Jun 30, 2022, 02:20 am
Written by Robert Stevens
Published: June 28, 2022
Head of the British Army General Sir Patrick Sanders.
![[Image: oKAHqjX6_o.jpg]](https://images2.imgbox.com/1b/b2/oKAHqjX6_o.jpg)
The new head of the British Army, General Sir Patrick Sanders, gave a blood-curdling speech Tuesday, insisting that the UK and its NATO allies must prepare to wage war against Russia.
Sanders’s keynote address to the Royal United Services Institute’s (RUSI) annual “Land Warfare Conference” was broadcast live on Sky News. Also in attendance was Defence Secretary Ben Wallace, United States Secretary of the Army Christine Wormuth, Germany’s Army Chief of Staff Lieutenant General Alfons Mais, and Oleksandr Danylyuk, former secretary of the National Security and Defense Council of Ukraine.
Sanders warned that Britain faced its “1937 moment”, referencing Field Marshal Bernard Law Montgomery who wrote that year, two years before the outbreak of the Second World War, “There is no need to continue doing a thing merely because it has been done in the Army for the last thirty or forty years—if this is the only reason for doing it, then it is high time we changed and did something else.”
Sanders said, “For us, today, that ‘something else’ is mobilising the Army to meet the new threat we face: a clear and present danger that was realised on 24th February when Russia used force to seize territory from Ukraine, a friend of the United Kingdom.”
Sanders added, “In all my years in uniform, I haven’t known such a clear threat to the principles of sovereignty and democracy, and the freedom to live without fear of violence, as the brutal aggression of President Putin and his expansionist ambitions.”
This cynical outburst is made by a veteran of every crime carried out by British imperialism for over three decades. Sanders commanded operations in Northern Ireland, Kosovo, Bosnia, Iraq and Afghanistan. It was transparent justification for his demand to strengthen the armed forces to wage offensive wars. What would be required from now on was an “increased focus on readiness and combined arms training and a broader institutional renewal that creates the culture required to win if called upon. This process, given a name Operation MOBILISE, will be the Army’s primary focus over the coming years.”
In Orwellian doublespeak, Sanders said the UK must “mobilise to meet today’s threat”, i.e., wage war, in order to “prevent war in Europe”. This meant arming Ukraine to the teeth in NATO’s proxy war against Russia.
Sanders boasted, “Defence has worked at a phenomenal pace to bring together a coalition of partners to provide materiel, intelligence and training to sustain Ukraine in its fight against the Russian invaders… this year alone we have supplied 9500 anti-tank missiles, of which over 5000 were NLAW. We have already provided UK-based training for 650 AFU soldiers, and in the coming months, the British Army will deliver battle-winning skills to a further 10,000. It’s just started.”
The UK must gear up to do whatever is necessary to win. “The Russian invasion has reminded us of the time-honoured maxim that if you want to avert conflict, you better be prepared to fight… And to make it crystal clear—This means focusing on winning the war, working with these allies, against this threat and in this location.”
In reference to the NATO summit Wednesday in the Spanish capital, Sanders declared, “And we will see the first orders issued in Madrid tomorrow.”
With the help of RUSI, “we will double-down on combined arms manoeuvre, especially in the deep battle, and devise a new doctrine rooted in geography, integrated with NATO’s war plans and specific enough to drive focused, relevant investment and inspire the imagination of our people to fight and win if called upon.”
Defeating Russia would require a mass mobilisation of personnel as “war in Ukraine also reminds us of the utility of Land Power: it takes an army to hold and regain territory and defend the people who live there. It takes an Army to deter. And this army, the British Army, will play its part alongside our allies.”
In “conjunction with our NATO allies and partners,” the UK must “meet strength with strength from the outset and be unequivocally prepared to fight for NATO territory.”
In such a conflict, “we would likely be outnumbered at the point of attack and fighting like hell. Standoff air, maritime or cyber fires are unlikely to dominate on their own. Land will still be the decisive domain… Success will be determined by combined arms and multi-domain competence. And mass. Ukraine has also shown that engaging with our adversaries and training, assisting and reassuring our partners is high payoff activity.”
By now overwhelmed by bloodlust, Sanders concluded, “The British Army must be prepared to engage in warfare at its most violent.”
Looking at his audience he saw, “the faces of friends from previous campaigns where we have shared hardship and laughter, failures and victories. We have shed blood together. We remember those we left behind. And it is this, our willingness to shed blood to protect our common values and each other’s territory, that will see us prevail.”
