Thursday 20 April 2017

How many of Jeremy Corbyn's policies do you actually disagree with?


A London School of Economics study into how Jeremy Corbyn is represented in the media found that only a paltry 11% of all newspaper articles about him bothered to accurately state a single one of his actual policies. In the hard-right Daily Mail and Express that figure was 0%.

Given this lack of unbiased political coverage it's not difficult to understand why so many people are so unfamiliar with Jeremy Corbyn's actual policies, and tend to judge him as if politics is some kind of vapid personality contest.

So here are some of the Jeremy Corbyn policies that the mainstream media really don't want to tell you about, so you can judge for yourself whether you like them or not.

Labour Party policies


Ban companies based in tax havens bidding for government contracts
It's astounding that this isn't the case already. How on earth could anyone even attempt to justify taxpayers' cash being paid to companies based in tax havens for the purpose of dodging tax?

£10 minimum wage for all workers over the age of 18
The UK is the only country in the developed world where workers' wages are declining in real terms, while the economy is actually growing. A £10 minimum wage would help to reverse this scenario, and it would also significantly reduce the cost of in-work benefits like tax credits and housing benefit (most of which goes to working families these days).

All rented accommodation to be fit for human habitation
Again, astounding that this isn't the case already, but in January 2016 the Tories (over 1/3 of whom are landlords) deliberately voted down a Labour Party amendment to their housing bill to ensure that all rented accommodation is fit for human habitation.

Renationalise the railways
This is a very popular policy that is supported by an overwhelming majority of the public. Do you support rail renationalisation too, or are you one of the minority who think that the current profiteer-administered shambles is acceptable?

Renationalise the NHS
The Tory party have been carving up the English NHS and distributing the pieces to the private sector, Jeremy Corbyn has pledged to reverse this process. Are you one of the 84% of people who thinks the NHS should be run as a not for profit public service, or the 7% who agree with the ongoing Tory privatisation agenda?

Free school meals
The policy of providing free school meals to all school children between the ages of 4 and 11 is based on evidence based research showing that universal free school meals lead to significantly improved grades. It will be paid for by ending the generous tax breaks (public subsidies) for the 7% of kids who go to private fee-paying schools.

Create a National Education Service
Jeremy Corbyn believes that education is a right, not a commodity. He wants to create an integrated National Education Service to ensure that education is freely available to anyone who needs it.

Scrap tuition fees
Thanks to the Tories (and their Lib-Dem enablers) UK students now face the most expensive tuition fees in the developed world for study at public universities, meaning students typically leave university with £50,000 of debt, and two thirds of them will never pay off their student debts. Labour would end this lunacy by getting rid of student fees.

Restore NHS Bursaries
One of the first things Theresa My did when she came to power was to scrap NHS bursaries for nurses and other NHS workers. This removal of financial support for nurses has caused a huge 10,000 decline in the number of applicants to nursing courses. This collapse in nursing recruitment would be bad enough in its own right, but in combination with a record increase in the number of EU nurses quitting the NHS, and a mind-boggling 92% fall in nursing recruitment from EU countries, the UK is clearly facing a massive NHS recruitment crisis. Labour would reverse this calamitous state of affairs by restoring NHS Bursaries for trainee nurses.


Increase the carers allowance
Labour are proposing to increase the Carers Allowance for the 1 million unpaid carers in the UK. This would be paid for by scrapping the Tories' Inheritance Tax cut for millionaires. Unpaid carers save the UK economy an estimated £132 million a year, and they're doing ever more work as a result of the £4.6 billion in Tory cuts to the social care budget.

Create a National Investment Bank
This is actually one of Jeremy Corbyn's best policies, but few people actually understand it. It's absolutely clear that allowing private banks to determine where money is invested ends up in huge speculative bubbles in housing and financial derivatives, while the real economy is starved of cash. A National Investment Bank would work by investing in things like infrastructure, services, businesses and regional development projects, and would end up becoming a kind of sovereign wealth fund for the UK.

