated the expenditure limits of the Stability Pact. In legal principle the Commission could have imposed a fine on the German government; in political practice this was and is inconceivable. Again, Sweden refuses to adopt the euro although, unlike Denmark, it does not have a legal opt-out permitting it to do so. But it is impossible to enforce Sweden?s Treaty obligations in this case because it is clear that the Swedes would throw out any government that proposed to take them into the monetary union. Here again the model of integration by law reaches a political limit. It would be desirable if opposition to the present direction of European construction and the assertion of different priorities, were to take a rational and unified form – if social movements, progressive governments and European electors successfully contested the actual integration model and imposed a wider and more balanced one. In practice, however, effective challenges to the EU seem likely to take the more negative form of national revolts, with a populist character, involving right-wing as well as left-wing political forces. These revolts might be in many respects highly dysfunctional, but they would still be a consequence of the persistent imbalances in European construction, and of the persistent refusal of EU leaderships to make a necessary change in course. It still seems possible, however, that a change in course can come about in a more constructive way than through a series of revolts in particular member states; that leaderships will respond to the drastic loss of legitimacy signalled by falling turnouts in European elections and repeated defeats in national referendums. But in any case the present path of the EU ? reinforcing inequalities, rendering employment ever more precarious and undermining the provision of public goods and social services – is eroding the political basis for European integration, and seems only to lead to a dead end. Notes 1. Governing in Europe. Effective and Democratic?, Oxford University Press 1999. 2. Philippe C. Schmitter, How to Democratize the European Union and Why Bother Lanham 2000. 3. See for example the Commission?s own annual report, The Social Situation in the European Union. 4. Commission of the European Communities, Green Paper: Modernising Labour Law to Meet the Challenges of the 21st Century, COM (2006) 708 final. 5. In spite of this virtually complete failure, the Commission, in its usual Brezhnevite way, reaffi rms the essence of the strategy. See Working Together for growth and Jobs – next steps in implementing the revised Lisbon strategy, SEC 2005. 6. For this reason it is somewhat harder to study, since the Reform Treaty merely lists amendments, and one has to compare the existing and amended articles to see what is meant. The consolidated text of the
EU Treaties as amended can be found at http://collections.europarchive.org/tna/20080205132101/www.fco.gov.uk/Fi…. 7. For the role of law in European integration, see the writings of J.J. Weiler, especially The Constitution of Europe – do the New Clothes have an Emperor? Cambridge University Press 1998.
After the crisis, a new beginning11 Oct 2008Strange times bring strange bedfellows. On the same day that Gordon Brown and Alistair Darling were putting the finishing touches to their plan to bail out the banks with up to 500bn of public money, the international labour movement marked the first ever world day for decent work. Events in more than 100 countries across five continents made it a genuinely global occasion, yet fears of imminent recession and accompanying job losses put any celebrations on ice. Instead the day was spent in sober reflection on the role decent work has to play in rebalancing the global economy and addressing the root causes of the crisis now threatening to spread across the world. For with the ink barely dry on the government’s immediate rescue plans, attention is already turning to the underlying economic problems that have allowed the current financial crisis to develop. Even now, the recognition is growing that fundamental changes are needed to the global economic system far beyond the reach of recapitalisation packages or injections of liquidity, however large. Increasingly, too, there is an understanding that rebalancing the relationship between capital and labour will be a central element in any long-term solution. Put simply, decent work forms an essential part of the macroeconomic restructuring needed to address the roots of the current malaise. The basic definition of decent work is productive employment for women and men in conditions of freedom, equity, security and human dignity. The moral case for such rights has been clear ever since Engels wrote his classic account of the working class in England in 1844, and there is still much to do today to ensure that all workers in Britain enjoy decent pay and working conditions. While the minimum wage posted its latest rise this month, to 5.73 an hour, many employers still break the law by not paying it. Women migrant workers are those most at risk. Yet many of the worst sweatshops relocated long ago to the low-cost labour markets of the developing world. The media has been filled with stories of workers producing goods for the British high street in abominable conditions in countries such as Bangladesh, China and India. Consumers have expressed outrage at news of women being forced to work around the clock for a few pence an hour under the threat of constant abuse and humiliation. As long as there are no legal requirements that companies must guarantee all workers decent conditions and a living wage, such scandals will continue. The UN has also stressed the importance of decent work for poverty reduction. Achieving full employment and decent work for all has been enshrined in the millennium development goals adopted by world leaders at the start of the century. UN agencies confirm that productive employment is the link that can translate economic growth into long-term development, enabling people to work their way out of poverty rather than just deeper into debt. Without decent work opportunities for the many, growth simply concentrates the benefits of economic development in the hands of an elite few. Yet decent work is no longer just a moral imperative. The financial crisis has underlined the systemic dangers to the wider economy of ignoring workers’ rights. For while the crisis may have manifested itself in the convulsions of the financial markets, its roots are to be found in the imbalance which has been allowed to grow between corporate power on the one hand and a disempowered labour movement on the other. “Light touch” globalisation has brought multinational corporations vast new freedoms as the regulations governing their operations are dismantled in country after country. By contrast, workers have found their rights, wages and working conditions increasingly undermined. As a result of this imbalance, multinational companies have amassed huge profits in the globalised economy, notably through relocating to or sourcing from labour markets such as China where pay and conditions are kept low. Working people have been largely excluded from the feast, as shown by the decline in the share of national income enjoyed by wages and salaries over the past three decades. The UK and US credit bubbles were inflated to record levels in order to make up for this shortfall in working people’s pay packets, and it is the bursting of those bubbles that echoes all around us today. By the same token, decent remuneration of workers is now necessary both to avoid driving us deeper into recession and to restore a broader macroeconomic balance. Darling’s suggestion just last month that public-sector wages must be kept low to stave off the threat of inflation now sounds as if it came from another world. This rebalancing of relations between capital and labour is especially important now that recession is looming, not least because it is working people who will again be hit hardest by the economic downturn. As demand weakens and businesses find credit harder to come by, the pressure on jobs will build. The first signs of this are already appearing in Britain, where official figures show the largest rise in unemployment in 16 years. The UK jobless total is forecast to pass the 2 million mark in the coming months for the first time in over a decade. In many of the world’s poorest countries the impact will be even worse, and it will again be women workers who are most affected by the downturn. When the economies of south-east Asia collapsed under the financial crisis of 1997, the feminisation of employment which had been heralded as one of the achievements of the Asian economic miracle turned into a feminisation of unemployment almost overnight. Thousands of Thai and Indonesian women were forced into prostitution as a result of losing their jobs. Today’s financial crisis opens up the debate over what sort of economic system we wish to create for the future. Now that the merits of free-market capitalism have been exposed as a dangerous mirage, the world has the opportunity to develop a fairer system of international economic governance and to redistribute the spoils of globalisation. Preserving the current model, with all its failings and injustices, will simply perpetuate the imbalances which have led to today’s crisis. A global economy based on decent work and a living wage for all women and men offers a real chance for a new beginning. John Hilary is executive director of War on Want.
