- Beth Winter MP: “This rotten Tory Government is failing working class people.”
- Major protest against cost of living crisis set for June 18th
Cover image: Beth Winter MP addresses an NHS pay protest in Cardiff, by Mehek Seth
A Welsh MP has attacked the Queen’s speech as a programme which sets out “how the Tories will protect bad bosses and the super-rich.”
Beth Winter, an anti-austerity campaigner and Labour MP for the Cynon Valley, said the Queen’s Speech amounted to a major attack on working class people.
“If the Tories were serious about the cost of living crisis that is causing so much suffering for working class people, we would have heard today about an emergency budget to raise incomes, about a Right to Food Bill, and about an Employment Bill to protect workers.”
Meanwhile, Heledd Fychan, the Plaid Cymru MS for South Wales Central, also hit out at the legislative announcement. “The Queen’s Speech was a series of platitudes, which will do nothing to alleviate the pressure on individuals and families that are suffering due to the cost of living crisis,” Ms Fychan told voice.wales
“What we needed was an emergency package to provide much needed support to households and small businesses, and accelerate our green transition.”
“This is why voters look at Westminster and despair and it has to change.”
Instead of being offered help, Beth Winter said that “those at the bottom will be left to go hungry and the Government are passing authoritarian laws to deal with anybody who dares to protest or complain. This rotten Tory Government is failing working class people.”
Winter was referring to legislation in the speech that sought to resurrect some of the most draconian elements of the police and crime bill that were previously defeated.
These included new offences to stop protesters “locking on” to infrastructure and an extension of police stop and search powers. The Tories also want to make it illegal for protesters to disrupt transport operations in an attack on environmental groups including Extinction Rebellion, Insulate Britain and Just Stop Oil, but the powers are likely to be used much more widely.
Whilst the speech brought in new measure against the right to protest, it also ensured that the cost of living crisis will continue to wreak havoc in people’s lives.
“Workers and communities are suffering,” said Unite general secretary Sharon Graham. “We are in the middle of a cost-of-living crisis and a recession is looming. So where is the programme to address these issues head on? Where are the laws to stop profiteering and prevent attacks on workers? Where is the help for the millions who are already faced with the shocking decision of whether to heat or eat?”
“We are hearing lots of talk, but that is all it is – talk, not action,” she added. “This is why voters look at Westminster and despair and it has to change.”
Cost of living protest – 18th June
Now Unite and other major unions in the TUC are organising a major protest against the cost of living crisis in London on 18th June.
People’s Assembly Wales, who are helping to organise coaches from across Wales to the protest, said that last month people saw the biggest household energy bill hike in modern history, pushing forty percent of Welsh households into fuel poverty.
“In the last year, Wales saw the biggest rent hike in any part of the UK other than London, rents rose twenty percent in Swansea and fourteen percent in Cardiff. Everything from food to petrol is going up and up. This is class war,” a spokesperson from the group said.
They said the government could act if it wanted to:
“Whilst our bills rose by 54%, in France they rose only by 4% and in Portugal bills are frozen this year. Norway imposes a permanent windfall tax of 55% on energy companies used for renewable energy and to reduce fuel poverty. Government could take energy off the market and re-nationalise it.”
“We have to make sure that June 18 is a major stepping stone towards building the kind of community and workplace movement across the UK that can rock the government and force it to end the crisis.”
Meanwhile, polling by the TUC has shown that almost 8 in 10 (77%) people in Wales think the UK government “has not done enough” to help with the rising cost of living.
The union body is calling on the Chancellor Rishi Sunak to urgently come back to parliament with an Emergency Budget to help struggling families.
Commenting on the poll, Wales TUC General Secretary Shavanah Taj said that responsibility for resolving the crisis sits primarily with the UK government, who control welfare spending and who dictate the size of the Welsh Government budget. :
“Everyone should have enough to pay their bills. But years of standstill wages have left millions at the mercy of soaring bills and prices,” said Ms Taj.
“The Chancellor must come back to parliament with an Emergency Budget, to help with energy bills and raise the minimum wage and Universal Credit.”