End the public sector pay freeze
Under Tory rule UK workers suffered the longest sustained decline in real wages since records began. The public sector pay freeze contributed massively to this. You'd have to be economically illiterate to imagine that repressing public sector wages with below inflation pay rises for year after year would not exert downwards pressure on private sector wages too. Ending the public sector pay freeze would actually boost the economy by putting more money in people's pockets, meaning an increase in aggregate demand.


End sweetheart tax deals between HMRC and massive corporations

David Cameron (the son of a tax-dodger) repeatedly lied through his teeth about how serious he was about confronting tax-dodging, whilst allowing HMRC to concoct sweetheart deals with corporations like Google, Vodafone and Starbucks. One of the main reasons the corporate press are so strongly opposed to Jeremy Corbyn is that they know that unlike David Cameron, he's serious when he talks about clamping down on tax-dodging.

Stop major corporations ripping off their suppliers
Major corporations are withholding an astounding £26 billion through late payment, which is responsible for an estimated 50,000 small businesses going bust every year. The scale of this problem is so massive that it should be a national scandal, and Jeremy Corbyn is absolutely right to align himself with small businesses to defend their interests. 

Reverse the Tory corporation tax cuts
Since 2010 the Tories have cut the rate of corporation tax for major multinational corporations from 28% to just 17% (by 2020) meaning the UK has one of the lowest corporation tax rates in the developed world. The global average is 27% and the G7 average is 32.3%. Theresa May has already threatened to lower the corporation tax even further to turn post-Brexit Britain into a tax haven economy, Corbyn is proposing to do the opposite and increase corporation tax rates so they're more in line with the rest of the developed world.

Defend Human Rights
Theresa May has repeatedly expressed her intention to tear up Winston Churchill's finest legacy, the European Convention on Human Rights. Labour would oppose this Tory attack on our human rights.

Zero Hours Contracts ban
Almost a million UK workers are now on exploitative Zero Hours Contracts. Last year the New Zealand parliament voted to ban them, and Labour is proposing to do the same. Long-term employees and workers doing regular hours would be protected from Zero Hours Contract exploitation.

Holding the Tories to account over Brexit

Labour have said that they won't block Brexit, but they will seek to hold the Tories to account over it. A landslide Tory victory would be a disaster for the UK because it would allow the Tories to pursue the most right-wing pro-corporate anti-worker Brexit possible with almost no democratic scrutiny. The only way to make sure the Tories don't push a fanatically right-wing Brexit on the nation is to return a Labour government, or ensure that there are enough opposition MPs to hold them to account.

Housebuilding
Under the Tory government the level of UK housebuilding has slumped to the lowest levels since the 1920s, even though demand for housing is extremely high. Labour are guaranteeing to invest in a programme of house building, and committing to ensure that half of the new houses are social housing. This wouldn't just alleviate the housing crisis, it would also stimulate the economy by increasing aggregate demand.

Combat inequality
George Osborne's ideological austerity agenda resulted in the longest sustained decline in workers' wages since records began and condemned an additional 400,000 children to growing up in poverty, meanwhile the tiny super-rich majority literally doubled their wealth. Labour is pledging to reduce the inequality gap and introduce progressive policies to reduce the gap between the incomes of the highest and lowest paid. There is plenty of evidence to show that the least unequal societies are more economically successful places where the people are happier.

Conclusion

So out of these 20 Labour Party policies, how many do you actually strongly disagree with?

Footnote


This article attracted rather a lot more interest than I'd imagined (well over 1 million hits in 3 days!). One of the big questions people have been asking is how all of this would be paid for.

The answer is that quite a lot of the policies are actually investments that would pay for themselves in the long-term because they would stimulate more economic activity than the investment cost (see my articles on fiscal multiplication and the marginal propensity to consume to get a better idea of how). Other policies could easily be funded if we had a government that was actually serious about cracking down on tax-dodging, which costs the country vast amounts per year. Just ending sweetheart deals between HMRC and major multinationals would generate £billions, which would pay for stuff like restoring the NHS bursary many times over.

