Owen Jones: If Labour does not stand up for people, Unions will

 

An article published on The Guardian today catches out attention. The title is pretty suggestive. Is The Guardian seems to indicating that the Labour Party and the trade unions will part company?

Sometime ago, a high ranking Liberal Democrat, Vince Cable, proposed the creation of a new political force that would unite Labour and Liberal Democrat politicians. The talk about cooperation in terms of voting strategies in recent by-elections also suggest that something is cooking.

Vince Cable, like many other Liberal Democrat politicians are closer to the City than they are to the Trade Union Movement, and Keir Starmer seem to have turned farther right than his predecessors. In fact, getting rid of Jeremy Corbyn was part of the strateg, but all might no be what it seems. The Labour Party is split from the very top and The Guardian's suggestion that 'Labour's hostile posture to a newly assertive trade union movement could prove a costly error'. It is not a secret that Trade Union that finance several Labour MPs and that certain guidelines have been adopted in term of withdrawing financial support for those who do not support the Trade Union Movement as much as the Trade Union Movement wants to be supported. Even David Lammy came out saying that 'he does not support strikes'. Labour's stances are a double edged sword that can hurt its aspirations.

The Leadership of the Labour Party knows fairly well that the present troubles are not really caused by economic policies implemented by the Conservative Party. They know that there are geopolitical issues that are accelerating inflation and leading to industrial unrest, unrest that would exist one way or another under a Conservative government or a Labour government, issues that would undermine any administratoion regardless of political orientation.

By-elections are by-elections, won one day and lost the next. Some Conservatives are not happy with a government that they think is 'not Conservative enough'. They might prefer to stick to the old ways, talking about lower taxes, a smaller state, and so forth. Do we favour the use of more fossil fuels or do we favour the environment with less use of fossil fuels? Energy costs are going up and will continue to go up, pushing prices up and leading to an effective devaluation of the Pound. If you can buy less with your Pound, then this is in fact devaluation of the Pound or you can call it also 'a salary reduction'. Nominally, you might have the same number of Pounds, but due to inflation you will only be able to buy less with your money.