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 New Socialist Settlement by Roger Warren Evans
first published 20 March 2002
V Eternal Vigilance
Given these imperatives, socialists face real challenges in the conduct of everyday politics at every level, international, national, regional and communal. The socialist settlement requires assertion day-in day-out, if it is not to be eroded and undermined by the abuse of power and personal wealth. Its demands are assertive as well as defensive, for in changing circumstances new institutional solutions are constantly required, to secure the continuing implementation of NSS values. And the core values, democracy and public primacy are under the constant pressure of events, of both public and private subversion.
For socialists, there is a heavy duty to deliver practical enforcement mechanisms throughout society, accessible to the many, not the few. Without practical enforcement, as trade unionists understand so well, civil and political rights are worthless. And in the UK, Labour’s enforcement record is patchy.
Labour was the pioneer,
for example, of the modern Legal Aid scheme, but recent Labour enactments have weakened
the accessibility of civil justice. Again, no rights of assisted representation have ever been created for administrative or other tribunals, although the trade unions have greatly assisted their members in industrial and social security tribunals, by way of voluntary sector initiative. Labour deserves credit for having enacted the Human Rights Act 1998, yet has signally failed to create a Human Rights Agency or Commission charged with securing its practical implementation (as with the Commission for Racial Equality, or the Equal Rights Commission).
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The Disability Rights Commission is an important Labour innovation, and its future must be closely monitored. The system of Citizens Advice Bureaux, while in receipt of a Government grant
(for the National Association of CABx) for adviser training, is poorly and erratically funded through local authorities and voluntary subscriptions, and is variable in quality and scope. Inadequacies of the public education system, perhaps more than any other default, rob our citizens of their democratic inheritance.
New sectors are opening up, in which the daily injustice of inequalities are difficult to counter, challenging the imagination of all socialists. The shadowy world of public and private residential provision for the elderly harbours many injustices, often suffered without effective protest. Labour has recently "nationalised" the regulatory system for private homes, removing the registration function from local authorities: it remains to be seen how effective these new arrangements will be - but the move is an example of the fine-tuning that is constantly necessary in matters of enforcement. Rural deprivation can be extensive, as local facilities decline in extent and quality.
The steady decline of bus transport is constraining many citizens’ lives, although Labour has made real advances, redressing the mayhem caused by bus privatisation and deregulation in the 1980s – free bus passes for all Welsh pensioners as from April 2002 is a significant achievement for Labour (and I will be a personal beneficiary…). Growing inequality in access to the Internet is important, sometimes creating exclusion and deprivations which are only poorly understood.
For most socialists, the daily political challenge will indeed be about enforcement, about eternal vigilance. For some, participation in the legislative and high administrative process is an option. For others, voluntary and charitable sector work offers the best practical canvas on which to paint. But for all, I propose the New Socialist Settlement as a practical route-map to a better society.
- I >>>
Foundation Values
II >>
Individual Freedom
III >
Democracy
IV >
Public Primacy
V >>
Eternal Vigilance
What do you think?
Drop me a line.
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