Trade unions must lead

We need change. Everyone under the age of 18 in Britain has only ever known austerity. Most do not have any confidence that they will be better off than their parents.

Over a million people under the age of 24 are unemployed; many more are underemployed, on a zero-hour contract, or otherwise in insecure work.

People of all ages are being squeezed by the relentless rise in the cost of living. Meanwhile bankers have just raked in their biggest bonuses since the 2008 financial crisis – £16.4 billion in the first quarter of this year.

Not only has none of that changed under Labour, it’s got worse. That fact, and also embarking on further attacks on the working class such as cutting winter fuel payments and trying to cut disability benefits, is what led to Keir Starmer being booted out.

So, on Monday 20 July, we will have a change of Prime Minister – Andy Burnham. He has already said he won’t be changing the self-imposed fiscal rules, which mean real-terms cuts to public services. He won’t be changing the plans to spend billions on the military at a time when education, health, social services, and more are suffering. He won’t be changing the divisive anti-migrant line taken by Starmer’s Home Secretary Shabana Mahmood.

Starmer’s demise illustrates the government’s weakness, and the weakness of British capitalism. That isn’t about to change either.

Instead of joining Labour right wingers by coming behind Burnham to ‘give him time’, the trade unions should be seizing the time to fight for what’s needed.

That is: huge investment in our crumbling public services, a minimum wage of at least £15 an hour with no youth exemptions, building the hundreds of thousands of council houses needed to address the housing crisis, and more.

This is a system in which vast amounts of wealth are hoarded by the capitalist class while the working class is made to suffer. That should not be accepted.

Andy Burnham will have a long queue of big business bosses at his door demanding he makes decisions in their interests. An immediate next step for the trade unions should be to bring hundreds of thousands onto the streets in Westminster this autumn, demanding an end to the austerity status quo.