DUNDEE PUBLIC MEETING

EXAMINING SCOTLAND'S CURRENCY OPTIONS

I recently received an email at my SSP account asking me to explain my views on the currency Scotland should adopt after Independence. I replied to say that this is one of those occasions where the question asked was admirably short but the answer could not be. Here’s the gist of my reply.

First I should point out that all four options raised so far assume the maintenance of a wholly capitalist model of economics and finance for Scotland. I’m in favour of an Independent socialist Scotland with complete democratic control and accountability of all our own economic decisions. Nonetheless, and since I would not want to appear to be ducking the question, I will outline my own view of the options presented so far in this debate.

There are, as you know, four currency options an Independent Scotland might consider after the 2014 Referendum and they are; either to keep the present arrangement with the pound remaining Scotland's currency, to move to what is termed a 'Sterling zone' where we share the pound with the rest of the UK but have control over our own fiscal policy, adopt the Euro or introduce our own new currency.

All four options are complicated including leaving things as they are since that would mean our Independent sovereign Government would be at the mercy of decisions taken beyond our control by the Bank of England and the City of London. And since, to a greater or lesser extent, all four options recognise all countries in today’s globalised and interdependent world, where enormous capital volumes are traded on a daily basis and moved in a millisecond, must have effective controls with which to defend their economy and currency from malicious speculators.

We must therefore approach this debate by asking what currency option gives Scotland most control of our economy and best protects us from the predatory instincts of financial speculators and hostile Governments. There have, after all, been many instances in recent years where speculators have attempted to undermine healthy economies and stable currencies for short term profit and that remains a very real feature of the modern world.

Of the 4 options mentioned each has its drawbacks. It goes without saying that keeping the Pound or establishing a 'Sterling Zone' means handing over a considerable amount of power and control over Scotland's economy and spending options to the Bank of England and the City of London. And many will inevitably ask what then is the point of Independence? On the other hand joining the Euro, as those who insist EU membership would compel us to do, means we would simply replace the Bank of England's control over our economy with the European Central Bank in Frankfurt. Given the terrible state of the ‘Eurozone’ and the collapse of economies like Ireland, Greece, Portugal, Italy, Spain and Cyprus - which all borrowed way beyond their ability to pay it back - this option would be politically impossible to sell. And perhaps for that reason alone it is probably the easiest to disregard at this stage.  
 
So, on balance, after weighing up all the issues involved and recognising that many other small Independent countries such as Norway, Switzerland and Iceland prefer to use their own currency - because it gives them more control of economic and financial decisions – this option seems to make most sense.

And I notice the ‘Greens’ agree. The SSP’s other partners in the 'Yes Scotland' coalition however, the SNP, currently prefer the 'Sterling Zone' option. They have it’s fair to say changed their mind on this issue often but their latest view seems to me entirely in keeping with their softly, softly, and dare I say conservative approach to selling Independence as a whole to those they believe are frightened by the concept of change. The SNP argue, as I understand it, that the transition to Independence should involve as little disruption as possible to people's day to day experience. I suspect they may well advocate a new Scottish currency being established in Scotland in due course.

ANOTHER SUCCESSFUL SSP PUBLIC MEETING IN EDINBURGH

Last nights Scottish Socialist Party public meeting in Craigentinny, East Edinburgh on the socialist case for Independence was a great success. I thought I might give you a flavour of the issues that arose.

Both speakers John Finnie, MSP [Independent: Highlands and Islands] and John McAllion for the Scottish Socialist Party were in sparkling form.

Unfortunately Sandra Webster, the SSP’s joint national spokeswoman, was unable to join us - her bus from Glasgow broke down en route. John Finnie opened the proceedings by insisting that Scotland was held back by the UK and the different values prevalent in the South East of England. He mentioned for example how the NHS South of the Border is facing further privatisation of services in many areas which he envisages will only worsen in the months and years to come under the Con-Dem Government. And the clear inference was that both the Con-Dems and New Labour have the same intentions for Scotland’s health services should there be a No vote in September 2014!

