Want a revolution? Vote to save the NHS
You say you want a revolution but, well, you know, it’s all in the head.
The last time Britain had truly had enough of the type of politics of the Tories was around 1990. The Poll Tax was introduced by Thatcher as a bailout for the Tories failed experiment with privatisation and to protect the wealth of those who had profited from the looting of decades of public investment in public services. Thatcher gutted elements of tax payer investment to inject an illusion of wealth back into the economy and made £millions for a small coterie of those in a privileged position to exploit it. The Poll Tax was a means of paying the bills without taxing the new found wealth of those privileged looters.
People didn’t really know why they should resist the Poll Tax, they just instinctively knew it was unfair, and across the country they took to the streets and vented against the injustice. It brought down Thatcher but, ultimately, it did not bring down the Poll Tax or tackle the injustice. That uprising failed because we didn’t know what we were rising against. We didn’t understand that privatisation was not a great way for the little ‘man’ to cash in on owning our public services, that it was designed for the ‘establishment’ to cash in on our decades of tax investment. We didn’t understand that Right To Buy was a gutting of tax payer investment in housing. The Tories were looting decades of tax payer investment, selling it off cheap and permitting the City to strip it, without meaningfully reinvesting back into the country. Thatcher sold Britain for glass beads and bad whiskey, the City cashed in decades of tax payer investment of £billions for £millions of personal gain. It is the blueprint of Tory economic policy and what drives their ideology. It is what we should be rising up against NOW.
People are frustrated. Millions have participated in marches across Britain over the past few years and the government ignores them. People want a revolution to save the NHS and are desperate to turn around what the Tories are doing to the NHS but it appears there is no meaningful way to accomplish that. We have an opportunity on the 8th June to vote the Tories out and to reverse the destruction of the single public service that almost 100% of the British public feel proud of and are desperate to protect. Will we take it? Lots of people, me included, fear that people will not vote to protect it. I fear that people are content to fool themselves that the intentional destruction of the NHS is not actually happening and that the party doing it are not simply motivated by personal greed and gutting decades of £trillions of our tax payer investment in it. The NHS is a sacrifiscal golden cow to the Tories (and those who venerate profiteering from public services).
A vote for the Tories on the 8th June will give them license to finish decimating the NHS, it will give them license to proceed with slashing spending on the public, in favour of spending on contracts that siphon Britain’s wealth out of the economy and into offshore bank accounts of tax avoiding companies. And they will do exactly that because they know no other way to ‘govern’. How will the public respond? Will people take to the streets as they did in 1990? If the people of Britain want a revolution how will the Tories in government respond?
Theresa May this week admitted that she is in favour of legalising blood sports in Britain, most particularly fox hunting. The significance of the leader of a major political party in Britain in the 21st Century believing that it is correct to consider the abuse of animals as sport is very telling. How we treat those more vulnerable than ourselves is an indication of our character, so we should not be surprised that the leader of the party accused by the UN of human rights abuses against people with disabilities is also in favour of tearing apart animals for fun. In other countries the bahaviour would be considered barbaric, sociopathic and it is to Britain’s shame that we do not. Though, as a country we do, which is why it was made illegal.
In 1984 (no irony) Thatcher released the hounds against members of the British public. During the Miner’s dispute, Thatcher ordered the forces of the state to assault British citizens. The Tories have refused an investigation into what took place surrounding that shameful attack from the government against people in Britain, just as they fought an inquiry into the tragedy at Hillsborough. Have the Tories moved on much from the mentality that Thatcher exposed in her treatment of British citizens? Evidence would seem to suggest no.
The British people are faced with a government and a major political party encumbered by a sense of entitlement and dismissive of the rights of the citizens over whom they reign. Our investment in our public services and pension funds are seen as pots into which they can plunge their hands and help themselves. Our opinions are not sought, not valued, and ignored. When we object, we are portrayed as the ‘enemy’ and subject to assault by people who, in the 21st Century, indulge themselves in the pastimes of centuries past. If we say we want a revolution, how far are we prepared to got? We will not drag them from their offices and hang them from lampposts, as befell Il Duce, because we are better than their breed of sociopathic, self-serving, self-aggrandising, delusional, regressive dross. We want a revolution and I hope we demonstrate that on the 8th June.
Britain needs an intellectual revolution to create the political revolution we need to save the NHS from the Tories. Have we reached the depths of 1990 yet?
