Category Archives: Economics

Stonewall forget their radical roots (again)

Posted on by symonhill

Is there no limit to the number of exploitative and violent institutions that Stonewall is prepared to endorse? Having already made awards to the likes of Goldman Sachs and the Royal Navy, Stonewall yesterday gave prizes to Ernst & Young, Barclay’s and MI5 for their supposedly gay-friendly employment practices.

Stonewall describe themselves as “the lesbian, gay and bisexual charity” (although many bisexual people dispute the description, arguing that Stonewall’s overwhelming concern is with gay and lesbian people). I have no doubt that Stonewall genuinely do a lot of good work. They have played an important part in raising equality issues in the media and in Parliament, tackling homophobic bullying and working for changes in the law.

Sadly, however, their campaigns are hampered by their failure to link their struggle with other issues of equality and justice. Not only are they rather cosy with elements of the establishment, but by giving awards based on absurdly narrow criteria they imply that there is no link between working for LGB people’s rights and promoting equality and justice in other areas. Their awards condone and celebrate some of the most unethical organisations in the country.

It is, of course, a good thing for an organisation to treat LGB people the same as straight people in recruitment and employment. But Stonewall’s awards seem to take no account of whether an organisation is a good employer in other ways. It seems it’s OK for them to treat their staff appallingly, as long as they mistreat their straight staff as well as their LGB staff. The Royal Navy, like the other armed forces, is exempted by law from a great deal of employment legislation. Its employees may not join trades unions or leave after a reasonable notice period. Giving them an award for employment practices is as absurd as it is offensive.

Stonewall also seem unwilling to take account of the purpose and practices of the organisations they reward. Ernst & Young’s promotion of tax avoidance helps wealthy individuals and corporations to steal millions from the rest of us at a time when this money is desperately needed. Barclay’s perpetuate a banking system that ensures an unjust distribution of the world’s resources and helps to keep power in the hands of the rich.

The core purpose of the armed forces is to engage in acts of violence. Not all their members are directly violent, and many of them are decent, compassionate people when in other contexts. But we should not be naïve or ignore the reality. MI5 is an extension of the violent, hierarchical and secretive practices of militarism.

In strugglnig aganist homophobia, I suggest that it is important to recognise that heteronormativity has been used by capitalism – either consciously or unconsciously – as a means of control. It has been linked to very narrow understandings of “family” that encourage people to be loyal to their own group of people, rather than compassionate towards the whole of humanity.

Of course, it is quite legitimate that there should be different views about war and economics within movements for queer freedom. I do not expect everyone to agree with me. Ethical considerations are, by their nature, very complex and very messy. Nonetheless, it is is reasonable to expect that a group of people campaigning for equality in one area should consider equality in other areas. Stonewall have this week undermined their own message by deliberately ignoring this principle.

Occupying Royal Holloway

Posted on by symonhill

This evening I have had the privilege of speaking with students at Royal Holloway College in the University of London. They today began an occupation of their college, camping outside the Principal’s office and calling on him to oppose the government’s agenda for higher education.

I gave two talks at the college. The first, which was planned weeks ago, was a talk about my walk of repentance for homophobia. I’d been invited by the Students’ Union, Chaplaincy and Catholic Society. It was great to have an engaged and diverse audience, with interesting and challenging questions from (among others) a Muslim and at least two Catholics and members of the college’s LGBT Society.

The second talk was much more spontaneous. Some of the students involved in the occupation, which began this afternoon, asked me to go and speak to them. I was honoured. I wasn’t sure what they wanted me to say, but as they gathered round in the corridor, I spoke about my delight at the outbreak of active nonviolence over the last year. I encouraged them to resist the lies and misconceptions that would be spread about them and shared some thoughts and experience. As with the people at the first talk, I also had much to learn from the questions and comments with which they responded.

I was inspired by the enthusiasm, sense and detailed commitment of these people.

Students listened to each other, including on occasions when they did not agree. They seemed to be working well together to organise things effectively. They have allocated one room (the Principal’s Meeting Room) as a quiet study area, where students who have essays to write or research to do can go and work in silence. There was a steady stream of people with books and laptops going in and out. There seems to be a careful allocation of space. There was a quieter area dedicated for sleeping. Bins are divided for paper recycling, plastic recycling and general rubbish.

