- The Guardian
- Issue #2059 03-07-2023
Brexit self-harm
Dear Comrade Editor,
Seven years ago a few currency speculators and hedge fund owners who knew they would make a lot of money, a few principled, thinking left-wing people who believed it would make nationalisation and other socialist measures easier under a future left-wing government, and an awful lot of people who would shave their hair and eat it in a pizza if the Mail, Express, Sun, Times, Telegraph, or Daily Star told them to, voted to leave the EU.
It was a conscious act of economic and political selfharm on a par with the repeated election of Thatcher in the 1980s with its resultant destruction of public housing, NHS, social care, social security and everything else which constitutes a coherent, caring and decent society.
Together, these two acts have transformed the UK from one led by people at least trying, in that memorable postwar phrase, to make “a country fit for heroes” to one stewarded by self serving liars, and ideally suited to property speculators, unscrupulous landlords, hedge fund owners, oligarchs wallowing in wealth stolen from socialist economies and privatised utility, railway, and healthcare parasites.
They have gone from being (rightly or wrongly) regarded as a leading force for social justice and intelligent leadership in Europe to being dismissed as an irrelevant sewage covered backwater run by people who hate foreigners.
And, seemingly to quell any doubt as to the correctness of this assessment, the government has apparently made it illegal for Sadiq Khan’s office to fly the EU flag today, despite the fact that 60 per cent of Londoners voted to stay in the EU.
He should do so anyway.
Anyhoo Bollocks to Brexit.
Jim Cowie
Melbourne
Shame Albo Shame
On Monday 26th June, the Australia government announced a new military package worth $110 million for Ukraine. The very same day Prime Minister Anthony Albanese, Foreign Affairs Minister Penny Wong, and Defence Minister Richard Marles paid tribute to ALP Elder Simon Crean who sadly passed away on Sunday 25th June in Germany, aged 74.
PM Albo obviously ignored that Simon Crean as leader of the ALP in opposition stood firmly against the war in Iraq that the Coalition government without parliament approval sent Australian troops to die in yet another US war.
It is a shame that the three main government representatives tried to persuade the public about their decision for more money for war while expressing their condolences to the family of Simon Crean’s. A trade unionist who rightly opposed a war for which war criminals at the helm have not been prosecuted.
People in the Ukraine do not need more military support. What the Ukrainian people need is international support for the initiatives trying to find a diplomatic political solution to the conflict.
While the war goes on the Ukrainian government is privatising all public enterprises, undermining the right for workers to organise and limit or ban the participation of working-class organisations.
At home the Australian government continues with its warmongering, pushing the AUKUS deal and taking scarce resources out of workers pockets. No money for health, dental, housing, and social spending just for war plans.
I would say Shame Albo Shame!
Vinnie Molina
WA
