The words 'British Steel' were once synonymous with excellence. Now they stand as a reminder of the futility of having faith in the Capitalist System, even when it hides itself under the name of the Mixed Economy.
In 1988, the Thatcher regime (under the direction of bankers such as SG Warburg) sold the UK Steel Industry to friends of the Conservative Party. Just as with the rest of the Socialised industries handed to corporate parasites, the 'sale' of British Steel was pushed under the propaganda (lie) that private ownership leads to greater efficiency, lower prices, more value for the customers, increased wages for the workers and generally happier times for everyone with the benefits spreading across the globe as protectionism falls in one country after another, banishing hunger, unemployment and despotism worldwide. This is no exaggeration of the ridiculous claims of the lackeys of Capitalism. The reality turned out to be somewhat different.
The main victims of the brutal butchery of de-Socialisation were of course the people. We lost our assets, which were sold for a total of £50 billion, which was misused (stolen) by government to benefit their Capitalist owners, not the people. But what of the industries themselves? The following assets of the people were sold for peanuts to organisations which had influence over the fraudulent democracy of the UK:
British Petroleum October 1979
British Aerospace February 1981
Cable & Wireless October 1981
Amersham International February 1982
National Freight Corporation February 1982
Britoil November 1982
Associated British Ports February 1983
Enterprise Oil July 1984
Jaguar August 1984
British Telecommunications December 1984
British Shipbuilders 1985 onwards
British Gas December 1986
British Airways February 1987
Rolls-Royce May 1987
BAA July 1987
British Steel December 1988
Water December 1989
Electricity 1990
The British Transport Docks Board was sold as Associated British Ports, which was gobbled up by the bankers of Goldman Sachs, literally transferring part of the infrastructure of the country into the hands of banking thieves.
British Gas was sold with the propaganda that prices would fall and people would have more choice and better services. Prices have rocketed and the competition which was promised proved illusory as the same gas comes through the same pipes with different middle men taking their cut from the money extorted from the people.
Electricity was sold off cheaply, with foreign companies taking charge of the vital resources of the country. The building of dangerous and inefficient nuclear power stations which have been proved to cause cancer among the people forced to live close to them - Working Class people who cannot afford to move away from them - has been a part of the reason for the sacrifice of British Steel, as the corrupt Cameron government has helped to break our steel industry in return for Chinese investment in nuclear power. (China dumps cheap steel worldwide and protectionist measures which could have saved British Steel have been vetoed in the EU by the UK government). Like Gas, the cost of Electricity has sky rocketed, creating financial misery for the poorest of our people.
British Telecom was sold as the first part of the de-socialisation of the Post Office. The cost of telephone calls is now so outrageous that house phones are seldom used. Public phone boxes which were available to use for 5 pence calls, now the minimum charge is 60 pence, and phone boxes are disappearing across the country. BT is also a rip off when it comes to Broadband. BT makes a fortune from screwing the people who used to own it.
The sale of Water was perhaps the most immoral of all the asset stripping gifts to the capitalist chums of the Ruling Class. Water is not something which should be viewed as a money-making industry, but a matter of sanitation, of health, of life itself. The introduction of Water Meters is forcing poorer people to bathe less frequently, flush their toilets less frequently and wash clothes or use water for household cleaning less frequently. This is causing increases in disease, and the knock on effect of putting further strain on the NHS. The water companies in England are almost exclusively owned by foreign bankers and finance capitalists. The quality of water had declined, the number of people employed has declined, the time taken to fix leaks has increased beyond what most of us dared to fear. The profits from water are obscene. Access to clean water is a human right. SWPE would socialise water as a priority and supply it for free.
The UK car industry, like the ship building industry, has collapsed since privatisation. The sale of British Leyland, Rover, Jaguar and Rolls Royce, left areas like Longbridge as wastelands where once thousands of Working Class people had jobs. The toff end of the car market has gone to overseas capitalists. The UK used to make cars for everyone. The industry was stripped and destroyed, creating mass unemployment and misery for ordinary people, at the same time of redistributing wealth into the hands of the Ruling Class in many countries.
The story is the same for every sector which we once owned. Prices have gone up, quality has gone down, workers have been thrown on the scrapheap, overseas capitalists and UK collaborators have gained immense wealth as we ordinary people have been robbed blind.
The betrayal of the Steel workers in Port Talbot, Scunthorpe, Teeside etc has shown the government for what it is - the servant of Global Capitalism. Eton tax dodger and pig raper, David Cameron, blocked plans by the EU to impose a 66% tariff on cheap steel imported from China. The tariff would have saved our Steel industry. Cameron traded the Steel industry for a promise by China to build a new Nuclear power station at Hinkley Point - never minding the danger to health associated with nuclear energy, nor the 40,000 jobs put at risk to tempt the Chinese to build the power station (which is not even guaranteed in any case).
The Capitalist system only benefits the robber barons at the top. Tariffs to protect the jobs of the people are not enough. We need to abandon Capitalism and Socialise the entire country. We have a collectivised army, police force, NHS. Only an idiot would think of handing health, defence and law and order to private profiteers, but this is what has been done with our vital infrastructure. Coal, Steel, Manufacturing, Utilities, Transport - all have gone into private hands. We even have private motorways to fleece drivers who are already paying heavy taxation in fuel taxes and road tax for a network which is unfit to drive on.
SWPE would end private ownership of all businesses except single owner/worker entities. We would make all businesses into Workers' Cooperatives, with decisions being decided upon by the Workers themselves, other than wages and prices which would be fixed by the State. Only a fully Socialised and fully Socialist economy can protect the rights, livelihoods and living standards of the people from greedy corporate globalist parasitism. Nothing less will do,
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