ALB
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Boris enters the fray:http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3137332/Boris-warns-Cameron-Osborne-against-hacking-tax-credits-firms-start-paying-workers-more.html
Quote:Five of the country's biggest retailers – Tesco, Asda, Sainsbury's, Morrison's and Next – reportedly receive £1billion-a-year in taxpayer-funded subsidies for their wages bill.Ministers hope that a move to cut tax credits, potentially back to levels last seen more than a decade ago, will put pressure on firms to increase wages.But it will not have an immediate impact on the incomes of people who rely on the money, sparking concern among campaigners.Speaking last night, Mr Johnson said the government should 'certainly be cutting welfare' but warned against hitting working families on low pay.He said: 'Before we start hacking back on people's in-work benefits we've got to look at the low pay from corporations that could be coughing up much, much more to help them.'Sounds like a cue for the trade unions to step in to try to get the low-paying firms to cough up the more than Boris says they can. They certainly won't pay up just because the government says they could nor just to reduce the tax burden on the rest of the capitalism class.What all this shows, of course, is the continuing relevance of the socialist call to abolish the wages system.
Here's Buffett's take on the idea of a $15 an hour minumum wage in his 21 May article "Better than Raising the Minimum Wage" in the Wall Street Journal:
Quote:I may wish to have all jobs pay at least $15 an hour. But that minumum would almost certainly reduce employment in a major way, crushing many workers possessing only basic skills. Smaller increases, though obviously welcome, will still leave many hardworking Americans mired in poverty. The better answer is a major and carefully crafted expansion of the Earned Income Credit (EITC), which currently goes to millions of low-income workers.In other words, subsidise their wages, tax the rest of the capitalist class for the benefit of those paying the below poverty line wages. Which is what Cameron, Osborne and Duncan Smith seem to be worried about.What I think he is saying about a high minumum wage is that this would mean that workers whose labour-power is worth less than $15 an hour wouldn't be able to get a job.It looks as if there's no way out for the capitalist class as well as for the working class.
Reading another old pamphlet Industrial Socialism by "Big Bill" Hayward and Frank Bohn that came out in 1911, here's what it says on this subject. The "Socialist Party" in question is the (reformist) Socialist Party of America:
Quote:What will the Socialist Party Do?-The great purpose of the Socialist Party is to seize the powers of government and thus prevent them from being used by the capitalists against the workers. With Socialists in political offices the workers can strike and not be shot. They can picket shops and not be arrested and imprisoned. Freedom of speech and of the press, now often abolished by the tyrannical capitalists, will be secured to the working class. Then they can continue the shop organization and the education of the workers. To win the demands made on the industrial field it is absolutely necessary to control the government, as experience shows strikes to have been lost through the interference of courts and militia. The same functions of government, controlled by a class-conscious working class, will be used to inspire confidence and compel the wheels of industry to move in spite of the devices and stumbling blocks of the capitalists. (p. 54-55)The Socialist Party and the Government of Cities – The Socialist Party has a further function. Modern industrial cities are a product of Capitalism. They are growing and will continue to grow constantly larger. The governments of cities are much more than the agents of the capitalist class. They develop social service departments, such as the fire department, the waterworks, public schools and parks. Through a department of public health, they can, by means of scientific hygiene, protect and promote the health of the community.These governments of cities are at present run by politicians, in the interests of the capitalists, for graft. They must be captured and used in the interest of the workers. But at present, city government in the interest of the workers is made almost impossible through the capitalist control of the states. With $he growth of the Socialist political power they can more, and more be liberated to serve the working class.The mission of the Socialist Party is therefore threefold: First, it must lay hold of all the powers of political government and prevent them from being used against the industrial organization of the workers.Second, it must be the bearer of sound knowledge, using its great and growing organization to teach Socialism.Third, it must use the governments of the cities to advance the social interests of the working class. (pp.58-59).You can see that this could have a reformist as well as an industrial unionist interpretation (both authors were associated with the IWW as well) but even so.These passages are from the 6th edition. The second passage was omitted from the 7th edition, which is the one on libcom here.
