THE SPLIT in the Tory Party over the planned hike in National Insurance (NI) has got wider and deeper!
Tory Chancellor Rishi Sunak’s proposed 1.25 percentage point rise in National Insurance contributions (NICs) will hit workers for six, and he is insisting that it must remain, to slash the Tory debt mountain.
Gas, electricity and petrol prices are already spiralling, while food costs are rocketing, with rents going through the roof. On top of this a massive NI tax hike to cut the Tory debt will force millions of workers to take to the streets, determined not to allow their families to be pauperised, to satisfy the greed of the bankers and bosses.
The Tories have wracked up debts exceeding £2.4 trillion. Just servicing this level of debt costs billions. Debt interest payments reached their highest ever December level of £8.1 billion last month owing to recent rises in inflation.
The ruling class of bankers and bosses are united in their determination to dump the entire weight of this crisis onto the backs of the working class.
However while Johnson preaches caution, and still mumbles about the ‘levelling up’ fiction, and the necessity of a retreat over NI, others like Chancellor Sunak, say ‘no’ to any postponement of the introduction of the NI charges, and that they must get on with the job of making the working class pay the full price of the capitalist crisis.
The divide in the Tory Party is threatening to turn into full-blown civil war with Johnson being warned he would face massive anger if he presses ahead with the NI rise, which will cost the average worker an extra £255 a year.
On Thursday, Mel Stride, the Conservative chairman of the Treasury select committee, said it was his ‘personal view’ that there was an ‘opportunity now to not go ahead with the national insurance rise in April … because of the cost of living pressures that there are’.
Suggesting it should be delayed by a year, he warned that as an inflationary measure, it would have knock-on consequences for the servicing costs of the national debt. A government source told The Times paper that PM Johnson was also considering delaying the NI rise for a year.
However Chancellor Sunak is determined to press ahead with his attempt to ‘balance the books’, starting with the raising of NI.
The likelihood is that if Johnson postpones the NI increase there will be a leadership challenge and he could be removed, or the Tories will be split.
The major capitalist party in the UK is on the point of splitting, so great is the capitalist crisis.
If Johnson quits or is evicted, and the Tories splinter, Labour leader Starmer will then have to decide whether to form a national government with the Johnson wing of the Tory Party or campaign in a crisis general election.
While the political leaders of British capitalism tear each other into shreds the leaders of the trade unions are simply watching and waiting to see who will win the struggle to form the leadership of the ruling class in the UK.
The reality is that UK capitalism is in its death agony, and is part of the most bankrupt section of the world capitalist economy.
It will provide no future for the working class no matter which faction of the Tory party wins the day.
However millions of workers are getting very angry over the huge rises in the cost of living, with much worse to come. There is already a strike wave of university staff, hospital staff, council workers and rail and tube workers developing.
The ruling class of bosses and bankers is however demanding more cuts and closures, to keep its profits intact, never mind the damage being done to the lives of millions of workers and youth.
They insist that the ‘risk’ of a revolutionary response from the working class is par for the course and that the state has got to be strengthened to face up to tackle a working class revolt and put it down.
The TUC trade unions must be made to get ready to defend the basic rights of the working class with a general strike to bring down the Tories and bring in a workers government and a socialist planned economy This is the only way forward. Join the WRP and the YS to organise the British Socialist Revolution!