A key feature of the No campaign’s strategy, suggested John, is to play down the Tories involvement in ‘Better Together’ and by contrast play up Labour’s. They recognise the Tories are a complete liability to the No camp and are urging Cameron, Osborne, Ian Duncan Smith and the others not to come to Scotland over the next 18 months. By the same token they are playing up Ed Milliband’s alleged appeal and his chances of winning the 2015 Westminster General Election. 

But even if Labour is elected in 2015, warned John Finnie, and it’s a big if, working people need to remember Labour supports 80% of the Con-Dem cuts, they will not repeal the bedroom tax, and they will keep the Trident nuclear missiles Scotland wants rid of. They too will attack the Scottish working class and people’s standard of living. That was after all the experience between 1997 and 2010 said John. Whilst the prospect of a Labour victory in 2015 may be the No campaigns favoured option, people recognise Labour are now staunch Unionists. They are as wedded to the City of London as the Tories and they will not hesitate to make whatever cuts they deem necessary to ensure working people pay for an economic crisis caused by the bankers and the rich.

John McAllion also took up this theme as he ridiculed the increasingly ‘doom laden’ propaganda coming out of the No campaign HQ. He ridiculed their increasingly gloomy predictions by highlighting how they present a relentless message of fear, panic and impending catastrophe should Scots opt for self-determination.

‘Scotland is too small they argue’ said John sardonically pillorying the No message

‘Scotland is too poor they tell us, we have too many old people, we couldn’t defend ourselves, none of our businesses could survive, we would be an economic basket case which couldn’t survive without the pound, we are vulnerable to financial speculators, cyber attacks and terrorists. And so it goes on. In other words its doom, doom, doom, doom from the No camp.’

But, said John, they need to make their minds up because Alistair Darling, their leader, rather insists on a different line. He says repeatedly ‘Of course Scotland could run its own affairs. Of course Scotland could be one of the wealthiest countries in the world. Of course Scotland could make its own decisions free from UK interference. Its just that we are even better off as part of the UK.’

The truth, insisted John McAllion, is that the UK does not serve Scotland’s needs and hasn’t done for decades. They need us far more than we need them. North Sea oil and gas revenues pour £40bn a year into the UK Treasury, with £1.25 trillion more due in over the next ten years. The UK Treasury and political elite in Whitehall are terrified of losing Scotland. As well as our huge oil and gas reserves, we have vast quantities of renewable energy and we have the highly profitable whisky, engineering and financial services industries too. So, Scotland becoming Independent would be a defeat for the British state itself an enemy of socialism and a warmongering exploiter of peoples worldwide.

Both men agreed the 2014 Referendum result is wide open and that there is every reason to believe working class people will see the advantages Independence brings, not least in avoiding the worst recession in 80 years and the disastrous consequences facing working class people. The UK Government intends to ruthlessly penalise working class people for a crisis caused by the greed and recklessness of the bankers and the rich. An Independence vote in Sept 2014 offers a way to avoid that dreadful fate and to embark on a historic and much more progressive course. Independence, bring it on, both men said as they predicted a Yes majority next year.

SCRAP TRIDENT AND LET SCOTLAND LEAD THE WAY - Why I’ll be marching on Saturday.

It is another measure of the paucity of argument offered by the defenders of nuclear weapons remaining on the Clyde when David Cameron claims, as he did last week, they are there to protect us from North Korea. It is not clear whether he had been drinking or not!

Kin Yong Un and the poor impoverished, frightened, North Koreans seem, for the moment at least, to have taken the place of the Russians, the Iranians and even the French as our gravest potential enemies in the ‘dangerous world’ the militarists never cease to warn us about. They have invented one supposed threat to Britain’s security after another for the past 50 years to insist we must continue to threaten the world with nuclear annihilation.

