Issue 324

New Labour Tax Rip Off

Darling wants your money to pay-off his rich friends

AS low paid workers open their wage packets and wage slips at the end of this month they are in for a big surprise.month they are in for a big surprise.
For anyone on an annual salary of under £17,000 per year they will actually receive less take home pay than they did at the end of the previous month.
That’s all down to robber Brown’s last budget which abolished the 10p rate of tax, reduced the basic rate of tax from 22p in the pound to 20p in the pound and raised the tax thresholds for all levels of salaries in favour of the better off.
The net result a shift in the tax burden from middle and high earners to the lowest paid workers in society as the table below shows.
This was the parting gift of former iron chancellor Brown to the poorest sections of society.
This comes on top of his initial gift in 1997 of abolishing the tax credits on the dividends of pensioner’s investments.
It is estimated that the net effect of this move was to reduce the value of a pension by about 30 per cent over average person’s lifetime.
New Labour has reversed the policy of progressive taxation where tax rates are increased the more a person earns.
Instead they have pandered to the needs of trying to maintain consumer demand as their neo-liberal economic project hits the buffers by boosting the spending power of middle and higher earners.
This is at time when inflation is running rampant again with daily increases in food prices, rocketing utility prices and soaring petrol prices.
This together with increase in housing costs, as lenders hit the poorest and least able to pay sections of society, means that inflation is running far above the government’s official figures of 2.5 per cent.
These costs of basic goods and services are what the lowest paid spend the overwhelming part of their income on. They will be badly hit by this callous premeditated move.
It is not as if there is not enough money to help the poorest sections of society.
The government have spent £110billion on nationalising Northern Rock to stop a collapse of the global financial markets, billions of pounds on illegal wars in Iraq and Afghanistan and to the unwanted nuclear replacement for Trident.
The Scottish Socialist Party is for a progressive taxation system where people pay tax according to the levels of their income to help pay for hospitals, schools, free prescriptions, free school meals and a free public transport system - projects that will benefit the whole of society and enrich the lives of its poorest members.
If Labour MPs have an ounce of compassion and social conscience they should oppose this vicious anti-working class tax change.

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NANOTECHNOLOGY ADDS TO GLOBAL FOOD CRISIS

by Ken Ferguson

AS the reality of the global food crisis sparks soaring prices and fears of shortages multinational food firms are stepping up their PR drive in favour of technological manipulation of food.
Predictably we are already hearing the siren calls telling us that only the publicly rejected GM foods can close the growing food gap.
Now a heavyweight report from Friends of the Earth Australia , Europe and USA warning of the dangers of nanotechnology in food has been backed by the International Union of Food workers.
Nanotechnology involves the manipulation of natural and synthetic material at the atomic and molecular scale.
The report titled Out of the laboratory and on to our plates outlines the use of the controversial technology in food processing, agriculture and packaging.
It highlights the known and potential risks to workplace and consumer health and safety and to the environment and links these developments to corporate control of the food supply and issues of sustainability.
The risks were spelt out in 2004 by the UK Royal Society and Royal Academy of Engineering which said:
“There is virtually no information available about the effect of nano-particles on species other than humans or about how they behave in the air, water or soil, or about their ability to accumulate in food chains”, concluding that
“Release of nanoparticles should be restricted due to the potential effects on environment and human health.”
The FoE report spotlights that the rapid expansion of the technology and calls for full regulation of the technology and warns of the current absence of regulations at all levels to deal with specific nanotechnologies.
The reports call for action closely follow those adopted by the IUF at its 2007 congress, including the call for a moratorium on the commercialisation of all food products incorporating nanotechnology until their safety can be demonstrated and nanospecific regulations to protect worker and public health and the environment are in place.
The IUF continues to draw attention to the multiple risks associated with the commercial availability of dozens of products including nano tech-based foods, food packaging, dietary supplements and pesticides.
There are currently no labelling requirements anywhere requiring the specific identification of nano materials in a product.
The union warned:
“Many thousands of workers are involved in the manufacture and handling of these products, yet there are no specific safety regimes in place.
“There currently exist no methods for even determining potential exposure levels of nano particles in the workplace.
“There is a clear need for unions to take action, together with civil society groups engaged with the same issues.”

