David Cameron – representing a venal and self-serving ruling elite
Capitalism – a great system?
Iram Awan from Left Unity High Wycombe looks at David Cameron’s work for the rich.
David Cameron is currently at the UN, and news is emerging that he plans to block the moves by a panel to include a commitment to reducing income inequality in the new targets set to replace the Millennium Development Goals.
The director of policy and advocacy of Save the Children is quoted as saying; “The panel has two tests; will it set out goals to eliminate poverty in all its forms and will it address inequality and discrimination which in many countries is the only route to poverty eradication”. He further says “This meeting is the last chance for the Prime Minister to save the panel’s report form being relegated to obscurity”.
So whilst wishing to eradicate world poverty, David Cameron is simultaneously blocking an initiative which would further this very goal. Hmm, let us unpick this supposed paradox.
I propose it is precisely because this commitment would include moves to publish wealth statistics of developed nations that our premier is lobbying hard to ensure that it is removed. Maybe then statistics such as the fact that the rich make up 8% of the world’s adult population and own 82% of its wealth[1] would be included in the report, and measures would be put into place to begin tackling this obscenity.
Would it be churlish to point out that the amassing of wealth by a minority of the population would necessarily have a detrimental effect on world poverty, and could actually be one of the main reasons behind it? Not according to No 10 where a source magnanimously explained “The prime minister wants to keep the focus on measurable concrete actions that would help to alleviate poverty and keep the focus on being something people could judge whether or not we are delivering.”
Now these are the kinds of statements which we the beleaguered electorate have got used to hearing from those in government; statements that don’t actually mean anything or on closer inspection invert the very truth they are seeking to convey. In this case, obfuscating the fact that focusing on reducing income inequality is an integral part of tackling extreme poverty, without which no significant gains will be made. Doing this would in reality produce the ‘measurable’ and concrete actions’ that No 10 is keen on seeing, and more tellingly would be the ‘something’ that people could easily judge was being delivered. The statistics on income inequality would be extremely clear and easily measurable, and maybe that’s the problem.
That this inequality is metastasizing with each passing year will also not have escaped most people. Figures released yesterday by the OECD further highlight what we all know; that austerity is increasing income disparity.
This kind of doublespeak from No 10 is only a conundrum for those who are still under the illusion that our ruling elite actually wish to better the lives of the poor or working class people. The reality is that the amassing of wealth is part and parcel of the neo liberal agenda to which most of our elected representatives ascribe and personally profit from. The fact that things such as extreme poverty and hunger exist at all in a world awash with riches in off shore bank accounts and military industrial complexes shows how venal and self-serving our ruling elite really are.
This is not about the politics of envy as some on the right purport, but the politics of morality and compassion which our ruling elite have worked hard to divorce from the political sphere.
[1] Suisse Global Wealth Databook October 2012
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11 responses to “David Cameron – representing a venal and self-serving ruling elite”
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A brilliant and well informed article…..
Excellent article. The geographer David Harvey calls this global process of appropriation of our shared wealth ‘accumulation by disposession’, a phrase which resonates more and more in every area of our lives. David Cameron is emphatically not in favour of ‘poverty reduction’ but rather its widest possible expansion.
insightful and well written
I agree that Cameron is hypocritical to the core. I also agree that there is something seriously wrong about the way wealth is distributed in the world. The balance is just wrong, wrong, wrong. Seeing just how wrong whether in the UK or in Pakistan is heartbreaking.
I also believe that the way to overcome this would be to completely change financial principles. Grassroots to corporations. The wealth should be taxed in a transparent and fair way. Offshore banking should be banned period. The stock market industries of the world need a complete overhaul. You should never be able to profit from a companies demise (shorting).
The concept of interest should also be seen for what it is. A tool for making the rich richer at the expense those that are enslaved by its chains.
Say the world Shariah and it is enough to bring terror and a touch of islamaphobia to the most liberal of minds. Yet the western world could learn a thing or two from Sharia Financing and why it is so fair especially with regards to ethical investing and moral purchasing.
This system allows a health socio-economic climate to develop. I am not campaigning to turn Britain into an Islamic state but I am saying consider some of the principles. The methods are worth looking at. People can be wealthy in a fair way knowing that you are contributing properly to social economy and doing your bit to redress the current rich-poor divide.
That sounds interesting – please tell us more! And yes, it’s a good article. it makes me angry that we’ve stolen from Africa, India etc etc for years and years and then we want to blame immigrants for all our self-imposed woes, and deny any more aid. Although I have to say that I’ve heard from Africans that so much aid actually causes more harm than good (e.g. because the conditions of receipt do things like forcing countries to grow food for export so they end up with not enough for themselves). Seems like it’s always a case of giving with one hand and taking away with the other.
Yes Merry that’s right. Aid and loans are usually accompanied by ‘Structural Adjustment Programmes’ (SAPS). A nasty set of policies pushed by the IMF and World Bank which force countries to privatise their industries even if it’s at a loss! They also force countries to change their agricultural practices and like you said this means food is geared towards the export market rather than providing food for themselves. A great book which goes into blood curdling details about all this is Naomi Klein’s shock doctrine which I would really recommend.