If anyone is genuinely worried about how stuff is going to be paid for, the first thing on their mind should of course be the impending threat of "no deal" Tory strop away from the Brexit negotiating table that the Tories have made the centrepiece of their so-called "negotiating strategy". If that happens the IFS have estimated a 6.3% -9.5% collapse in GDP, which would be a much more significant economic meltdown than the one that was caused by the 2007-08 global financial sector insolvency crisis (that our economy and our wages have still nowhere near recovered from). What do you think would happen to the tax take and the budget deficit if the economy tanked even worse than it did in 2009 thanks to the Tories' alarmingly woeful threat-based Brexit negotiation strategy resulting in the chaos of an economically ruinous cliff edge Brexit?




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52 comments:

Unknown said...

Can you post a list of the policy's .As in just the policy's

Anonymous said...

Don't trust Labour for a second.history says Labour has done Nothing for this country..

Anonymous said...

The NHS.

Mark said...

And what about all the other policy’s, ie to kiss Merkels ass and bow down to any eu law which includes allowing any immigrants no matter if he was a bat crazy killer, child molester or rapist, cos let’s face it, nobody knows the background of these people, you only have to look at the troubles in Germany to understand the downfalls, Vote Labour, Vote Dickheads

Unknown said...

To reply to Anonymous on the 8th of September - i.e. "Labour has done nothing for this country" who does this person think created The NHS, decriminalised homosexuality, introduced the national minimum wage, the equal pay act, introduced civil partnerships, the Good Friday agreement and created Sure start? Can you please let me know when you find out what the Tories have ever done for us?

Unknown said...

Just a few of achievements of new labour perfect by no means as we all know.

1. longest period of sustained low inflation since the 60s
2. Low mortgage rates
3. Introduces the national min wage and raised it to £5.52 ph
4. 14,000 more police
5. cut crime by 32 per cent
6. record levels of literacy and numeracy in schools
I could go on but we need a Labour government under Corbyn asap. If I was Corbyn's PR manager I would be putting his policies above everything else to the general public and how it is costed on every leaflet and post it through everyone's letter box again and again and again

Jack said...

There is a serious understatement error in the section about unpaid carers. It says carers 'save' the UK economy, not just the NHS, £132 millions. That should read at least £132 BILLIONS! (my emphasis)

Unknown said...

Would you really want a terrorist loving antisemit running the country. I am not a tory but what he is trying to do is overthrow an elected government and trying to install himself as a caretaker priminister

Anonymous said...

That is the single most retarded statement I've read all day.

Unknown said...

Grow up

Unknown said...

Grow up

ian said...

No they just ruined it. I voted Labour 30 years ago. NEVER AGAIN

Anonymous said...

By staying out of Schengen which incidentally is one of the many concessions we get from the EU you won't have to stress

Cazzy said...

You can’t call Tony Blair Labour... he was a con man who wave the labour banner but implemented Tory ideals

Unknown said...

How about voting Labour in see how they do. If they f..k everything up then go ahead and vote the disastrous Tories back in. To me its not the EU who are the enemy but the Tories and because of Brexit they are getting away with murder.

Unknown said...

Cazzy you can slag off Blair until the cows come home, but you can't argue with results the UK was doing fine under him. Corbyn in my opinion needs to be more business friendly with his policies. Like it or not we need people with money in the country along with the workers.

Anonymous said...

Those who say they will never vote labour again never have.
Those who voted for Blair have never voted labour all they have done is vote for an extension of Thatcher's government, after all she did say my greatest achievement was Blair and the new labour. So as I said you have never voted labour.

Janet Jarwood said...

Someone with sense. They are running JC down on TV now. Really gets me when all this government has done us destroy the country. What is the matter with people
Do they REALLY want more of the last 9 years.

Janet Jarwood said...