NUS right-wing reforms stopped... for now

by Andrew Weir, SSP student organiser

FIVE SSP students - three from Edinburgh University, one from Edinburgh College of Art, and one ex-pat member now studying at Oxford - attended the conference of the National Union of Students 1-3 April in Blackpool. SSP members in the Edinburgh delegation were joined by an independent member of Edinburgh’s Socialist Society.
The conference comes after a long period of decline in student activism, and with the leadership of the NUS dominated by Labour Students and other right-wingers more interested in kow-towing to the Government than in seriously challenging it on the issues of free education and student grants.
The main item on the Conference’s agenda was ratification of the so-called “Governance Review” - an attempt to completely overhaul NUS’s internal democracy, replacing the whole of the NUS’s constitution and rules.
This ‘review’ was supported by most of the leadership of NUS, and it isn’t hard to see why - it would have removed the majority of decision-making power from Annual Conference, which would have been re-christened ‘Congress’ and billed as “a celebration of NUS’s achievements in the past year”.
It would also have introduced non-student members onto the union’s Executive.
Essentially, it would have greatly reduced the ability of ordinary students to get involved in their national union - so, naturally, Labour Student doublespeak hailed it as the way to bring the NUS closer to “real students” (the phrase “making the NUS relevant to real students” appeared very often during the debate -presumably as opposed to making it relevant to all these pretendy students there are around the place).
Democracy in the NUS is already pretty limited Conferences have been repeatedly cut in length over the past twenty years, and there is never enough time to discuss all the business and hold the executive of the union fully to account.
The left in NUS, notoriously fractious, was therefore united in its opposition to this Review and this unity brought results.
The Review required a two-thirds majority to pass conference - but received 65 per cent of the vote.
This result caused furore in the Conference hall among Labour Student delegates, who were convinced that they had it in the bag.
The socialist delegates from Edinburgh University, despite standing and winning on manifestos stating that they would vote against the Governance Review, had been mandated by their student association to vote for the review - a mandate which we broke.
This led to a shameful attempt by the Edinburgh University student president -surprise surprise, a Labour Student -to confiscate our credentials and voting cards: that’s what the face of “democratic reform” looked like in the Edinburgh delegation!
There was no humility in defeat either -with the President-elect of NUS, Wes Streeting (yes, another Labour Student), saying to the Left, “bring it on - we’ll be bringing this back next year”.
The fight for genuine democracy in the NUS will obviously have to continue long after this conference.
Elsewhere, results were disappointing for the left. Voice readers may have noticed headlines in the national press along the lines of “Students drop opposition to fees” - well, some of us haven’t; but unfortunately this was indeed the majority point of view among delegates to NUS conference, in the name of being “pragmatic” and “recognising that the nature of the debate has changed”.
The entirety of NUS’s vision is now focused on “keeping the cap” on tuition fees in the 2009 review of university funding ó not a slogan we can expect to get students out on the streets campaigning and protesting.
The left also lost the vote on a motion calling for opposition to military recruitment on campuses, although a motion calling for opposition to any potential war in Iran passed.
The left was also unable to defeat a motion supporting the Government’s plans to extend the age of compulsory education to 18.
The left’s argument that while opportunities for further education should be open to all, no young person should be compelled to stay in education if they choose not to, fell on deaf ears at Conference.
Election results were also not great for the left.
The NUS’s full-time officers remain Labour or allies, while in the election for the twelve part-time executive members the left went from three seats to two (both members of Student Respect) - although another left candidate, Heather Shaw of the Alliance for Workers’ Liberty and the Education Not for Sale network, lost out on a seat by the narrowest of margins.
Despite these negative results for the left, after the defeat of the Governance Review there still remains space for socialist students to organise within the NUS.
Most left-wing student groups can manage to get at least a couple of delegates elected to the conference; the most substantial and visible are Student Respect (linked to the SWP) and the Education Not for Sale network (ENS). SSP delegates, already having been in contact with members of ENS, spent most of their time working with this group, although this was an informal arr angement.
Although those are the principal ones, there are a bewildering number of left-wing student groups in the NUS; now, more than ever, the student left needs to unite to reclaim our national union to be a genuine campaigning organisation rather than a training ground for future Cabinet ministers.

WENDY’S LABOUR BACKING COUNCIL HOUSE SALES

by Ken Ferguson

THE Thatcher years saw several key moments in her war against the Left and the labour movement.
The mass mobilisation of state violence against the miners in the 1984 strike, the relentless privatisation of public assets and the Falklands War cry to ‘Rejoice’ amidst the war dead are such moments.
But above all else one policy has achieved outstanding success in its intention of destroying collective services : the right to buy council houses.
The so called ‘Right to Buy’ for council tenants saw tens of thousands of council houses sold off at cut prices to tenants and has, in Scotland, reduced the stock of homes for rent by almost half a million.
Along with the sale of shares in public firms such as gas and electricity this key policy aimed to turn workers into ‘stakeholders’ in capitalism and weaken support for unions and collective services.
It has to be said that the Tories made no secret of their intention.
In 1974 a Tory think tank wrote:
“Simply by visiting Glasgow, one can see life as it will be like throughout the country if the trend to council housing continues. Housing in industrial Scotland has much in common with that in many Iron Curtain countries housing has frozen class divisions.”
To counter this they drove the sell off policy through and after some initial resistance Labour surrendered and accepted it.
Thirty years on the proportion of people saddled with mortgage debt and facing soaring housing costs as the price of putting roof over their head has soared.
Every day the media talk of house prices, interest rates and possible house repossessions as the crisis deepens.
Thirty years on and there is a growing realisation that the huge rise in house prices allied to the growing difficulty in paying them means that rented homes are needed again.
In a welcome move in that direction last year the SNP government announced plans to restart modestly a council house building programme.
They have also restricted the right to buy yet when the issue came before the Scottish Parliament last month the supposed ‘socialists’ on the Labour benches voted, along with the Tories, to oppose it
Probably not since Holyrood opened for business has there been a clearer example of the total abandonment of principles which lie at the heart of New Labour.
They are now 110 per cent behind the idea of people merely as consumers who meet their needs in the market with those unable to do so left to make do with increasingly pressurised public services.
That’s why when Wendy rose to proclaim to Labour’s Aviemore conference that she was the ‘socialist’ alternative to Salmond her performance was about as convincing as Bernard Mathews endorsing vegetarianism.
This latest blunder further underlines the reality of New Labour as washed up and incapable of meeting the challenges posed by the current environmental and economic crisis.

BRITAIN LOCKED INTO IRAQ NIGHTMARE

by Ken Ferguson

LAUNCHED amidst a flood of high noon tough talk to the local militias demanding they surrender the Iraq army led assault on Basra has proved a disaster for everybody apart from the militias it was supposedly going to defeat.
Perhaps the operation was doomed from the moment that Bush praised it and described it as a “defining moment” in the war so far.
Iraqi prime minister, Nouri al-Maliki flew to Basra along with 40,000 troops and police and, rather like some cowboy Sheriff, demanded that his opponents hand over their weapons in 72 hours.
In the teeth of stiff resistance which saw some Iraqi forces refusing to fight and some changing sides this deadline was first extended and them quietly shelved.
Days of fighting which effectively imprisoned the civilian population in their houses without basic services such as water and electricity and killed hundreds was simply a complete failure.
Its wider significance it that it brings into question a key part of the US version of Iraq, the idea that the Iraqi army is a unified disciplined force capable of keeping order on the strife torn streets.
Nouri al-Maliki’s prestige has taken a dive and wider questions about the official tale of an Iraq calmed by the US troop surge returning to normal are now being asked.
Moqtada al-Sadr, the target of the assault, emerges from the crisis strengthened not only as a military figure but also as a political player in the elections due later this year.
Not only has this led the US front man General Petraeus to warn against a withdrawal of American forces at the end of the surge but it has cruelly exposed talk of a British withdrawal.
Far from packing their kit bags and getting on a flight home it is now clear that UK forces were active participants in the Basra debacle.
BBC news of course spoke of the Brits supplying food and ammunition but it is also clear that Royal Artillery units were bombarding targets in support of the Iraqi army and that RAF planes launched air strikes.
Most significantly was the revelation that wavering Iraqi army units were ‘stiffened’ by the support of 150 Scots infantrymen from the Royal Borderers backed by armoured vehicles.
The relatively small number involved will be downplayed but in reality means that far from just training the Iraqi army to shoot straight and march in step the Brits are once again active participants in the war.
Only last autumn at the height of election speculation Gordon Brown stood among the tropical kitted troops and spoke of getting the Brits out of the desert.
That now seems about as real as a desert mirage and Brown must add the Iraqi quick sands to growing list of disasters increasingly imperilling his government.

