Front line in the class war

Child Poverty in Leicestershire & Rutland and Leicester City

Leicester Anarchist Communists note from an article in the 11th January Leicester Mercury that Leicestershire County Council, in order to save £3.8 million, is set to shut down over half of the county's Children & Family Centres - that's 25 out of 40 of those facilities used by those families most in need. In a county where at last estimate (Dec 2015) at least 12,700 children (that's over 15% of those under 18) were deemed to be living in poverty, it's hard not to be appalled by the level of callousness.

Tory austerity and Tory County Council though, innit, some might say and while we would agree that Tories are indeed a vile, callous bunch, at some point or other, councils of whatever political stripe have all been guilty of similar behaviour at various times - and Leicester City Council (Labour) has been no stranger to making cuts to services for the most needy. Incidentally, more recent research on child poverty within the City boundaries, according to the Leicestershire Child Poverty Commission, states that "26,000 children and young people are growing up in poverty in Leicester."  That's more than a staggering 30% of children and young people.

This all becomes even more obscene when you realise that not only is Leicestershire far from being one of the nation's poorest counties (Uncle Wikipedia says it's actually the 18th richest), it's also home to people like (sorry Foxes fans) Vichai Srivaddhanaprabha, currently worth £2.8 billion; John Bloor (of John Bloor investments), worth £1.45 billion; Will Adderly and family (Dunelm Group), worth £1.2 billion... and then there's a veritable shitload of millionaires in tow, starting with Peter and Sir Roger De Haan, worth a cool 900 million quid. We say 'worth' but in terms of their contributions to the general betterment of humanity, this lot really aint worth shit.

The problem, of course, is not whether it's Tory, Labour or some other chumps running the council (or central government, for that matter), the problem is capitalism itself. And the shutting down of such centres is just all part and parcel of a system that exploits workers and shits on the poorest most. We're talking about an ongoing class war, and this, coupled with things like continual wage restraint, massive rent rises, the lack of social housing, the introduction of Universal Credit and general attacks on those receiving benefits... these are all battles in this war that only one side appears to be fighting at the minute: them, the rich, the government, the boss class. But we really need to wise up and start defending ourselves by coming together at work, in our communities, with our fellow tenants to organise and fight back.

By the way, in a final messed up irony, to save that £3.5 million, Leicestershire County Council might end up having to pay back £5.8 million of grants already received from central government as a result of shutting down these centres! You really could not make it up.

Sources:
Leicester Mercury on children centres closing
End Child Poverty website - poverty in your area
Leicester Child Poverty Commission
Richest counties - Wikipedia
Mercury - Leicestershire rich list 2017

Fat Cat Thursday - morning of shame

Clichéd fat cat capitalist, not such a cliché then

The poorest sections of the working class continue to bear the brunt of capitalist austerity while the rate of exploitation increases and levels of poverty become ever more pronounced - especially with the catastrophic effects of Universal Credit here in the UK. 

Still, it’s not bad for everyone. Research by the Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development (CIPD) and the High Pay Centre shows that, on average, chief executives of FTSE 100 companies are paid around £898 per hour – that’s 256 times what apprentices earn on the minimum wage. If that’s not sickening enough, how about the fact that last Thursday morning (now known as ‘Fat Cat Thursday’) the UK’s highest paid bosses actually ‘earned’ more before lunchtime than the average UK worker earns in the whole year! In other words, the median wage for chief executives of FTSE 100 companies is around £3.45m a year… that’s 120 times the UK average full-time wage of £28,758.

While this Guardian article contains further horrifying statistics for Fat Cat Thursday, as anarchist communists we have to say we are not really surprised by this kind of behaviour from the most exploitative sections of the boss class. After all, it's what the capitalist system's all about. What is more surprising, however, is how people can still continue to swallow myths like 'we're all in it together' and 'the national interest' when, in reality, the national interest is, by definition, what's of interest (and profitable) to the bosses. So it goes without saying that we, as a class, need to totally reject the myth that workers have anything in common with these parasitic leeches if we ever want to see any change for the better in this world.