The diversity of students present was a challenge to the assumption that student activists are a small minority of eccentrics who get no real interest from the main student body. There appeared to be a gender and racial balance and the diversity of clothing did not live up to stereotypes of activist hippies.

The two talks I gave this evening were about different subjects, but the links between them are becoming ever clearer to me. Sexual ethics and economic ethics are closely linked. Tackling homophobia and resisting economic injustice are both part of a wider struggle to challenge a world in which people are encouraged to relate to each other on the basis of power, prejudice, money or convention. As a Christian, I believe we are called to relationships – whether personal or political – based on love, justice and mutuality. This is a challenge to both legalism and selfishness.

I am often accused of being too optimistic, particularly about politics. But I find it hard to imagine my reaction if someone had told me after last year’s general election that there would be an outbreak of active nonviolence in the coming year and a half. If they had told me that people would peacefully occupy the shops of tax-dodging corporations, that student activists would occupy universities across the UK in protest at tuition fees and that there would be a global movement of nonviolent occupations targeting financial centres, I would probably have laughed in their face.

In some ways, there are many reasons to be pessimistic about the future. Economies are in crisis across Europe. The UK government is responding with a vicious assault on public services and the welfare state.

But as I sat in that corridor at Royal Holloway tonight, I was reminded that there is another way. That the government’s assault on the working class and lower middle class is being met with resistance. That people from Cairo to Wall Street have inspired the world to stand up to injustice. That the power of money and markets will never understand or suppress the power of love manifested in active nonviolence.

No longer can radical campaigns be dismissed as the preserve of eccentric minorities. The breadth of support for Occupy Royal Holloway was very clear. While I was there, the Roman Catholic Chaplain spoke and offered his solidarity. For me, one of the most encouraging comments came from a security guard, as he wandered over to listen to the discussions. He told us he was glad to be working the evening shift because “I wouldn’t have missed this for the world”.

Christian solidarity with Occupy London

Posted on by symonhill

A number of groups have now signed a statement of Christian solidarity with the Occupy London movement. I’m delighted to say that the statement has been welcomed by both Christians and non-Christians involved in the occupations near the London Stock Exchange.

Signatories so far are Ekklesia, Christianity Uncut and the London Catholic Worker, although we’re confident that others will join in soon. The statement has been welcomed on the Occupy London website.

The statement can be read below.

 

Christian solidarity with the ‘Occupy London’ movement 

As Christians, we stand alongside people of all religions and none who are resisting economic injustice with active nonviolence. We offer our greetings to people engaged in occupations of financial centres throughout the world.

We seek to witness to the love and justice of God, proclaimed by Jesus Christ. Jesus said that he had come to “set free the oppressed”. His gospel is good news for all people. It is a challenge to all structures, systems, practices and attitudes that lead people to exploit and oppress their fellow human beings.

The global economic system divides people one from another and separates humanity from creation. It perpetuates the wealth of the few at the expense of the many. It fuels violence and environmental destruction. It is based on idolatrous subservience to markets. We cannot worship both God and money.

We are inspired by Jesus, who protested against exploitative traders and moneychangers in the Jerusalem Temple. Christianity began as a grassroots protest movement. Nonviolent direct action can play an important and ethical role in resisting injustice and achieving change.

We stand in solidarity with the ‘Occupy London’ movement and regret that they have not been able to make their protest closer to the London Stock Exchange. We applaud their commitment to co-operating with St Paul’s Cathedral and to ensuring that their camp is safe for everyone in the vicinity. We were pleased by the cathedral’s initial welcome to the camp and hope that difficulties between the occupiers and the cathedral can be speedily resolved, keeping the focus on the need to challenge the financial injustices perpetuated by the City of London.

Would Jesus kick the ‘Occupy London’ protesters off the St Paul’s Cathedral grounds?

Posted on by symonhill

I wrote a piece for the Guardian on this issue on Thursday (20 October). It can be read online at http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2011/oct/20/occupy-london-st-pauls-christianity. This was before St Paul’s Cathedral had closed and asked protesters to leave.