PRIVATISING THE RAINFOREST

by Liam Young

IN December the World Bank added to it’s so called Clean Development Mechanism a plan to slow down deforestation.
The World Bank’s Forest Carbon Partnership Facility (FCPF) has been set up to entice poor nations to include their tropical forests in the international carbon market after 2012.
This will provide polluters with an opportunity to avoid reducing emissions in their own countries by buying cheap credits from poorer nations.
As for the poorer countries with tropical rainforests they will see the privatisation of forests, the destruction of local communities and the trashing of indigenous peoples rights.
The World Bank revealed it’s true interests in the tropical forests earlier this year when it spent large sums of money on cattle ranching and Soya production.
These industries are acknowledged as being two of the worst threats to the rainforests of the Amazon.
In one project they donated $9billion dollars to Brazil’s leading beef producer.
This despite an environmental study that had shown expansion of a single slaughterhouse in Maraba would lead to 300,000 acres of rainforest being destroyed.
The Amazon basin is home to one in ten mammals, 15 per cent of all the Earth’s plant-life, and holds half the world’s fresh water.
All this is threatened by vast tracks of land being cleared for cattle ranching, Soya production to grow animal feed and sugar cane production for bio-fuels.
The World Wildlife Fund estimates that the Amazon could be completely eradicated by fire and drought by 2030.
The world is losing forests the size of Nicaragua every year.
This process of deforestation accounts for a fifth of all carbon emissions.
The measure the World Bank is proposing is supposed to encourage poor countries to conserve their forests by setting up a carbon trading market with the industrialized countries.
The plan will work in two ways. Firstly it will provide tools needed to measure the carbon content of forests in order to establish their value on the carbon market.
Secondly the FCPF will offer money to countries to encourage a series of pilot schemes that will see countries being compensated for their ‘carbon reservoirs’.
This will generate pollution rights that the governments of the poorer nations can sell to northern industries allowing them to carry on polluting.
The World Bank plan will be organized at a national government level and will have no participation from local communities.
Indigenous peoples whose livelihoods and cultures depend on the forests will be sidelined.
Already there has been lobbying of donor countries to persuade them to legalize and institutionalise the global carbon trading markets.
Advocates of the scheme include a number of carbon finance companies eager to make big money out of the carbon trade.
Any expansion of the schemes will see governments rushing for the cash, as there will be hundreds of millions of dollars up for grabs.
Carbon trading stocks on the international market will never solve the problem of climate change.
The World Bank is committed to capitalism an economic system that turns living nature into dead commodities in order to make a profit.
The FCPF deforestation plan will only lead to the enclosure of forests as private firms evict forest dwellers and indigenous communities in order to make a killing.
This is an example of the World Bank representing the financial interests of the rich by using land already supporting the lives of local communities to create carbon sinks that allow the major industrial companies to simply buy a license to pollute.
Until the needs of people and communities are placed before that of companies making profits then the environment of the planet will continue to be threatened.

LETTERS

RADICAL LEARNING

Radical Education Network Inaugural meeting Saturday 19 April 12pm - 4pm

This will be the first of several meetings to establish the Radical Education Network, with a plan to hold meetings in other parts of the country. The Network is not restricted to party members and is open to others who are interested in developing radical education in Scotland. The session will look at what is meant by Popular /Radical education and how it could be used in practice in Scotland. If you can’t make the meeting but want to join the Network let me know. The intention is to set up an e-group of Network members as well as plan future sessions.

Future Sessions

Thursday 24 April 7pm-9pm
Workshop How to build left political parties in the 21st Century Using an article written by Hilary Wainright we look at the main issues facing activists†internationally- †who are building socialist and anti capitalist parties. How to marry effective organisation with democracy and the role of social movements in building new parties.

Saturday 26 Apri1
12pm - 4pm Workshop How to win Free Public Transport Now we have almost won Free Prescription Charges, Free School Meals and Abolition of the Council Tax - all SSP policies -†what is it going to take to win Free Public Transport? This workshop looks at policy, strategy and building the campaign through activity. It will be part classroom based and part street activity. If you would like to take part let me know.

Thursday 1 May 7pm - 9pm
Workshop How to Organise an SSP branch, the good the bad and the inspirational! With Kevin McVey who has seen it all. Kevin from Cumbernauld has been the branch organiser of; his trade union branch, the Scottish Socialist Alliance branch, and his Scottish Socialist Party branch, over the last 15 years. This workshop is aimed at branch organisers, chairpersons, Voice organisers and treasurers, his Scottish Socialist Alliance branch and his SSP branch. It will be a practical workshop aimed at sharing our skills.

All sessions take place at:
Department of Adult and Continuing Education Glasgow University St Andrew’s Building 11 Eldon Street Glasgow G3 (Across from the STUC building, Kelvinbridge Underground or 5 mins walk from Charing Cross up Woodlands Road.)