Sanders references conflicts such as Iraq and Afghanistan that claimed over a million lives. This is nothing compared with the death toll that would result from the total war with Russia he now advocates and plans.
Key sections of Sanders’s speech were warnings to the government that to mobilise for war means a ramping up of human resources and weaponry. “As we face a new reality, a race to mobilise, we must be honest with ourselves about Future Soldiers [the British Army transformation programme] timelines, capability gaps and risks—and now our own diminished stockpiles as a result of Gifting in Kind to the brave soldiers of the Armed Forces of Ukraine.”
Hinting unmistakably at the possible necessity of instituting a draft, he insisted, “We should not be afraid of necessary heresies. Defence is only as strong as its weakest domain. And technology does not eliminate the relevance of combat mass.”
Sanders’s claim that his plan has been necessitated by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine is a transparent lie. His entire speech only puts flesh on that delivered at a RUSI conference in 2018 by General Sir Nicholas Carter, the Chief of the Defence Staff until November last year.
He proposed that the British Army needed “to be able to deploy overland by road and by rail. And our Strike concept seeks to project land capability over distances of up to some 2,000 km.”
This would involve aping the Nazi invasion of Russia in 1941, carried out over a 2,900-kilometer front, with Carter saying, “For example we are copying what the Germans did very well in 1940 when all of their prime movers, in terms of their tanks and armoured vehicles, had trailers; and by doing that, it reduces your logistic tail.”
Defence Secretary Wallace’s presence alongside Sanders was meant to reinforce his own demands this week for a 20 percent hike in military spending to 2.5 percent of GDP. He told the conference, “It is now time to signal that the peace dividend is over, and investment needs to continue to grow.” At last week’s G7 summit in Germany, Prime Minister Boris Johnson stated that Britain’s commitment to spend 2 percent of GDP on defence was “a floor not a ceiling.”
This is only what the Tories are prepared to say in public. Military conflict with Russia and China would require defence spending on a truly vast scale combined with, as Sanders made clear, a militarisation of society that demands the waging of class war against British workers and the destruction of fundamental democratic rights. That is why striking railworkers have been denounced as “Putin’s stooges”, as the government prepares legislation to allow the use of agency workers as scabs and “minimum service” provisions that would effectively outlaw strikes in essential industries and services.
https://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2022/06...d-j28.html
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Related News:
Johnson calls for increased defence spending while ‘ignoring the cost-of-living crisis’
Written by Ceren Sagir
Published: June 29, 2022
The hypocrisy of this government “knows no bounds,” anti-war campaigners have warned after Boris Johnson called for Nato countries to increase their defence budgets.
Leaders of the 30 alliance members gathered in Madrid to agree on a new plan in response to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
At the summit, the Prime Minister called on alliance leaders to increase their defence budgets while Nato agreed to a “fundamental shift” which will see it return to a cold-war-style readiness to respond to the increased threat posed by Russia.
Heavy equipment will be pre-positioned in eastern Nato members along with stockpiles of supplies, while forces from western members will be assigned specific regions on the eastern flank to protect in partnership with local troops.
Britain already has a significant military presence in Estonia but Mr Johnson used the summit to increase its headquarters in the Baltic nation.
Officials said this will ensure Britain can provide rapid reinforcements if needed, and deploy artillery, air defence and helicopters.
The alliance plans to have 300,000 troops at high readiness — up from the current 40,000 — and Britain will commit capabilities in land, air and sea to the “new force model.”
Defence Secretary Ben Wallace, who also attended the summit, said that while he has enough funding for the “here and now,” extra investment is needed in the next government spending round from the middle of the decade.
The PM also claimed that “if Vladimir Putin was hoping he would be getting less Nato … he’s been proved completely wrong” by Sweden and Finland joining the alliance.
The two Nordic countries are on track to end their historic neutrality after Turkey withdrew its objections following negotiations during the Nato summit today.
Meanwhile, the government announced a new round of sanctions on Russia’s allies today, as new data revealed the country is still one of the biggest suppliers of refined oil to Britain.
Britain will be imposing sanctions on the country’s second-richest man Vladimir Potanin and Russian President Vladimir Putin’s cousin Anna Tsivileva, who is president of the JSC Kolmar Group coalmining company.
