Link to this page: http://www.socialistparty.org.uk/issue/699/13388
From The Socialist newspaper, 4 January 2012
Liverpool's managed decline: Tarzan to the rescue?
Tony Mulhearn, Former Liverpool councillor
The campaign built by Liverpool city council in 1983-87 to win extra funding inspired thousands of workers, photo Dave Sinclair (Click to enlarge)
In a breathtaking example of Tory mendacity former 'Minister for Merseyside' Michael Heseltine claims he rescued Liverpool from 'managed decline'.
This fate was proposed by chancellor Geoffrey Howe following the 1981 Toxteth riots, as shown by recently released government archives. But the blunt fact is that the decline continued.
In the two years after the riots not a single house for rent had been built by the Liberal/Tory alliance which controlled the council; council rents were the highest in the UK outside London; 5,000 council jobs had vanished, and some £30 million had been slashed from Liverpool's rate support grant by Heseltine's Thatcher government.
Youth unemployment in some areas of the city was in excess of 50%, and the defeated Liberal/Tory alliance had left behind a financial gap of £10 million pounds of unallocated cuts.
This was the dark scenario inherited by the newly elected socialist Labour council in May 1983.
Unlike the capitulation of today's 'Labour' councillors, that scenario was not used as an excuse for doing nothing, but as a reason for carrying out their election promises by launching a programme of action which included: building houses, freezing rents, creating jobs, expanding services, and opening six new sports centres.
By contrast Heseltine planted hundreds of trees.
If Liverpool's dogs could vote no doubt his Lordship would top the poll.
Liverpool A City that Dared to Fight
Liverpool - A city that Dared to Fight
By Peter Taaffe and Tony Mulhearn
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In The Socialist 4 January 2012:
Anti-cuts campaign
Defend public sector pensions - "action must be escalated"
PCS Left Unity open organising conference in defence of pensions
Reject pensions 'deal' - fight until we win
Socialist Party NHS campaign
Socialist Party feature
Socialist Party news and analysis
2012: Millions face poverty and homelessness
Liverpool's managed decline: Tarzan to the rescue?
"Seismic collapse" of private pensions
Socialist Party events
National meeting for women in the Socialist Party
Socialist Party workplace news
Unity against wage cuts in construction
Cuts used to attack trade unionists
International socialist news and analysis
Nigeria: Boko Haram's Christmas Day bombings
USA: Occupy movement links with working class
Socialist Party reviews and comments
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