Sorry Samina, but “Shariah” based lending – supposedly done with no interest-bearing element – to meet the principle within Islam (and of course traditional Christianity )not to engage in “usury” is simply a presentational cosmetic con. look closer at supposed “interest-free” Shariah lending, and you will find that the provider of the cash actually receives an overall “return” on the money leant out which is remarkably similar to the interest rates prevailing in “conventional” non-Shariah banking . The extra elements of the “return” above the original principal sum leant out are simply cosmetically dressed up to appear to be other overhead costs and charges, rather than crude “usurious” interest.
How could it be otherwise ? the Islamic world is a fully integrated part of world capitalism – and competitive capital flows dominate Islamic economies exactly as they do elsewhere.
Sorry, but you are deluding yourself if you believe “islamic” principles alone evade the worldwide operational dynamics of capitalism. Only a fully socialised economic system which has replaced the class-based power of capital with democratically planned production and distribution worldwide could do that.
BROKENBRITISHPOLITICS- SNEAKY TORIES SENDING MIXED MESSAGES
Whenever the Government are up to something sinister the Media is swamped by misinformation .If you recollect the Horsemeat saga – no deaths occurred ,nutritionally it is better than other meats but the Press and News bombarded us for days about the incident just as the Secret Courts Bill was going through Parliament .Today the Home Secretary May states that the Police should Help the Media name suspects of those arrested – so why Secret Closed Courts. Cameron yesterday ordered Tories to support a backbench Bill promising voters an in-out EU referendum by the end of 2017.Why is he still dithering Brussels have just come up with FTT ,Financial Tax Transaction starting next year they will be hitting the City of London big time with this Tax. http://brokenbritishpolitics.simplesite.com
Some good points in all of the above. THE REAL DEPENDENCY CULTURE in the World is that of the rich and powerful. Every day they must pray that the working billions will turn up to work to create the wealth and make societies work. The rich in advanced capitalists liberal democracies legally steal the surplus labour of working people and share it out amongst themselves and their apologists. People are hoodwinked by the right wing media – as the Right continue to CON progressive humanity needs to wake people up!
Threre is also a massive MIIDDLE CLASS WELFARE STATE with the m class being subsidised ie by tax relief on practically everything, public schools with charitable status, £70b uncollected taxes from the rich each year, the 1,000 richest people in the UK have £400b between them, the rich trousered £850b in illicit offshore banking in 2010 so we have plenty to politicise people about!
The EC Financial Transaction Tax (Robib Hood Tax) is only 0.1% which will bring in £35b in the EC but we should be bolder – 1% means £350b and % means 1.75trillion – it is our wealth really , ‘You better give them what they really own!” – John Lennon, Power to the People. Hopefully when structure, constitution etc. which is important but dull to some is out of way we can get down to policy and practice! Yours in solidarity!
PS -a progressive economist (Dr HaJoon Chang) recommends we all read the financial pages of newspapers, sounds boring but I have done so ever since . I think being w class most of us are used to budgeting in small amounts and it is rare you may spend £1,000 or so and we almost have a fear of big figures – millions, billions, trillions! But I am not afraid of these sums any more. You also see in the a financial pages the rich and powerful in their parallel universe!
With best wishes.
Hi Bazza and everyone who looks forward to your pieces
As an admirer of most of your contributions, I have been meaning to question your regular ‘divide and rule’ habit of talking in that very English way of working and middle class – as if they have nothing in common or are different species. The old clause 4 “by hand and by brain” (clumsy phrase, as both are required in most work, but anyway …) suggested a unity of ‘blue and white collar’ workers. Yes, or course, some ‘middle class’ people think their interests lie more with the 1% than the 99, but they are wrong – and many do not.
I have laughed at your description of mc ultra-left and we’ve all cringed at the posh paper-sellers, but this masks a more important point I think, that we need to think and speak of ‘the working class’ as 99% or 95 at least. ‘You and me’ are the upper-middle class, globally, if measured in income and being concerned about our own little island rather than the murder ‘our’ 1% causes in the rest of the world.
Our wc hero mate was part of the 1%, whether he liked it or not (white rollers, investing in refrigerated fur and all) but he was on ‘our’ side. Many rich people eventually realise that the lyrics of “Imagine’ (sanitised as they are by appropriation) are true and peace and ‘love is all you need’ – trouble is they are usually not brave enough to take the chance and find out in practice.
LU has to appeal to the 99%, as I’m sure you agree by the feel of your great contributions. Yes, there is hope! and one day, hopefully, there will be peace and sharing.
Re this very topic, I noticed in the press today that Oxfam have just produced a report which after much number crunching has estimated the tax dodging of the superrich and corporations worldwide each year to be in the order of about £20 billion. Oxfam says this sum could abolish the worst aspects of worldwide poverty many times over. still, I don’t suppose Dave Cameron, a man whose family fortune is directly based on his dear old dad’s establishment of oversees tax havens during the Thatcher era would be keen to act on that issue !