Criminalising free speech11 Oct 2008In November 2007 the European Commission submitted a proposal to add three new criminal offences to the 2002 EU Framework Decision on terrorism.1 If agreed by governments, EU countries will be obliged to criminalise ?provocation?, ?recruitment? and ?training? for terrorism. Charges of ?recruitment? and ?training? will need to show a direct link with terrorist groups or activity (as defined in 2002), but the ?provocation? offence is extremely broad, as it does not require a direct encouragement to commit terrorist acts but applies to any statements which create a ?danger? of such acts being committed. According to the proposal: “public provocation to commit a terrorist offence” means the distribution, or otherwise making available, of a message to the public, with the intent to incite the commission of [a terrorist offence as defined in the Framework Decision], where such conduct, whether or not directly advocating terrorist offences, causes a danger that one or more such offences may be committed. As Statewatch pointed out in its analysis of the proposal, the wording of this definition is clearly likely to result in the criminalisation of the expression of political views (for example on the situation in Middle East or on certain conflicts within Member States), even if that expression does not in any way include the advocacy of terrorism to support those opinions.2 It will be enough that the authorities deem that there is a ?danger? that this will happen, an actual terrorist offence as a consequence is expressly not necessary for the Framework Decision to apply. The origins of the proposal All three offences in the proposed Framework Decision are taken from the text of the 2005 Council of Europe convention on the prevention of terrorism.3 This Convention started life in 2003 in a working group established by Council of Europe Justice ministers to consider the harmonization of laws on incitement to terrorism and the act of ?justifying terrorism?, which was already illegal in Spain (where prosecutions for the crime of ?apologa? have been extensive) and France (where prosecutions for ?apologie? are extremely rare). After the Madrid bombings in March 2004 the Council of Europe mandated a far-reaching Convention addressing ?public expressions of support for terrorist offences and/or groups?; ?the instigation of ethnic and religious tensions which can provide a basis for terrorism?; ?the dissemination of “hate speech” and the promotion of ideologies favourable to terrorism?. The Council of Europe already had some experience in this area, having adopted in 2003 a Protocol to the ?Cybercrime Convention? (of 2001) concerning the ?criminalisation of acts of a racist and xenophobic nature committed through computer systems?, which addresses the dissemination of ?racist propaganda? over the internet.4 However, while this Protocol contains an opt-out based expressly on established national principles concerning freedom of expression, there is no opt-out in the terrorism Convention agreed in 2005. There is at least a ?safeguards? clause (in article 12) which obliges states to respect ?freedom of expression, freedom of association and freedom of religion?, the principle of ?proportionality? and the prohibition of ?arbitrariness or discriminatory or racist treatment?. But in the EU proposals, even these limited safeguards have been dropped. The EU negotiations The EU proposals are a recipe for an overbroad offence encompassing political opinion and giving prosecutors enormous discretion in deciding when and if to bring cases for ?public provocation? to terrorism. So bereft of human rights safeguards is the Commission?s proposal that the member states are considering introducing some of their own ? a first for EU decision-making. The EU Council presidency describes the Commission?s proposal as ?very delicate? situated on the borderline of fundamental rights and freedoms such as freedom of expression, assembly or of association and the right to respect for family life?.5 It is therefore ?essential?, suggests the presidency, ?that the right balance is struck?, as in the Council of Europe Convention. Of course, if the CoE Convention strikes such a delicate balance, why bother tinkering with it at all? The solution proposed by the presidency is the insertion of a recital in the preamble to the draft Framework Decision based on article 12 of the Council of Europe Convention. However, as a recital, it will be of limited effect because member states are only obliged to align their national legal systems with the substantive obligations in the actual articles of the text. In opposition to the Commission proposal, Sweden ? supported by other unnamed EU member states ? has proposed a new article based on the draft EU Framework Decision on racism and xenophobia, which (like the CoE Cybercrime Protocol) contains an express opt-out allowing member states to abstain from enacting ?measures in contradiction to fundamental principles relating to freedom of association and freedom of expression and assembly, in particular freedom of the press and the freedom of expression in other media?. The limits to free speech Jyllands-Posten, the Danish newspaper that commissioned the cartoons depicting the Prophet Mohammed as, among other things, a terrorist, argued ? provocatively and erroneously the eyes of many ? that its actions addressed an important issue of self-censorship in the media: “The modern, secular society is rejected by some Muslims. They demand a special position, insisting on special consideration of their own religious feelings. It is incompatible with contemporary democracy and freedom of speech, where you must be ready to put up with insults, mockery and ridicule.6 While newspapers in many countries reprinted the cartoons, it is notable that the overwhelming majority of media organisations in the UK, USA, Canada and elsewhere chose not to. In doing so, they tacitly acknowledged the limits to free speech. As A. Sivanandan has put it: “Europe holds that freedom of speech is the very basis of western democracy and cannot therefore be compromised or watered down. It is an absolute. But that is a fallacy. No freedom is an absolute. Every freedom carries with it its own responsibility. The right to freedom of speech does not, as Oliver Wendell Holmes, the great American judge said, give you the right to falsely cry ‘fire’ in a crowded theatre.7“ Indeed, laws criminalising holocaust denial and incitement to racial hatred show very well the limits to free speech in western democracies. The status quo is an uneasy compromise based on the principles of respect for minority communities and social cohesion. Here the media occupies a crucial position, particularly when it comes to moderating the so-called ?clash of civilisations?. Aidan White, Secretary-General of the International Federation of Journalists, has warned that ?journalists need to be more conscious than ever about the dangers of media manipulation by unscrupulous politicians and racists?.8 Index on censorship What began in Denmark as an exercise in counter-self censorship ? albeit one of extremely dubious judgment, to say the least ? quickly exploded into a politically charged issue seized upon by both sides of the ?debate?. Exactly the same thing happened last year when Oxford University?s Student Union chose to hold a debate on free speech involving David Irving and Nick Griffin. Last month the Archbishop of Canterbury provoked a similar storm when his views about Sharia Law in Britain were seized upon by other supposed champions of free speech in the media. Yet for all the limits on free speech, all three examples show that freedom of expression is alive and well for cartoonists, racists, Archbishops and, for the time being at least, those that they offend. The new EU proposals threaten to radically alter the status quo by criminalising speech that may provoke terrorism, even if where it does not directly advocate acts of terrorism. Because the EU?s definition of terrorism is so broad, the scope for criminalisation is enormous. ?Terrorism? was defined in EU law in 2002 as: “seriously intimidating a population, or unduly compelling a Government or international organisation to perform or abstain from performing any act, or seriously destabilising or destroying the fundamental political, constitutional, economic or social structures of a country or an international organisation.” To suggest that the Palestinians, Lebanese, Iraqis or Afghans have the right to resist occupation and aggression through armed struggle could easily be construed as public provocation to terrorism. Advocates of direct action against corporations, government policies and intergovernmental organisations like the EU may also fall foul of the new laws. Those who say that the new laws are needed argue that they are required to deal with ?preachers of hate? and ?Jihadi? websites. On the other hand, since incitement to murder and incitement to terrorism (included in the 2002 EU Framework Decision) are criminal offences, why not let the courts decide if that is what people are guilty of? It does seem reasonable for states to attempt action against websites that directly encourage atrocities such as ?9/11? and the Madrid and London bombings ? however futile the uncontrollable nature of the web may render this exercise ? but it is patently absurd to use them as a justification for the introduction of new offences criminalising people for their political beliefs or opinions. The limits to permissible thought In November 2007, Samina Malik, the 23-year-old self-professed ?lyrical terrorist?, was convicted under section 28 of the UK Terrorism Act 2000 for the possession of material that is ?likely to be useful to a person committing or preparing an act of terrorism?. The articles in question included the ?terrorist manuals? she had downloaded from the internet and poems she had written about ?Jihad?. After five months in prison on remand, Ms Malik was acquitted of the more serious charge of ?possessing an article for terrorist purposes? under section 58 of the Act. So despite the jury finding no evidence to suggest that she ever actually intended to carry out an act of terrorism, she was given a suspended sentence for having even entertained the idea. On 13 February 2008, the Court of Appeal quashed the earlier section 58 convictions of five young Muslim students for downloading extremist literature. The Court decided that while there was no doubt the men had possessed extremist literature, there was no proof that they ever intended to do anything with it. This demand for legal certainty exposes the inherent flaws in the EU proposals ? they seek to criminalise the possession of a ?dangerous? opinion. Christopher Hitchens recently defended the author Martin Amis of racist attacks on Muslims, saying ?the harshness Amis was canvassing was not in the least a recommendation, but rather an experiment in the limits of permissible thought?. As John Pilger and others asked in a letter to the Guardian newspaper following the conviction of the ?lyrical terrorist?, is the right to ?experiment with the limits of permissible thought? now only accorded to people who have the correct skin colour, religion and academic background?9 Ben Hayes is a researcher with Statewatch and the Transnational Institute. 1. COM (2007) 650, 6.11.07. See SEMDOC website: http://www.statewatch.org/semdoc/503.html 2. See Statewatch News online, November 2007: http://www.statewatch.org/news/2007/nov/03eu-com-terror-plans.htm 3. Council of Europe Convention on the Prevention of Terrorism of 2005 (CETS No.: 196) 4. Additional Protocol to the Convention on cybercrime, concerning the criminalisation of acts of a racist and xenophobic nature committed through computer systems (CETS No.: 189) 5. Council doc. 6761/08, 20.2.02. 6. ?Muhammeds ansigt?, Flemming Rose, Jyllands-Posten, 30.9.05 7. ?Freedom of speech is not an absolute?, interview with A. Sivanandan, Race & Class, July 2006. 8. ?Journalism and Combating Intolerance: Those Cartoons and a Challenge to Free Expression and Quality Media?, Aidan White, http://www.ifj-asia.org/page/white_danish_cartoons.html 9. ?Race, class and freedom of speech?, Iain Banks, Caryl Churchill, Lindsey German, Michael Kustow, Adrian Mitchell, Andrew Murray, John Pilger, Michael Rosen, Guardian, 7.12.07.
