This conference could establish the Greens as the party of the left
The Green Party of England and Wales’ Spring Conference looks set to be a radical one. In just a couple of weeks’ time – and on the Greens’ 40th ‘birthday’ – hundreds will gather to determine the direction of the party. The votes of these members could help establish the Greens as the party of the left at a time when the left – or at least large sections of it – is in complete disarray in Britain.
Why will it be a radical conference? The results of the ‘Prioritisation Ballot’ – the vote on how motions get ranked on the conference agenda (determining how likely they are to be debated) – are now in. Sadly few voted – just over 100 people, in fact. But the results are important nonetheless.
In policy, the top three motions are telling for how the party has grown to be a real force for progress in the face of a weak and ideologically vacuous Labour Party. The first, ‘Making Social Justice Central’ states ‘Green politics and social justice are fundamentally dependent – without environmentalism, the planet will become uninhabitable; without social justice, the planet isn’t worth living on.’
It proposes to alter the current ‘Philosophical Basis’ – the party’s core values statement, in effect – towards recognising the necessity of social justice as well as environmentalism in our politics, replacing the rather depressing and misanthropic current preamble, which begins: ‘Life on Earth is under immense pressure. It is human activity, more than anything else, which is threatening the well-being of the environment on which we depend.’ with this:
‘A system based on inequality and exploitation is threatening the future of the planet on which we depend, and encouraging reckless and environmentally damaging consumerism. A world based on cooperation and democracy would prioritise the many, not the few, and would not risk the planet’s future with environmental destruction and unsustainable consumption’
A big shift, on the surface. But it retains the vital ecological focus, while at the same time demanding an alternative to the current economic system. At a time of global financial crisis, such a statement is more necessary than ever.
Myself and a large number of other Young Greens proposed and supported this motion, after a similar item was passed at the last Young Greens Convention. Whether it will succeed is unclear – but it will open up an important debate nonetheless, at a time when we need to declare where we stand.
The second top-ranked motion is on pay-day loans – again a particularly prominent subject in this economic climate. Workers’ wages are stagnating while the loan-sharks use this as a chance to make a quick buck. The motion condemns the ‘morally unacceptable and economically imprudent’ pay-day loans system, and puts interest-rate capping and government support to ethical lenders into party policy. I have a feeling this one will be largely uncontroversial.
Next is monetary policy reform – not a hugely stirring topic, perhaps. But the motion is an interesting one, effectively calling for the nationalisation of the money supply, out of private banks’ hands – i.e. ‘control of money supply solely by the state’. The ramifications are significant, and plenty of debate will be vital. Nonetheless, it proposes a turn away from the dominance of multinational finance towards democratic control.
Further motions demand ‘community self-government over corporate rights’ and the anonymisation of job application forms to protect against racial discrimination.
The really radical shifts, though, are organisational.
The first, a motion supported by many in Green Left – the Greens’ eco-socialist wing – calls for the establishment of an anti-cuts councillor conference, and couldn’t come at a more urgent time. Council chambers across the country are currently setting their annual budgets. Following the founding of the new ‘Councillors Against Cuts’ initiative – so far Labour-dominated, but with steadily growing Green support – an anti-cuts councillor conference would enable cross-party discussion of legal challenges to the cuts, opening up the possibility of setting ‘needs budgets’, and encouraging direct action from below.
Building links with the unions has been at the core of Natalie Bennett’s vision since being elected. Her election speech encouraged the party to ask the unions – ‘what can we do for you?’ The motion on Green Party support for trade unionism is therefore a welcome one. In passing it, the party would declare ‘the Trade Union movement plays a vital role in defending the interests of working people’ and encourage ‘all its members to be active Trade Unionists’. Solid stuff.
Finally, G4S – yes, that lot who cocked up during the Olympics – have just been voted the world’s worst company for their role in the privatisation of warfare. This year’s Spring Conference could affirm that, in committing the Greens to oppose and expose G4S for the ‘illegal detention of Palestinians, profiteering from public sector privatisation & the neglect and mistreatment of refugees in the asylum system’ – among other crimes. It’s third on the ‘organisational’ agenda, and the Greens endorsement of the Stop G4S campaign would be cheered by campaigners word-wide, sending a very strong message to anti-war and human rights activists – we’re on your side.