Just read an old SLP pamphlet from 1907 The Development of Socialism in Great Britain which I collected with other pamphlets and books from a comrade who died and before depositing it in HO Library. It has this to say on "villeins" (only mentioned once in 1215 Magna Carta and not at all in the Forest Charter) as distinct from the "free men" (frequently mentioned in both) or "freeholders":
Quote:Chattel slavery was displaced as feudalism became thoroughly established, by the feudal system of villeinage. The villein, unlike the chattel slave, could not be sold in the market. He was tied to the soil, ascriptus glebae—part and parcel of the estate on which he was born. When the land was sold, or otherwise transferred from one owner to another, the villein changed masters as well. In return for the portion of land which he cultivated for his own use, the villein was compelled lo work so many days in the week on the private demesne of the feudal superior. As time went on, the feudal lord found it more profitable to commute this labour for a fixed rent. It is easy to see how this happened. Forced labour, hated by the villein and resisted in every possible fashion was much less productive than labour which could be hired. Consequently during the 14th century the institution of villeinage gradually decayed. The former villein became a "copy-holder" or tenant farmer. Formerly the villein could not depart from the soil; now he became free to come or go as he chose. His superior had also the right to turn him off the land when he chose. An attempt was subsequently made by the barons to revert to the old system. The pestilence called The Black Death which swept over Europe 1347-49, by enormously decreasing the agricultural population, increased the price of labour. When the lords, aided by the lawyers, tried to re-inforce the old villeinage duties, the villeins rose in revolt in 1381 in various counties in the South and East of England under Wat Tyler, Jack Straw, John Ball and other leaders. Although the rising was suppressed, it was found impossible to enforce the old services effectively, and villeinage disappeared at the close of the 14th. century.As far as they were concerned it was a Magna Farta.
Now you've got an official statement from their National Secretary, Charlie Kimber, to throw back at them !
Quote:If there is no left or radical candidate then we are for voting Labour.Further admission in the Times today that "tax credits" are a subsidy to low-wage employers. In her opinion column Rachel Sylvester quotes "an ally of the work and pensions secretary" (Ian Duncan Smith) as saying:
Quote:You’ve got some big businesses that are making huge profits but paying their workers poverty wages. They get away with it because workers are supplemented by the tax credit system but why should ordinary taxpayers subsidise these companies?She reports that, unlike Buffett, Duncan Smith wants to increase the minimum wage instead, so shifting the burden of paying for the working poor from the state to employers.This is a dispute within pro-capitalist circles as to how to deal with the problem of workers unable to sell their low quality labour-power for a so-called ‘living wage’. Does the state try to make employers pay them a living wage? Or does it top up the low wages which are only what employers are prepared to pay? Or again, does it simply pay them ‘welfare’ for not working?In the end, as with many political issues, it comes down to which section of the capitalist class should bear ‘the burden’.
I wouldn't have thought so. They are more likely to have been class-struggle anarchists. After all, the SWP was advocating voting Labour in most constituencies. See this fro Socialist Worker of 14 April:http://socialistworker.co.uk/art/40340/Use+your+vote+to+strengthen+the+leftEspecially:
Quote:Millions of workers who do not think much of Ed Miliband will nevertheless vote Labour to eject the Tories and block Ukip. In a withered and distorted way Labour retains a link to organised workers through the union leaders. If there is no left or radical candidate then we are for voting Labour.Since there won't have been more than 200 such candidates on their definition this was a call to vote Labour in the other 450 constituencies.
Paul Scivier wrote:In WSM litereture I have seen a reference to the Peasants revolt of 1381 in which John Ball is quoted. What was missing from that quote was the Lollard John Ball quote " When Adam delved and Eve Span, where was the getleman?"Can't have been this, then:http://www.worldsocialism.org/spgb/socialist-standard/2000s/2004/no-1204-december-2004/book-reviewsor this:http://www.worldsocialism.org/spgb/socialist-standard/2010s/2014/no-1314-february-2014/book-reviews-poor-mans-heaven-state-capitalism-a
Paul Scivier wrote:Both John Ball and Gerard Winstanley were both calling for real socilaism long before marx,and the word socilaism existed, and both followed the teachings of Jesus the nazarene.In those days, all ideas were and , on pain of death, had to be expressed in religious terms. Actually, Winstanley was as near to a materialist as you could then have publicly become. More a pantheist than an orthodox christian.These days, three and half centuries later, we can express ourselves in secular terms.