Has Black History Month become too safe?11 Oct 2008Every year in late September I get a flurry of emails from council officials telling me that October is Black History Month and that a number of events are taking place to celebrate it. These are typically accompanied by flyers featuring pictures of Mary Seacole or Nelson Mandela. It?s very important that we should celebrate major black figures in history. But Black History Month has become very sanitised. It?s always the safest and least controversial figures that are put forward as its representatives. Even though there?s a lot of talk about Mandela ? who represents the overthrow of the racist apartheid system in South Africa ? there is little mention of the mass struggles of black South Africans such as the Soweto uprising of 1976. This is one reason why Black History Month is failing to connect with so many disaffected black youth. Another is the fact that more recent mass struggles of black people in Britain against racism ? which would be directly relevant to young people today ? are kept out of the picture. Racism is still a cancer in society, and black youth feel this keenly. The gun and knife crime debate has led to increased police harassment of young black people. Black people are seven times more likely to be stopped and searched than white people. Black children face higher levels of exclusion from school. All this reminds me of the huge levels of racism black people faced when I was growing up in the 1970s and early 1980s. We felt that we were under siege. There was vicious police persecution. I remember watching a group of white men jump out of a car, grab a Rastafarian man and beat him up. When people shouted for someone to call the police, one of the men took out his badge to reveal that they were the police. There was also the racism of the fascist National Front (NF). We lived in Hoxton, east London, where the NF had its headquarters. This area was a bastion of racism. A pensioner spat at my sister and me as we walked down the street. People shouted, ?Nigger, go home.? But two events came together to drive back this tide of racism. The first was the anti-fascist movement, led by the Anti Nazi League and Rock Against Racism. This smashed the NF. The people behind this movement in Hackney were mainly white, which helped me realise that a lot of people were anti-racist and that black and white could unite to fight racism. This was a very important stage of my life and it gave me a sense of hope. The second event was the wave of riots that took place in Brixton, Toxteth, the St Pauls area of Bristol, Handsworth in Birmingham and other black inner city areas in the early 1980s. This was black people saying that we?d had enough of racism. There was a sense that we had to move from being a persecuted sect to being a community that was proud to fight back. There was a sea change in official attitudes after the riots. The government launched the Scarman inquiry into police racism. The media had to stop constantly demonising black people. Today, when I tell young people about the racism my generation faced, there is a sense of disbelief that things were ever so bad. The fact that there is a generation that can?t imagine the racism that took place in Britain only 25 years ago shows the importance and effect of the struggles of that time. Yet too many young people don?t know about these struggles. They hate the police, racism and their treatment at the hands of the authorities, but they don?t think anything can be done about it. The establishment is now trying to roll back the gains that black people have made, but a benchmark has been set. There will be no going back to the levels of racism we saw in the 1970s. As recession looms, councils and the government will be looking at areas where they can make cuts. In many areas this will mean cuts to black community facilities and youth provision. We will need to fight against this. But black people face a lack of representation in official society. Many politicians and professionals are divorced from the black community. After the Broadwater Farm riots in north London in 1985, local MP Bernie Grant made the immortal comment, ?What the police got was a bloody good hiding.? That summed up how many people felt. It made people feel that here was a black politician who didn?t suck up to the racist establishment. But the black politicians who rose up on the backs of the struggles of the 1980s don?t represent people any more. There?s a lot of talk from some of them, but no action. They are becoming increasingly irrelevant. We need a renewed grassroots movement of black and white people to challenge the increase in police stop and search, school exclusions, racism and the rise of the fascist British National Party. And this has to be an ongoing movement, not a once a year event. We need to teach young people the lessons of mass battles against racism ? and inspire them to fight again.
The End of the World is Nigh11 Oct 2008The end of the world is nigh … on impossible to second guess – but SchNEWS trys anyway Another fifty issues under the belt and its time for SchNEWS to once again take stock. Two years ago back in issue 550, SchNEWS went all Mystic Meg (or Cassandra – for you ancient Greek fans) in our ‘State of the Indignation’ address. At the time the economy was bubbling along happily for those lucky enough to get on the housing ladder and there was little sign of popular discontent around the ?nuclear-powered police state? in the offing. But we predicted that ?the cracks were already beginning to show? and suggested that the inevitable recession would represent a major political opportunity. And this downturn looks set to be a real corker! In hindsight of course it was bleedin? obvious that a debt-fuelled consumer boom based on the idea that that house prices would rise infinitely was a bubble ripe for bursting. And now falling house prices, dropping at records rates, are bringing down the economic house of cards ? further fuelling the falls… Yer ever prophetic SchNEWS hit that nail firmly on the head with our truth-hammer. Funnily the article was so persuasive that just two years later the economics correspondents of all the major newspapers are now united in their dismissal of the fools who were nave enough to believe that free market capitalism was ever considered a good idea. But what?s stepping into its place? Bigger monopolies and mergers are concentrating power into fewer hands and no doubt there will be vulture capitalists picking up the remains. As banks go under, the state turns a blind eye to flagrant abuse of anti-monopoly rules as Lloyds TSB takes over HBOS, turning into an uber-behemoth with its hands on everyone?s houses and wallets. Most of the 700 billion US bail out is to be handed straight to the small elite which caused this meltdown in the first place. In the meantime the surveillance state shows no signs of receding. Not content with having the largest CCTV network in the world (one for every fourteen of us and counting!), the stealthy introduction of I.D cards, 28 days detention etc, Britain?s ruling class now want the ability to instantly interrogate every single piece of data-transfer happening in the UK ? that?s every phone call, text message and e-mail ? in real time. The Intercept Modernisation Programme is a a 12 billion scheme to spy on the entire telecommunications system. Current UK law requires a warrant is to intercept communications (or at least to produce the evidence in court) but that will change with the implementation of the new database. Meanwhile, Scotland ? traditional home of unpopular pilot schemes ? is now hosting a national roll-out of Automatic Numberplate Recognition (ANPR). Around 450,000 number plates will be recorded every day and used to flag up the whereabouts of known suspects. The 2.4m system will also help investigators build up evidence using a database of millions of car journeys. How soon before the scheme is rolled out across the whole of the UK? This massive expansion of state surveillance will make ruling the country in the rocky times ahead easier for the power elite. They already have the framework of repression: tighter public order laws, terrorism legislation and the power to declare martial law (The Civil Contingencies Act, SchNEWS 437) all passed with little resistance in a time of peace and little social strife. The elite knew that the clock was ticking and have prepared accordingly. Increasing numbers of police have gone hand in hand with centralization of law enforcement. The Police Reform Act 2002 gave the police the ability to hand out police powers to ?accredited? organisations. Private security firms and council busybodies are now being issued with the right to issue fines for ?anti-social behaviour? – a slippery term which easily becomes a euphemism for state interference in every aspect of your life. For example, Parkguard – a firm which patrols parks and housing estates, now has powers in Hertfordshire and Essex to issue fixed penalty notices for anti-social behaviour and confiscate alcohol and tobacco. Even private companies like Group 4 now employ large numbers of people legally authorised to use ?Control & Restraint? techniques to ensure the compliance of the awkward. Abuses within the Asylum detention system largely run by these companies are well documented. The existence of different ?members? of the police family gives the state the option of playing one against the other ? could the Community support brigade be inflated into a strong-arm squad to keep order on the streets if the police ever made good on their threat to strike? So what should SchNEWS readers make of the current ?crisis?? Clearly there is a lurch to more state control over the economy as the whole free market system unravels, with a serious potential shift to national socialism as states adopt a protectionist policy and take control of the economy and put up borders. Capitalism?s current decline wasn?t bought about by anti-capitalist direct action, which itself had declined in the west in recent years ? with more energy being put into the war on Iraq and the recent resurgence of eco-action around oil use and climate change. So have these shifts in the direct action movement been misguided? Not entirely ? the War on Iraq and all the associated ?terror? scares and repression still needs to be resisted. And climate change ain?t gonna go away just yet ? the government is still gonna dig up loads of coal as a quick and dirty solution to the energy crisis bought about by years of reliance on gas which the UK now has to import. Also the skills learned by the direct action movement in organisation, resistance to state power and a culture of self-reliance and cooperation should prove us in good stead in times of crisis. These skills and vision need to be shared with the wider population if they are not merely to remain part of a sub-culture getting by in the recession, while the majority of the population struggle with crippling debts and job insecurity. How long the recession and how deep it hurts is anyone?s guess, but is doubtless that, as ever, the poorest will be hit hardest. However, we are at least used it to some extent – the question is how will the consumer classes take it when their ivory-towered aspirational lifestyles grind to a halt? The shock might finally persuade them to think about something more radical than giving David Cameron a go…see you in 50 issues when we?re eating our words (or each other).
The Curse of These Demonic Call Centres9 Oct 2008If there is one aspect of modern society that sums up the relentless, tortuous contempt in which the mass of humanity is held by the thieving, sociopathic executives that rule our essential institutions, it’s the call centre. It now takes such an effort of will and determination to begin the four-hour task of contacting, for example, the gas board, that no matter how serious your problem, you try to put it off forever. So, even if your house explodes, you are likely to hover over the phone for a minute, then think, “Oh sod it, I’ll just live in the rubble for a few days.” But worst of all, and maybe this explains the current world situation, are the banks. When I joined my bank there was a local branch, full of helpful, jokey staff, that made ordering a new cheque book a positive social experience. So they were all sacked and replaced with the demonic call centre and hours of repetitive ambient trancey music, punctuated with a sinisterly smooth voice telling you they’re doing ALL they can to answer your call, although the one method they never quite get round to trying is to pick up the sodding phone. Presumably when a phone rings they try blowing on it, sitting on it, spreading marmalade over it, then sit round gasping, “We’ve tried EVERYTHING and we STILL can’t seem to answer it.” Eventually you slide into a trance, barely aware of your own existence, until finally you are jolted back to reality by a voice telling you, “Hello, I’m Sonia, how can I help you today?” But you are in such a daze it’s like when someone knocks on the door to ask if you want a cup of tea when you’ve fallen asleep in the bath. For the first few seconds you can only make groaning, dribbling noises as you piece together how you came to be here, or anywhere, until you tell them the thing you requested three weeks ago hasn’t happened. Then they change all the security stuff, so now as well as Pin numbers, passwords and account details, my bank also insists on an ID number and a SPECIAL Pin number which was supposed to come in the post but didn’t. Even then they might ask for your mother’s maiden name and you get past that they’ll probably say, “What’s your favourite breed of hippo? Well I’m afraid we can’t discuss your details unless you can confirm your favourite breed of hippo. It’s for your own security Mr Steel.” Then it will turn out that everything’s your fault. Because the thing you say happened isn’t on the system, or you shouldn’t have requested it on a Tuesday or should really have spoken to the Referral Current Monetary Unit based in Lithuainia. Then they’ll pretend they’re being helpful by saying, “You do have the option of sending us a painting depicting the nature of the withdrawal you are requesting. And strictly speaking it should be a traditional oil painting but, in this case, I am prepared to accept a piece of Cubism or even abstract shapes.” And if you get that far, they’ll say, “Now all we need to do to complete the transaction is press this button, which should be done within 10 working days.” So the call centre workers and their customers are pitted against each other, when the lives of both have been made more awkward so the AGM can announce a greater dividend. Now even bailout packages can’t stop the banks’ demise, probably because every time a government agrees to one, they ring the bank to tell them but can’t bloody get through.
