IT was Mussolini who said that he would drive the Mafia out of Italy and send it packing to the United States. Mussolini went on to place the working class in chains. Now Blair has followed the example of this pioneer of ‘third way’ politics, by spelling out that he intends to harry, hassle and hound criminals out of the country.
Blair said, ‘I would widen the police powers to seize the cash of suspected drug dealers, the cars they drive round in, and require them to prove they came by them lawfully.
‘I would impose restrictions on those suspected of being involved in organised crime.
In fact, I would generally harry, hassle and hound them until they give up or leave the country.’
The Blair ‘summary justice’ approach is the order of the day. There is no mention of innocent until proven guilty, trial by jury, or even conviction.
The suspicions of an all powerful state are sufficient.
This attitude is shared by Home Secretary Clarke who recently reported to the House of Commons that people who complete their sentences should remain under the control and supervision of the state if he suspected that they could re-offend.
On the question of miscarriages of justice, Clarke has ruled that compensation payments should be much reduced, and that there should be none at all for the period up to the first appeal made by a wrongly convicted person, no matter how long that period was.
Again the state is to be favoured above the citizen, with the implication that the citizen never deserved substantial compensation, and may well have committed the crime. Again it is the state that knows best.
The same Home Secretary and government are in favour of the police being able to hold people for 90 days without charging them or allowing them to see a solicitor. After 90 days in police custody, a lot of people would sign anything.
There are already no jury trials in terrorist and other cases, while Labour is discussing having a system of summary justice where a police officer and the Crown Prosecution Service can charge, convict and fine somebody, allowing the person only an appeal after the sentence has been carried out.
Labour is building a strong state, that will constitute the law. It appears to be to help the weak who are being ‘terrified’ by criminality, but in reality it is being built up for an entirely different purpose.
Labour is for giving asbos to young people, but when giant companies pull out of Britain and sack thousands destroying whole areas and pauperising tens of thousands, Blair declares that this really criminal behaviour is legal, honourable and inevitable as he did in the case of Gate Gourmet and Peugeot.
The ending of the mining industry and the destruction of manufacturing has destroyed the lives of millions. While Blair pats the bosses on the back, he gets the asbos out for rightfully discontented young people and criminalises them.
However, the essential reason for the turn to a strong state is to have the necessary reactionary legislation on the books, and the forces ready to deal with millions of workers when they take action to prevent Blair destroying the Welfare State.
Already on the statute books is the Civil Contingencies Act. Under this, ministers have the power to declare states of emergencies, quarantine areas, and hand control of key industries over to the armed forces.
The same Act allows ministers in a situation of ‘emergency’ to rule without parliament and to get the approval of parliament for their deeds after the event.
Already, DNA evidence can be obtained when a person is arrested and be retained as part of a national register even if the person is acquitted or does not face prosecution.
Under the Prevention of Terrorism Act 2005, the Home Secretary can issue control orders to put individuals under house arrest without a trial, or even knowing the evidence against them.
This state apparatus is being built up to make war on the working class. There is only one way to deal with it.
That is through the organisation of a socialist revolution to smash it up and destroy it, to allow the working class to go forward to socialism under which the state will wither away and be replaced by an administration of common property.
