As Osbourne ramps up the economically backward, ideologically based austerity as he seeks to ensure the working class and out must vulnerable pay for a crisis of the bankers and super elites, the call to resist has never been so important. This is now about defending and protecting the most basic and most valued of services in our communities and institutions as every major gain fought for and won through generations of working class and trade union activism faces oblivion at the hands of the most right wing, if not ever more right wing Government, than Thatcher herself.
Saturday’s anti-austerity protests, both in Glasgow and in London, as inspiring and as heartening as they were, need to be the springboard for and not the end of resistance to a Tory government with a mandate of a mere 24% of the population.
Through re-listening recently to the tales of the SSP National Workplace Organiser Richie Venton on the titanic struggle waged by the city and council in Liverpool in the 1980s of which he was a driving force behind as Militant regional organiser, it reignites the passion and potential for a mass anti-cuts movement in Scotland, the likes of which have never been seen before. In Liverpool, the City Council refused to set a cuts budget, instead choosing to invest in building much needed council housing, schools and parks, while rallying the communities behind the demands of returning the millions stolen from the council in budget cuts set by Tory central government, and in 1984, won.
In Scotland today, post referendum, where levels of political engagement and activism are at a level never seen before the potential to emulate and exceed the Liverpool example are staggering. In the last general election, over 50% of the Scots electorate voted for the SNP on a ticket of being anti-austerity and to lock the Tories out of Downing Street. With 1 Tory MP in Scotland, the democratic deficit has never been so clear to see, and with a majority at both Holyrood and Westminster, the SNP need to lead, alongside others, the movement against savage cuts from a government rejected on mass by the people of Scotland, not simply bend the knee and pass down Westminster cuts while proclaiming to be anti-austerity and blaming Westminster. Scotland didn’t vote for austerity, and working class communities won’t stand idly by while a democratically illegitimate government tears away the social fabric of Scotland and slashes services and jobs upon which our communities rely upon. We never have, and never will.
The much acclaimed Scotland’s voice won’t be heard from the green benches alone. Only a grassroots campaign, based in and organising around the schemes and workplaces across the country can ever defeat the Tories and cause panic at Westminster. The anti-poll tax movement, the anti-bedroom tax movement and the Independence movement are prime examples. We don’t yet know the details, but Wednesday 8th July signals the start of what will be a long, thankless and tiring campaign to save our communities, our jobs and public services.
The time for talking is over, the time for direct action starts as soon as Osborne “commends the budget to the House.” Only community and class solidarity, resistance and the presentation of a viable alternative will do. In building that, we all have a part to play.