BP and the Fuelling of Heathrow9 Oct 2008Somewhere in our hearts we know that the terror unleashed by Hurricane Katrina, or the anxiety produced by the collapse of another ice sheet, will not be addressed by changing our light bulbs, cutting car use, not taking flights, or reducing food miles. These things are vital, but not enough. And perhaps our intuition also tells us the focus has been too squarely on the consumers of fossil fuels rather than their producers. And indeed that the focus is too much on individual consumers, rather than commercial or institutional customers. PLATFORM?s work since the mid 1990s has combined research, art and activism around the oil and gas industry, especially looking at the web of institutions and companies that surround BP and Shell, enabling them to carry out their core functions – the extraction and sale of hydrocarbons. Amongst the many other impacts that it has on the environment, human rights, workers? rights and democracy, this web – the Carbon Web – drives forward climate change (see my article in Soundings 35). In doing this work we have focused on the producers of the problem. Consumers and producers Power is the ability to ensure that others carry the burden of change. Thus, when as a society we?re trying to tackle problem of over-fishing in North Sea, the UK government and EU limit the numbers of fishing boats working in British harbours. Here it is regulating the producers – because the fishing industry is weak, it carries the burden of change. But this focus on producers is unusual. Other cases illustrate this point. By the end of the twentieth century it was widely accepted that smoking caused horrendous health problems, and this was placing a huge strain on the health systems of the state. In order to tackle this, and pressured by popular opinion, the UK government now uses the law, advertising and health information programmes to constrain UK citizens from smoking. But it does little to attack the tobacco companies, the producers of cigarettes. In this instance the individual consumers carry the burden of change, as the tobacco industry is too powerful for the government to force it to carry the burden. In tackling the need to change the amount of CO2 emissions this nation produces, the government uses advertising, education programmes and grant aid, to assist individuals to take up renewables and energy efficiency measures. It tries to encourage individual consumers to consider changing their consumption patterns. But it signally fails to tackle the fossil fuel industry, the ultimate producers of the majority of CO2 emissions. We can assume that this is largely because the latter is too powerful to be forced to carry the burden of change. Thus the government White Paper on Climate Change drawn up under environment minister Michael Meacher in the late 1990s was radical in its analysis of the problem, but laughable in its solutions – talking about encouraging householders to not overfill kettles, and so on. This was a report from a state that is partly financed by taxes from North Sea oil and gas extraction, a state that is home to two of the three largest oil and gas producers in the world. Why was the Environment Ministry so oblivious of the opportunities for really tackling the issue? Why is it so powerless? I want to focus on the example of BP here, though I could tell the same story about Shell, or indeed a number of other oil corporations. Firstly, let?s consider the scale of BP. BP is one of the world?s largest oil producers. In terms of oil and gas actually produced, it is effectively neck and neck with ExxonMobil. Measured by market capitalisation, BP is the fifth largest company in the world, and the largest UK company. It constitutes 9 per cent of the FTSE 100 index, effectively 9 per cent of the capital on the London Stock Exchange. The movements of its internal economy shift the whole London Stock Market, and thereby the UK economy. The company pays 1.7 billion in tax each year to the Treasury. One in six of the shares held by UK pension funds are shares in BP. And the political power of BP in the UK is immense. Shortly before becoming prime minister, Gordon Brown was asked who in Britain was more powerful than him – at that time the Chancellor. He gave the names of four men, all businessmen, and top of the list was Lord John Browne, CEO of BP. By the time Gordon Browne became prime minister, John Browne had fallen from office, but one of the new prime minister?s first acts was to establish a new ?Business Council?, and prime amongst the Chief Executives appointed to the Council was Tony Hayward, the new CEO of BP. Let?s consider the scale of CO2 emissions of BP. According to the Kyoto Protocol, global CO2 emissions are apportioned by state, so the UK is held responsible for 2.5 per cent of global CO2 emissions. If we take the emissions both of BP?s processes – i.e. the flights its staff take, the energy consumed in running a refinery, etc – and of BP?s products – i.e. what it sells: petrol, jet fuel, etc – then its CO2 emissions are equivalent to 5.6 per cent of global CO2 emissions. In other words, over twice that of all the 62 million UK citizens. From the mid 1990s onwards BP led the way in striving to reduce the emissions from its processes. It made improvements in some areas of the company, and published the figures for the annual emissions from its processes and products in order to demonstrate this progress. However, since 2004 it has only published the emissions from its processes – and careful examination shows that these are only 6 per cent of its total emissions. The implication is that the company has ceased to take responsibility for the effects of its products – ceased to take responsibility for 94 per cent of its emissions. This would be the equivalent of British American Tobacco saying: ?There are health issues around smoking and we are tackling them ? we?ve instituted a no smoking policy in our factories and offices?. Yet the tobacco industry is now increasingly understood as being responsible for the impacts of its products. Lawsuits in the US have been unfolding in an attempt to try to enforce this understanding of the responsibilities of a company, and to show the culpability of producers. The question is how to apply the ?north sea fish stock control principle? to the production of CO2 emissions. How to focus efforts on constraining the suppliers, to ensure that they carry a substantial part of the burden of change, to ensure that they cease extracting and selling oil and gas. How BP fuels Heathrow Look closely at a 747 taking off. Don?t look at the body of the plane, but see the fuel tanks, see the burning in the combustion engines. In the first 600 seconds the engines burn 200 gallons of Jet Air B high octane fuel. They burn rocks from deep beneath the earth and turn them into gas. Look and you can see the geology of the North Sea, Nigeria, Kuwait ? turning into gas. Heathrow is like a massive bonfire of global proportions. Let us try and picture how this burning takes place. Tom Stewart works on a vast liquid clock. He?s employed by BP at Kenneil, near Edinburgh. He?s a Throughput Analyst on the Forties Pipeline System. Essentially what he does, from an office on the edge of the vast refinery and chemical works at Grangemouth, is make predictions as to how much crude oil will be flowing down the Forties Pipeline tomorrow, next week, next year. He?s a futurologist. Forties is one of the two main pipeline systems in the UK sector of the North Sea. It gathers the oil and gas output from over thirty fields and transports it four hundred miles across the sea bed and under farmland to the Gas Separation Plant at Kenneil. About 40 per cent of the UK?s daily oil production passes through this pipe. Every 24 hours over 100 million dollars worth of hydrocarbons moves along its length. Tom?s vast clock allows us to chart the passing of time – ten days. I will set this tale in the winter of 2008, but you could just as easily set it in the ten days that preceded your reading of this essay. On Saturday 26 January the flare stack on BP?s Andrew oil platform burnt brightly in the grey morning. Meanwhile it took 37 minutes for oil and gas to rise 8000 feet from the Paleocene sandstone – created 57 million years ago – to the drill deck. Over the 48 hours of Saturday 26 and Sunday 27 January, the oil and gas passed down the pipeline to Kenneil. On that Sunday it took three hours to separate the gas from the oil, and for the latter to pass to the loading terminal at Hound Point. On Monday 28 January it took 17 hours for the crude to be loaded onto a 300,000 tonne oil tanker in the Firth of Forth. The tanker took 24 hours to sail to Coryton Refinery on the Thames Estuary in Essex, thirty miles to the east of London. Between 29 January and 2 February the crude was refined into a number of products, including aviation fuel. On 3 February this aviation fuel was pumped to the Buncefield Depot near Hemel Hempstead, before it travelled via the West London Pipeline to Heathrow. On the morning of Monday 4 February, 72 tonnes of the fuel filled the tanks of a Virgin Atlantic Boeing 747 and later it travelled to New York at 555 miles per hour, achieving an altitude of 31,000 feet above the Irish Sea. In its engines ? the burning fuel. The liquid clock takes under ten days to run its course, ten days for the oil to move from 8000 feet below sea level to 31,000 feet above sea level; ten days for the liquid rocks to melt into air, ten days for geology laid down 57 million years ago to be incinerated into gas. This clock drives forward minute by minute, hour by hour, 24 hours a day, 365 days a year – like her sisters owned by BP across the world – the Baku-Tibilisi-Ceyhan Pipeline, the Trans-Alaska Pipeline, the Ocensa Pipeline. Moving constantly, they are part of a vast system that transfers carbon from the lithosphere to the atmosphere. How Heathrow fuels BP This tale illustrates how BP fuels Heathrow, but we also need to understand how Heathrow fuels BP. I?d like to illustrate the characters involved in this fuelling. Lets look at Andy Chubb, head of Air BP for the UK & Ireland. His job is to sell as much aviation fuel as he can. To be more exact, retaining his post, or getting promotion, or a pay rise, or bonus, depends on him making more money from selling aviation fuel this year than he did last year – if income from sales remains steady or declines, his position will come under scrutiny. The keys to increasing profit are (a) buying fuel cheap and selling it expensive, or (b) selling more fuel to the same customers or new customers. Air BP?s key customers in the UK are the Ministry of Defence and the civil aviation industry – in the case of Heathrow the customers are BAA and the airlines that operate there via the Heathrow Airport Fuel Co. BP has a strong position in two of the three pipelines that feed Heathrow, and as the airport has only two days worth of peak usage supply on site, it is dependent on pipelines. With outright ownership of the pipeline from the BP depot at Walton-on-Thames, and a 50 per cent ownership of the pipeline from Buncefield, Heathrow is a key source of revenue, of profit, for BP. But business is cutthroat. Six companies supply fuel at Heathrow, and that means that BP is in competition with the likes of ExxonMobil, which supplies Heathrow via a pipeline from its refinery at Fawley near Southampton – the third of the pipelines feeding Heathrow. So Andy Chubb constantly needs to find ways of building customer loyalty and