28.08.1997

Scotland’s referendum: Bosses warm to Labour’s sop

While some on the left portray the Scottish parliament as the first step on the way to providing decent services and conditions for people in Scotland, Donald Dewar makes it clear big business will remain firmly in control

After last week’s distraction, the Labour Party has finally managed to turn the media spotlight away from the murky waters of life in Paisley and back to the referendum.

Although suspended Labour MP Tommy Graham threatened to hold a press conference to declare his innocence and “set the record straight” about his role in the Paisley affair, he has abandoned this idea until after the referendum. No doubt he was leaned on very heavily by the Labour hierarchy.

It was the anti-devolution sentiments of Bank of Scotland governor Bruce Pattullo, publicly expressed in an interview in The Scotsman, which meant that he, and not Graham, took the front pages. He specifically focused on the tax raising powers of Labour’s parliament, forecasting that the plans would harm job creation and discourage investment. He also raised the spectre of a rise in the uniform business rate. In conclusion he stated that a ‘yes, no’ vote on September 11 would be better than a ‘yes, yes’ vote.

Inevitably his intervention has brought much criticism from the Labour Party and the Scottish National Party. In retaliation Scotland Forward released a list of 16 major companies, including BT, Abbey National, Midland Bank and NEC, who have announced significant investment in Scotland since the general election. Other prominent business figures backing Scotland Forward include the former chief executive of the Scottish Development Agency, millionaire merchant banker Iain Noble and the boss of Inveresk paper manufacturers. Government ministers Dewar and McLeish have gone onto the offensive in an effort to reassure Scottish business, the latter guaranteeing they will not be put at a competitive disadvantage by devolution.

Dewar was mealy mouthed in replying to Pattullo’s accusation that the Edinburgh parliament would cost each Scot up to £6 per week: “What we are doing is giving very limited tax varying powers. And it’s a matter for a grown-up parliament with grown-up responsibilities to decide how it will use these powers” (my emphasis). Yes, Donald: too limited.

Such interventions by some sections of the business community have seen the Labour Party in Scotland, like their colleagues in England, grovel and appease big business in an effort to reassure them that their profits are safe in Labour’s hands.

As with all bourgeois parties, the needs of the working class come way down the list of Labour’s priorities. While they rightly accuse the Tories and the ‘no, no’ campaign of not trusting people in Scotland to decide their own future, the Labour Party is no better. Blair’s parliament with restricted powers is a sop which shows that Labour too does not trust us to determine all aspects of our future - including all taxation and the constitutional relationship with the rest of Britain.

Labour’s proposed tax varying powers for a Scottish parliament are pathetic. By allowing a variation of only three pence in the pound on the basic rate of income tax, it will be the lowest paid who will bear the biggest burden of any tax rises to fund public services. Instead it should be the rich and big business who should be forced to dig into their reserves, investments, share portfolios and super-profits to fund a Scottish parliament with full powers and provide quality public services that people in Scotland deserve and need.

Some on the left, most notably Scottish Militant Labour, seem to believe that this outcome will evolve inevitably out of Labour’s sop. They are fooling themselves. The working class must start to organise itself now to win any concessions and to take control over our own lives. The capitalist ruling class will not hand over its power willingly. This is the message that the Campaign for Genuine Self-Determination must ensure is heard loud and clear in the run-up to the referendum.

Nick Clarke