So, this conference is set to be one of the most important Green Party gatherings in years – one which could solidify the party’s status as a party of the left, of social justice, and a party which stands on the side of those opposing austerity and war nationally and internationally. Watch this space.
- Josiah Mortimer is from the University of York Green Party.
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Think you’re spot on and all these changes are goos
Ann argues that there is now no ‘fractional reserve’ for banks. While it is true that deregulation has removed any compulsory level of reserve, nevertheless banks do need to keep some reserve, but at a level set at their own discretion – and in many cases, far too low for their security!
Re Alison’s point 1: A 100% reserve requirement means that banks can lend money lent to them in ‘savings’ of ‘time-deposit’ accounts, or from their own capital or borrowed from other sources, but could no longer create the money they lend, as they do now.
Re Alison’s point 3,: Ann is right, however, that “Deposits are not endowments that precede loan formation; it is loans that create deposits”, as she quotes, in her review/essay on Ingham’s book, from financial cycle and macroeconomics: What have we learnt? Claudio Borio. BIS Working Paper No 395. December, 2012. http://www.bis.org/publ/work395.pdf. I.e. commercial banks do, indeed, create money this way – currently, over 97% of the money now in circulation!
Ann does not, however, seem to envisage a state where, eventually, after reform, all the money in circulation has been created-and-spent into ongoing circulation, instead of having been lent into temporary circulation, while the borrower accumulates interest charges. By then, if the Money Creation Committee (see Positive Money’s new book, ‘Modernising Money’) has done a good job, there will be vastly less need for borrowing than now – as it was in the distant past, before the banks took over the creation of money.
Ann writes that ‘all banks or lenders would first have to mobilise 100% of the funds needed for lending. This would massively constrain the availability of credit.’ She seems not to realise that if the MCC has done its job, there should be adequate funds available to banks to on-lend, but also that there would be FAR less demand for borrowing!
As Positive Money and others argue, it would be as wrong to leave the control of the adjustment of the amount of money-in-circulation to the spending authority – the government – as it clearly is, as now, to leave it to the self-interest of commercial banks, even if it was not made worse by having it dependent on creation of interest-bearing debts. This is why it is proposed to have an accountable public body independent of government made responsible to do this.
Under current proposals, there would not be a ‘fixed quantity’ of money, as Ann assumes. The MCC would periodically, perhaps monthly, make adjustments up or down, as needs changed.
One point I would dispute is the desirability of aiming for price stability. As Ann notes, we need to end our destructive ‘economic growth’ and as Herman Daly argues, aim instead for a ‘steady-state’ economy, at a sustainable level; Margrit Kennedy, in ‘Interest and Inflation Free Money’, has calculated that a least half of the costs entering into prices, on average, is due to interest charges. With reform reducing the need to borrow, prices should be able to fall, without causing ‘depression’.
Ann writes “Credit, well managed and regulated, enables society to do what we can do.” But she dos not seem to accept that the ‘credit’ she discusses is in fact ‘money’; or that the present system not only needlessly creates escalating levels of debt, but that the WAY that that credit/money enters circulation is of fundamental importance.
First, on social justice.
Many of “the many” want as much unsustainable consumption as they can get, just as much as many of “the few” do.
I’m not against social justice, but environmentalism should remain as a separate and central core value.
Second, on “nationalisation of the money supply, out of private banks’ hands – i.e. ‘control of money supply solely by the state’ “.
Ann Pettifor has written about this:
“Given that credit creation should ideally reflect a multitude of risk assessments of society’s varied and complex needs for finance to kick-start economic activity, should a) the quantity of credit be a limited sum? (decided by ‘the sovereign’), and b) should the task of allocating interest-free credit be limited to civil servants in central banks and finance ministries? I think not.”
( http://www.opendemocracy.net/ourkingdom/ann-pettifor/power-to-create-money-out-of-thin-air )
I agree with that, but not with all the rest of what she writes. Some of my alternative opinions are:
1. A 100% reserve requirement doesn’t mean that 100% of the funds needed would have to be mobilised before they are lent. It means that no money can be lent.
2. Not only did Polanyi think that money is a false commodity, he seems to have thought that labour and the environment are as well. The implication seems to be that wages and rent as well as other profits should be abolished.
3. Central banks may create money out of thin air, by quantitative easing. Other banks don’t, they have to pay for the money they create.