Momentum votes to campaign for public ownership of the banks

Submitted by AWL on 13 April, 2021 - 4:42
FBU banks balloon

Momentum members have voted to prioritise eight motions for the 2021 Labour Party conference (September 25-9, Brighton).

The motions prioritised are: “£15 minimum wage”; “Time for proportional representation”; “Green jobs revolution”; “Global climate justice”; “Build council housing and end homelessness”; “Reject integrated care systems, renationalise England’s NHS and social care”; “A four day week for a society in which we work to live, not live to work”; and “Build back fairer: attack poverty and inequality”. Momentum's office says that the Momentum National Coordinating Group will add others on racism.

Two motions which Momentum Internationalists pushed got into the eight: "Build back fairer" and "Global climate justice". Three others pushed by MI failed to reach the final eight: one from the Labour Campaign for Free Movement and others on migrants' rights, one from Free Our Unions and the Fire Brigades Union, and one from the Uyghur Solidarity Campaign and Labour Solidarity with Hong Kong. (See here for all motions submitted.)

"Build back fairer: attack poverty and inequality” (see the full text in comment below) includes a relatively comprehensive program of demands for reshaping society as we move forward through and perhaps out of the Covid-19 crisis. It goes far beyond not only what the Labour Party is advocating – not difficult – but beyond what the bulk of the left, inside and outside Labour, is arguing for.

Crucially for its demands, all the demands in all the other motions and any other demands we might make, the motion notes the dramatic and deepening concentration of wealth in the hands of the super-rich and says:

“We need to take back wealth, with a wealth tax, increased corporation tax, capital gains tax and taxing very high incomes; and taking banking and finance into democratic public ownership.”

The demand for public ownership of the banks and financial sector – also referred to in the “Global climate justice” motion – is particularly vital for meeting the multiple crises we face. As far as we know this is the first time Momentum has advocated it; we should push to make sure it does so prominently.

The motion includes a number of other essential but often neglected pro-working class demands, like repealing all anti-trade union laws and abolishing the "No recourse to public funds" rule targeting many migrants.

For why public ownership of the financial sector is so important, see Michael Roberts here and a range of other labour movement activists here.

Comments

Submitted by AWL on Wed, 07/04/2021 - 20:56

Build back fairer: attack poverty and inequality

The Marmot report “Build Back Fairer” says: “mismanagement during the pandemic, and the unequal way the pandemic has struck, is of a piece with what happened... in the decade from 2010… enduring social and economic inequalities... mean that public health was threatened before and during the pandemic and will be after.”

The Resolution Foundation and Wealth Tax Commission estimate that concentration of wealth in the hands of the super rich is even worse than previously thought – by £800bn! We need to take back wealth, with a wealth tax, increased corporation tax, capital gains tax and taxing very high incomes; and taking banking and finance into democratic public ownership.

We commit to “building back fairer”, campaigning for all with targeted action to increase racial, ethnic, gender, class and economic equality, campaigning for and implementing:

● Benefits increased to a liveable level. £260pw Universal Credit (demanded by the TUC).
● Extension and strengthening of furlough and self-employment schemes.
● Increase the minimum wage to £12ph, scrapping exemptions and differentials. Action to increase wages; substantial increases for public-sector workers.
● The right to isolate on full pay; improved sick pay for all, 100% of wages for all sickness periods.
● Repeal of all anti-union laws.
● Banning of zero-hours contracts.
● Reversal of all cuts since 2010, increased funding.
● Comprehensive reversal of privatisation and outsourcing; full public ownership of health and social care.
● Abolition of ‘No Recourse to Public Funds’.
● Building at least 100,000 council homes a year.
● Creation of millions of secure, well-paid, public jobs in services and green industry.

Submitted by: North East Momentum, Stevenage Momentum and Southampton Momentum

Submitted by Down to earth,… (not verified) on Sat, 12/06/2021 - 14:24

Yes, there needs to be changes. It doesn't mean that everything needs to be public sector, in my view. At least one major bank. Gas, electricity, water, trains, buses. At least one supermarket. At least one communications company. At least one airline. This is out of the government having control of essential infrastructure, neither for money, nor out of political dogma. Are you aware that if the stock market crashed to zero today, you would have outright anarchy with the government controlling nothing?

Lastly, Batley and Spen, nothing against her but Labour have picked the wrong candidate in my view. Labour are so very far away from the people that they couldn't see the obvious. How did Batley and Spen vote at Brexit? The candidate is the sister of who? And what opinion did her sister hold?

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