We must unite for our public services

By Maeve Cohen, Project Lead at the Social Guarantee

A recent study led by University of Glasgow and the Glasgow Centre for Population Health found that between 2012 and 2019, the austerity policies of the Coalition and Conservative governments had led to over 330,000 excess deaths. This number is truly horrifying. Worst of all, it is not the result of some natural disaster or unavoidable calamity, but the result of actions taken by well paid, powerful people and inflicted on the most vulnerable members of our society. 

"This study shows that in the UK a great many more deaths are likely to have been caused by UK government economic policy than by the Covid-19 pandemic" - Ruth Dundas, co-author of the study

This research is just one in a series of entirely predictable – and indeed long predicted – indicators of the cumulative effects of the steady erosion of an entire suite of essential services. No single thing caused these deaths: it was the culmination of cuts to housing, healthcare, social care, public transport routes, community spaces and early years provision, as well as to in-work and out-of-work incomes. 

The real impact of austerity

More examples of the mounting toll of austerity policies are recorded with ever-greater frequency. The ONS reported last month that the number of people withdrawing from the workforce due to long-term sickness has risen to the highest level on record, at 2.5 million people. This has been attributed to the pandemic and a collapsing NHS, but underlying causes undoubtedly include poor housing, precarity and mental ill health. Child poverty has increased, affecting almost a third of British children at 31% in 2019/20, up from 27% in 2010/11 and is only set to get worse as food and energy prices rise. Life expectancy in the UK has stalled for the first time in a century and in some instances fallen. The list goes on.  

It is clear that these sweeping cuts across multiple public services has had a serious and lasting effect on the wellbeing of British society and the economy. Yet voices on the left are worryingly quiet and fragmented about this. Where there were once united calls for ending austerity and restoring essential services, think tanks and charities are focussing increasingly on incomes and benefits. Of course, good wages and supportive benefits are important to social wellbeing but they are only a small part of the story. People would not be struggling so much if rents were not so high, if there were adequate, affordable public transport systems, if there were universal free or affordable childcare, if people were mentally and physically well because of a thriving NHS and social care system. We’d have a healthier, stronger population, if young people were stimulated and supported by a flourishing school system, if communities were sustained by social infrastructure in the form of libraries, parks and community groups. Individually, the effect of eroding an essential service is stark. Cumulatively, the effects are catastrophic. 

From the top down?

For too long the mantra of ‘trickle down economics’ has dominated economic policy. This is the idea that if we make it ever easier for business to make huge amounts of money, this money will trickle down to the rest of us. This theory is false. A recent report by the think tanks Common Wealth and the Institute for Public Policy Research showed that since the pandemic, shareholders of businesses have seen their dividends grow significantly more than wages. These excess profits have not been reinvested in the economy to support us all. Instead, they are spent on share buybacks (where firms buy their own shares to keep demand, and therefore prices, high) which have more than quadrupled from £3.4bn in 2015 to an astounding £16.2bn in the four years to 2019. Rather than properly taxing this money and using it to restore our public services, the government is proposing taxing ordinary people more and carrying out further cuts to essential services which have already been cut to the bone. 

The fight back starts here

This cannot be allowed to happen. People and organisations across the movement for people over profit need to create a unified message, countering this attack on ordinary people to deliver tax cuts for the rich. The message must go well beyond uplifting benefits in line with inflation. It must demand a restoration and expansion of our collectively owned public services. It must demand shared ownership of services and universal access to life’s essentials, sending a message that profiteering is not welcome in our children’s homes, hospitals, schools or utility companies. It must demand the decarbonisation of our economy by collectively insulating houses, generating renewable energy and building sustainable public transport systems - and also by investing in and expanding the already low-carbon sectors such as health, education and social care. 

These are the essentials that we all depend on. To build a thriving, sustainable economy in which the needs of people are met we must have a well-educated, healthy and secure society with access to a suite of public services that meet the needs of us all, rather than making profits for the few. This does not come by giving more money to the rich. It comes from building a Social Guarantee for us all.