encouraging customers to purchase more fuel. Partly he does this by an intimate knowledge of his customers. ExxonMobil has a database that records every detail of its key industrial clients, such as the important personnel?s birthdays and favourite restaurant. We can be sure that Andy has something similar at his disposal. But there are other means of building relationships with key customers. Since 2002, BP has been a leading contractor to BAA on the $6 billion Terminal Five, doing the detailed engineering and design work for the terminal?s fuelling facilities, the underground pipeline network which provides aircraft fuel 24 hours a day and is able to fill nine 747s at a time with 1,650 gallons of jet fuel per minute. ?We won the contract because Air BP has an excellent relationship with them and we work well together?, said Colin Robinson, engineering team leader. And Richard Farmer, Air BP technical business manager, explained: ?It is extremely important that Air BP is seen to be capable of delivering fuel system solutions to the industry?. Terminal Five will be ?a showpiece which will really give us something to show off to our technical customers worldwide?. The relationship with BAA is crucial to BP, not only to ensure its business at Heathrow but to gain business around the world. Andy Chubb is under pressure to perform from his immediate superior Peter Mather, BP UK head of country. Peter can assist Andy in the process of fuel sales, for example by putting pressure on the UK Treasury not to levy tax on aviation fuel. If taxes are levied this will reduce the profitability of airlines and therefore the amount of fuel they purchase from BP – here BP works in concert with the airlines and the airports. But Peter Mather is also under pressure to perform, from his immediate superior, Iain Conn, head of BP Marketing and Refining globally. Iain is responsible for most of the stages of the shifting of energy from an oil field to a jet engine. In the journey of the oil discussed above, he is responsible for the passage of fuel from the Hound Point tanker terminal to Heathrow, from BP Shipping to Air BP. Iain is responsible to the Chief Executive of BP – Tony Hayward – and the Board of BP under the Chairmanship of Peter Sutherland. Returning to the question of limiting CO2 emissions. Sixty-six million passengers passed through Heathrow last year, a vast number of consumers of jet fuel, and these are the people who are commonly held to have the responsibility for the CO2 emissions. These are the combusters. But five men – Sutherland, Hayward, Conn, Mather and Chubb – alongside a few more – are responsible for supplying approximately 30 per cent of the fuel consumed at Heathrow. The fuel consumed by perhaps 22 million people. We need to focus our efforts not on the consumers, but on the suppliers – not on those eating fish, but the fishing boats. The trouble is that these five men, three of them millionaires, are far more powerful than the nation?s fishermen. And they use their power to ensure that they don?t have to take the burden of change. Heathrow fuels BP in another direct way. Look at an airliner in the sky and you can be sure that at this moment a BP member of staff is airborne. The company has 100,000 staff globally, and the largest concentration of BP staff is in the Greater London area. There?s BP Oil UK and Europe offices at Milton Keynes, Air BP, the British Pipeline Agency, BP Shipping, BP Pensions and BP Marine?s offices at Hemel Hempstead; and there?s a further vast campus of BP offices at Sunbury, four miles south of Heathrow, with 2500 staff working in units of BP Exploration, BP Refining and Marketing and BP Solar. Then there?s BP Alternative Energy offices in Weybridge, Surrey ? not forgetting BP?s several offices in the City, offices of Integrated Supply & Trading at Canary Wharf, and of course the head offices at St James?s Square, Piccadilly. Perhaps a total of seven to ten thousand BP staff work and live in this area, out of the 17,000 BP staff who work in the UK. We should also remember that for every one person directly employed by BP there are three
indirectly employed workers working for other firms – accountants, designers, environmental assessors and so on – that are contracted to work for BP. This
probably totals another twenty to thirty thousand people. London is an oil city – arguably the most important oil city in the world – and Heathrow is the main gate of entrance and exit to that city. If there?s a disruption of Heathrow it badly disrupts the workings of BP. It is a likelihood that BP?s staff security considered the possible risks of the disruption of Heathrow by the Camp for Climate Action in August 2007 and looked at other means for senior executives to travel in this period – there was a marked up-take during this period in the number of private jets being booked from smaller airfields, as the Financial Times reported. BP was founded in 1909 and has grown up alongside air transport. Arguably, it is simply not possible to run a global TNC of this scale without air travel. It?s quite common for mid-level to senior staff to fly from, say, Anchorage to Kuwait for a meeting. Lord Browne had a private company jet – now used by Tony Hayward – and would fly even short distances, such as that from London to Hull. Disrupting Heathrow At 7pm in the evening of 10 December 2005 the pipeline from Thameside, Coryton, began filling tank 912 at Buncefield depot, Hemel Hempstead. By 5.20am the next morning there was a malfunction and the tank overflowed. At 6am there was a massive explosion, leading to the largest fire in Europe in peacetime. The smoke was visible all over the South East. It took 56 hours to put out, but miraculously only 43 people were injured, among them two BP staff. Air BP?s offices at Hemel Hempstead were evacuated for five weeks. The pipeline from Buncefield to Heathrow was shut down, and there were fears over security of supply at the airport. BP tried to reduce the disruption by increasing the supply from the Walton-on-Thames depot, and other companies brought in fuel by road tanker. Supply via the Buncefield pipeline was disrupted for more than two months, but very few flights were cancelled. Other alternative supplies were also found – for example Thai Airlines started taking on fuel in Copenhagen, Singapore Airlines in Frankfurt, and so on. It had been the biggest disruption of supply at Heathrow in recent memory, and yet it had a marginal impact on the great bonfire. In the journey of oil from an oil rig in the North Sea to a jet engine at Heathrow, we can identify six stages, and these would be roughly the same if the oil was coming from Kuwait, Iraq, Nigeria, Azerbaijan, Algeria or Western Siberia. The stages are: (1) rig (2) pipeline (3) tanker (4) refinery (5) pipelines and depots (6) airport. Each of these stages is vulnerable, but security around them is extremely strong. Oil rigs are off-limits to civilians almost the world over – they are either off-shore or in security zones. Crude pipelines are buried and heavily policed – my colleague was arrested recently for merely being in the vicinity of the Baku-Tiblisi-Ceyhan pipeline. Tankers are generally offshore and tanker terminals are places of high security. Refineries are likewise. Pipelines of refined product, jet fuel for example, are buried deep, unmarked, and a careful eye is kept on them. Heathrow, like all airports, is high security. It?s almost as if there?s a high security strip running all the way from, say, off-shore Azerbaijan to Heathrow. We could imagine it like a long, long line of two fences. And there are hundreds of such strips running across the world to this airport, the great bonfire. Two other examples illustrate the issue of disruption – one at a refinery and one during transportation. During the Fuel Protests in September 2000 there
was a blockade of Coryton. But at no point during the blockade was the supply of fuel to Heathrow disrupted – due to the delivery of fuel by pipeline. There is clear evidence that the oil companies colluded in the blockade of the refineries in order to put pressure on the government on a number of issues, in particular North Sea oil tax. The person that represented BP in the negotiations with the UK government, working in the Cabinet Office at the thick of the crisis, was John Manzoni. A previous disruption to transportation occurred in 1956, when the countries of the Gulf declared a halt to oil exports to the UK following the British attack on Egypt at Suez. It was a disaster for British economy; there was petrol rationing and disruption of flights at Heathrow. We know that the UK, and of course its more senior ally the USA, will now go to great lengths to ensure this kind of thing doesn?t happen again in a hurry. (And we should remember that the impact of the Suez Crisis was acute in part because the USA did not back the British government.) But perhaps thinking like this is to fixate too much on the technology, the hardware of oil production and distribution. What of the financial flows that ensure
this system runs smoothly, the financing of it from within the company selling the jet fuel (BP) and the companies purchasing the fuel (BAA and the airlines), and the financing of it from without by banks such as the Royal Bank of Scotland? What of the political support and the wider social support and acceptability – ?the social license to operate? – that the companies try to build and we as citizens collude in? And then again, what of the role of those five men we talked of earlier? Are there possibilities of disruption here? The challenge again In the past year it has become increasingly understood that the UK needs to reduce its CO2 emissions by 90 per cent by 2030, and global emissions must stabilise by 2015, if we are to avoid going beyond 2 degrees Celsius of global warming. These ideas and principles are generally thought of as being applied to nation states. But what happens if we apply them to companies? BP is a multinational; it operates in over one hundred countries in the world. How does that fit within the frame of national reduction targets? Let?s, for argument?s sake, apply the UK reduction targets to BP – that would mean that the company – which produces more than twice as many CO2 emissions as all the citizens of the UK put together, would have to reduce its CO2 output by 90 per cent by 2030, and cease to increase its emissions output within the next seven years. It would effectively need to phase out its oil and gas production and retail – which currently generates 97 per cent of its total turnover. How is this to be done? Let?s go back to Andy Chubb – within the next seven years, he, or his successor, needs to be proudly showing at the end of each year that he has actually reduced the amount of oil that he?s sold in comparison to the previous year. And this needs to go on happening until the amount of jet fuel he is selling is a mere 10 per cent of what he?s currently selling. And he needs to stay in his job. So he needs the support of Peter Mather, Iain Conn, Tony Hayward and Peter Sutherland. Of course we can nuance this. If BP as a whole is to reduce its emissions by 90 per cent, it might do so by reducing in other areas more dramatically than in the aviation fuels division. But the basic direction of travel remains the same – and this is going to be extremely hard to do, for reducing sales dramatically reduces profits, and that impacts on the shareholder value; and CEO Tony Hayward and Chairman Peter Sutherland depend for their