Oil imports from Russia have been significantly reduced in the immediate aftermath of the Ukraine invasion, the Office for National Statistics (ONS) said.
But in April, Britain still imported about £140 million of petrol, diesel, heating oil and more from the country — two months after the war began.
In February, Russia was Britain’s biggest supplier at £410 million of imports but now remains at number six.
Britain has instead increased its supply from other countries to make up for the shortfall, including Saudi Arabia, despite the Kingdom’s own atrocities in Yemen.
Stop the War Coalition’s Lindsey German told the Star: “The hypocrisy of this government knows no bounds.
“Boris Johnson calls for Nato countries to increase their defence budgets while he ignores the cost-of-living crisis which is wrecking lives in Britain and abroad.
“He supports still more sanctions on Russia even though this is exacerbating that cost-of-living crisis.
“He welcomes Sweden and Finland joining the aggressive alliance even though this ends their traditional neutrality and comes at the price of a deal with Turkey which means much greater oppression of the Kurds.
“Condemnation of military aggression is aimed at Russia, while Saudi war crimes in Yemen are ignored, and the Saudis are rewarded by Britain buying more of their oil.”
Ms German said the desperate plight of the Ukrainian people “will not be helped by any of this,” adding: “They deserve peace, and every government should be prioritising how to achieve this, not how to escalate war.”
The Peace Pledge Union tweeted: “To gain Nato membership, Sweden & Finland have agreed to lift an arms embargo on Turkey and extradite prisoners to Turkey.
“Being part of Nato has already led them to compromise policies on the arms trade and human rights — and they’re not even members yet!
https://morningstaronline.co.uk/article/...ing-crisis
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
Former UK PM Gordon Brown 'shocked' by growing poverty levels
Written by Soraya Ebrahimi
Published: June 19, 2022
Former UK prime minister Gordon Brown has said he is shocked at the growing number of those in poverty and called for the UK government to introduce a fourth budget to help struggling families.
Prime Minister Boris Johnson has to “get people together” to solve rising inflation and put in place a plan for growth, Mr Brown told the BBC.
He was prime minister during Britain’s last financial crisis between 2007 and 2010, and chancellor from 1997 to 2007.
“I am shocked by the fact that so many families and so many children are going to be forced into poverty during this winter, despite Chancellor [Rishi] Sunak’s proposals last month," Mr Brown said.
“I see millions of families in poverty, and millions of children going to school ill-clad and hungry. People are unable to afford to put up their heating.
“Something has got to be done about this. And it has to be done in a far fairer way than the previous three budgets.
“Family budgets are under huge pressure and the government will need a plan. I am proposing a fourth budget.
"We’ve had three budgets this year. We need to do three things. First of all, we need to get inflation on a pathway towards stable prices.
“Secondly, the government’s got to help ease family poverty, because child poverty is going to go beyond five million if we don’t take further action.
"And thirdly, I think what people are really looking for is a plan for growth to get over this.”
https://www.msn.com/en-ae/news/world/for...ar-AAYE00m
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
Middle-class families in Britain at risk of poverty as cost-of-living crisis hits, says scholar
Published: June 4, 2022
Middle-class families in Britain have been running a risk of falling into poverty because of the massive rise in utility bills and the cost-of-living crisis, an academic in Scotland has told Xinhua.
"We haven't seen what we are experiencing now since the days of World War Two," said Keith Baker, a research fellow specializing in fuel poverty and energy policy at Glasgow Caledonian University, in a recent interview.
To ease the pain of surging costs, Chancellor of the Exchequer Rishi Sunak announced in May that around 8 million of the country's poorest families will receive a payment of 650 British pounds (816 U.S. dollars) alongside other supporting measures.
"The measures that he's announced won't actually hit a large number of those people who are in the most severe levels of poverty," Baker said. "What's really concerning now is that when we talk about fuel poverty, we talk about a heat or eat dilemma.
"When we're at the point where it's not going to be heat or eat, we're now getting a lot of people to the point where they're going to be struggling to pay their rent or pay their home mortgages," the expert said. "So we are into really quite scary territory, and what the government has done is an absolute drop in the ocean."
Baker said his biggest fear is that some people may react to the problem by rioting. "At its worst, I honestly don't know how the public will respond," he noted. "I'm not saying I would support rioting, but I would totally understand anybody who is reaching the point where they're broken. What other option do they have?"
For families, particularly with the winter approaching, "we're heading into very scary territory," Baker said.
