Andy Burnham offers a vision for the UK’s future- for debate. A closer relationship with our main trading partner, Europe. Reform of social care. Restraining the privatisation of the 1980s. Greater local power and autonomy. The details to be worked out in debate. It is a risky strategy (including perhaps the gibe that if you don’t know what to do, you start a debate), and may need electoral reform to achieve (though 2029 will still be fought on first-past-the-post).
The UK cannot expect concessions from the EU won by Thatcher to be returned to us. The 1992 Maastricht Treaty set its economy free from “over-much” parliamentary control, but the negative results of that are evident today. The EU is now far more fragmented- a European Disunion? And we still want our own freedoms here at home. Does government (or do local mayors) have the capacity to manage (for example) water companies and the national grid effectively? The UK is far more centralised than many other states- 95% of taxation is collected centrally, only 30% in Germany and the USA, and 50% in Canada (a legacy of the Tudors, perhaps).
The commitment to “net zero” clashes with the estimated £17.5 billion annual subsidy to fossil fuels (through tax relief and other concessions). Are electric cars a solution, given the resources needed for batteries (until they can be phased out, perhaps in 50 years)? Do companies buy up patents of inventions that would threaten their profits? Is it true that electricity is more expensive in the UK than in the USA or Europe (Sunday Times, 27th September)? If so, why? How do we know what is really going on?
Our reading was Matthew 6: “No one can serve two masters……. You cannot serve God and Mammon”. Not that prosperity is a bad thing- far from it. But when it is exalted into a “god”, to be served before anything else, it distorts the economy and corrupts society and humanity. Instead “Seek first God’s kingdom and its justice, and these things will be yours as well”. In other words, prosperity comes from justice, not the reverse. But it is a great leap of faith for today’s society to adopt such a policy.
Gordon Brown’s new book “The Future Starts with Us” (see the link below), launched on September 10th, and based on data from 100 thousand people globally, argues that the lurch to the political Right, away from free market liberalism to authoritarian models of society, comes from disillusionment with organisations and withdrawal from political engagement. Isolated individuals are far more likely to fall prey to fear and a desire for strong “protective” policies. But so can communities who feel fearful and ignored (a clue to Piddington’s “declaration of UDI” in the face of the proposal to use the nearby Bicester MOD for asylum-seekers?). The future will not be decided by declarations of presidents, or by summits, says Brown, but by communities coming together.
And if local communities are to be effective, not only in overcoming the isolation of individuals, and resisting the desperation of authoritarian solutions, but in building sustainable futures, they will need growing links with others whose experience, culture and faith may be very different from their own. And that will require a great deal of patience and skilful listening, a skill that we all need to learn.
The Future Starts With Us (New) | Gordon Brown | 9781398514188 | Awesome Books