THE Prime Minister began yesterday to sell off anything and everything that can be used to raise much needed cash, £16bn in fact, to try to dent the £175bn government deficit that is expected to rise to £250bn in the next 12 months.
His government has built up this debt, through its determination to put securing the interests of the bankers and the bosses before those of the working class and the middle class.
His ‘master’ plan is to dump onto a deflated market the state’s portfolio of ‘non financial assets’ held by Whitehall, and also by the country’s local authorities, over the next two years, for what will be a sale price well below their value.
Brown yesterday outlined sales that may raise £3bn, including the student loan book, the Tote, the Dartford Tunnel and the Channel Tunnel rail link.
Also on the list will be further sales. Undoubtedly among them will be the Royal Mail, parts of the NHS, the government’s 33 per cent share in the Urenco uranium enrichment company, as well as properties and amenities owned by local authorities.
£11bn of the £16bn will have to come from the sale of local authority properties.
These will include local authority owned airports, amenities including parks, green spaces, libraries and museums, as well as the sale of prime road networks to toll companies.
This sell-out of the country to the world’s bourgeoisie was yesterday being hailed by Business Secretary Lord Mandelson as Labour’s alternative to the savage cuts that have already been pledged by the Tories.
However, the Tories support his policy.
Tory leader Cameron said: ‘Obviously we do need to do this, but we must make sure – as every family knows – if you sell something it can help you in the short term, but it doesn’t actually help you live within your means in the long term.
‘So, we’ve still got to get to grips with public spending, get to grips with the deficit – and we must make sure we get good value for money.’
Liberal Democrat treasury spokesman Vince Cable said the policy was fundamentally flawed. ‘What worries me about the government proposal is that they’re proposing to sell off in very depressed markets, under very depressed markets for land and for shares.’
Cameron says that it is just the start of what is necessary and Cable says that it will not raise as much as expected since the market is deflated.
It plainly is a policy that is calculated to try to get Labour over the hump of the election, and then, if returned, to start carrying out the necessary savage cuts alongside the sell-offs.
If the government is so hungry for cash, then Prince Charles’ estate, the Duchy of Lancaster, is worth £300 million. The Queen has a personal fortune of some £500 million, and also numerous estates and palaces from Sandringham to Balmoral and Windsor. Taken together, the estates and the palaces and the paintings and the crown jewels will raise billions.
However the monarchy, the symbol of the state, and the bankers are the untouchables as far as sell-offs, savage cuts and ‘sacrifices’ are concerned.
These are reserved for the working class and the middle class who are to have their amenities of all kinds sold off around them, putting an end to civilised bourgeois society, and turning Britain into a very backward country.
The truth is that the capitalist system has had its back broken, and instead if burying this bankrupt system, the ruling class intends to force the working people of the world to pay all of its debts.
The way to resolve the crisis of capitalism is by getting rid of it with a socialist revolution. The need for this revolution becomes greater with every day that passes!