positions on the maintenance of shareholder value. This is leaving aside the impact that a dramatic collapse of profitability in the largest capital company in the UK would have on this country?s economy – and all those pensions. But we need to avoid two degrees of warming, so this kind of change is going to have to come about. Sweden has set up a government unit to define a post-oil Sweden, and David Miliband (as Environment Minister) talked of the same for UK in 2006. We all know that the UK government has been proud of the fact that in the late 1990s it led the industrial world in the level at which it cut its CO2 emissions, and we also know that this was largely due the switch of power stations from coal to gas and to the closing down of the UK coal industry. The communities in the coalfields in Wales, the Midlands, Kent, Yorkshire and Scotland bore the burden of that change. Now we need to reduce our CO2 emissions radically further; and a key part of this will be changing the structures of supply, not just the structures of consumption. This will be hard, but we need to draw to ourselves the power to ensure that the suppliers – the oil and gas and coal companies – carry the burden of that change. BP knows this change is going to come – after all this is the company that called itself ?Beyond Petroleum? – it is simply a question of by when, and how quickly. Though CEO of Shell UK James Smith said in 2006 that Shell?s target was 550ppm CO2 concentration in the atmosphere, BP steadfastly refuses to articulate a target. Yet even Shell?s target is not enough. Mark Lynas writes: 500ppm (is) 100ppm higher than the level I consider necessary to stabilise the climate below two degrees of global warming. Indeed, a 500ppm concentration would probably warm the globe by between three and four degrees, crossing both the carbon cycle and the Siberian methane tipping point in the process, and leading inexorably therefore to even greater warming. BP?s slowness to change results from its not wanting to take the capital hit that a rapid shift would necessitate, from not wanting to have to ?strand assets?. Its slowness will mean that others have to carry the burden of change. Some of those others are already carrying the burden – in Bangladesh, in the Arctic regions, and so on. How do we draw the necessary power to ourselves? How to we pressurise a company such as BP to undergo that radical shift? We need to work together, put our hearts, minds and wills together. Understanding the need to tackle the producers is a first step.
Global crisis and an international fightback8 Oct 2008THE global economic crisis threatens to hit poor people hardest amid the challenge to defend millions of jobs. But next Tuesday (October 7) campaigners will launch a fightback with the biggest gathering of international development and labour-related organisations in Britain. War on Want will play a leading part in this TUC event at Congress House in London which marks the World Day for Decent Work, co-ordinated by the Brussels-based International Trade Union Confederation. Almost a decade ago, the International Labour Organisation developed the concept of decent work. It defined the concept as ?productive work for women and men in conditions of freedom, equity, security and human dignity. Decent work involves opportunities for work that is productive and delivers a fair income; provides security in the workplace and social protection for workers and their families; offers better prospects for personal development and encourages social integration; gives people the freedom to express their concerns, to organise and participate in decisions that affects their lives; and guarantees equal opportunities and equal treatment for all.? Yet besides the grim statistic that almost 200 million people remain unemployed around the globe, far greater numbers are underemployed or not paid for their work. In addition, half of the world?s workforce earns less than two dollars a day; more than 12 million women and men work in slavery; 200 million children aged under 15 work, rather than go to school; more than two million people die from work-related accidents and diseases every year. Moreover, people in developed and developing countries work harder for less money. Companies use the threat of outsourcing to drive down wages and hard-won freedoms, such as the right to collective bargaining and to strike. And trade unionists who fight these trends are dismissed, threatened, jailed and even killed. The Congress House event will feature more than 50 workshops, films, exhibitions and stalls from unions and development charities, as well as fair and ethical trade groups and academic institutions. War on Want will lead a session on how free trade rules have destroyed millions of jobs through cheap imports and the new threat to livelihoods posed by the ?Global Europe? policy of European Union trade commissioner Peter Mandelson. This will take place from 11.15 am-12.30pm, with speakers including War on Want trade campaigns officer Dave Tucker and Wendy Willems, the charity?s international programmes research officer. As developing countries resist wealthy nations? pressure in the World Trade Organisation, the EU aims to bully them one by one into accepting terms that will increase poverty. Another disturbing trend concerns the growing numbers of people ? overwhelmingly women ? forced to make their living in the so-called informal economy, without social protection or rights and in precarious jobs. Zambia, once among the richest African countries, slumped in the 1970s when copper prices collapsed. In return for loans from the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund, the government slashed health and education spending, privatised industries and opened the economy to foreign business. Now seven in 10 Zambians face life on less than $1 a day, with many struggling to survive through small-scale trading in street markets. Global Europe defines the EU?s interests in terms of an aggressive market access agenda on behalf of European business. This identifies three key areas in which the EU will press to secure new market access opportunities for its corporations in external markets by renewing commitment to reducing tariffs in developing countries and opposing or preventing other so-called barriers to trade; removing controls which impede access for European business to developing countries? natural resources, especially in energy; enforcing intellectual property rights, liberalising services and opening public procurement markets to transport, construction and utilities companies. The Global Europe strategy also seeks to favour corporate interests by lowering social and environmental protection to match US deregulation. The ILO?s reference to a ?fair income? in its decent work definition contrasts with the poverty pay for up to 90-hour weeks toiled by millions of garment workers making clothes for British retailers. In Asian countries such as Bangladesh, India, China and Sri Lanka, employees in sweatshops earn far less than needed to meet bills for food, housing and healthcare. In June, new research launched by War on Want and the campaign group Labour Behind the Label showed Indian workers making Tesco clothes toiling long hours for as little as 16p an hour ? only half a living wage. In January this year, War on Want revealed new evidence from the Garment and Textile Workers? Union in India that employees producing clothes for Matalan and H&M earned only 38 a month, well under a living wage. And a month later the charity found workers in Kenya and Colombia facing poor wages, health problems and job insecurity, supplying flowers as Valentine?s Day gifts in British supermarkets. In another workshop organised by War on Want, from 1.30-2.45pm, the speakers will include Simon McRae, its senior campaigns officer, who will describe the charity?s support for garment workers battling for a living wage. The world financial crisis has sparked widespread debate about its effect on the plight of millions of poor people. The TUC event offers a timely opportunity for activists to join forces in the battle to save jobs and step the campaign to ensure that all employment meets the criteria to justify the term decent work. Paul Collins is media officer at War on Want
EU paralysed in face of market turmoil8 Oct 2008The European Union?s finance ministers agreed Tuesday to raise the guarantee on bank deposits to a minimum of ?50,000 ($68,160) and ?to take all necessary measures to enhance the soundness and stability of our banking system and to protect the deposits of individual savers.? They would ?ensure a comprehensive and coordinated response to the current situation,? a joint statement declared. The finance ministers ruled out a US-style bailout, but said they would defend ?systemic? institutions from collapse. The declaration was an attempt to present a united front after days of indecision and fractious wrangling. It came in the aftermath of ?Meltdown Monday,? in which nervousness over the state of Europe?s banking system contributed to massive falls in share prices on the major stock exchanges. In just 24 hours, governments in Belgium, Luxemburg and Germany were forced to mount emergency bank rescue operations, while in Iceland trading was suspended and the government warned of the potential collapse of the country?s economy. Russia suspended trading twice on Monday and Tuesday and share values fell by over 20 percent. The market turmoil exploded claims that Europe was relatively free from the financial crisis gripping Wall Street. Whatever the precise degree of direct involvement by the various European banks in the speculative activities most closely associated with the US and Britain, the world?s financial institutions are tightly integrated. Moreover, what began as a liquidity crisis has now spilled over into the rest of the economy. It was evident that European leaders, like their US counterparts, had underestimated the depth and rapidity of the crisis gripping the world economy. Peter Peston of the BBC said, ?One thing, and one thing alone is crystal clear: European governments are as dazed and confused by the mayhem in the global banking system as most of the rest of us.? Even as the finance ministers began their meeting on Monday, Peer Steinbrueck had to excuse himself to work on what was described as a ?system-wide rescue plan for Germany.? This came just hours after the second bailout in a week for the German mortgage lender Hypo Real Estate had been put into place. In addition to the ongoing uncertainty, what frightened international markets was the prospect of beggar-thy-neighbour measures further destabilising Europe. Germany, Sweden, Austria and Denmark had followed Ireland and Greece in making unilateral pledges to support all savings, raising fears of a massive flight of capital across national borders. In particular, Sunday?s ?political commitment? by German Chancellor Angela Merkel to protect savings in German banks opened up the prospect of cut-throat inter-bank competition throughout the continent. Merkel?s announcement came less than 24 hours after the Paris summit of France, Germany, Britain and Italy had denounced such unilateral guarantees. There was immediate speculation that Britain would have to follow suit?exposing the Brown government to liabilities in excess of 950 billion in retail deposits, double the figure involved in Germany. Despite the protestations levelled against Berlin, Dublin and Athens, the Paris summit had in fact paved the way