These dodgy practices go way beyond Fox and Werrity

Posted on by symonhill

It’s happened at last. Liam Fox, one of the most gung-ho militarists ever to occupy the post of Defence Secretary, has returned to the backbenches. All the excuses and half-truths his supporters could come up with have not saved him. But his departure will be largely pointless if we don’t learn a great deal from the Werrity scandal. When it comes to dodgy practices involving arms lobbyists and the Ministry of Defence, Adam Werrity is only the tip of the iceberg.

Adam Werrity appears to have lobbied Fox on behalf of arms-related companies without civil servants present. Whether the presence of civil servants would have made any difference is open to debate. The MoD’s tendency to lobby for the interests of arms dealers is now widely recognised. Labour’s shadow trade minister Wilf Stevenson (a member of the House of Lords) referred to it only last month, describing the situation as “bonkers”.

There is a revolving door between government and the arms trade, allowing a string of former ministers, civil servants and generals to retire to lucrative roles on the boards of arms companies. In 2006, multinational arms company BAE Systems used its influence on Tony Blair to ensure that they were effectively placed above the law, as Blair pressured the Serious Fraud Office into dropping a criminal investigation into BAE’s Saudi deals. Former Foreign Secretary Robin Cook wrote in his memoirs that the head of BAE had “the key to the garden door at Number Ten”.

On Sunday, it will be five years since I joined hundreds of other campaigners to surround the central London offices of the Defence Export Services Organisation (DESO), a unit of the MoD that promoted private arms companies. In a blatant example of a conflict of interest, DESO’s boss received both a civil service salary and a “top-up” payment from the arms industry.

DESO’s closure was announced by Gordon Brown’s government in 2007, following a long-running campaign by the Campaign Against Arms Trade (CAAT), the Fellowship of Reconciliation and other groups. The arms industry reacted with fury. They lobbied to ensure that DESO’s replacement was only slightly weaker. DESO’s functions were transferred to UK Trade and Investment (UKTI), a unit of the Department for Business that promotes British exports. UKTI now employs more staff in its arms section than in all civil sections combined – even though arms make up only 1.5% of UK exports.

This resignation is not enough. We need an end to the sort of practices demonstrated by Liam Fox and Adam Werrity. We need a thoroughgoing, genuinely independent inquiry, not only into the MoD but into all government relations with the arms industry.

This is about power. It is widely understood that arms dealers are helping to suppress human rights around the world with their supply of weapons. It is vital to realise that they are also undermining democracy in Britain with their excessive and corrupting influence at the heart of government.

The parallel universe of David Cameron

Posted on by symonhill

Welcome to the parallel universe of David Cameron. It is a world in which the Tories stand up for the poor, lead the fight against dictatorship and stop people from being given benefits on demand. It is a world that exists in a conference hall in Manchester this week, in a few daily papers the rest of the time, and in the less well-informed parts of the right-wing blogosphere. It has nothing in common with the world that most of us live in.

The real story of David Cameron’s speech is the blunder that saw him removing his comments about credit card debt at the last minute. It appears to have taken his advisers a while to realise that being lectured on managing your personal finances by a multi-millionaire would not go down well with people struggling to make ends meet. Nor would the prospect of being told to give money to banks by politicians who have already bailed them out with billions of pounds of our money.

In terms of what Cameron did say, it is difficult to know where to start in pointing out the inaccuracies and half-truths. On at least one occasion, he told a straightforward lie. He said that people receiving disability benefits were ‘Not officially unemployed, but claiming welfare, no questions asked.’

What are these mythical benefits that are given to people without asking questions? My father was on disability benefits throughout the nineties. Many friends of mine have been on them since. All of them had not only to answer strings of questions but undergo tests and interviews, some of them ridiculously over-the-top, that in some cases made their health worse.

Cameron said, ‘Now we’re asking those questions’. He failed to mention that Atos, the company contracted to ‘ask the questions’ – and to re-assess people for ability to work – has done its job so badly that around 40% of appeals have been upheld. Atos’ approach makes clear that the government is interested in throwing as many people off benefits as possible.