"Unfortunately, people have been so ground down through the COVID-19 pandemic and Partygate and all the other problems and scandals that have surrounded the government, but they're really just struggling and now we're looking at some significant rises in energy bills," he said.
Britain's energy price cap jumped from 1,277 British pounds to 1,971 pounds per year in April for about 22 million customers. The country's energy regulator warned in May that the cap is expected to rise to around 2,800 pounds per year in October.
Baker said what worries him is potentially many people are to plunge into severe levels of poverty and that could mean some families struggling to keep a roof over their heads.
"Also, there will be a lot of people who've not been in poverty before," he said. "The lower and middle classes are going to be finding themselves in fuel poverty. There are estimates of easily 40 percent of the United Kingdom (UK) population struggling to pay their energy bills by the end of the year. And that is absolutely shocking.
"This really is disaster capitalism UK style. We have an awful lot of people getting very rich off the back of what the government is doing and a large and growing section of the population getting very poor."
Central to the crisis is increasing inflation, heading towards double-digit figures.
"You'd be naive not to expect inflation to increase. So, again, there's another pressure coming. I'm not an economist, but I can only imagine how that feeds into the wider situation of price rises and costs going up across all sections of life," he said.
Baker said his biggest fear is that rising inflation will turn a storm into a hurricane, with fears that energy prices could rise every three to six months for the next couple of years. "What we've got now is just a starter," he added.
What is needed to resolve the problems, said Baker, is changes to the system. "We need a much wider and systematic change, and that should be a move towards some form of universal basic income," he told Xinhua.
As for the future, Baker said people are not prepared. "A lot of people are genuinely worried and actually that itself causes a lot of mental distress, and that can lead to mental health problems and further inabilities to manage their bills," he noted.
Baker said people in fuel poverty often suffer from mental health issues, and "that actually just makes the spiral even worse."
The upcoming problems will not just hit low-income families, according to Baker.
"We could talk about the squeezed middle, talking about a large section of the traditional middle classes effectively being pushed into poverty, the wiping out of the lower to middle classes, leaving only the richest at the top who are basically profiting from the poorest," he said.
"We need a real big restructuring of the economy. The pandemic was a perfect opportunity to do it. That opportunity was lost," Baker said.
https://english.news.cn/20220604/0d6bf78...0b4/c.html
Published: June 28, 2022
Head of the British Army General Sir Patrick Sanders.
The new head of the British Army, General Sir Patrick Sanders, gave a blood-curdling speech Tuesday, insisting that the UK and its NATO allies must prepare to wage war against Russia.
Sanders’s keynote address to the Royal United Services Institute’s (RUSI) annual “Land Warfare Conference” was broadcast live on Sky News. Also in attendance was Defence Secretary Ben Wallace, United States Secretary of the Army Christine Wormuth, Germany’s Army Chief of Staff Lieutenant General Alfons Mais, and Oleksandr Danylyuk, former secretary of the National Security and Defense Council of Ukraine.
Sanders warned that Britain faced its “1937 moment”, referencing Field Marshal Bernard Law Montgomery who wrote that year, two years before the outbreak of the Second World War, “There is no need to continue doing a thing merely because it has been done in the Army for the last thirty or forty years—if this is the only reason for doing it, then it is high time we changed and did something else.”
Sanders said, “For us, today, that ‘something else’ is mobilising the Army to meet the new threat we face: a clear and present danger that was realised on 24th February when Russia used force to seize territory from Ukraine, a friend of the United Kingdom.”
Sanders added, “In all my years in uniform, I haven’t known such a clear threat to the principles of sovereignty and democracy, and the freedom to live without fear of violence, as the brutal aggression of President Putin and his expansionist ambitions.”
This cynical outburst is made by a veteran of every crime carried out by British imperialism for over three decades. Sanders commanded operations in Northern Ireland, Kosovo, Bosnia, Iraq and Afghanistan. It was transparent justification for his demand to strengthen the armed forces to wage offensive wars. What would be required from now on was an “increased focus on readiness and combined arms training and a broader institutional renewal that creates the culture required to win if called upon. This process, given a name Operation MOBILISE, will be the Army’s primary focus over the coming years.”
In Orwellian doublespeak, Sanders said the UK must “mobilise to meet today’s threat”, i.e., wage war, in order to “prevent war in Europe”. This meant arming Ukraine to the teeth in NATO’s proxy war against Russia.
