What the far-right won’t tell you -Part - IV

Socialists say that the far right may talk about two tiers of the police system but tends to ignore the invisible social apartheid that prevents poor white people from joining certain elitist clubs, depriving them of all leisure and entertainment owing to their meagre sources of earning. The contention is that Farage and Tommy don’t talk about the two-tier social system that is the biggest enemy of the working classes of the country, the majority of whom are white.

Many in the UK believe that the underlying factors must be addressed if the rise of the far right is to be reversed. For instance, housing is one of the issues that need immediate attention from the government. A report from Shelter, an NGO working on housing issues, showed last year that at least 309,000 people in England might spend Christmas without a home, including almost 140,000 children. Another NGO called Crisis, working on housing, says there are already five million affordable homes in the UK. The NGO believes that with the right government action, providing enough genuinely affordable housing is a real possibility.

In addition to that, the government must tackle rising unemployment which was 4.6 per cent in June this year. Unemployment has exacerbated over the decades because of greedy capitalists, the majority of whom are white, who relocated their businesses to India and other countries for the sake of profit. But their gargantuan appetite for profit is never condemned by Farage, Tommy and other ultranationalists. Hundreds of thousands or possibly millions of British could be provided with sources of employment if such relocation for voracious greed is halted. You would not find even a single tweet on this issue from ultra-nationalists let alone a sustained campaign or even fiery statements.

It is widely believed that the years of Tory rule have badly affected working-class people of all backgrounds. Trade unions especially point out the austerity horrors that were caused by the policy of the Conservative Party. Citing reports of various institutions and media outlets, the Unite the Union’s website claims that the Tory government axed almost 5,000 bus routes, asserting that railways prices were increased by 30 per cent in a decade. The website says that the National Health System’s elective care list is at record levels in England - exceeding 7.4 million, revealing that nearly five million patients each month in England wait more than a fortnight for a GP appointment. The union accuses the Tory of neglecting the NHS which requires nearly 112,000 full-time equivalent staff vacancies including over 40,000 nurses.

It bemoans the fact that 6.7 million people are currently living in fuel poverty while the companies in this sector made GBP45 billion profit from the UK domestic energy system in 2022. “If that money had been kept in public hands, it could have been used to save each household £1,800 on their energy bills.” The website also points out the plight of students whose loans are estimated to be around £460 billion (2021/22 prices) by the mid-2040s. The union claims that school spending per pupil in England fell by 9.0 per cent in real terms between 2009–10 and 2019–20, the largest cut in over 40 years. It is claimed that GBP14 billion has been taken out of the welfare system since 2010/11.

Critics believe that this brutal austerity greatly affected people’s living standards. The union says that between 2008/09 and 2020/21, the number of food bank users increased every year, from just under 26,000 to more than 2.56 million. “In 2022/23 approximately 2.99 million people used a food bank in the United Kingdom. Around 4.2 million children (or 29% of children) in the UK are living in poverty. In addition to that, public spending cuts have closed almost 800 libraries in the past decade. In 2018, it was claimed almost 700 local authority-run facilities (toilets) in the UK had closed since 2010 – one in eight – while 65 pools had also closed, either temporarily or permanently during the Tory times. Between 2009/10 and 2019/20, local authority spending on waste collection fell by 17% in real terms. Official figures show that 1,342 children’s centres have closed over the last decade.”

Amidst these cuts, it was also revealed that the richest 50 families in the UK have more wealth than the bottom half of the UK population (33.5 million people). When the first rich list was compiled in 1989, a rich person had 6,000 times the average person. Today it is 18,000 times. So, it is the hardships of the people caused by the austerity policies of Tory and other governments that need to be addressed to counter the tide of the far right that is pushing the country towards polarization and disharmony.

But you would never see any far-right activists making a hue and cry on this rising inequality and brutal austerity. They might make tall claims about the welfare of working people but in reality, critics see them as the stooges of private capital who ardently support the naked free-market onslaught that has created immense hardships.

It is not only the far right or the Tories who should be blamed for the entire crisis. Some Muslim extremists are also busy implementing their divisive agenda, spewing venom against secularism, advocating for inhuman punishments and romanticizing terrorism. Their attitude towards women is also appalling. Such attitudes provide the far right an opportunity to defame Muslims and immigrants.

These Muslim extremists tend to forget that their hegemonic attitude and open war against Western values of secularism and women's emancipation could create immense hardships for Muslims and other immigrants. No indigenous people of any country can tolerate this. They want freedom of religion in Western societies but are not ready to extend the same freedoms to minorities in their own countries. They even want to curb such freedoms for minorities in Western countries.

But what the far right chooses to ignore is the fact that most Muslims don’t approve of such radical thoughts and will never vote for them if such groups contest elections. Such elements were rejected in Pakistan and Indonesia – the two most populous Muslim nations on earth.

Most British Muslims are politically moderate – voting for the Conservative, Liberal and Labour parties. If they had really subscribed to the ideology of this tiny section of Muslim society, they would have formed a political party on these ideological lines. But they are pragmatists voting for the parties that can solve their day-to-day issues rather than the people delivering sermons on some imagined world.

The far right is also wrong in asserting that many British Muslims don’t speak English or like British culture. Older generations indeed find it hard to speak the language but one would hardly find any young person who cannot communicate in English or who doesn't have a flair for English food and music. Therefore, the government must address socio-economic issues that are fueling far-right popularity besides creating a narrative that debunks the false claims of people like Farage and Tommy. They seem to be winning the narrative war despite all the efforts of the British government.

Concluded

The writer is a freelance

journalist who can be reached at: egalitarianism444@gmail.com