Once upon a time, a Conservative leader pronounced that there was no such thing as society. Then, after the party had spent long years in the wilderness, another leader came along to trounce that fatuous notion and declare that there had to be a Big Society. He called his vision “the biggest, most dramatic redistribution of power” from the state to individualism.
Many of the workers in this state worried about this because, to them, it sounded more like a cover for one of the biggest-ever cuts in public spending. In this Big Society, there were fewer jobs – many, many, fewer jobs. Those in need of help from the state had to go without because the state was on a crash slimming diet and its ability to function cohesively dwindled. But it was not all bad news. Public services that once soaked up so much of the taxpayers’ own money were replaced by voluntary groups and charities. It was called Austerity and the new leader said it was unavoidable. Just like in those jolly old Victorian times, whose values were once extolled by the former Tory leader, the poor would be elevated to become once again that more noble of species, the Needy Poor. Not to be confused with the Undeserving Poor.
Moreover, there would be many winners in this Big Society. Bankers would continue to gorge on immeasurable profits while the Deserving Greed of clever entrepreneurs would see healthy profits made on the privatisation of the health and education services. Doubters claimed that the new Tory leader was simply taking advantage of a crisis to impose an unwritten agenda which became known as the Conservative Ideology and doing it with the assistance of his new friends in a tribe called the Lib Dems.
Alas, it did not end well. Society became so broken that the former Tory leader’s words did indeed prove prophetic.
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There is much good to be said of the Green Party’s intentions. Many will share Carl Rowlands’ welcome (page 13) of the election of Caroline Lucas as a Westminster MP. Many more might lament the fact that, in order to get there, she had to beat an exceptional Labour candidate in Nancy Platts, who by any standards showed the promise of being an outstanding parliamentary representative.
That said, the election of the Greens’ first MP, their “foot in the door of Westminster”, is occasion to shine the policy spotlight on a party that has always needed to be taken more seriously than the mainstream media generally care to. Not least it has been seen by a significant number of Labour voters as a safe – or, even, positive – alternative, either tactically or as a frustrated protest against the vagaries of New Labour.
But it is as well to know who your friends are and, as Carl Rowlands shows, Greens across Europe have some not so savoury political allies and prop up anti-progressive policies. As he says, the green revolution is one which leaves the main redoubts of capitalism and ownership untouched. Be careful what we wish – or vote – for.