Tea, coffee & biscuits will be provided. Contact Frances Curran: frances.curran@ntlworld.com or 07882 472 429

OBITUARY
Rowland Sheret
1945-2008

by David Fowler

IT was without doubt gratifying to all friends and family of Rowland Sheret who gathered at Falkirk Crematorium on 4 April to celebrate the life of this exemplary comrade to see such numbers attending this commemoration.
Rowland had discussed with friends prior to his death the manner in which he wished this, his final meeting, to be conducted, and faithful to his lifelong atheism there was no religious element to the proceedings.
Instead, we joined together in singing Scots Wha Hae and Auld Lang Syne, to symbolise Rowland’s commitment to an independent socialist Scotland, and, the Internationale and Avanti Popolo, to remind us of his deep seated internationalism.
Between the songs there were short reminiscences of Rowland and particularly moving were the words of Chilean exiles Patty and Pedro who spoke eloquently of Rowland’s work, not only supporting exiled Chileans in Scotland but also in securing the twinning of Stirling with the town of Calama.
According to these comrades, there are many today in Calama who would have starved but for this act of solidarity.
In honour of this a Chilean flag draped his coffin.
After the committal, the celebration of Rowland’s life continued in Stirling with the reading of poems, music, messages of condolence from the many comrades unable to attend, and further tributes.
One of these pointed out that from the Vietnamese Solidarity Campaign, through the miners strike, to G8 and the campaign against the privatisation of Stirling’s council housing, Rowland was always there, sometimes to the detriment of his own health.
Another, that Rowland was one of those rare people who managed to combine trade union militancy and political activism.
I first met Rowland, as a callow youth, in 1972 in the wake of the protests against the Queen’s visit to Stirling University.
When the university authorities attempted to victimise some of those who participated in this demonstration that so enraged the unionist press at the time, Rowland was tireless in his solidarity.
Later, at his prompting I started to read the socialist classics.
At times it was difficult, but one concept - the Leninist idea of the worker intellectual - gave me no problems at all, for I had the living embodiment before me.

WHAT’S GOING ON WITH THE HOUSING MARKET?

An interest rate inflated economic bubble that is about to burst

As fears continue in the media of a house price crash and possible recession, Raphie de Santos looks at the economics behind the current crisis of capitalism.

Brief history of economic bubbles

The latest news of the first monthly decline in the average selling price of a UK house indicates that the bursting of one of the great economic bubbles of modern times is well underway. We will show that the UK housing bubble is much larger than in the US because the low interest rate policies of the early part of the new century have been compounded in the UK by two other factors. The graph shows that the average UK house price has increased 4.5 times since the start of 1987 this is compared to about a peak of 3.5 times in the US. We are therefore, likely to see a much larger fall in house prices in the UK than in the US where house prices have already fallen 11 per cent from their peak. In the UK we expect to see a fall in house prices of between 20 per cent and 40 per cent from the peak, meaning that the average peak house price of £184,000 would fall to approximately between £147,000 and £110,000. This will have serious consequences for the economy and individuals which we will discuss later in the article. We will also, show that despite what Brown is saying the main reason for the housing bubble in the UK is the Bank of England’s policy of dramatically cutting interest rates to avert a recession and revive the stock market at turn of the last century.
Economic bubbles are nothing new of course and have been around for several centuries. The first was the tulip bubble in the Netherlands in the 17th century which saw the whole Dutch population taking part in a speculative frenzy based on borrowed money which resulted when it burst in many individual bankruptcies and the Dutch economy slipping into what we would now call an economic depression.
Bubbles are characterised by a frenzied greed where all rational decision making and valuation is thrown out of the window. Investors bury their heads in the sand refusing to face the real value of the assets they are buying, the fact that buyers will eventually run out and that external factors beyond their control which will affect the value of the asset itself or the economic condition of the investors.

20th Century Bubbles
In the 20th century there have been three great economic bubbles. The first two started in the stock market ñ the 1987 crash and the Japanese equity crash of 1989. The former had no effect on the general economy while the latter took the Japanese economy into a recession and stagnation that it has not really emerged from some 19 years later!

The Wall Street Crash
The final one is the one that most resembles what is happening today with the US and UK housing markets. That is of course the famous Wall Street crash of 1929. This started around a recovery in the US economy in the early 1920s and individuals started to buy the shares of US companies. They borrowed heavily from banks to do this and they were highly leveraged. The banks took as security against these loans the actual shares that were being bought. A speculative frenzy drove the price of US shares to way above what their real economic prospects indicated. A correction on Wall Street started panic selling as investors tried to sell their shares to repay their loans. This drove the stock market down by 89 per cent over a period of 3 years and it took until 1954 for the market to recover to its pre-crash level. Banks across the US went bankrupt as they could not recover the loans and the price of the shares they held as security had fallen in value radically. This slowed the whole economy to a halt as both individuals and banks went bankrupt and the economy slipped into the great depression of the 1920s/30s which spread throughout the world.
The 1929 crash had started in the performance of the US economy and transferred itself into the stock market then into the banks to individuals and back into the economy.

The Great UK Housing Bubble
The great 1980s UK housing bubble, which is now deflating rapidly, started with problems in the economy in 1970/80s and was inflated by:

¦ government policy around selling council houses
¦ a disastrous entry into the European Exchange Rate Mechanism
¦ central bankers cutting interest rates to avoid a deep recession at the turn of the millennium
The last major economic slumps in 1974/75 and 1979/80 saw a mass over production of goods and services with factories and warehouses stockpiled with unsold goods.
Capitalist governments sought to stop a repeat of such a crisis of over production. One way was to find alternative homes for investments; the other was to increase consumer demand for goods. The US and the UK in particular did this by privatising state industries for excess capital to flow into and by creating a climate and appetite for credit amongst the working and middle classes of the advanced capitalist countries. One way this was carried out in the UK was to sell off social housing.
This allowed spare capital to be invested in a growing private housing market and created a shortage of social housing meaning that ordinary people were forced to look at buying rather renting a council home.
The second effect was to create a feeling of wealth through home ownership which encouraged people to borrow money through credit - loans and credit cards. Thus these factors started at the beginning of the 1980s the great UK housing bubble.
A second factor which was also absent in the US was the UK’s entry in the European Exchange rate mechanism. However, because of the weakness of the UK economy and hence Sterling, the UK was forced to keep interest rates high to attract investors into Sterling assets and keep it within the bands of the exchange rate mechanism. This was not sustainable and on Black Wednesday in September of 1992, the Tory chancellor on the same day put interest rates up from 12 to 15 percent and then announced Britain was withdrawing from the ERM and slashed them to 12 percent again. This allowed the UK to cut interest rates dramatically and bring the country out of recession but at the same time create a boom in the housing industry and a growth in credit.
The final stimulus to the UK Housing market came at the turn of the millennium when the US had slipped into recession and their Dot.com shares bubble burst. The US central bank, the Federal Reserve, cut interest rates aggressively and Chancellor Brown followed suit. This fuelled a massive boom in credit and house prises with all types of liberal lending practices developing – buy to let, no deposit mortgages, loans a multiple of three times ones income, re-mortgages, loans secured on equity in homes and low fixed rate mortgages. These are the UK sub-prime loans. It is this final leg of the UK housing bubble which has just come to an end.