The fact remains Britain is one of only 9 ‘rogue’ states with these indiscriminate nuclear weapons of mass civilian slaughter in the world today; the USA, Russia, China, France, India, Pakistan, Israel and North Korea being the others. Whilst the US is said to have around 60,000 nuclear warheads, North Korea is suspected of having just one and no one is quite sure if it even works. Be that as it may, launched from a site on land it certainly can’t reach Britain. Korea is 6,000 miles away. Trident on the other hand is a submarine based system constantly at sea and therefore capable of potentially annihilating people in any country in the world.

Furthermore given that it is Britain [and the US] that has been invading and occupying countries all around the world in recent years, perhaps the question most people who share this planet with us will be asking is ‘Who protects us from Britain and America?’

Opinion poll after opinion poll in Scotland show a large majority of people here want rid of Trident. On Saturday that view will again be demonstrated as thousands take to the streets demanding Scotland scraps Trident and leads the way to a nuclear free world.

We in the Scrap Trident coalition want rid of them for many reasons. We are outraged Scotland should be associated internationally with such immoral missiles. They are in the last analysis un-useable militarily. And we firmly believe the £100bn earmarked for a second generation of nuclear weapons would be better spent creating jobs, building houses, hospitals and schools and creating a better world, not threatening to destroy this one.

That’s why I will be marching in Glasgow this Saturday alongside my colleagues in the Scottish Socialist Party. It’s not the first Trident protest the SSP has been involved in these past 15 years and it probably wont be the last. But it is nonetheless where all progressive minded, peace loving, internationalists should be this weekend.

Saturday’s march and rally is the centre piece of a weekend of action against Trident. There are workshops on non-violent direct action on Sunday and a mass blockade of Faslane Naval base on Monday.

THATCHER'S LEGACY - MYTH AND REALITY

In death as in life Margaret Thatcher fiercely polarised opinion. History will inevitably record that she governed for her kind, for finance capital and for the elite who believe they have a right to power and privilege. And it is their spokesmen above all who are today proclaiming her many alleged political, economic and social achievements. But in the long run history must distinguish myth from reality.

Whilst it is true that some in the City of London made billions out of Thatcher’s decisions, millions more were pauperised by her. The boardrooms of Britain revered her its true as she helped them maximise their profits, but those profits came from the increased exploitation of the unorganised and the weak. The neo-liberal political establishment today celebrates her legacy and yearns for her return, but billions more are glad to see the back of her.

And the wall-to-wall media coverage her death has attracted reminds us what it is we loathed about her. In the former pit villages and steel towns, including the one I grew up in, no tears will be shed for her passing. She was despised in a way no other British Prime Minister ever was, not even the warmonger and liar Tony Blair. And she was despised above all because she destroyed communities of people and brought premature death to millions. Indeed her wanton acts of brutality, greed and exploitation render redundant the verse of St Francis of Assisi she famously cited on the steps of Downing Street on assuming office in May 1979 - ‘Where their was hope she brought despair, where there was harmony she brought discord, where there was security she brought exploitation and fear’.

Margaret Thatcher’s legacy was mass unemployment and the Poll tax. That’s what she will be remembered above all in working class Britain. She was responsible for appalling levels of poverty, indebtedness and insecurity and the fear that accompanies it. ‘Expert witnesses’ in studios across the land tell us today she was right about the unions and the decrepit state of British industry and made the necessary changes but they are wrong.

They refuse to see her real legacy. She was wrong about the Poll tax, she was wrong about Scotland, she was wrong about privatisation, she was wrong to sell off Britain to City spivs in London in a way and to an extent never seen before. She is also responsible for Britain becoming one of the most unequal societies in the Industrialised world.

And Internationally she disgraced Britain and our values repeatedly with her use of the UN veto and her association with vicious regimes like General Pinochet’s in Chile and the Apartheid Government in South Africa. And history demands we record she goes to her grave having called Nelson Mandela and the ANC ‘terrorists’ for insisting on black majority rule.