Then there were Cameron’s comments on Gaddafi, for whose overthrow he appeared to take personal responsibility. The people of Libya might feel that they had something to do with it too. Cameron said that Labour were saying sorry for ‘sucking up to Gaddafi’ but nor for what ‘really’ mattered. The implication is that siding with Gaddafi is not a major problem. This would explain why Cameron’s government attempted to sell sniper rifles to the Gaddafi regime only weeks before the Libyan uprising began.

Cameron re-announced the government’s consultation on same-sex marriage. This was announced two weeks ago by Equalities Minister Lynne Featherstone. Indeed, a consultation had already been announced and Featherstone was effectively confirming that it had been postponed. She promised legal recognition of same-sex civil marriage by 2015. Throwing people off benefits can be done overnight, but marriage equality apparently takes a minimum of four years.

The more I read of Cameron’s speech, the more sickened I felt. But none of it quite compared to a comment made yesterday by Iain Duncan Smith, the Work and Pensions Secretary. He claimed that the Conservative Party are ‘the party of the poor’.

This is the party of the poll tax, privatisation, mass unemployment and the great social housing sell-off. This is the party that is now leading an assault on the working class and lower middle class with policies that lead to increased homelessness, fewer jobs, lower pensions, worse public services and the abolition of benefits vital to disabled people.

The Tory Party’s core purpose has never varied over the last three hundred years. It exists to promote the interests of the rich. I’m sure that the Conservative Party includes compassionate individuals who genuinely believe that they are working for the best interests of society as a whole. But as institution, this is not how the Tory Party has worked. The Tories have opposed every major progressive policy ever introduced, from old age pensions at the beginning of the twentieth century, to the National Health Service in the 1940s, to the minimum wage fifty years later.

But Cameron and Duncan Smith are right about one thing: Labour is not the party of the poor. Labour presided over an increase in inequality. The ConDems are simply going further. Working class and lower middle class people are increasingly unrepresented by all three establishment parties. Fortunately, we don’t have to rely on these parties. Progressive political change does not start with politicians, but with ordinary people like us. It’s time to remember our own power.

The reality of BAE’s job cuts

Posted on by symonhill

I don’t claim to be an expert at making political predictions. Some of my predictions have been woefully off-course. But yesterday I made what must surely be the most precise political prediction of my life.

Speaking about the arms trade at a fringe meeting at the Labour Party conference, I was asked about the impact on jobs if the UK stopped exporting arms. I replied that even if arms exports are not reduced at all, arms industry jobs would gradually disappear from Britain, as companies such as BAE move employment to India and elsewhere. Later in the day, BAE confirmed nearly 3,000 job losses in the UK.

The redundancies are already being blamed on the government’s military cuts. The reality is that cuts to the military budget (or the “defence budget”, as its euphemistically known) have been relatively slight when compared to the coalition’s swingeing attacks on public services and the welfare state.

Furthermore, BAE have got form for being misleading about employment. When they signed a major deal with India last year, they said it would protect jobs at their Brough plant. Within months, they were announcing job losses at Brough. In 2006, when arms dealers were lobbying to end a criminal investigation into BAE, they claimed that the latest Saudi arms deal would provide 16,000 jobs in the UK (and both the Daily Mail and the Daily Telegraph put the figure at 50,000). Once the deal was signed, BAE cynically announced that most of the jobs would be based in Saudi Arabia, with very few new jobs in the UK.

In this context, it would not be a surprise to hear an announcement from BAE pretty soon about the creation of new jobs in India or the USA. If this happens, it would be naive to think that this had no connection with the job losses in Britain.

There is no future in the arms industry. Apologists for the arms trade try to justify it by speaking of the number of jobs it creates (a tactic also used by supporters of the transatlantic slave trade over 200 years ago). In reality, the arms industry is subsidised with about £700million of taxpayers’ money every year. Future generations will look back in disbelief, unable to understand why, when faced with the horrors of climate change, we chose to throw millions into arms production. We could be using those millions, and the skills of thousands of British workers, to research and develop renewable energy and technologies that can help us to tackle the physical, economic and security threats resulting from climate change. Let’s start by retraining the workers that BAE have so callously thrown on the dole.

To read more on arms trade issues, please visit the Campaign Against Arms Trade website.