The Fed and Bank of England Inflates the Housing Bubble

The US central bank, the Federal Reserve, cut interest rates aggressively, during 2000/2001 to dampen the domestic recession and lift the stock markets after the dot.com shares bubble burst. They cut interest rates to as low as 1.0 per cent -in the UK they were cut to a low of 3.5 per cent. This created the conditions for a credit boom and in particular a house lending boom which because of the low level of interest rates was aimed at low income families or even families on social security. They could be charged a much higher rate than the market interest rate to compensate for the increased risk of these borrowers defaulting on their loans.
Mortgage brokers sought out these loans and then laid them off onto investment and commercial banks who repacked them as complex securities called collateralised debt obligations (CDOs). These were then sold on to hedge funds (highly speculative leveraged non-regulated investment vehicles), pension funds, insurance companies and banks all over the world reaching every corner of the global financial system. The model that is used to value these products was flawed and based on a very low default rate by the sub-prime borrowers in the US and a very low estimation of the close relationship between these borrowers.
When the Federal Reserve staring putting up interest rates to cool the credit boom and curb creeping inflation the default rate amongst the sub-prime borrowers picked up dramatically and the closeness of the relationship between these borrowers turned out to be much greater than at first estimated. This caused the value of these CDOs to fall rapidly leading to loses throughout the global financial system. Loses so far are estimated at $US300billion to $US500billion with the International Monetary Fund believing that the final loses could be nearer $US1trillion (1,000,000,000,000).

The Chickens Come Home To Roost

In August 2007 this caused the money market to dry up as nobody would lend to each other as lenders did not know what risk the borrowers were carrying. This is an unsecured lending market and the interest rates quoted are based on the borrowers and lenders having the highest credit rating called Triple A. There are now only two major banks which still are rated at Triple A and one of those is on a negative watch - that is it could be downgraded. This meant those lending money put a premium on the rates they would lend at to other financial institutions depending on their view of how risky was the borrowers business.
No matter how low central banks cut interest rates - where they would lend to the Triple AAA rated banks - it made no difference to the rate where these banks would lend on in an unsecured manner to other financial institutions.
This is the so-called credit crunch and it is filtering through to every level of society right across the world.
The credit crunch is what is causing the deflation in the UK mortgage market as all the exotic cheap deals end, lenders put up the rate that people borrow at to buy a house and also will only lend to the most secure borrowers because they themselves can now access a much smaller pool of money.
Therefore, the demand for property will fall sharply with fewer buyers seeking to purchase house. It’s a simple economic law of over supply and under demand which leads to a decrease in the price of an asset. This decline will go on for some time as it will take one to three further years to unravel the global sub-prime lending products and losses.

Recession on its Way
The consequence for the UK economy is severe in that there will be a big drop off in consumer demand as credit dries up rapidly - we are already seeing this from consumer confidence surveys -and the UK economy is almost certain to go into a recession some time at the end of 2008 or the beginning of 2009. The other economy apart from the US and UK which has large housing market is Spain and it is already experiencing house price declines. There are also property hot spots in the emerging economies of China, India, Brazil and Hong Kong which will follow the same fate as the US and UK housing markets. It is too difficult to estimate if we are going to enter a full blown global slump of 1930s or 1974/75 proportions but the odds of it happening are shortening all the time.

Alternatives to the Crisis

Socialists have an answerer to the crisis:

■ We would provide sustainable and affordable social housing for rent. The £110 billion that the UK government spent on saving Northern Rock would alone pay for 2 million of such houses!

■ We would take under common ownership all banks that were in trouble and turn their mortgages into cheap social loans.

■ We would pass legislation to stop repossessions happening and turn the property involved in the loan into socially rented housing.

The UK deflating housing bubble is just but one manifestation of an interconnected global financial and economical crisis. Socialists will have plenty of opportunities in the coming months and years to show there is rational and humane alternative to capitalisms terminal death agony.

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NEO-LIBERALS AND SOCIAL DEMOCRATS