Sanders boasted, “Defence has worked at a phenomenal pace to bring together a coalition of partners to provide materiel, intelligence and training to sustain Ukraine in its fight against the Russian invaders… this year alone we have supplied 9500 anti-tank missiles, of which over 5000 were NLAW. We have already provided UK-based training for 650 AFU soldiers, and in the coming months, the British Army will deliver battle-winning skills to a further 10,000. It’s just started.”
The UK must gear up to do whatever is necessary to win. “The Russian invasion has reminded us of the time-honoured maxim that if you want to avert conflict, you better be prepared to fight… And to make it crystal clear—This means focusing on winning the war, working with these allies, against this threat and in this location.”
In reference to the NATO summit Wednesday in the Spanish capital, Sanders declared, “And we will see the first orders issued in Madrid tomorrow.”
With the help of RUSI, “we will double-down on combined arms manoeuvre, especially in the deep battle, and devise a new doctrine rooted in geography, integrated with NATO’s war plans and specific enough to drive focused, relevant investment and inspire the imagination of our people to fight and win if called upon.”
Defeating Russia would require a mass mobilisation of personnel as “war in Ukraine also reminds us of the utility of Land Power: it takes an army to hold and regain territory and defend the people who live there. It takes an Army to deter. And this army, the British Army, will play its part alongside our allies.”
In “conjunction with our NATO allies and partners,” the UK must “meet strength with strength from the outset and be unequivocally prepared to fight for NATO territory.”
In such a conflict, “we would likely be outnumbered at the point of attack and fighting like hell. Standoff air, maritime or cyber fires are unlikely to dominate on their own. Land will still be the decisive domain… Success will be determined by combined arms and multi-domain competence. And mass. Ukraine has also shown that engaging with our adversaries and training, assisting and reassuring our partners is high payoff activity.”
By now overwhelmed by bloodlust, Sanders concluded, “The British Army must be prepared to engage in warfare at its most violent.”
Looking at his audience he saw, “the faces of friends from previous campaigns where we have shared hardship and laughter, failures and victories. We have shed blood together. We remember those we left behind. And it is this, our willingness to shed blood to protect our common values and each other’s territory, that will see us prevail.”
Sanders references conflicts such as Iraq and Afghanistan that claimed over a million lives. This is nothing compared with the death toll that would result from the total war with Russia he now advocates and plans.
Key sections of Sanders’s speech were warnings to the government that to mobilise for war means a ramping up of human resources and weaponry. “As we face a new reality, a race to mobilise, we must be honest with ourselves about Future Soldiers [the British Army transformation programme] timelines, capability gaps and risks—and now our own diminished stockpiles as a result of Gifting in Kind to the brave soldiers of the Armed Forces of Ukraine.”
Hinting unmistakably at the possible necessity of instituting a draft, he insisted, “We should not be afraid of necessary heresies. Defence is only as strong as its weakest domain. And technology does not eliminate the relevance of combat mass.”
Sanders’s claim that his plan has been necessitated by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine is a transparent lie. His entire speech only puts flesh on that delivered at a RUSI conference in 2018 by General Sir Nicholas Carter, the Chief of the Defence Staff until November last year.
He proposed that the British Army needed “to be able to deploy overland by road and by rail. And our Strike concept seeks to project land capability over distances of up to some 2,000 km.”
This would involve aping the Nazi invasion of Russia in 1941, carried out over a 2,900-kilometer front, with Carter saying, “For example we are copying what the Germans did very well in 1940 when all of their prime movers, in terms of their tanks and armoured vehicles, had trailers; and by doing that, it reduces your logistic tail.”
Defence Secretary Wallace’s presence alongside Sanders was meant to reinforce his own demands this week for a 20 percent hike in military spending to 2.5 percent of GDP. He told the conference, “It is now time to signal that the peace dividend is over, and investment needs to continue to grow.” At last week’s G7 summit in Germany, Prime Minister Boris Johnson stated that Britain’s commitment to spend 2 percent of GDP on defence was “a floor not a ceiling.”