The Labour Party and the arms trade

Posted on by symonhill

Yesterday, I was pleased to be able to speak on the arms trade at a fringe meeting at the Labour Party annual conference in Liverpool. The meeting was organised by the Christian Socialist Movement (CSM). The text of my talk was as follows (I deviated slightly from this text at times).  

It’s great to be here. Many thanks to the Christian Socialist Movement for hosting this event and many thanks to all of you for coming.  

I’m Symon Hill. I’m first and foremost an activist. I’m also associate director of the Christian thinktank Ekklesia. And I’m a member of the steering committee of the Campaign Against Arms Trade. I’m not a member of the Labour Party or the Christian Socialist Movement, although I am a Christian and a socialist. Those two words describe my approach to politics and to life.  

As a socialist and as a Christian, I believe that change is possible and that ordinary people like you and me can bring it about. I’m inspired by Jesus, who through his teachings and actions promoted a radical approach to human relationships with principles that we might now call equality and active nonviolence. I would not be a Christian if I did not believe that Jesus’ teachings were realistic. 

So let’s be real. Two weeks ago I was protesting outside the London arms fair. The government had invited some of the world’s most brutal regimes to meet arms dealers in east London. Earlier this year, ministers revoked arms exports licences to Bahrain after the Bahraini regime used its weapons against its own people. But despite this, a delegation from Bahrain was invited to turn up at the London arms fair. 

As many of us protested outside the arms fair, Liam Fox was making a speech inside. Fox told the arms dealers that he was “proud” of the UK’s arms industry – or the “defence industry” as he euphemistically calls it. Fox talked about how many jobs the arms industry provides.  

I would like to share a piece of advice that’s always helped me: Beware of Tories talking about jobs. Conservative ministers are not usually motivated by a desire to tackle unemployment. When they justify something by the jobs it provides, it’s time to be suspicious.  

So let’s look at some of the facts. 

Firstly, we have the physical effects of the arms trade. It is often argued that if people want to fight a war, they will find the means to do so. There is some truth in this. But it would be naïve to suggest that the arms industry is simply supplying a need. Violence begets violence. Violence also begets profits.

As the world watched with excitement a few months ago, the Arab Spring saw millions of amazingly brave and inspiring people standing up to tyranny. It quickly emerged that many of the regimes concerned had been supplied with weapons from the UK. When the Bahraini regime invited the Saudi army in to help suppress peaceful protest, the Saudi forces arrived with armoured vehicles made in Newcastle.

Furthermore, many of the people who die as a result of the arms trade are not killed directly with the weapons involved. Corruption is inherent in the arms trade. And as Hilary Benn has put it, “corruption kills”.

For example, the multinational arms company BAE Systems is alleged – and if there are any libel lawyers present, I hope that word will be sufficient – to have bribed Tanzanian officials to spend public money on equipment that the country clearly did not need. The money could have been spent tackling poverty or providing healthcare.

The economic effects of the arms trade are also bad for Britain. Have a look at UK Trade and Investment (UKTI), a unit of Vince Cable’s Department for Business. UKTI is responsible for promoting British exports. They devote more staff to the section promoting arms exports than to all civil sectors combined. But arms make up only 1.5% of UK exports.

Only about 0.2% of British jobs are dependent on arms exports. Every one of those people has a right to be considered. Nobody’s livelihood is irrelevant and I refuse to discuss any economic question without considering the people it will affect. I grew up in the eighties under Thatcher with my father on the dole. I know what unemployment does to people and I wouldn’t wish it on my worst enemy.

Apologists for the arms industry seem to have a much more more laid-back approach to unemployment. As controversy raged over BAE’s Saudi arms deals in 2006, BAE’s friends at the Daily Mail and Daily Telegraph made increasingly wild statements about the number of jobs that would be created by the latest Saudi arms deal. The original suggestion had been 11,000 jobs across Europe. Soon, it was said there would be 16,000 jobs in Britain alone. This magically rose to 50,000 and the highest figure I saw was 100,000. Almost as soon as the deal was signed, BAE announced that most of the jobs would be based in Saudi Arabia, with few new jobs in the UK.