Please read up on JC. Who has received several peace prizes and was part of the GOOD FRIDAY AGREEMENT. Stop showing how ignorant you are. Do some research

Carol said...

Unknown your a idiot as Janet Harwood says. Do your research. 76

Anonymous said...

Luckily the National Forest was replanted 15 years ago with a fresh stock of £50 and £20 trees which are mature now and should start producing all the required money. (To speed things up they could go out and borrow billions instead.....which is exactly what they'll do

Janet Jarwood said...

Torys have run NHS into the ground. Let's hope you can all afford you ops and babies. You diabetes jabs. To name but a small portion of what the NHS is all about. Good luck

kevo said...

Sadly very true.

Unknown said...

Ian: Labour started the NHS...

Alice Coper said...

THIS IS NOT THE LABOUR PARTY OF OUR GRANDPARENTS. I'm working class, I dont resent those richer than me, those higher on the ladder. That is the politics of Champagne Labour... rich people telling the poor people "come on, let's go get those Very very rich bastards" its hypocrisy beyond belief.

"Fuck the rich" said McDonnell, and you all applauded, you FUCKING IMBECILES.

"how are you going to fund renationalistaion of the Railways and Utilities Johnny Boy?"

...."Erm.... we have private investors willing to buy into our dream"

Yep, righto... who in their right mind would trust John McDonnell with their money.

But a bankrupt Britain wont worry him, or Jezza, or Fatbott, or Starmer, Milne, Murray, linesman, Harman... they are THE ELITE...Untouchables

GTS said...

That’s what the Tories used isn’t it? You know, to bribe the DUP. Clown.

GTS said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Anonymous said...

how are they going to pay for all this? Don't say tax the rich, the rich will move their money out of the country, so the middle classes will pay and keep paying. The railways were terrible before they were nationalized, they are not perfect, but they are modern, clean and run well. Inflation under the Labour government was enormous. Why do people NOT on benefits need the government to pay for free school meals??? An unnecessary expense.The middle class working people will pay for this. JC will also be the most uneducated PM in history, he has been a career politician, never had a proper job, HE has earned millions from the state. He will take away ALL aspiration from people. Why should the state pay for university tuition? Graduates earn far more so they should pay for their own education, this will make them work harder, with more drive and direction.

Anonymous said...

"Some day I might be rich, and then people like me better watch their step!"

Unknown said...

agreed

SteveP said...

If you mean the vote of no confidence, the WHOLE HOUSE needs to vote in majority, not one person standing up and saying 'i'm taking control'
Oh, and the position is Prime Minister, the fact that you can't even type that correctly, shows that you shouldn't be commenting on shit you know nothing about.
It's also Antisemite, but what's an e between friends, keep taking them, it might help you

Barry de la Rosa said...

Is this post still up to date and relevant to the upcoming GE?

Unknown said...

If Thatcher made greed respectable, Blair made lying respectable. JC needs to get rid of the Blairites, starting with Tom Watson.

Anonymous said...

Do you mean an unelected PM, and following a vote of no confidence through the proper parliamentary process? If that had been the case,then Corbyn would have had every right, as leader of the opposition, to become caretaker PM. As for calling Corbyn a terrorist sympathiser and an anti-Semite, this has been debunked...in the case of the latter, he has fought racism in every form, his entire political career, so let's drop that old chestnut, eh!

Unknown said...

the people with money you think we need, only get that money by stealing it from ordinary people

Unknown said...

It is certainly out-of-date but some of the points are relevant today.

Unknown said...

Our current Con party have borrowed at an alarming rate - for more rapidly and disproportunately than any previous government - whilst the country has been in austerity - wheres the money??

Anonymous said...

Don't trust posh people running the government. Tories have ruined it enough! Plus how is it, they feck up Brexit every time. Just stick Labour in power for this occasion and see how that goes. For Pete's sake you have Boris Johnson in charge and he's as useful as a bulimic in an all you can eat buffet.

...... said...

