No More Austerity

TyLean Polley, a new Left Unity member in Luton, reports on Saturday’s People’s Assembly demonstration

Some people are driven by a need for appreciation. Some are driven by money. Not me…. I’m driven by an addiction to new experiences, and on Saturday, I did something that was a first for me: I marched in protest!

My husband, my son and I made our way to London by train and then took the underground from Kings Cross to Oxford Circus. We were running about 15 minutes late, and I was feeling anxious about whether the march had already left and we missed it…. and I hadn’t written down directions; would we find the starting point? As soon as we rose on the escalator from the depths of Oxford Circus Underground Station, I realised how unfounded these worries were. My eyes were instantly pulled toward a No More Austerity sign on the wall of the ticket hall… and then to a TFL employee with a pink mohawk. As we ascended the last steps leading to the street – carrying our pushchair, our home made sign and our child – I could feel the levels of excitement in the air rising in tandem.

On the journey, we had been painfully hungry and hoping we would have time to grab something to eat, but we completely forgot about our hunger as we drew closer to the assembled protesters and deeper into the electrifying hive of activity. We obtained a sign that read “Gove Out” and more leaflets than we knew what to do with.

We weren’t there with any particular group, but we filed in near the NUT teachers’ union. (My husband is actually a member of the NASUWT teachers’ union, so this seemed close enough). Not that this mattered as our place within the march kept changing, having to occasionally stop to sort out our child. This turned out to be an advantage, because we got to see the wide range of people who were there to protest, and perhaps more impressively, just how far some people had come to march, including considerable representation from Wales. One person in particular caught my eye, having beautifully hand-crafted a banner that shamed our paint-still-wet cardboard made hastily that morning. It was turquoise, white and purple macramé and read “Tax the Rich.”

The demonstration took us from just outside of BBC studio to the green outside Parliament. Interestingly, BBC didn’t mention a single word about the protest of 50,000 people on their doorstep. ITV mentioned it briefly.

The following day, I began to dive into my pile of pamphlets and political literature. Some of it was just plain bat shit! (Entertaining however). A lot of the literature made excellent points. One such point was made in an A3 booklet from a new political party called Left Unity. It contained several articles written by different members, and the one that really caught my eye was written by Kate Hudson called European Elections: A Rising Left Amid the Far Right Danger. The article explains that although news coverage is extremely focused on the rise of far right political parties such as UKIP, the rise in far left parties has been nearly as great and in some cases greater.

Dreading the rise of the right, I have been throwing my support behind Labour as the best alternative, although they don’t truly represent my opinions and views. Both in America and Britain, the major left wing parties have become – in fact – moderate parties, attempting to pander to both sides. Before the European Elections, I scoured the internet for a party that was on the left and pro-EU. The best I could come up with were the Liberal Democrats. Every other party was either formed on an anti-EU policy or – at best – non-committal to either side of the debate.

I have always been proud to be an unaffiliated, independent voter, open to considering the best candidate for the job regardless of their political affiliation. However, the only thing that remains constant is change, and I now feel I need to openly support the growing wing of politics that I was inaccurately led to believe was shrinking. Yesterday, I had another “first experience.” I joined Left Unity!