The arms industry receives around £700 million in taxpayer-funded subsidies every year. This is partly through the funding of research and development. Future generations will look back in amazement, unable to understand why, when faced with the threat of runaway climate change, we subsidised jobs in the arms industry instead of putting money into renewable energy and other technologies to tackle the environmental, economic and security threats that climate change is bringing.

Our economy is distorted by the arms industry. This is because our democracy is distorted by the arms industry. Sixteen years ago, I sat in Labour Party conference and heard Robin Cook promise that under a Labour government, there would be no arms sold to regimes that used them for internal repression or external aggression. I’m sure that many of you share my sadness that this change never came about. In his diaries, Robin Cook lays bare the grotesque influence wielded by the arms industry. He says that he never saw Tony Blair take a decision that would inconvenience BAE Systems.

The arms industry’s influence within government means that exports regulations are full of loopholes and worded so vaguely that they allowed Cameron’s government to attempt to sell sniper rifles to Gaddafi only months before the Libyan uprising. This influence means that the UK government can stand up at the United Nations and back an Arms Trade Treaty so flimsy that ministers have assured British arms companies that it will make no difference to them.

Many people, both within the Labour Party and beyond it, were inspired by Robin Cook’s commitment in 1995. We need a renewed commitment to ending arms exports to oppressive regimes. This cannot be done by regulations alone. A future Labour government, if truly committed to democracy, would need to reduce the power of the arms dealers by tackling the structures and cultures that give them so much influence. Robin Cook wrote in his diaries that the chairman of BAE Systems had “the key to the garden door at Number Ten”. We need to get the locks changed.

———

Many thanks to CSM and CAAT for inviting me to give this talk at their fringe meeting. The meeting was chaired by CSM’s director, Andy Flanagan. The other speakers were Wilf Stevenson (Shadow Trade Minister), Alan Storkey (Christian theologian and economist) and Helen Goodman (Shadow Justice Minister). Please click here for a news report on the event.

“Rogue trader” went to a Quaker school

Posted on by symonhill

Much has been written today about Kweku Adoboli, the “rogue trader” who lost £1.3bn of other people’s money. One fact that has received little attention is that he went to a Quaker school.

According to the Daily Telegraph, Adoboli attended Ackworth School in West Yorkshire. The Telegraph doesn’t mention that it’s a Quaker institution, but it does mention that it charges £19,635 per year (only slightly below the average annual income in the UK).

If Wikipedia is to be believed, Adoboli was not only a student at the school, but was “Head Boy” from 1997-98.

The UK’s “Quaker schools” are nearly all privately owned, fee-paying institutions and the vast majority of their students are not Quakers. They provoke bitter debate amongst British Quakers, many of whom object to the name of their religion being associated with anything as elitist and divisive as a private school.

I understand that some of them offer bursaries for students with Quaker parents, meaning that at least a few of their students are not from wealthy backgrounds. But this only adds an element of religious discrimination on top of the socio-economic discrimination inherent in their nature.

I respect the fact that some Quaker parents struggle with the ethical issues involved before deciding to send their children to Quaker schools. What I find alarming is how many Quakers are prepared to robustly defend Quaker private schools while otherwise being apparently committed to principles of equality which lie at the root of Quakerism.

I am not of course suggesting that Ackworth School should be held responsible for Adoboli’s dealings. Far more blame must attach to the financial industry and the politicians who won’t stand up to it. It is not really accurate to describe Adoboli as a “rogue trader”, when the whole investment banking sector is effectively a rogue trade.

Nonetheless, I hope this incident will trigger renewed debate about the realities of Quaker schools and give British Quakers a wake-up call about education.

I have been involved with Quakers, to varying degrees, for thirteen years. I now attend both a Baptist Church and a Quaker Meeting, as well as worshipping in other contexts. Quakerism is a significant part of the way I understand my Christian faith.

Since becoming involved in Quakers, I have been encouraged and inspired by the number of Quakers, and Quaker bodies, taking a radical stand on issues of peace and justice. And I have been enormously frustrated by the lack of radicalism that is apparent whenever it comes to questioning Quaker institutions themselves. For a movement founded on convictions about the free movement of the Holy Spirit, Quaker institutions can be unbelievably hard to change.