Selling off Scotland’s water a drop at a time

Soap Box
John McAllion

THE SNP describes itself as a ‘left leaning nationalist party’. Shortly after becoming Scotland’s First Minister, Alex Salmond told the BBC’s Andrew Marr that the new party of government was “social democratic” with “radical social ambitions for Scotland”.
Some influential voices outside of the SNP readily accept the nationalists' claim to be a party of the political left.
Leading columnist Ian McWhirter has argued that the nationalist government has done more in 10 months to uphold social democratic values than 'Red Wendy's' New Labour has done in 10 years.
As evidence, he quoted a string of early social reforms from free school meal pilots to the rejection of a new generation of nuclear power stations.
It is certainly true that by comparison with it's immediate predecessors, the SNP has moved Scottish Government decision-making to the left, including opposition to the Iraq war and the phasing out of NHS prescription charges.
Yet, these 'social democratic' measures still fall well short of what would pass as a genuinely democratic socialist programme.
Before neo-liberalism’s current hegemony, the minimum requirement for such a programme was to bring about a fundamental and irreversible shift in the balance of power and wealth in favour of working people and their families. Such a shift is not and never will be on the agenda of the nationalist government.
This becomes clear if we look at their policy on Scotland's publicly owned water and sewerage industry.
The self-proclaimed 'left leaning' government is currently presiding over what the Scottish Water Industry Commission's Chief Executive describes as "the most significant change ever to affect the water industry in Scotland".
The Scottish Water Industry Commission, under the chairmanship of the neo-lberal Ian Byatt, is charged with safeguarding the public interest in the supply of sewerage services, but has in fact been driving the industry towards privatisation for some considerable time.
The change referred to by Chief Executive Alan Sutherland is the opening up of Scotland's non-domestic sector to competition from the private sector. From 1st April this year the business sector will be able to choose to switch away from Scottish Water and to buy their water and sewerage services from newly licensed private suppliers.
Speaking at a recent Turning the Tide conference on the future of the Scottish water industry, Sutherland made clear just how radical a change this represented.
Scotland's non-domestic sector, "from the smallest newsagents in the Western Isles... to the largest industrial sites... to council offices... leisure centres... hospitals... would all now be free to choose private water suppliers".
Scottish Water, of course, will continue to control the publicly owned network of pipes, sewers and treatment works and to be responsible for the actual delivery of water and sewerage services across Scotland.
What will change will be a new layer of licensed private companies providing retail services like billing, business advice and customer relations.
Scottish Water will supply services at a wholesale price to the private companies who will then sell it on to their new customers at a different retail price.
The Commission will regulate the wholesale prices that Scottish Water can charge the private companies and have promised that these prices will be no higher than is 'absolutely necessary'.
The wholesale price charged, of course, will be set well below the retail price the private companies charge their new customers to allow for attractive profit margins.
At the same time, the Commission has promised that no business customer anywhere will be worse off.
So if the private companies are getting the water at knock-down prices from publicly owned Scottish Water, and their business customers will at a minimum be no worse off and probably better off, it does not take a genius to see that taxpayer funded Scottish Water will be left to pick up the bill for creamed off private profits and cut-price business charges.
The wind of change sweeping across our water and sewerage industry is the same neo-liberal wind that has forced privatisation and market forces on public sectors around the world.
Regina Finn, Chief Executive of OFWAT, has promised that the 28 private water monopolies in England and Wales will support cross border competition.
A subsidiary of Anglian Water has already registered as a licensed supplier for the Scottish market. Others will follow.
Alan Sutherland has suggested that big energy giants such as EDF and NPower will move into the market offering customers integrated bills for electricity, gas, water and sewerage.
Meanwhile, Scotland's 'left-leaning' government - nominally in favour of keeping Scottish water public - has welcomed the new wind of privatisation.
Water Minister Stuart Stevenson has described the invasion of private suppliers as "an exciting development" that will lead to "keener prices, innovation and improved service".
As privatised companies in England and Wales are hit with record fines for falsifying data, poor customer service and overcharging customers, Scottish Government ministers welcome them with open arms to a new Scottish market in water and sewerage.
It seems that social democracy and neo-liberalism walk hand in hand.
The SNP government may be social democratic. It certainly is neo-liberal.
Socialist it ain't and we should never forget that.

Edinburgh Leisure announce six crèches to close

by Linda Somerville

IN the four weeks since Edinburgh Leisure announced their shock decision to close six out of eight crèche facilities in their swim and leisure facilities in the City parents and carers have moved swiftly to fight the closures.
Edinburgh Leisure, a not for profit organisation, which manages sports and leisure facilities for the City of Edinburgh Council had its funding cut by £300,000 in February this year.
Edinburgh Leisure relies on the council for a third of its income and blames the closures on the Council’s budget decision. Meanwhile councillors have tried to distance themselves from the plan.
Lib Dem Council Leader, Jenny Dawe complained of inappropriate lobbying and explained to women who were protesting to her on the issue that, “it should be to Edinburgh Leisure whom they made their case”.
Angry mums demonstrated with their children outside the Council meeting in March calling on the Council to reverse the decision to close their crèche services.
Meanwhile the LibDem/SNP coalition council tried to face down the protesters with SNP Deputy Council Leader, Steve Cardownie stating “Edinburgh Leisure’s main job is to provide sports facilities not childcare”.
Cllr Cardownie failed to understand that without the quality, affordable childcare provided in the crèches most mothers could not participate in any activities.
With the level of protest rising mothers with children also targeted Edinburgh Leisure’s Board Meeting and handed in their petition.
In an attempt to halt the protest Edinburgh Leisure announced a change of plan, an immediate increase in crèche charges of £2 per visit and the closure of four out of eight services, rather than six.
Whilst this concession was welcomed by the campaign it still leaves four centres due for closure.
Edinburgh Leisure and the Council had assumed that they could get away with axing a subsidised service for women, it is nearly all mothers who use the service, as they were unorganised and dispersed.
However, the response from the women has been dynamic and effective forcing a review of the decision within weeks.
This situation shows the problems thrown up by public services being hived off to ‘not for profit’ or ‘trust status’ organisations.
No one is willing to take responsibility and be accountable for these closures.
Equally important is the fact that no public consultation was offered by the council or Edinburgh Leisure on the closures.
Our public services are paid for by our council tax and yet those who run the services believe they can change and scrap them at will.
The campaign to save our crèche services in Edinburgh will continue as parents are determined to have the final say.
¦ For more information see: Saveourcreche.blogspot.com

END OF A COWBOY

The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford. Directed by Andrew Dominik. Available now on DVD.

