"Observers
might conclude that the DWP had been tasked with designing a digital and
sanitized version of the 19th century workhouse, made infamous by Charles
Dickens."
"As
Thomas Hobbes observed long ago, such an approach condemns the least well off
to lives that are 'solitary, poor, nasty, brutish and short'".
These
are just two of the many devastating sentences in the recent UN report on
Britain by their rapporteur on extreme poverty, Professor Philip Alston.
In
terms of facts and figures, there is not that much new in his account of
poverty and inequality in the fifth-richest economy on earth. It's more the
source and force of presentation of this searing condemnation of the state of
Tory Britain that has hit the headlines - and inflamed the feelings of Tory
Ministers like Amber Rudd, who whinge that it's not representative of the UK,
2019.
In
fact, this short, sharp, 20-page Report - based on far-reaching research and
two weeks of face-to-face meetings with people affected - is all too realistic,
all too accurate, and therefore all the more an indictment of the life-crushing
poverty and inequality that is in the bone-marrow of capitalism.
Poverty and Destitution
One
in five of the UK population (14 million people) live in poverty - 4 million of
them at least 50% below the poverty line.
A further 2.5 million are less than
10% above the official poverty line; one emergency away from falling into the
pits of penury.
'Destitution'
is a word sometimes demeaned by over-use. The official definition of
destitution is having less than £10-a-day after housing costs, or having to go
without at least two essentials such as shelter, food, heat, light, clothing or
toiletries during a one-month period. An incredible 1.5 million citizens of the
world's fifth-richest economy experienced destitution in 2017!
Some
of the symptoms of this appalling state of affairs, identified by the UN
Report, include "a shocking rise in use of food banks [a four-fold
increase since 2012 - RV] and rough sleeping...falling life expectancy for
some...denial of benefits to the severely disabled...impoverishment of single
mothers and people with mental illness..."
'Systematic Immiseration'
But
Professor Alston rightly points the finger at the Tory government for
consciously driving people down into the muck and misery of poverty. It's not
the natural order of things, nor some god-given condition.
He accuses the
Tories in scathing language:
"Much
of the glue that held British society together since World War Two has been
deliberately removed and replaced with a harsh and uncaring ethos... There's
been a systematic immiseration of a significant part of the population...
Austerity has deliberately gutted local authorities [on provision of libraries,
youth facilities, parks and other services], leading to unheard-of levels of
loneliness and isolation."
Alston
identifies the cruel abomination of Universal Credit as one major cause of this
suffering - an accusation made flesh and bone by one of the community activists
he met in Scotland, Ruchazie's Jamie Clark:
"I've
seen people get into two months' rent arrears while they wait 8 weeks for their
first payment of Universal Credit. In that time they've been threatened with
legal action by their housing provider. I know from personal experience the
impact it has on your mental health and family life when you live in fear of
eviction because you can't pay the rent."
Warning the Exploiters
But
Alston also rightly highlights that "60% of the people in poverty are in
families where someone works."
That's
60% of 14 million people, left stranded in poverty because a family member or
members suffers poverty pay and/or insecure contracts; victims of a system that
has systematically robbed wages in favour of profits.
As Alston warns,
alongside "massive disinvestment in the social security network",
this low-wage economy has "created a highly combustible situation that
will have dire consequences."
As
well as lambasting the Tories for their track-record, their
ideologically-driven austerity agenda, the UN rapporteur is hereby warning the
ruling capitalist class of the social and political upheaval they are storing
up.
'Capitalism Isn't Working'
An
even more stark version of the same alarm call has been issued by Nobel
prize-winning economist, Professor Sir Angus Deaton, in his far-reaching report
on inequality in the UK, for the Institute for Fiscal Studies.
"There's
a real question whether democratic capitalism is working, when it's only
working for part of the population", the IFS report cries out.
It
goes on to warn that widening wealth gaps "make a mockery of
democracy", with the assessment that "people are more troubled by
inequality than at any time since the 1940s."
'Deaths of Despair'
This
major new study shows that the share of household income going to the richest
1% has tripled in the past 30 years, as Britain has become one of the most
unequal societies on earth, after the US. Deaton describes the contrast between
"runaway incomes for high earners" with the rise in what he calls
"deaths of despair" - early deaths through addiction and suicide -
linked to poverty, social isolation and mental health problems.
Since
the 2008 bankers' crisis, such 'deaths of despair' have rocketed from 30 to 61
per 100,000 for men, and from 15 to 26 per 100,000 women.
The
capitalist economist's devastating picture of growing, galloping inequality
lacks any substantial proposals to overcome it, but concedes "Falling
trade union membership may have removed constraints on wage dispersion,
increased the surplus going to executives, or more generally reduced the
political clout of ordinary workers against other dominant groups."
Emergency Measures Against Poverty and Inequality
These
two authoritative reports condemn the Tories and capitalism as a system for
failing the millions; deliberately! So what possible solutions to poverty and
inequality can we advocate?
The
meek and mild recommendations of the UN Report to restore local authority
funding, reverse benefit caps and scrap the two-child limit are welcome and
necessary, but wholly inadequate in the teeth of a social and human
catastrophe.
The
benefits system needs to be fundamentally overhauled, to transform it into a
genuine 'social security system' for those most in need, or at times of
greatest need.
Going
beyond that, the battle for a decent wage and secure jobs is critical. For an
immediate £10-an-hour minimum wage for all over 16, scrapping the lower youth
rates, as an emergency step towards a real living minimum wage. And for a
guaranteed minimum 16-hour week for all who want it, abolishing the poverty and
mind-bending insecurity of zero-hours or short-hours contracts.
For a Legal Maximum Income
Equally, the trade union and socialist movement needs to take serious action against inequality, around the demand for a legal maximum income, initially set at no more than 10 times the minimum wage.That would help reverse the rising tide of extreme incomes for those who take but don't make wealth - and add to social cohesion and well-being.
Along with progressive taxation of the rich and big corporations, such fighting demands would vastly strengthen the organised trade union movement - which the IFS report acknowledges is one of the pivotal requirements to combating inequality.
As we've written before, it's no accident that inequality was at its narrowest in Britain when the unions had over 13 million members, with collective bargaining covering the big majority of workers - the mirror opposite to today's situation.
Democratic Ownership
If
we are to challenge the widening gap in wealth, health and life expectancy
itself, we need the audacity to question the whole source of such appalling
inequalities: the ownership of wealth and its means of creation.
It's
not 'democracy' that isn't working, it's capitalism - a system of ownership of
wealth and power that excludes the vast majority of the population from any
meaningful democracy, let alone a secure lifestyle.
Why
should a handful of bankers, a few hundred industrial corporations, and
shrinking numbers of fabulously rich landowners dictate the lives of billions
of people across the globe?
We
need to build a socialist party and trade union movement that campaigns for
real democracy - democratic public ownership of land, industry, finance and
services - with a plan of sustainable social production that creates hundreds
of thousands of homes, decent jobs, clean energy and free public
transport.
There's
no question about it: capitalism is not working. Our task is to organise for
its replacement, in defense of both people and planet. That's the democratic
and socialist future that fills the thinkers of capitalism with dread.
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