This is only what the Tories are prepared to say in public. Military conflict with Russia and China would require defence spending on a truly vast scale combined with, as Sanders made clear, a militarisation of society that demands the waging of class war against British workers and the destruction of fundamental democratic rights. That is why striking railworkers have been denounced as “Putin’s stooges”, as the government prepares legislation to allow the use of agency workers as scabs and “minimum service” provisions that would effectively outlaw strikes in essential industries and services.
https://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2022/06...d-j28.html
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Related News:
Johnson calls for increased defence spending while ‘ignoring the cost-of-living crisis’
Written by Ceren Sagir
Published: June 29, 2022
The hypocrisy of this government “knows no bounds,” anti-war campaigners have warned after Boris Johnson called for Nato countries to increase their defence budgets.
Leaders of the 30 alliance members gathered in Madrid to agree on a new plan in response to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
At the summit, the Prime Minister called on alliance leaders to increase their defence budgets while Nato agreed to a “fundamental shift” which will see it return to a cold-war-style readiness to respond to the increased threat posed by Russia.
Heavy equipment will be pre-positioned in eastern Nato members along with stockpiles of supplies, while forces from western members will be assigned specific regions on the eastern flank to protect in partnership with local troops.
Britain already has a significant military presence in Estonia but Mr Johnson used the summit to increase its headquarters in the Baltic nation.
Officials said this will ensure Britain can provide rapid reinforcements if needed, and deploy artillery, air defence and helicopters.
The alliance plans to have 300,000 troops at high readiness — up from the current 40,000 — and Britain will commit capabilities in land, air and sea to the “new force model.”
Defence Secretary Ben Wallace, who also attended the summit, said that while he has enough funding for the “here and now,” extra investment is needed in the next government spending round from the middle of the decade.
The PM also claimed that “if Vladimir Putin was hoping he would be getting less Nato … he’s been proved completely wrong” by Sweden and Finland joining the alliance.
The two Nordic countries are on track to end their historic neutrality after Turkey withdrew its objections following negotiations during the Nato summit today.
Meanwhile, the government announced a new round of sanctions on Russia’s allies today, as new data revealed the country is still one of the biggest suppliers of refined oil to Britain.
Britain will be imposing sanctions on the country’s second-richest man Vladimir Potanin and Russian President Vladimir Putin’s cousin Anna Tsivileva, who is president of the JSC Kolmar Group coalmining company.
Oil imports from Russia have been significantly reduced in the immediate aftermath of the Ukraine invasion, the Office for National Statistics (ONS) said.
But in April, Britain still imported about £140 million of petrol, diesel, heating oil and more from the country — two months after the war began.
In February, Russia was Britain’s biggest supplier at £410 million of imports but now remains at number six.
Britain has instead increased its supply from other countries to make up for the shortfall, including Saudi Arabia, despite the Kingdom’s own atrocities in Yemen.
Stop the War Coalition’s Lindsey German told the Star: “The hypocrisy of this government knows no bounds.
“Boris Johnson calls for Nato countries to increase their defence budgets while he ignores the cost-of-living crisis which is wrecking lives in Britain and abroad.
“He supports still more sanctions on Russia even though this is exacerbating that cost-of-living crisis.
“He welcomes Sweden and Finland joining the aggressive alliance even though this ends their traditional neutrality and comes at the price of a deal with Turkey which means much greater oppression of the Kurds.
“Condemnation of military aggression is aimed at Russia, while Saudi war crimes in Yemen are ignored, and the Saudis are rewarded by Britain buying more of their oil.”
Ms German said the desperate plight of the Ukrainian people “will not be helped by any of this,” adding: “They deserve peace, and every government should be prioritising how to achieve this, not how to escalate war.”
The Peace Pledge Union tweeted: “To gain Nato membership, Sweden & Finland have agreed to lift an arms embargo on Turkey and extradite prisoners to Turkey.
“Being part of Nato has already led them to compromise policies on the arms trade and human rights — and they’re not even members yet!
https://morningstaronline.co.uk/article/...ing-crisis
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
Former UK PM Gordon Brown 'shocked' by growing poverty levels
Written by Soraya Ebrahimi
Published: June 19, 2022
Former UK prime minister Gordon Brown has said he is shocked at the growing number of those in poverty and called for the UK government to introduce a fourth budget to help struggling families.
Prime Minister Boris Johnson has to “get people together” to solve rising inflation and put in place a plan for growth, Mr Brown told the BBC.
He was prime minister during Britain’s last financial crisis between 2007 and 2010, and chancellor from 1997 to 2007.
“I am shocked by the fact that so many families and so many children are going to be forced into poverty during this winter, despite Chancellor [Rishi] Sunak’s proposals last month," Mr Brown said.
