Anthony Barnett (London, OK): “We need a party which will speak for an interest other than self-interested, amoral plutocrats. None exists.” With these words Will Hutton concludes a swinging attack on “degenerate Britain” in today’s Observer.
Read it, is an essential reality check.
And it adds a much more convincing description of today’s Britain than it being a country where “anarchy” rules the streets. Hutton’s despair starts with his utter disbelief at the way the global financial institutions are on a one-way street to cheap money, government credit and shed loads of profits,
"One of the most inequitable and amoral acts in modern times is happening in front of our eyes and in Britain there is hardly a murmur of protest. The multi-billion dollar bail-out of global finance after one of the most reckless periods of lending and deal-making since the late 1920s is extraordinarily one-sided.
Little people's taxes are underwriting the mistakes of big people, who in the process have made riches beyond the dreams of avarice. Globalisation, it is now clear, is run in the interests of a global financial class which has Western governments in its thrall. This class does not give a fig for the interests of savers, clients or wider workforces.
The rules of the game are set up solely to benefit the financiers whether in London, New York or Hong Kong".
His argument amplifies and sharpens the case set out by our Editor-in-Chief at openDemocracy, Tony Curzon Price whose measured criticism warns our rules not to "hug a hedgy''. “The financial crises and asset bubbles we see today are the symptom of a broken system”, Tony concludes. The debate was further stirred by Ann Pettifor who claims there will be a system wide, global capitalist crisis brought on by the reckless permission for a system of super-profits built on unsecured debt. Her claim generated some heavyweight exchanges. Including an entertaining one from Roger Scruton. Behind it the question looms, "In whose interests is Britain governed?
