THE TRUSS EXPERIMENT: IT’S MEANING & PRECEDENT SET SEEN FROM LEFT FIELD
20/10/22: minor amendments made 21/10/22 & link added to start 12.11.22 Larry O’Hara
To provide context to the article below, first have a look at this opinion piece linked to in red, written by a banker, regarding the removal of Truss. As my article makes clear, the issue of her removal does not interest me out of concern for Truss, but the grave precedent it sets for democratic possibilities open to a Left Government, in terms of capitalist resistance. Whereas the BBC and other mainstream media hyenas think the takeaway from the episode is the idiocy of Truss/Kwarteng, and every unfunny comedian is guaranteed a cheap laugh at their expense. I would suggest it should rather be the possibility, as articulated in the link, that this was a Bank of England coup, culminating (as I anticipated) in the crowning as PM of multi-millionaire Sunak without even the pretence of any democratic input (however limited), to media acclaim. Though I have little hope a brain-dead gibbering idiot like BBC ‘Chief Political Correspondent’ Chris Mason (who I once heard being annihilated by John Redwood when the idiot Mason was a BBC ‘Fact-Checker’) or indeed his evil twin, the equally inarticulate Robert Peston, are in any way able to even begin to understand the complexities of real politics. Enjoy: and do read the link, then the article….
Original article follows >>>
First let me start by stating the obvious: I do not have, nor have I ever had, any time for the Tory Party in general, including Liz Truss. What interests me is how a socialist transformation might come about in Britain (in the first instance). While the final stage of that transformation may (must!) involve a revolutionary situation, an unavoidable first step, in my considered opinion, is a Left (Reformist) government that will not complete the transition, but could set the scene for the mass mobilisation necessary, even despite itself. You may ask at this point, quite reasonably, what has this got to do with the Truss downfall. Patience: I will explain soon. Another serious objection is that a Left-led Labour Party is very unlikely, with Starmer expelling socialists/rigging MP candidate selection procedures. A fair point, but of course should Starmer win the next election, the utter bankruptcy of his reheated Blairite politics would be revealed sooner rather than later, for despite organisational weakness it is still the Labour Left who have the policy ideas: Green New Deal, Community Wealth Building, National Investment Bank etc.
Now, back to the defenestration of Truss. Two aspects are of interest: the process by which it happened, and the precedent it sets (or perhaps reinforces).
The Defenestration Process
The first thing to say here is that the precipitating factor was ostensibly her mini-budget, enacted by faithful (perhaps now former faithful) ally Chancellor Kwasi Kwarteng. Certainly, measures in it were objectionable to most of the public: ending the cap on banker’s bonuses, reducing the top rate of income tax to name but two. But let’s get real here: we’re talking about the Tories, one of the cruellest bunch of chancers Britain has ever been saddled with. While the ideological impetus behind the budget is not one I share, it was all laid out in the 2012 anthology Britannia Unchained, and more to the point, in Truss’ leadership campaign.
The issue, to be honest, wasn’t so much that the measures were unpopular (Energy Price Cap aside) but that powerful forces, capitalist forces, didn’t like them. By which I mean the bond markets, the gilt markets, international investors, and the IMF. It was this that spooked, or perhaps provided the opportunity, for Tory MPs who had never liked Truss (preferring millionaire tax-evader Sunak) to pile on the pressure. This was amplified by the usual suspects: BBC/Sky/Channel 4/The Guardian etc. into a full-blown attack on Truss, forcing her to sacrifice Kwarteng and then herself. A sub-text of course is Brexit: much of the ruling class never supported it and will try any trick in the book (and a few outside it) to reverse it.
It was certainly the case that too many measures were rushed through at once: and this shows a certain (technical) level of incompetence. However Tory incompetence over the economy is not new. Remember George Osborne, who with his 2012 ‘Omnishambles’ budget (the infamous pastie tax one) was also guilty on that score. More recently, Rishi Sunak presided over a veritable cash-point for corrupt crooks with his check-free Covid Business Loans policy. No, it was not just undoubted incompetence that did for Truss/Kwarteng, but the real threat that their mini-budget inadvertently constituted to the Gargantuan Ponzi racket that is the City of London and its equivalents overseas. On one level, they were castigated for refusing to say how their tax cuts were to be paid for in the short-term, leading ‘investors’ to force up interest rates, which directly hits a key Tory base, mortgage-holders. Which then resulted in the Bank of England bailing out pension funds: at the expense of all of us. Yet while all this is true, there is more to this than meets the eye: when did Sunak ever outline in credible detail how government Covid spending was to be paid for? He didn’t, yet the markets (and media) never turned on him. So, “unfunded” promises cannot be the whole story. To paraphrase Brecht, why don’t we dissolve the British people, and allow the City to elect another?
