Labour Turns its Back on the Welfare State

When Tony Benn died, along with him died the unheeded conscience of the Labour Party. Yesterday the Party of Atlee and Bevan turned its back on the Welfare State and forfeited for once and for all the right to be considered the inheritors of the legacy of the post-war government.

Save the Children has warned that the welfare cap will push 345,000 children into poverty over the next four years. And for what? This policy won’t do anything to address the problem. It isn’t trying to.

The problem is that ordinary decent people are in low paid jobs with wages that don’t meet the spiralling costs of living, meaning they have to rely on tax credits and housing benefits. Do you receive tax credits? They are subject to the cap.

The problem is that many of those in work have zero hour contracts, are in unstable self-employment, or having their hours slashed. The problem is that people are facing the choice between heat and food.

This is a policy decided in reaction to Daily Mail headlines and by trying to out-Farage UKIP.

The people that will be harmed are not “scroungers” but ordinary decent families in need. And that is the point. We have a Labour Party – a Labour Party! – that is demonising the poor. On the back of a few sensationalised accounts in rightwing newspapers and some lurid television programmes, a picture has been painted of an “undeserving poor” that the “deserving poor” are meant to vilify. And that is the justification for this attack on all those in need. The attack on disabled people, on retired people, on people in unstable employment, on people out of work, the vast majority of whom desperately want work.

This policy will push people into debt, into further poverty, into food banks, and into homelessness. This is a policy that blames and punishes those in need for the economic crisis. Never mind corporations that avoid tax, let’s attack the poor. The bankers cause a crash? Bail them out, but savagely attack the poor. Energy companies racking up heating bills? Means test pensioners for winter fuel allowance.

“We’re all in it together”. It’s a sick joke that Osborne repeated in his budget speech. And all of this is backed by Labour. Balls and Miliband have said they will stick to the austerity ideology of the Tories. They have said they will not reverse any of the Tory welfare cuts.

When I first reached voting age, in 1983, it seemed only natural for me to vote Labour. There was never even any question in my mind that I should vote any other way. Now, where should people turn for decency and humanity? Labour is morally bankrupt. It no longer represents the people it was founded to represent. It has turned its back on us.

This is the party that wants us to vote No in the independence referendum. It wants us to vote No in the hope that Labour will win the next Westminster election. It is far from certain that Labour would win, but even if it did, what difference would it make? They’ve already told us they’ll do the same as the Tories anyway! After Labour’s shameful performance yesterday, I expect more and more people to see that Labour has abandoned them. I expect more and more people to turn away from the morally bankrupt politics of Westminster. And I expect more and more people to come round to the idea of voting Yes on 18th September.