Adam Harmsworth, Coventry Socialist Party
One word dominated chancellor Reeves’s ‘Mansion House’ speech to the bankers, speculators and parasites of the financial services sector – regulation. And she wasn’t announcing new ones!
She described regulation of the finance sector as a “boot on the neck of businesses”, spoke repeatedly about regulating “for growth”, and proudly proclaimed that Labour is sweeping away regulation.
In short, Reeves plans to tear up the paltry rules that attempt to keep banks and investment firms in check, hoping this will encourage those banks and the super-rich to throw more money at the UK. Wealth clearly hasn’t been trickling down to the working class in Labour’s year in office. Does she think we’ll believe that letting the wealthy get even wealthier will somehow change this?
Reeves complains in her speech that Britain has been too concerned about risk. Perhaps she has forgotten why such strict regulations were introduced in the first place, or more likely she’s desperate for any signs of economic growth. In the early 2000s banks and big businesses in Britain and abroad amassed wealth, making risky investments to try and win even bigger profits. In 2007-08, it all unravelled. The financial crash shook capitalism to its core. Ever since, governments in the major world economies including Britain have been making workers pay the price while the rich have only got richer.
New Labour bailed out the banks and brought in some regulations, in theory to stop such a crisis returning, and mindful of the working-class breathing down their necks threatening their system. Now, Labour is back in power and happy to let the super-rich speculators loose on the British economy once again. It’s a desperate move from a government that hasn’t delivered any growth and has only taken more from the working class.
This deregulation of the finance sector will worry and anger workers, especially those who experienced the first financial crash and lost jobs and homes, vital public services, pay, pensions, savings. Whatever triggers the next economic crash, we won’t have a decade-long boom to soften the blow as we did in 2008.
Reeves and the whole Labour government are prepared to risk a new crisis just to let the rich gamble their ill-gotten billions of pounds, while millions of workers continue to count their pennies to make ends meet. Reeves has underlined whose side Labour is on – not ours!
Instead of even less control over the finance sector, we should control it entirely. The major banks and biggest businesses should be in public ownership, with their resources democratically controlled by us instead of profit-obsessed bankers and speculators.
