CNJ COMMENT- Tension in the ranks of the anti-cuts campaigners

Published: 13 January, 2011

AN unwholesome whiff of rancour hung over short stretches of a protest rally at the Town Hall on Monday as a few members of the crowd unfairly taunted Frank Dobson for not doing enough to challenge the Coalition’s deficit policy.

A few wanted Labour to refuse to set a budget even if, eventually, it meant breaking the law.

Dobson got caught up in the crossfire – as he did earlier while defending his office for failing to acknowledge two emails sent by a disabled woman.

It was, relatively, a small matter but it caught, momentarily, the mood of the meeting.

A silent Lib-Dem observer probably formed  the impression that all is not well in the enemy camp.

Attendance was higher than at previous protest meetings but as the chairman, George Binette, said a long, hard road lies ahead.

Signs, however small, of disunity would not have encouraged organisers of the meeting.

As a speaker emphasised, the arguments against the government have made little impression “in the street”.

Whether they will remains to be seen. Prime Ministers have been known to effect U-turns.  

The economy can deteriorate. But it can also improve. Little is certain.  Yet protest movements have to start out with the conviction that their analysis of the crisis is broadly correct and that, as they see it, worsening living standards, together with a break-up of the social fabric, will bring public opinion on side.

Labour in Camden knows it is caught in the middle. 

Most Labour councillors fear the  Welfare State, created by the Attlee government, is fundamentally at risk – a historic change in the nation’s affairs.

The majority, perhaps, believe they can save enough of the “front-line” services to keep things together for the next three years, and then emerge from the storm to win the next election.

Others fear this is far too optimistic a scenario.

Opinion seems to be against a refusal to set a budget for fear that this would lead to a government take-over and even severer cuts than those now being planned by Labour.

Behind this may hover a fear that a government-run Town Hall, on the other hand, could emerge more efficient with heavier cuts in staffing ratios than Labour find acceptable today leading, possibly, to  lighter economies in “front-line” services than presently mapped out.

If this were to come about, Labour’s hopes for 2014 could run aground.