by Jack Ferguson

THE Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford, was one of the hidden gems of last year. Despite critical acclaim, not many people went to see it at the cinema. That’s a real shame, because when I did I was completely blown away. As it’s just been released on DVD you’ve got a second chance to catch it.
The poor turnout at the cinema was despite the fact of it starring one of Hollywood’s main leading men, Brad Pitt, and new star Casey Affleck (brother of Ben.) Both give brilliant performances, Brad Pitt outshining anything else I’ve ever seen him in.
Pitt is the legendary train and bank robber Jesse James, and Affleck the young boy Robert Ford, who spent his whole life idolising the first media celebrity in the US, James. Growing up he collects every comic and newspaper report, and dreams of becoming famous himself as James’ sidekick.
The film opens with the James’ gang last robbery, which Ford has managed to worm his way to being part of. In the run up to the robbery Ford tries to impress his need to be one of the gang on Jesse’s older brother Frank and then on Jesse himself. Although Frank is unimpressed, Jesse chooses to keep him around. He seems in some way fascinated by this shuffling, shy young man who clearly idolises him, watching his every move. Affleck plays Robert Ford as the prototype celebrity stalker. Although Jesse is violent and terrifying, this weird character always at his side is scary in his own creepy way.
Pitt plays Jesse James as a tormented psychopath. In real life Jesse James spent his teens as a member of a brutal confederate guerrilla squad in the US civil war, and had been a victim and perpetrator of horrific atrocities.
The film, which only covers the last months of his life, shows him to be melancholy, and paranoid, believing those around him are going to betray him to the authorities, and so murdering his former friends and companions.
His capacity to flip is in several scenes genuinely terrifying. In the end all he is left with for companions are his weird stalker and his brother.
The film shows Jesse teasing and playing with Robert, pushing him to the eventual outcome: Robert Ford decided he would not be famous for being Jesse James’ companion, but as the man that killed him.
The film goes on beyond the killing itself to show what happened to Robert afterward, as he did become an overnight celebrity, and started a stage show, reenacting how he killed Jesse again and again. But as Jesse begins to become the first mass media hero, a figure turned into ‘the American Robin Hood’, his fame becomes a curse as people come to hate him for what he’s done. It examines his guilt and regret, until finally he falls victim to someone else who is inspired by the myth of Jesse James to violent action.
The film is long, and some critics found it slow, but I think it’s worth every minute. It’s beautifully shot, taking the time to linger over every moment of Jesse’s paranoid pacing and staring, or Robert Ford’s creepy sidelong looks at his hero or mumbling words. There’s a massive tension that just builds and build between the two stars as the film goes on, played out in their every gesture. The setting is a beautifully shot rural America, and it’s incredibly visually striking again and again.
A mention should also be given to the brilliant score, written in part by Nick Cave. The music is melancholy and fearful, a perfect counterpart to the moody, dark film. Nick Cave also has a great scene where he plays a small cameo.
I bought the special edition DVD, which includes an extra documentary telling the historical story of Jesse James. If you don’t know the history, of how his crimes began as political revenge against radical republicans, and how he the pro-Southern, pro-slavery media turned him into a heroic figure after the war, it’s good at giving you the background.
But the main thing is you really need this film in your life, it’s a masterpiece and people should beg, borrow, download or whatever themselves a copy so you get to see it.

The Wild Brunch

Awww, ma belly. Too many roast tatties? Too much Peri Peri sauce on the quorn burger? Two boiled eggs? Maybe that desk job and customer service pressures are causing an ulcer to erupt and poison me? Who can help?
Well I don’t have time to go the doctors. I would have to make up the time and work earlier or later. NHS 24? Naw, TV said that they gave people baaaad advice. Mum? Oh no, no. Her universal cure for diseases and ailments from the cold, viral infections and a shattered knee is malt whisky.
Not saying it does not work for many bodily matters but I need a little more science and little less peet.
There’s only one place left for us 21st Century people. A little surgery called The Internet. If something is broken, leeking, hurting, demented or even confused then there is an answer on the net.
Unfortunately not only is there answer, there are about 42billion more of them and the people providing them go from experts, fools or mouthpieces for a biomedical-industrial-complex eager to profit from our fears and hopes with super drugs and theories.
So in the most information accessible age of the millennium can the internet help us and who am I to judge?
Well as a sexy physically active alpha-male with a interest in alcohol abuse and self doubt, I have used the net on the more than one occasion to assist in the diagnosis process.
The results have been mixed.
Case One: Returning from a game of fives one night with a wrist so swollen it looked like a nest of wasps was growing in there, I thought the only answer could be a broken wrist.
Most websites agreed, pointing to real areas of pain. NHS 24 diagnosed some sort of bone disease! Hospital and nurse agreed with the majority of the sites. Well done internet.
Case Two: After a few weeks of toothache I see the dentist who does some dentistry. Pain goes but then returns after a week. Do I want to go back to the dentist since each visit reminds me of The Marathon Man? Internet tells me about various types of gum disease and infections. I’m going to die! Dentist says tooth is dead and yanks it out after one unsuccessful attempt. Internet caused undue alarm.
Case Three: This world. This system. Full of hope, teasing your ambitions and desires while crushing them in dreary cities, depressing work and through people you think are scum. You drink to forget but never forget to drink. Was at a low ebb. Wikipedia told me I was clinically depressed. I had ticked all the boxes. Luckily my best friend pointed out that was bollocks and gave me a hug. Internet -super failure.
I could go on but hey you see the point. The column’s pointless? Defo. But also you got it to take dead easy when using the beast that is the interweb. Opinion as fact or a even worse a sales pitch as fact can only mean a information consumer struggling to filter the advice from the hindrance.
By the way what was the problem the belly. Gas.

Quick Goodbye:
Richard Widmark: Great yet unfashionable actor in classic films. Essential viewing: Cheyenne Autumn, The Bedford Incident, The Way West, The Law & Jake Wade.

