Welfare cuts - Labour's latest collision with its own base
MPs must vote against the welfare cuts
As we have previously discussed, including here, the Reeves-Starmer framework for the economy shifted Labour considerably to the right in opposition, generating a host of tensions and conflicts with the party’s own base once in government. This was seen almost immediately with Rachel Reeves’ removal of pensioners’ winter fuel payments, a cut that precipitated Labour’s slide in the polls.
The latest collision with Labour’s own base is over the welfare state.
Although social security had been in the chancellor’s sights for some time, her autumn budget indicated that pressure for cuts and ‘efficiency’ was going to fall heavily on welfare spending. The government is now turning its attack on recipients of benefits. A total figure for welfare cuts of between £5bn and 6bn a year is planned. That is reported to involve a consultation on changing the Work Capability Assessment (WCA). It is also reported to include changes to Universal Credit that would see the amount paid to those too ill to work reduced, changes to Personal Independence Payments (PIP) – a benefit designed to help people with the extra costs of disability – including freezing some payments, meaning cuts in real terms.
It is necessary to pause and consider the full position of the Labour government. There are indeed some residual mild reforming elements of the government’s programme such as public ownership on the railways, free school breakfast clubs, and the employment bill. But these are not the characteristic features of the government. On the contrary the dominant character - outweighing everything else – is its accelerated momentum to the right. Labour’s repeated ‘tough’ choices have meant outright rejection of the Waspi women, rising student fees, increased bus fares, retention of the two-child benefit cap, and so on. Job cuts in the civil service and public sector pay are lining Labour up for potential confrontations with the workforce: the government’s unfunded recommendation to the pay review bodies for a pay rise limit of a 2.8 per cent means teachers are now balloting over whether to reject it. Labour under Starmer and Reeves has bound itself to strict fiscal rules, refuses to use the major progressive revenue-raising levers, is starving many public services of necessary additional funding, whilst at the same time it slashes international aid in order to pay for the first phase of a push for ‘rearmament.’ The new militarism has seen Reeves change the remit of the National Wealth Fund so it can invest in the military. (The investment fund was previously to be used for infrastructure projects, such as green energy). As the government goes further on military expenditure, other areas of spending will necessarily be hit. Attacking spending on the poorest in society and simultaneously failing to take any action over prices and tight household incomes, Labour is presiding over a squeeze on living standards of both those in work and not in work. Taken in the round, including welfare cutbacks, likely further cuts to other departments in the forthcoming budget, the slashing of international development expenditure, and the allocation of big extra resources to military spending, we are at a decisive staging point in life of the Labour government. Keir Starmer’s government is politically consistent with the course of earlier Labour governments that also chose confrontations with the interests of their own working class base. Although that has been clear for some time, the acceleration of Labour’s right wing dynamic means it has entered a crucial phase, in which the need for more - and more organised - opposition is sharply posed.
Although concern about the welfare cuts is widespread, the government’s politics also give room for the most reactionary side of Labour to exert itself. Some Labour MPs have formed a grouping to justify the attack on the welfare state. Politico reported a range of views in the PLP where an MP ‘who represents a northern rust belt seat, said their constituents “love” the prospect of welfare cuts — and also support increased defense spending.’ Some Labour MPs have called for military expenditure to be classified as ethical.
But nonetheless Labour is experiencing a blowback within the labour movement, amongst disabled people, charities, campaigners and across civil society organisations working to deal with the impact of poverty. The government’s plans were characterised earlier in the week by the Guardian as ‘austerity rebranded as reform.’ Bloomberg has revealed that at Tuesday’s Cabinet, over half of its members urged Reeves to rethink the cuts. Opposition in the PLP is not limited long-serving members of the Socialist Campaign Group. The newly-elected MP Brian Leishman has already indicated that if it goes to a vote, ‘I will be voting against austerity,’ whilst the new MP for Poole, Neil Duncan-Jordan, used his appearance on Newsnight to argue that the government ‘could have chosen to raise money from wealthy corporations and individuals.’
Efforts are now underway to cajole MPs on the Labour benches not to rebel. Downing Street began inviting groups of Labour backbenchers to meetings this week led by the Prime Minister’s political director Claire Reynolds, making the ‘moral case’ for the cuts. Combined with persuasion and engagement, Number 10 is letting it be known that it is considering whether to ‘introduce a measure to protect the most disabled when they cut benefits for those who are judged to be out of work,’ according to ITV’s Anushka Asthana who has been consistently ahead of the story. Adjustments of this nature would then be used by the government to say that it had listened to ensure a balanced package, as a mechanism to seek to limit a rebellion. The i paper reported one MP who was invited to the Downing Street briefings as saying the government was ‘panicking’ and could be forced into making ‘small’ changes to its policy.
No one should be fooled, however. It is not possible to carve £6billion from the welfare budget and not cause widespread pain and a further squeeze on the living standards of some of the most struggling people in society. A cut on this scale is savage.
Against this background, MPs will face a choice when and if the welfare cuts are put to a vote in parliament. On the welfare bill there is no principled option other than to vote against the government’s plans when and if the opportunity arises.
Keir Starmer’s government has chosen a course that will keep placing it conflict with millions of people. The budget is likely to see yet more cuts in other departments and the basis for further battles over other ‘tough choices’ has already been established. Only maximising the scale of opposition is viable.
Urge your MP to vote against welfare cuts here
June 7th, People’s Assembly march and rally against the cuts