And yet it was her flagship policy, the Poll tax, which was most typical of her and her kind. This transparent attempt to shift the burden of tax from the rich to the poor not only came to symbolise her, it finally claimed her. More than 14 million people refused to pay it in the biggest act of mass defiance Britain has ever seen. Her legendary stubbornness meant she was toppled by that rebellion and removed from office by her fellow Tory MP’s, fearing they’d lose their own seats, hung her out to dry before they all ‘hung together’ in the 1992 General Election. 

And yet there is one important lesson above all the British labour movement still has to learn from the Thatcher era, and Tony Benn put it best, ‘ the working class in Britain need a leader to stand up for us in the way Thatcher stood up for her class’.    

WITH LIVING STANDARDS PLUNGING, THE REASONS TO VOTE YES RISE AND RISE

The Independence movement in Scotland is understandably focused, with 18 months to go until the Referendum, on how to turn around opinion polls suggesting only 38% or so intend to vote Yes.

There are those, like the Scotsman columnist and SNP insider George Kerevan, who insist the Referendum is more likely to be won on the back of a growing economy that makes people feel confident about their future. But with economic and social conditions across Britain facing a prolonged deterioration for the working class majority, the key challenge must surely rather be to show Independence offers us the chance to avoid the worst recession in 80 years, to avoid another generation being lost to under-employment, to avoid the further vicious attacks on our living standards planned by the Tory/Lib Dem Coalition.

The ‘under occupation penalty’, as the UK Government prefer to call the ‘bedroom tax’, is the latest policy of a Coalition making working class people pay for a crisis caused by bankers and the rich. It is a harbinger of what is to come for more and more of us. It means a cut in housing benefit of up to £35 per week for those least able to weather the economic turbulence. Due to be implemented on April 1st the ‘bedroom tax’ is being compared to the Poll tax because it is again being implemented here despite the opposition of the overwhelming majority of Scots. Yet we remain powerless to stop it because we are at the mercy of a Government we did not elect.

Scotland has rejected the ‘bedroom tax’ as we rejected NHS prescription charges, elderly care charges and university tuition fees. We have, as is plain to see, different political values North of the Border. The Independence movement must therefore explain to all our fellow Scots there would be no bedroom tax and no more Tory Government’s hacking away our standard of living if we were able to make all our own decisions.

But for the Scottish Socialist Party Independence means more than that. It involves a commitment to full employment with everyone earning a living wage and enjoying far better working conditions than is currently the case. It means ending fuel poverty, with our gas and electricity industries returned to public ownership and control. It means ridding our nation of chronic poverty and inequality that brings shame on our international reputation. It means a higher standard of living for the vast majority of us. For the SSP being part of the UK holds Scotland’s working class majority back.

The Referendum is being fought against a background of deteriorating economic and social conditions for millions. Last week for example ‘The Independent’ newspaper warned in a page one headline ‘Half UK children will be living below the breadline by 2015.’ [14/3/13]. And ‘The Scotsman’ [13/3/13] reported Government figures show the standard of living of Scotland’s working class majority has plunged over the last 5 years with household bills up 25% whilst wages increased on average by only 6%.

This then is the context of the Independence debate and we should not underestimate the profound desire for change that is sweeping the country. Independence could offer us the chance to avoid a sizeable fall in our living standards.

All supporters of Independence will have realised, I’m sure, that our opponents pay us a great complement by ditching the central message they used during the last Referendum in the 1970’s. They argued then that Scotland was ‘too small, too poor and too weak to be an Independent nation’. But that argument has been so soundly defeated they dumped it and now claim ‘Of course we could run our own affairs. Of course Scotland could be one of the wealthiest nations on earth, it’s just we will be even better off if we remain within the UK.’ Unfortunately the bedroom tax, rising fuel poverty, falling living standards, rising under-employment, rising child poverty and the worst recession in 80 years make this claim increasingly difficult to sustain.

The choice then is increasingly clear. We can vote Yes and become a nation free to determine our own future or watch our living standards plummet further as attacks on public services and social support take hold as our reward for remaining part of the United Kingdom.