See Nation or Class meeting info below.

Because they were poor - the Grenfell fire

This article was written by a member of London AF who is involved with housing activism in the City. Published in the London AF bulletin, Rebel City.  

Angry Londoner writes:

"The people who died and lost their homes - this happened to them because they are poor"
Akala, rapper and poet, local resident.

“Regeneration is a euphemism for ethnic and class cleansing”
Kensington resident and writer Ishmahil Blagrove.

GUILTY: Boris Johnson. When Mayor of London he put through cuts including the closure of 10 fire stations and the loss of 552 firefighters jobs despite pre-election promises not to do so. When questioned over this at the Greater London Assembly he said:” Get Stuffed”. The loss to the fire services meant a slower response time to the fire, with fire teams having to be called in from outside London.

GUILTY: Kensington and Chelsea Council. They repeatedly ignored warnings for years from residents about fire hazards. They attempted to close down a blogger, Francis O’Connor, member of the Grenfell Action Group (GAG) after he warned about fire hazards at Grenfell. They sent a lawyer to threaten him, which he ignored. Nicholas Paget-Brown, leader of the council, attended a private dinner to which he was invited by organizers of the MIPIM (property developers’ event) conference in 2015. The council has had plans to cleanse the residents and build luxury flats in the neighbourhood for the last three years. Now Paget-Brown is trying to put blame on the residents by falsely saying that they objected to water sprinklers.

GUILTY: Kensington and Chelsea Tenants Management Organisation. The “arm’s length” body set up by Kensington and Chelsea Council to manage Grenfell block ignored tenants’ warnings. It was handed £11 million by the Council to manage the block and in 2015-2016 its bosses got a grand total of £650,794 in salaries! As GAG wrote: “We believe that the KCTMO have ensured their ongoing survival by the use of proxy votes at their Annual General Meeting that see them returned with a mandate of 98% in favour of the continuation of their inept and highly dangerous management of our homes” and that “It is our conviction that a serious fire in a tower block or similar high density residential property is the most likely reason that those who wield power at the KCTMO will be found out and brought to justice! The Grenfell Action Group believe that the KCTMO narrowly averted a major fire disaster at Grenfell Tower in 2013 when residents experienced a period of terrifying power surges that were subsequently found to have been caused by faulty wiring. We believe that our attempts to highlight the seriousness of this event were covered up by the KCTMO with the help of the RBKC Scrutiny Committee who refused to investigate the legitimate concerns of tenants and leaseholders.” (this was written in November 2016!) KCTMO was given a “deficiency notice” last year by the London fire brigade after an audit at another of its properties.

GUILTY: Gavin Barwell. Now Theresa May’s chief of staff,  the then Housing Minister  in 2013 promised to review part B of the Building Regulations 2010,  relating to fire safety, but the review never happened. This was after the fire at another tower block, Lakanal House in Southwark in 2009 that killed six people. Instead housing ministers have sat on it for four years!

GUILTY: Brandon Lewis. Another Tory Housing Minister who sat on information about fire risks at blocks like Grenfell because it would “discourage building”. He waved away suggestions about installation of water sprinklers in 2014 saying it was “all red tape”.

GUILTY: The Conservative government itself and back bench Tory MPS who voted against a motion to make “homes fit or human habitation” in 2016 with a clause to undertake regular electrical checking. Among these were 72 MPs who are also landlords, including the present Police and Fire Minister Nick Hurd. The then local government minister Marcus Jones said: it "would result in unnecessary regulation and cost to landlords".

But GUILTY most of all is the whole class system, capitalism itself, that for decades now has unleashed  the policies of neoliberalism on the working class, policies of the unbridled market,  policies of austerity, policies of vicious attacks on social services and what is the robbing of the poor to make the wealthy even wealthier. This system should be sentenced to death.

Pilgrim Tucker from Grenfell Action Group on Newsnight

Grenfell support website