After the fact, everybody now accepts the massive proliferation of sub-prime mortgage loans precipitated the 2008 financial crisis, but these were just the then latest wheeze (financial instrument) dreamed up by the financial guru racket. You don’t have to look very far to see that financial markets today are currently built on similar ‘wheezes’ that years down the line, after the fact (and financial bonuses duly accrued by City beneficiaries) will be held responsible. But we have no need to wait: is not (for instance) the ease with which people who cannot afford a new car are currently inveigled into buying one on the ‘never never’ today’s equivalent of sub-prime? And of course the massively over-heated housing market has pushed people who (rightly) want a home into massive mortgage commitments (and rents if they do not own) they now find it difficult to pay. These things are not directly caused by government policy, rather the repeated refusal of governments to tackle the crooks who run the City of London. Removing Truss has not ended the possibility of the Day of Reckoning, merely postponed it. Indeed, it will probably happen if/when Starmer is in government, and the rejuvenated Tories will yet again (as in 2010) trot out the line Labour is to blame. Mark my words, and remember you heard it here first. That was the key Truss/Kwarteng crime: they inadvertently brushed against the flimsy House of Cards that is City ‘stability’ and that will not do!
Now she has gone, the 1922 Committee and others in grey suits have ensured that very few: maximum three: candidates can stand to replace her, by setting a 100 MP nomination threshold. And of course the media/opposition are again calling for a General Election: yet to have one would only underline our gradual drift to a Presidential (not Party) system of government. Let me be clear here: if the choice is between government by parties, elected on a manifesto who then adapt to changing circumstances, or a popularity poll between Leaders every time one changes, I’ll take the former system for now. Funny that those most loudly bleating about the lack of a ‘mandate’ are often the same suspects who have resolutely urged us to ignore the biggest ever mandate in British history: the Brexit referendum. On second thoughts, it isn’t.
This short summary would not be complete without reference to the utterly diabolical performance (as usual) of the mainstream media. This is in three very important respects:
- Nowhere have I seen questioning of the legitimacy of international capitalists demanding to influence government policy and get away with it. Who, exactly, voted for the IMF? I never did, nor would I, given their blood-soaked record.
- There is constant reference to £45 billion of unfunded tax cuts: yet Covid even in January 2021 cost £271 billion, not to mention the cost of war in Ukraine (nobody does…).
- While the political dullards in Starmer’s Shadow Cabinet are given free rein to talk about the utter shambles of the country, none of them are pinned down on their own attempts to remove then leader Jeremy Corbyn without even any external pretext
The Precedents set
Hopefully you will now see (those astute enough to realise I am no Truss supporter) where I am going with this, for the implications for any future Left Government are grave:
- The ruthless and speedy reaction from finance capital to Tory measures that were hardly genuinely radical underlines as nothing else could how effective countermeasures to counter capitalist resistance need to be in place from Day One, or before, of such a government. Not currently the case
- If the undemocratic legitimacy of the IMF, Office For Budget Responsibility and Bank of England criticising government policy is not questioned, these institutions will be doubly empowered to act thus under a Left Government. You have been warned. The Treasury do indeed practice Abacus Economics, as the likes of John McDonnell have long pointed out, in so many words.
- Over and above the democratic legitimacy question, the craven refusal of Rachel Reeves (Shadow Chancellor) to use this moment to criticise the crippling impact of the City on the economy is no surprise: she used to work for the Bank of England/HBOS after all, and is ideally suited to parrot the City’s propaganda for them. Her boss, Sir Dullard, is of course on record as admitting economic ignorance (hardly lessened by reported tutorials from Blair’s old flat-mate Lord ‘Charlie’ Falconer): and to be fair, displays it every time he speaks. We need (with due respect to the original) a new younger John (or Jane!) McDonnell. Could it be Grace Blakeley? I only ask but her output is certainly promising in many respects.
- There was a strategic logic to the Truss/Kwarteng axis advancing their most radical measures straight away, in what they thought would be a honeymoon period. The implication for us is it would be even more difficult for a Left Government: in which case the advice offered by James Schneider in his recent book (Our Bloc: How We Win, which I have reviewed for November’s issue of the one and only original Labour Briefing) about policy stages (building on the ideas of Andre Gorz) should be a vital starting point.
- The moves to give more influence to MPs in choosing a party leader by raising the nomination threshold to 100/other measures will be keenly eyed by the Labour Right, but should be challenged at every turn: a party whose main focus is parliament is no good for genuine socialist advance
- There is borrowing, and borrowing: the idea everything has to be funded in advance treats the nation’s budget like a household one, a false analogy. Even by default, this language should not be slipped into. As with everything else above, those words, like decade-old Meta/Twitter posts, would be used mercilessly against a radical Left Government.
- The final, terrible precedent. In Chris Mullin’s novel ‘A Very British Coup’ the Left PM. Harry Perkins, is brought down by a personal peccadillo. The fact that a PM has been brought down within weeks by a majority of her own MPs who never liked her should send a loud and clear message to the Labour Left: if you ever get power in Labour again (and I hope you do) unlike the Corbyn years, you must be utterly thorough in exterminating the Labour Right politically: in the Party bureaucracy, locally, and above all within Parliament. If you do not, more will not only conspire against the Left (as Starmer did against Corbyn over EU policy) they will in future do it openly, and with lightning speed. The die is now cast.
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