alanjjohnstone wrote:Alterbnatively, fight austerity the anarchist wayI don't think so. Emma Goodman was a vanguardist and certainly not a role model. Here's what the September 1924 Socialist Standard wrote about her:
Quote:Emma Goldman in her book Anarchism and Other Essays says the majority is always wrong. The Anarchists, therefore, will either rule with a minority or be wrong if they become a majority. She further states the great mass of the people never were and never will be the ones to progress. Just the intellectual few. Such views mean that the great body of people will depend upon the kindness and wisdom of the Anarchist intellectuals to guide and mother us.The offending article can be found here, particularly in chapter 2 "Minorities Versus Majorities" and its concluding sentence:
Emma Goldmann wrote:In other words, the living, vital truth of social and economic well-being will become a reality only through the zeal, courage, the non-compromising determination of intelligent minorities, and not through the mass.Interesting. This thread discusses the same idea (and its limitations within capitalism):http://www.worldsocialism.org/spgb/forum/general-discussion/consumerism-v-sharing
It's not just Tories who can, and maybe will, take advantage of Labour's open primary system for seleting a Leader. Judging by leaflets handed out at yesterday's anti-austerity march, non and even anti Labour Leftists will be too. The front page of the Weekly Worker is given over wholly to a photo of Corbyn and the two words VOTE CORBYN and there are a couple of articles inside arguing for this. One of them reports a resolution passed at a meeting of Left Unity's national council:
Quote:If Jeremy Corbyn is on the ballot paper LU will support him via a press statement in discussion with his campaign. Indivudual members may want to support him in any other way.This can only be interpreted as including signing up as a Labour supporter so as to be able to vote for him. This is what the Weekly Worker and its party, the self-styled CPGB, are explicitly urging.Writing in Counterfire (ex-SWPers) Lindsey German looks forward to a "mass campaign … with meetings up and down the country, drawing on the whole of the left", ending less rather than more cryptically:
Quote:And any member of a trade union affiliated to Labour (which is most of them) can vote if they register to so before 12 August.This is true, but there is a catch. The Corbyn4Leader campaign was handing out registration forms. This shows that members of unions affiliated to Labour can register for free (whereas others have to pay £3) but they and others have to sign and date a declaration:
Quote:I support the Labour Party's aims and values and am not a supporter of any organisation opposed to it.Which would seem to rule out members of another party or of groups which support candidates standing against Labour. Of course this won't stop members of an Machiovellist-Leninist group like the Weekly Worker, who are already members of Left Unity as well as their own party (and, some of them, no doubt of the Labour Party too under a different "cadre name"). Nor the Trotskyist organisation with their notorious tactic of "entryism"..Or perhaps the various Trotskyist groups can justify signing on the grounds that their "organisation" is not really opposed to Labour.In any event, Labour's open primary system is open to abuse and will no doubt be abused. This could turn the whole thing into a farce (or, rather, even more of one).
Seven members distributed all our leaflets (so there will have to be a new leaflet for the next one) to a small portion of the demonstrators. Some (the organisers) are saying there were 250,000.That can be doubted but I don't know how you estimate such things, but there were a lot, more than we'd expected, mainly public sector trade unionists, a lot of Greens and some local Labour parties as well as the usual suspects (SWP, Militant, etc). We leafetted both the start outside the Bank of England and the end in Whitehall and Parliament Square but it was raining at the end.The star speakers were Russell Brand and Charlotte Church but we didn't hear them as we stopped off at the Wetherspoons pub in Chancery Lane for lunch. As we approached the Savoy Hotel in the Strand we saw a group outside who appeared to be shouting "The Ritz, the Ritz, We've gotta get rid of the Ritz". But on getting nearer saw they were not performers hired by the Savoy to do down a rival, but Class War shouting "The Rich, the Rich …" A dozen or so of them then set off down the Strand accompanied by the same number of police. We could have mounted a bigger "march" than this (after all, we got more votes than them in the general election). In Whitehall the cenotaph was boarded up, providing a convenient space for grafitti. We added one calling for the abolition of the wages system (photo available) as well as adding "and Labour" to one which said "Down with Tory scum".
