Reforming social security
Andrew Fisher, Co-ordinator, Left Economics Advisory Panel
Andrew Fisher is a founder and co-ordinator of LEAP, which he formed
with John McDonnell MP in 2006. He is also a former co-Secretary of
the Labour Representation Committee, an organization that was reformed to secure a voice for left wing policies within the labour
movement. Andrew is an expert in economics and welfare policy.
Twitter: @AndrewFisher79
Growing up in the 1980s in a lone-parent household exposed you to a fair amount of
prejudice. Back then, no one used the term 'lone-parent', it was 'single mothers' with no shortage of moralising about promiscuity, irresponsibility and becoming
pregnant to get a council house.
I always found this deeply irrational, hurtful and insulting. My mum was a hardworking, dedicated parent for whom I have never felt anything but love and
admiration. Nevertheless, the political rhetoric created a hostile environment in which
lone-parents were made to feel ashamed, and their children were bullied in school.
Today the same nasty rhetoric exists, though it is increasingly targeted at
unemployed and disabled people.
My household wasn't political, but I grew up despising those who talked about
people like my mum as if they were degenerates. I felt the sense of Aneurin Bevan's
words well before I ever read them: "No attempts at ethical or social seduction, can
eradicate from my heart a deep burning hatred for the Tory Party that inflicted those
bitter experiences on me. So far as I am concerned they are lower than vermin."
The Labour government in which Bevan served was probably the most radical in
British history. It won seats across the country in a Labour landslide - and it did so by
putting forward a bold vision for social unity and hope. To this day, there is much
that the Attlee government created that we should be proud of. Social security stops
people living in abject poverty, prevents mass homelessness, means pensioners don't
freeze to death and stops children from being malnourished.
“If the social security bill is high, it is the result of economic failure –
systematic, not individual”
If the social security bill is high, it is the result of economic failure – systematic, not
individual. The failure to provide sufficient jobs. The failure to ensure that work pays
revolutionise.it
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