I live in Germany. Its fine. Merkel is fine. No one kisses her ass. Most terrorismis by neo-nazis in fact not immigrants. The mi5 said even in uk most cases are now about right wing fascists. I'm british but disgusted how we hold on to racist ideology grown from an empire 3 generations ago, and disgusted how people treat Germans because of a war 2 generations ago. idiots. Just idiots. Live in 2019 for crying out aloud not 1945

Anonymous said...

fabulously misinformed

alexl said...

All of our current problems stem from the relationship between Thatcher and Reagan and their empowerment of the financial institutions(parasites)
a proper Socialist government has been prevented from getting into power by all manner of dirty tricks both here and "over the pond"
our class system and two tier parliament are antiquated and entirely undemocratic, far too many decisions made without public scrutiny and way too many "professional politicians"
these people do not represent us, nor do they have our collective interests at heart

Adrian said...

I said I wanted Vanilla and Strawberry and they gave me Vanilla and Chocolate. Heartbroken. Disillusioned. If they renationalise Brexit there might still be a fleeting chance I will get my biscuit

Unknown said...

Tuition fees. Brought in by Labour in 1998.

Anonymous said...

At what income amount does someone become an enemy? £100k, £150k, £200k? Inheritance tax at that amount (remember it includes all your assets like your family house) will in reality punish the people who save their money for their children rather than spend it on iPhones, expensive cars and, probably most relatable, multiple holidays abroad. These people can't afford to hire multiple accountants to hide their money, unlike the super rich who won't even be touched by this. Probably the most important thing that is a problem with Cornyn government is how it will negatively affect small and medium size businesses. Landlords will be hit with the right to buy scheme (think you might have forgot to include this?), which will mean they will have to offer first dibs to their tenants at probably a reduced rate. Not sure if corporation tax applies to these size of businesses but the business rates are absolutely massive at the moment and have already forced several businesses to close. This could be the last straw for many. I know that there is this thought at the moment that people who own businesses are fat cats but please remember that many have put their own life savings into setting up these companies and take the risk that they may lose it all while not knowing if they will get any income this month, whereas employees with a wage will get that amount of money coming in all the tkme they are employed there. Please don't get me wrong, I like many of the policies on there, renationalisation of the railway and NHS for example and I don't like any of the parties at the moment but as part of a family business trying to get going, a lot of these policies are really not brilliant. Also just a quick note on Brexit - we had a referendum on whether to stay or leave and the country voted to leave so that's what we need to do. Although I voted to remain, I now think we need to leave otherwise what's the point of democracy? We can't throw our toys out of the pram just because we didn't get our way. Also the EU isn't exactly a bed of roses, the expenses they claim makes our expenses scandal look very small indeed and there does seem to be a lot of corruption in there. There is a lot of echo chambering and absolute fury if someone doesn't agree with your views at the moment, so please don't get angry with this post and instead debate with me, I'm always ready to change my views ��

gslphoto said...

Facts: Labour have controlled the economy and deficit much better than Tories since the 50’s; control of immigrants with criminal records or with proven tendencies to illegal activities is and always has been under our own government’s control (not the EU); the government fails to collect around 32 billion pounds in taxes every year; most laws across the EU were either proposed by or agreed by the UK government and were not imposed upon us - particularly environmental laws, H&S and what would be new EU law on tax avoidance except if we leave the EU when the rich will have a field day. I don’t vote labour but these are all sensible policies, whatever you do don’t vote Tory.

Anonymous said...

WHAT ?? He led you to the biggest election defeat since the 1930's and still he claims he won...

Let me ask you a question: If JC (a clearly under educated, dull, angry, shouty little man) continues to shout the lie, does the lie become truth ? Or do you simply become a part of the lie ??

The British people have much to thank all members of Momentum for, along with all other democracy deniers who attempted to bully their way to victory. Pure socialism in action if ever we saw it.

Always remember: YOU are the reason why Labour was, is and will remain unelectable !!!

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