Link to this page: http://www.socialistparty.org.uk/issue/549/6432
From The Socialist newspaper, 24 September 2008
Salford councillors play blame game
SALFORD CITY council recently held "The Big Ask", supposedly an opportunity for residents to ask leaders of the council's three main parties about local issues.
Steven North
As part of a local campaign to keep our post offices open - three currently face closure - I asked whether councillors felt the council should subsidise or take over the running of those post offices to ensure the public are not deprived of these essential public services.
All three pledged support for the post offices, but carefully avoided the question of subsidies. The Tory representative then - correctly, but obviously for his own aims - accused Labour MPs of voting for closures in parliament and opposing them locally.
Councillor Merry, Labour leader and council leader, said the problem started with the Tories and then attacked the Lib Dems for wanting to sell shares in Post Office Ltd - thus privatising it, despite his own party's obsession with marketisation.
All three councillors then attacked each other for thinking exactly the same way. Then Communities Secretary and Salford MP Hazel Blears - who had entered the room after the question was asked - joined in.
I commented that people were sick of being told to 'support Labour because the Tories are so much worse'. Blears then told me: "Well that's your choice - deal with it!"
Well, I'm sorry Hazel - I won't "deal with it!" I'll do what I can, along with increasing numbers of others to help build a party that working-class people are proud to vote for. We are fighting for a party that doesn't blackmail the public into voting for it by insisting the others are worse.
When we have such a party, the Labour Party will unfortunately not be remembered for the NHS, for public education and the welfare state, but for cuts, closures, privatisation - and arrogance!
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In The Socialist 24 September 2008:
Their failure, their system: make capitalists pay
Socialist Students
Education a 'them and us' system
Socialist Party editorial
New Labour flounders in face of economic crisis
Socialist Party feature
Merseyside CNWP calls for socialist policies
Socialist Party campaigns
Protesting against Bush and Brown's wars
Jamie's school dinner staff threatened with privatisation
Fighting the racist BNP in Stoke
We won't take the RAP on pollution
Health Trust concessions on Swansea casualty unit
Salford councillors play blame game
Socialist Party workplace news
Civil service strike ballot begins
Workers vow to fight Ford's closure plans
International socialist news and analysis
Revolution and counter-revolution in Bolivia
Socialist Party review
The Dark Knight: Batman's latest crime-buster
McMafia: Crime Without Borders
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