“I see millions of families in poverty, and millions of children going to school ill-clad and hungry. People are unable to afford to put up their heating.
“Something has got to be done about this. And it has to be done in a far fairer way than the previous three budgets.
“Family budgets are under huge pressure and the government will need a plan. I am proposing a fourth budget.
"We’ve had three budgets this year. We need to do three things. First of all, we need to get inflation on a pathway towards stable prices.
“Secondly, the government’s got to help ease family poverty, because child poverty is going to go beyond five million if we don’t take further action.
"And thirdly, I think what people are really looking for is a plan for growth to get over this.”
https://www.msn.com/en-ae/news/world/for...ar-AAYE00m
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
Middle-class families in Britain at risk of poverty as cost-of-living crisis hits, says scholar
Published: June 4, 2022
Middle-class families in Britain have been running a risk of falling into poverty because of the massive rise in utility bills and the cost-of-living crisis, an academic in Scotland has told Xinhua.
"We haven't seen what we are experiencing now since the days of World War Two," said Keith Baker, a research fellow specializing in fuel poverty and energy policy at Glasgow Caledonian University, in a recent interview.
To ease the pain of surging costs, Chancellor of the Exchequer Rishi Sunak announced in May that around 8 million of the country's poorest families will receive a payment of 650 British pounds (816 U.S. dollars) alongside other supporting measures.
"The measures that he's announced won't actually hit a large number of those people who are in the most severe levels of poverty," Baker said. "What's really concerning now is that when we talk about fuel poverty, we talk about a heat or eat dilemma.
"When we're at the point where it's not going to be heat or eat, we're now getting a lot of people to the point where they're going to be struggling to pay their rent or pay their home mortgages," the expert said. "So we are into really quite scary territory, and what the government has done is an absolute drop in the ocean."
Baker said his biggest fear is that some people may react to the problem by rioting. "At its worst, I honestly don't know how the public will respond," he noted. "I'm not saying I would support rioting, but I would totally understand anybody who is reaching the point where they're broken. What other option do they have?"
For families, particularly with the winter approaching, "we're heading into very scary territory," Baker said.
"Unfortunately, people have been so ground down through the COVID-19 pandemic and Partygate and all the other problems and scandals that have surrounded the government, but they're really just struggling and now we're looking at some significant rises in energy bills," he said.
Britain's energy price cap jumped from 1,277 British pounds to 1,971 pounds per year in April for about 22 million customers. The country's energy regulator warned in May that the cap is expected to rise to around 2,800 pounds per year in October.
Baker said what worries him is potentially many people are to plunge into severe levels of poverty and that could mean some families struggling to keep a roof over their heads.
"Also, there will be a lot of people who've not been in poverty before," he said. "The lower and middle classes are going to be finding themselves in fuel poverty. There are estimates of easily 40 percent of the United Kingdom (UK) population struggling to pay their energy bills by the end of the year. And that is absolutely shocking.
"This really is disaster capitalism UK style. We have an awful lot of people getting very rich off the back of what the government is doing and a large and growing section of the population getting very poor."
Central to the crisis is increasing inflation, heading towards double-digit figures.
"You'd be naive not to expect inflation to increase. So, again, there's another pressure coming. I'm not an economist, but I can only imagine how that feeds into the wider situation of price rises and costs going up across all sections of life," he said.
Baker said his biggest fear is that rising inflation will turn a storm into a hurricane, with fears that energy prices could rise every three to six months for the next couple of years. "What we've got now is just a starter," he added.
What is needed to resolve the problems, said Baker, is changes to the system. "We need a much wider and systematic change, and that should be a move towards some form of universal basic income," he told Xinhua.
As for the future, Baker said people are not prepared. "A lot of people are genuinely worried and actually that itself causes a lot of mental distress, and that can lead to mental health problems and further inabilities to manage their bills," he noted.
Baker said people in fuel poverty often suffer from mental health issues, and "that actually just makes the spiral even worse."
The upcoming problems will not just hit low-income families, according to Baker.
"We could talk about the squeezed middle, talking about a large section of the traditional middle classes effectively being pushed into poverty, the wiping out of the lower to middle classes, leaving only the richest at the top who are basically profiting from the poorest," he said.
"We need a real big restructuring of the economy. The pandemic was a perfect opportunity to do it. That opportunity was lost," Baker said.
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