Socialist Slapdown

Response to ‘Welfare System has Failed Working Folk’ (Crewe Chronicle, Wed 12^th June).

I enjoyed Mick Robert’s letter in last week’s edition ‘Welfare System has Failed Working Folk’, for what he unwittingly wrote was a perfect description of how irrelevant the Labour Party has become.

The Labour Movement was once a very important Political Force in our country. Its achievements in Worker’s Rights during the Industrial Revolution – a time of tremendous and unprecedented social upheaval – should be applauded. However, most of the points raised by Mr Roberts illustrate perfectly, just how the Labour Party has become an organisation no longer motivated by the needs of honest, hard working people, but simply by its own Self-Preservation and Socialist Ideology.

He claims that the strain on the Welfare System is due to the ‘broader structural causes of need’. To understand this rather cryptic statement, one must understand Labour’s interpretation of ‘the needy’. To Labour, ‘the needy’ are not merely those less-fortunate individuals who through no fault of their own are unable to work, but anyone they can possibly get onto State Benefits.

This is Labour’s raison d’être. They believe the more people they can get ‘hooked on handouts’, the greater their vote. That’s why, under the Blair/Brown governments, the number of individuals in receipt of State Benefits increased from 24% to 39% of the population, with the welfare bill soaring from £55Bn to £112Bn over the same period (source: ukpublicspending.co.uk). This was despicable vote-buying of the worst kind, the bill for which we will all be paying for the best part of 20 years at the expense of economic growth and jobs.

All of which makes Mr Roberts’ subsequent comment about George Osborne’s ‘damaging economic policies’ completely incredulous. True, Mr Osborne’s policies are far from successful, but I credit the people of Crewe and Nantwich with the intelligence to understand that the causes of our huge budget deficit are the structural costs built-in by Gordon Brown’s welfare profligacy. Mr Roberts clearly does not.

It is telling that Mr Roberts speaks of ‘action on demeaning work’. Exactly which jobs does Mr Roberts consider ‘demeaning’? Perhaps if fewer of those falling under this socialist doctrine considered certain jobs ‘beneath them’, the welfare system would be sufficient to help those truly in need. In my opinion, no work is demeaning.

He also blames the strain on our welfare system on ‘widening inequality in our society’. We do live in an unequal society – this is due not to a lack of opportunity, but aspiration – itself a failure of the burgeoning Welfare State. After all, every child has the opportunity to go to school, work hard and do well. But some do not take this opportunity, having been raised with a ‘something for nothing’ culture of entitlement. The real solution here is ‘breaking the cycle’ through education and a cultural shift towards aspiration and hard work – not through the usual Labour plan of ‘throwing money at a problem’ by increasing benefits. This, I believe. Is Labour’s greatest betrayal of the honest, working people of the United Kingdom. As someone once said, “Socialism is fine – until you run out of other people’s money”.

I look forward to the day when genuine, hard working, people, who have, with the best of intentions voted for Labour in the past realise they have been sold a pup. No other party has done more to make life difficult for the working people of the United Kingdom.

For it was Labour that opened the floodgates to millions of unskilled migrants, taking jobs and depressing wages, it was Labour that slapped ineffective, ‘green’ taxes on industry, forcing what was left of our Heavy Manufacturing to move overseas, it was Labour that scrapped Grammar Schools, a tremendous vehicle of social mobility for working class boys and girls, it was Labour that introduced Tuition Fees, making it harder for students from working families to go to university, and it is Labour that still refuses to give the ordinary, working people of the UK their say on who runs our country in an EU Referendum.

Cllr. Stuart Hutton (UKIP).