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CHAVEZ BACKS STRIKERS

by Jack Ferguson

THE revolution in Venezuela has taken more dramatic steps forward, with the nationalisation of the biggest steel firm in the Andes, and the taking of a controlling stake in the cement industry.
As reported previously in the Voice, workers at the Argentine controlled Ternium Sidor steel plant have been involved in 14 month dispute over contracts and pay that has seen several strikes as well as mass direct action.
After facing violent repression at the hands of the local state government, the workers appealed to the socialist President Chavez to intervene on the side of the workers. Following a meeting with representatives of the workers’ SUTISS union, Venezuelan Vice President RamÛn Carrizalez praised the workers for their heroic role in defending the Venezuelan revolution during the US backed failed military coup.
He declared “This is a government that protects workers and will never take the side of a transnational company.”
Shortly afterwards it was announced that the government was going to take take over control of the plant from it's owners.
"Union members are jubillant and celebrating".
SUTISS finance secretary Jose Melendez called the nationalisation a step toward "the workers dream of the socialism of the 21st century."
Since Chavez sent Carrizalez to renew negotiations with Sidor last Sunday, the workers were demanding a daily pay increase of 53 bolivars ($24.65) compared to the company's offer of 44 bolivars ($20.50), and the doubling of retirement pensions which are currently half the minimum wage, Melendez said.
Also, union negotiators sought to include a portion of Sidor’s approximately 9,000 non-unionised contract workers, who are subject to completely unsafe conditions miserable salary, without health care or job security, in the disputed collective contract, which currently involves 4,035 permanent employees, MelÈndez explained.
Implying support for this demand, Chavez recounted Sunday the law he decreed on 1 May last year against the undercutting of unions by companies that increase their contract labour force. An official from the National Workers Union federation welcomed the intervention of President Chavez, and condemned those forces within the state government and the ministry of Labour who had backed the bosses. “They were mistaken to forget that we are the brave People of April 13, we have dignity, referring to the day masses of Venezuelans took to the streets to return Chavez to power after a two-day coup in 2002.
“We can and must confide in the strength of the workers and that this revolutionary process can go far beyond where we are today. Meanwhile, the government has also announced it is to take a controlling stake in Venezuela’s leading cement manufacturers, in move aimed at forcing them to produce cement for Venezuela rather than export. A special commission that includes the ministries of light commerce, basic industries and mining, and housing, first meeting initiate negotiations of indemnity with representatives from the Mexican firm CEMEX, France’s Lafarge, and the Swiss cement company Holcim.
“We are sure that it will be possible to come to an agreement with the companies”, Oil and Energy Minister Rafael RamÌrez declared. He added that the gaining the of a controlling share of the three companies, which combined comprise nearly all cement production in Venezuela ,”will permit us to have effective control over cement,” which he called “fundamental” and “crucial” for our national development plan.
CEMEX, by far the largest cement company in Venezuela with 32 factories and approximately 50 per cent of the market, announced its “willingness to dialogue with the authorities in order to find mutually acceptable solutions” in a communique. Mexican officials echoed this sentiment, but reiterated intentions to defend the “legitimate interests” of Mexican companies “by all means within reach.”
Mexico’s Finance Minister AgustÌn Carstens, a former IMF sub-director, called the nationalisation ‘inappropriate’ for not respecting Mexican property rights and was backed up by Guillermo Ortiz MartÌnez, the director of the Bank of Mexico.

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ZIMBABWE HOVERS ON THE BRINK

by Bill Bonnar

THE likelihood of a re-run Presidential election between Robert Mugabe of ZANU-PF and Morgan Tsvangirai of the Movement for Democratic Change is the latest episode in the ongoing economic and political crisis in Zimbabwe.
Most observers, including ZANU-PF, accept that Tsvangirai won the election but without the required majority of votes. The fears of many is that in the weeks leading up to the re-run elections ZANU-PF will mobilise the state forces at its command to guarantee victory.
An alternative scenario would be a deal which allows Mugabe to step down and for Tsvangirai to head up what would in effect be a coalition between ZANU -PF and the MDC.
The roots of this crisis go back to the early days of independence. Rhodesia was a British colony ruled by a brutal white settler regime.
Despite their self-deluding pretence of bringing European civilisation to this corner of Africa, this was a regime founded on repression and exploitation.
In particular, despite making up less that 4 per cent of the population they controlled something like 96 per cent of the best land which in turn was the basis for their millionaire lifestyles.
In contrast, most of the rest of the population lived in grinding poverty. In 1965, with British colonial rule about to end, the settlers seized power and continued to rule the country for the next 16 years.
In response the a powerful Zimbabwean liberation movement emerged comprising ZANU led by Robert Mugabe and supported by China and the smaller ZAPU (Zimbabwean African Peoples Union) led by Joshua Nkomo and supported by the Soviet Union.
They combined to form a highly successful liberation struggle which forced the Settler Regime from power and led the country to independence in 1981.
In the early days the new ZANU dominated government was lauded by the West.
This was in part because of its accommodation with the white settlers and its refusal to carry out any meaningful land reforms.
It also made clear from the outset that it would protect western commercial and strategic interests. At the same time it clamped down on any radical challenge to its rule.
This mostly came from the more left wing ZAPU party which was in the early to mid-eighties subjected to fierce repression.
While ZANU drew most of its support from the majority Shona population ZAPU was mainly based among the minority Ndebele people.
As many as 25,000 Ndebele were killed by the security forces in an attempt to smash ZAPU and in 1987 it was swallowed up by ZANU to become ZANU-PF.
The western media, so outraged by a few attacks on rich white farmers, was completely silent in the face of these mass killings.
Despite its role in bringing about independence ZANU-PF is in every way a government not fit for purpose.
Instead of trying to build a national-democratic revolution in Zimbabwe which would unite all the people in a project of progressive nation building it increasingly resorted to tribal politics to maintain a popular base.
Its relationship to the white settlers has always been contradictory.
For the first few years it protected them in a country crying out for meaningful land reform then reverted to a process of land grabs in an attempt to buy off its own supporters.
It has presided over an economic collapse without precedent in postcolonial Africa and has used every form of repression to keep itself in power.
The regime has also became extremely corrupt; one of the main reasons it wants to maintain power.
Unless a deal is struck Zanu-PF will almost certainly ‘win’ the runoff Presidential election but this will only provide a short-term respite for them.
The economic crisis will not go away and has created a mood of both desperation and militancy among the Zimbabwean people.
The political crisis will not be resolved until Mugabe and his closest cohorts are removed and a new government elected.
If that government can rediscover the sense of heroism and idealism which forged the earlier liberation movement and bring about meaningful reform to tackle poverty, corruption and the still unresolved land question the future can still be bright for