for go-it-alone measures when it vetoed proposals for a coordinated bailout plan floated by France and Italy. The proposal was opposed by both Germany and the UK, which would not countenance bailing out their European rivals. French President Nicolas Sarkozy was later forced to deny having mooted the plan and the summit instead issued a vague commitment that each European government would act to safeguard its own national institutions. This prompted Forbes to comment that ?Europe?s most powerful heads of state? had ?managed to quietly figure out that it was going to be every man for himself.? The Guardian?s financial correspondent David Gow?s verdict on the Paris summit was even more damning. It represented ?the flight of the EU?s seven leading figures from reality,? he wrote. ?Outside, on a chilly but sunny evening, the creeping Balkanisation of Europe?s integrated banking system is moving up a gear; inside, they?re talking up a coordinated, collective response to combat the risk of a 1930s-style depression. But they… know full well that the EU?s financial system is going down the Seine and they are preparing emergency ?national measures?.? The fracturing of political relations was made more apparent by the fact that the four acted without any consultation with the rest of the EU?s 27 member states, including the 12 others within the euro zone. Spain protested bitterly at its exclusion. With the markets in free-fall, there were strident demands for Europe to present some semblance of a common position. International Monetary Fund head Dominique Strauss-Kahn insisted, ?Europe must prepare to put in place a collective line of defence. The stability of the world economy is at stake.? To this end, on Monday night Sarkozy?acting on behalf of the EU?pledged that ?No depositor in the banks of our countries has suffered losses and we will continue to take the necessary measures to protect the system as well as depositors… In taking these measures, European leaders confirm the necessity of a close coordination and cooperation.? Even at the eleventh hour, discord continued. Italian Premier Silvio Berlusconi had reportedly read out the same statement earlier as if it were his own, while claiming that a European-wide bailout might still be possible and that Germany had objected only because Merkel ?didn?t have the power.? Later, at a joint press conference in Berlin with Berlusconi, Merkel again rejected proposals for a pan-European bailout, insisting that ?every country has to live up to its own responsibilities.? Meanwhile, Iceland?s prime minister, Geir Haarde, attacked his country?s ?friends? for failing to offer financial assistance to the ailing economy, forcing him to go cap in hand to Russia for a ?4 billion ($5.4 billion) loan. Tuesday?s package was an attempt by EU leaders to claw their way back from the precipice and make a show of unity. But it was far from convincing. The financial publication Bloomberg concluded that the ministers had ?failed to find a solution to the frozen credit markets that created the biggest financial crisis since the Great Depression, settling for an increase on consumers? deposit insurance.? Even this limited measure was a compromise, after some countries urged a guarantee on deposits up to ?100,000. The minimum level of support that was specified still leaves differing levels of guarantee across the continent. Whatever action is taken remains to be organised on a national rather than European-wide basis. What does Merkel?s demand that every country must ?live up to its own responsibilities? mean other than a further descent of the continent into economic conflict? An hour after the statement was issued, Spain announced that it was raising its guarantee of savings from ?20,000 to ?100,000. The Paris summit had already agreed to temporarily relax euro zone rules against state subsidies and limits on national budgets?bringing an effective end to a coordinated monetary policy. There is even some speculation that the euro zone could fracture under the weight of increasingly divergent national interests. Noting that recent years had seen ?extreme movements in competitiveness, unit labour costs and trade balances across the euro zone,? the Guardian cited Charles Goodhart of the London School of Economics estimating the risk that the monetary union will break up at between 10 to 20 percent. Leaving aside such doomsday scenarios, the economic and social implications of what has currently been proposed are vast. The banks and major corporations are demanding that billions be made available to them, under conditions in which France is officially in recession, Britain?s Chamber of Commerce insists that the UK is in recession and the rest of Europe looks set to follow. For the last decade, Europe?s leaders have slashed welfare and public spending on essential services, claiming that the money was not available and the private sector was more efficient. Now, without any democratic consultation, let alone a vote, they have agreed to direct vast tranches of public funds into unstable financial institutions to pay for rampant speculation by the super rich. So far this process has gone furthest in the UK, which is one of the world?s leading financial centres. Already this year some 200 billion has been made available to just two banks. As Brown held urgent talks with the Bank of England on Tuesday night, there were calls for the government to recapitalise major banks whose shares in some instances fell by around 40 percent. This is just the tip of the iceberg?and there is no guarantee that it will work. Working people thus face wage cuts and tax hikes to preserve the grotesque wealth accrued by the financial oligarchy under conditions in which tens of thousands have already been thrown out of work across Europe. Unemployment stood at 7.5 percent in August and there are predictions that millions more could lose their jobs by the end of the year.
UKTI: Armed and dangerous8 Oct 2008CAAT?s new Core Campaign Co-ordinator Sarah Waldron announces CAAT?s latest campaign to ?end the uncivil service? In 2007 campaigning by CAAT and a variety of other groups led to the closure of the Defence Export Services Organisation (DESO), the government?s arms sales unit. This was a significant achievement, hopefully marking the beginning of the end of arms industry influence at the heart of government. DESO, a secretive organisation located within the Ministry of Defence (MoD), employed nearly 500 civil servants to facilitate the sale of arms worldwide and to lobby for military exports. For four decades it brokered arms sales to conflict zones, poverty-stricken countries and repressive regimes. DESO gave unaccountable private interests an extraordinary level of access to government and influence over public policy. It used taxpayers? money to, in its own words: ?[harness] other parts of the MoD, the Armed Forces and Whitehall to support industry?s efforts?. DESO?s head was seconded from the arms industry and had direct access to ministers at the highest level. The last incumbent, Alan Garwood, seconded from BAE, reportedly had his salary
topped-up to 400,000 by the arms industry. No wonder the heads of arms companies such as BAE and Rolls-Royce were furious when DESO?s closure was announced. No special treatment?
Gordon Brown announced DESO?s closure in July 2007. Since April this year the promotion of military exports has been the responsibility of UK Trade and Investment (UKTI), the body that supports all UK exports. About 200 of DESO?s staff have been transferred from the MoD, to form the UKTI Defence and Security Organisation. Whilst the name may be similar, a lot has changed. The arms industry is no longer such a special case, with its very own department hidden away from public scrutiny and direct access to ministers. It is now one sector alongside other civil industry sectors within UKTI. Logically, it should operate in much the same way as they do and CAAT is far from alone in calling for this to happen. UKTI DSO?s head, Richard Paniguian, does not come from an arms industry background and is answerable to the UKTI Chief Executive, a civil servant, rather than those who decide arms export policy. The arms industry?s attempts to supplement his salary were rejected. Clearly, the arms industry has lost much of its privileged access but the business remains the same: promoting arms exports. UKTI DSO is offering to take UK arms companies ?under its wing? this November at IDEAS Pakistan, an arms fair operating under the slogan ?arms for peace?, which has previously hosted delegations from North Korea, Myanmar (Burma), Zimbabwe, Iran, Sudan, China and Indonesia. The industry also continues to receive a disproportionate level of government support. UKTI DSO staff numbers are far greater than that of any civil industry sector. In fact, CAAT estimates that arms export staffing will match that of all of other sectors combined despite military equipment accounting for less than two per cent of the UK?s visible exports. UK Defence Statistics show that only 65,000 jobs (just 0.2 per cent of the national labour force) are
sustained by military exports. November
CAAT?s new campaign aims to end the favourable treatment of the arms industry. UKTI DSO staff will move into their new department in November. Our campaign will call on UKTI not to let them get too comfortable. We expect to meet with widespread sympathy. The closure of DESO involved a recognition that the arms industry has changed and that the special treatment of arms exports is increasingly unjustifiable, a sentiment likely to be shared by other
industry sectors. With enough public pressure, we are well-placed to demonstrate that arms exports are a dangerous investment. Join us in November, when we?ll be taking that message to the doors of UKTI
Interview: Jon McClure of Reverend and the Makers7 Oct 2008Jon McClure, lead singer of Sheffield band, Reverend and The Makers, hosted the recent 4,500-strong Love Music Hate Racism Rotherham Carnival. He speaks to Lee Billingham about his music and politics How did you get into music? I got into music by being a kind of poet and writer. I put on parties and performed poetry. I also wrote stuff for the Arctic Monkeys’ website. I used to write it under various pseudonyms, which kind of increased their mythology. It was more politically inclined than their music would be. It was around the time of the Iraq war, during which time I had an Iraqi girlfriend for six years. She was from a Shia family, so we were increasingly politicised. That led me into being in a band called 1984 for a number of years, which were really political. I always had the nickname “The Reverend”, not for any religious reason but because people were always saying, “Oh, he’s like a preacher man.” After a while I started putting the prose and poetry into a more musical form, which has led me to be where I am now. How do you feel about the music industry and the extent to which you can express yourself, particularly regarding political ideas and lyrics? It’s difficult because here there’s no one doing it. There are people like Damon Albarn, Ian Brown and 3D from Massive Attack and people like that, but among new artists there’s only me and MIA who seriously and permanently question British government foreign policy. That is really dark compared to the counter-culture in the 1960s and the punk movement in the 1970s and Red Wedge in the 1980s. They were a kind of social voice but now there’s none. This is at a time with the current economic situation, being