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| Volume 55 Number 8, April 5, 2025 | ARCHIVE | HOME | JBCENTRE | SUBSCRIBE |
The Chancellor of the Exchequer, Rachel Reeves, presented her "surprise" spring budget to the House of Commons on March 26 [1]. She alleged that the government's task had been to "provide security for working people. And to deliver a decade of national renewal." What this "security" and "national renewal" meant was soon revealed when she justified the government's war budget by saying: "Now our task is to secure Britain's future ... in a world that is changing before our eyes. The threat facing our continent was transformed when Putin invaded Ukraine. It has since escalated further... and continues to evolve rapidly." What kind of "secure future" do Britain's working people contemplate with Reeves' announcement that "we will increase defence spending to 2.5% [an increase of £2.2bn - Ed] of GDP", coupled with the claim that this further militarisation is to be funded by "reducing overseas aid to 0.3% of Gross National Income ... to fund our more capital-intensive defence commitments"? The Chancellor is presenting cuts on the claims of the people on the economy and investing in war as "a decade of national renewal"! Some renewal! Some security!
Actually, reduction of "overseas aid" was just mentioned twice, and with no details. It was the reduction in the payment of welfare benefits "saving £4.8bn in the welfare budget" that revealed most about this government's contempt for the vulnerable, being almost on a par with the increase in the "defence" budget of well over £5 billion, along with the £3bn Britain gives to Ukraine annually. What Reeves referred to as "capital-intensive defence commitments" means huge profits for Britain's war industries. It can be seen that the real aim of the budget is a blatant attack on the welfare benefits and vital social programmes of the people, including in investments in the NHS. Right through her speech, Reeves tried to address the situation as if the government were concerned mainly about dealing with "driving efficiency and productivity across government". Allegedly, there were to be £3.6 billion of departmental day-to-day spending reductions, and £1 billion of additional revenue from reducing tax avoidance. The actuality is that the spring statement crudely cobbled together cuts right across the social spectrum on livelihoods and claims of the people. What was so noticeable was the vindictiveness with which a so-called "Labour" government is making cuts to the disabled, the old and the poor.
As the Stop the War coalition declaimed: "Already a third of children were living in poverty before this week's cuts were announced - that's 4.4 million children. According to the government's own assessment 250,000 more people, including 50,000 more children, will be plunged into poverty as a result of their cuts - campaigners say this is a gross underestimate. Over three million people will be hit by the changes to Personal Independence Payments (PIP).
"Yet the Ministry of Defence is to receive a further £2.2 billion increase in its budget this year - that's on top of the £13.5 billion more per year Starmer previously pledged. Starmer's Labour is prioritising the arms industry and City bankers over our children, the poor, the sick and disabled."
"Balancing the books on the back of the poorest"
Such has been the characterisation of the Chancellor's proposals. The government's self-imposed fiscal rules are meant to serve as a signal of its fiscal rectitude, reflecting a claim to the mantle of economic competency that the Conservatives under Liz Truss renounced. The cartel parties' concurrence on the thrust of the statement confirms that militarisation is not simply a policy of the government, but a dictate of the state under the control of oligarchs of the ruling elite and those in the political sphere following their agenda.
These fiscal rules are economic nonsense, non-sequiturs which cover over that working people applying their labour are the source of wealth. It is the direction of economy which needs to change from cutting funding for social programmes into investing in social programmes, putting more into the economy than is taken out as the economy is geared to paying the rich and militarisation. What is the government's mantra of "growth" about, unless it is grasped that the economy must be geared to the people's interests and their claims?
The programme of the government is more austerity, deeper austerity, whatever they say, and making sure the state jumps to the tune of the financial and other oligarchs. Necessary public investment in the economy is termed as "splashing the cash" and other derogative terms. A "blackhole" in balancing the books is nonsensical. And, even if we were to take the claim at face value, a moratorium on interest and debt repayments with the well-being of the people in mind would be a sensible measure.
Increasing investments and funding in social programmes that favour the people, the polity and the economy, not funding on militarisation and war, is the direction for the economy which is so much needed.
The people's opposition intensifies
Immediately there has rightly been huge opposition to this Spring budget. Even before Rachel Reeves got up to speak, there was a furious rally outside Downing Street as over 1,000 disabled people, trade unionists, anti-poverty and anti-war campaigners protested. Many more protests and demonstrations have taken place across the country.
It is vital to also oppose the Labour government's use of the budget to directly fund increased investment in the war industries, especially for interference in and support for wars in other countries such as Palestine and Ukraine. These measures are not to defend the peace and security of Britain and Europe but for Britain to participate in escalating NATO's proxy war in Ukraine and to continue to play a warmongering role in interfering in Eastern Europe, West Asia and Africa as well as other areas of the world. The measures are also in support of and arming the Israeli genocide against the Palestinians and to participate in the bombing of Yemen, all of which must be condemned and opposed.
Rachel Reeves tries to pass over Britain's role by claiming that Ukraine and Russia and the Middle East and elsewhere are "our continent" and that this is to "secure Britain's future". The British government's role in funding war and attacking the welfare of the people in the name or providing "working people with security" and "national renewal" is opposed to the renewal of society and on the contrary will lead to, and is hell bent on, Britain's destruction.
The government's latest attacks on the most vulnerable in society must continue to be opposed. Britain's escalation of war and the sending of its armies, air force and navy to get involved in Europe, or West Asia and elsewhere must continue to be opposed. The opposition must be stepped up by the working class to win over people as they fight to defend the rights and claims of all the people and oppose the youth being sent to die in the wars of the ruling class in other countries.
Fight for the Alternative!
It is the well-being of all the members of the polity, not just the rich, whose interests must determine the solutions to a broken economy. The necessity is not for the government's "national renewal" but for the democratic renewal of society that is pro-social and anti-war and that gives rise to people's empowerment with the modern democratic personality. The aim is to make sure that the people, not ruling elites, set the direction for the economy, and take the path of ending the power and privileges of ruling elites. The way forward lies in fighting for political renewal, for modern arrangements which empower the people, not those with power and privilege, and in preparing the conditions to establish an Anti-War Government in Britain.
This is the alternative. It is an alternative which puts human persons at the centre of the solution of the problems which face them. This is the modern programme for the youth and all of the working class and people.
Note
1. Spring Statement 2025 speech as delivered by Chancellor Rachel Reeves.
https://www.gov.uk/government/speeches/spring-statement-2025-speech