at war in two countries, with the possibility of a war in a third country – or fourth if you include Pakistan – there’s the situation with climate change and there’s the rise of the BNP. I would argue we need a politicised voice more than ever, but within mainstream music there’s no one, and you have to ask yourself why. I think one of the reasons is that it has been recently a bit of a commercial suicide to entertain politics in your music. But my heroes were political – Bob Marley, John Lennon, Joe Strummer. It’s become un-cool to care about the world you live in. It’s become cool to take crack. I don’t think that’s a rebellious act. I think it’s far more rebellious to question the country we live in and the government. I never fell out of love with the idea of it being cool to care about the world you live in. Do you think it’s something that’s actively discouraged in the music industry? Did you, personally have to be more subtle or have you always been overt with your messages? I’d sooner be more overt, and increasingly the messages are becoming more overt. When I first came out two years ago the climate wasn’t there for me to be saying these things but now people are saying, “Maybe you’re right actually.” I think there is conservatism in the music industry because of vested interests. But then there are really good people in the music industry too. There are some good journalists at the NME and there are some good people who work in the industry who want change. People are thinking, “We’re bored of guitar bands doing the same old shit,” and looking for something of a little more substance. Until recently I was very pessimistic. But my optimism’s returning and I think it’s because people don’t want to listen until it affects them and suddenly all these things are starting to affect them. People are starting to think, “Petrol prices are going up. I wonder if that’s got something to do with Iraq.” Damn right it’s got something to do with Iraq! I think people are starting to put two and two together. If people don’t give a shit about the world, that’s when the BNP comes to power. Suddenly they’ve got all these seats and people are thinking, “How did that happen?” I’m an eternal optimist. I think that’s one of the main differences that separates left from right: the left have an undying optimism in humankind and the human spirit. What is your Instigate Debate project? It’s a website I set up to talk about meaningful subjects to people in the public eye. We’re encouraging people to go up to celebrities, and rather than asking for a photograph or an autograph to ask them a question that means something. We had a bit of a debate with a lad who works for the NME – while he liked the idea he didn’t think we were maximising it. But rather than us just being a closed shop or getting into a slanging match we said to him, “Why don’t you come and help us?” This thing has to be formed. In the same way that punk was unpopular at first, people have to help shape it and mould it, and he’s very kindly agreed to help us with it. What we’re doing is building a bit of a coalition of musicians, and the music press is going to get behind it. In that regard it becomes a real movement. It’s tangible, because there are kids out there who are ready to go and do this. As a way of encouraging people we’ll go and play at their house. It could be the start of something quite big. I’m excited. The idea was to hold to account some of the journalists from papers like the Sun, and in particular the Daily Mail and people in the right wing press who really hold more power than the people in Westminster. They’re unelected “people-shapers”. If the government had any morality they’d pass some kind of monopolies bill for press freedom, because Rupert Murdoch and the people who own the Daily Mail have a monopoly on people’s minds. I’ve got a song on my new album called “Hard Times for Dreamers”, and it really is. Unless we fight back and make people aware, and we make these people look like the bigots they actually are, we aren’t going to get anywhere. For example the “Fagin’s Heirs” headlines about the Romanian pickpockets that were supposedly running rampant in London: no one was ever charged but there was no retraction, maybe a one-line thing. The truth becomes completely distorted, which gives rise to the BNP. What do you think about the rise of the BNP and using the culture of music as a weapon against them? The rise of the BNP has been fuelled by the right wing media who are putting the blame on immigrants. The blame within society should be over the mismanagement of the economy and foreign policies by successive Tory and Labour governments. The problem isn’t immigrants. Unfortunately the fuel being thrown onto the fire by the right wing press is making white working class people, who are looking for someone to blame for the things they see to be wrong with society, put their faith in the BNP. But what these people think they are doing is safeguarding Britain. What they’re actually doing is giving power to Nazis, people we fought a war against. I remember talking to an ex-RAF fellah. He said he didn’t understand it: “I fought for six years against them Nazis only for them to get elected where I live.” I thought that pretty much summed it up. Other musicians taking a stand against them is good, because young people listen to music and also there’s a much funkier and cooler message in it than marching up and down a street with Dr Martens boots on. It’s sad to say, but looking at the music world people seem to be more into making money than they are into making any sort of statement. I think it’ll be a bit like the speculators in the stock exchange – they’ll be caught out for that. They’ll be caught out for chasing dollars. They’ve got no substance. I’ll laugh at them when that comes. They won’t have any career left. Their own greed will be their downfall. What did you think about the LMHR event in Rotherham last month and the effect it had on South Yorkshire? The event was brilliant. I think the effect on South Yorkshire has been massive because everybody knew about it. I’m in favour of grandiose political gestures: you need a gig with thousands. Even people who were just there for the bands got the message loud and clear. I think the BNP will have an increasingly difficult time in Rotherham after that and it gives us the chance to make networks to go back to next election and say, “Remember that gig we did? Well, this is why we did it. In these elections we don’t want you voting for the BNP.” You and your family have been getting some grief for your work with LMHR. There’s some far right websites where I’ve been threatened and someone would phone up my parents to say I’m a psychopath. My parents have had to go ex-directory. It’s upsetting because my parents aren’t me. If you’ve got an issue take it to me. It’s just cowardly. It also underlines the tactics of fear that the far right and the BNP use. I would never threaten them physically. I’m completely opposed to everything that they stand for politically, but I would never threaten them or any member of their family. It’s disgusting that they stoop that low, but I won’t be deterred. One of the first things that brought you into politics was the illegal invasion of Iraq. What do you think about the situation in the Middle East now? I think the occupation of Iraq should end, primarily because the Iraqi people don’t want the US or British troops there. Everything else is an irrelevance. The other problem is people don’t talk about Israel. People are scared to talk about it because of accusations of anti-Semitism. The state of Israel, however, is holding the democratically elected government of the Palestinian people to ransom, and Gaza has become a big concentration camp. Hamas, whether people like it or not, were the democratic choice. If we go around the world espousing the merits of freedom and democracy we have to respect other people’s choices. We can’t have democracy but only when it’s the people we want to get in. You can’t espouse freedom and democracy while we’re allying with Azerbaijan or Saudi Arabia, two of the world’s most brutal dictatorships. The Israeli government should accept the fact that they have to come to a permanent accommodation with the Palestinian people the same way that the white South Africans and white Rhodesians did, because the three of them were all in alliance in terms of counter-intelligence and counter-terrorism manoeuvres. In actual fact there’s not a lot of difference really. For Barack Obama and US presidents to just blindly profess their support for Israel, no matter what it does, is very dangerous. And we have no cause to be in Iran at all. The US aren’t going to be able to win in a military fashion. It’s just not going to be possible. As well as the politics of your music you give expression of an experience, particularly a working class experience, and perhaps an experience of the north of England. There’s a slight bit of humour in it, I think. You hear it in a lot of Sheffield music – a bit of cynicism. We’ve been fucked over for so many years I think people resort to humour. Hearing Jarvis Cocker’s lyrics and Richard Hawley’s and my own, it’s that slightly tongue in cheek, “It’s shit up here, innit? But let’s have a laugh.” My first record was quite regionally specific. It’s located in the working class because that’s where I come from. I could never make that record twice because that’s not where I am anymore, but it’s certainly rooted in that. I don’t want to be a rock star who talks about leaving Sheffield. There’s only me and Richard Hawley who still live in Sheffield of the Sheffield musicians, and I think that keeps you grounded. The 1980s Sheffield scene seems to run through your music. What’s your attitude to making music? I’m very open-minded and I owe a lot of debt to Cabaret Voltaire, Human League and Pulp. I think the thing is that in the 1980s everyone was so skint that they couldn’t afford new gear. Everyone ended up with analogue synthesisers and stuff. Sheffield has always had an artistic community and because all the steel factories shut down the students and the artists could move into them and use them. That’s why electronica took off because people were saying, “We’ve got a synth and an empty room. Shall we do something with that?” That’s literally how it began, and in that regard it’s a really organic thing. I think people assume Sheffield music began and ended four years ago with the Arctic Monkeys, but there’s a lot of things happening – Warp Records and Squarepusher, and everything from Cabaret Voltaire and Human League era. It’s a very vibrant city, I think our music is a fusion of all of the stuff put together. What plans are there for the Northern Carnival 2009? The same way the Rotherham gig sent a message across South Yorkshire, I think the Northern Carnival will send a message across the whole of the north of England, saying, “What are you doing? Stop this. We don’t want the BNP round here.” Hopefully people will sit up, take notice and actually listen to what we’re saying. The message will be a very loud and powerful one, and that’s needed. We had the one in London last year, but a lot of the problems are in the north, a lot of the deprivation, a lot of the racial tension. I think we’ll smack it next year and it should be beautiful, and I think the BNP will be put out of existence. Websites: Reverend and the Makers Jon McClure’s politically charged side project
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