Why I will be marching with London Young Labour on March 26th

By Ken Livingstone

Like many thousands of others I will be joining the March for the Alternative on 26th March, to make the case against the cuts and higher taxes on the majority imposed by Cameron’s government.

I will be marching with London Young Labour because in the end this is all about our country’s future.

Young people are bearing the brunt of the government’s malicious and economically dangerous policies.

Whether it is children or young adults the government has declared open season on the next generation: from Education Maintenance Allowance and the future jobs fund to sure start and child benefit, to the schools cuts under BSF. The Conservative Party’s cuts to the house building budget will damage the life chances of young people looking for a secure and affordable home.

Grotesquely, the Tory-led government tells us that the nation must bring down its debt – by saddling future students with massive debts themselves. Under the Tories, what is unacceptable for the nation is acceptable for young people.

London is affected by all this in two particular ways. One, because London’s population is so large that anything that harms the public as a whole will be numerically highly concentrated here. London has the largest student population in the country, with thousands of London families aspiring to higher education. The number of recipients of EMA in London numbers close to 100,000.

Two, Londoners are disproportionately affected by the high cost of living. This worsens the effect of many of the Tories’ measures. A Tory London weighting in reverse is adding extra misery to cuts, fees and higher taxes on middle and low incomes.

For example, the Conservative Party likes to argue that the fees rise is reasonable because graduates will only pay it back when they are earning £25,000. The high cost of living, driven by factors such as the cost of housing makes £25,000 a very tight budget indeed in this city. You are not ‘well off’ in London on £25,000 – your budget is squeezed exceptionally tight already. Fees of this magnitude on top are a major deterrent and a measure that directly harms London and Londoners.

I’m currently spending a day in each London borough to meet local people and hear their concerns. Yesterday I met students at Barnet College in north London, who echoed the same sentiments of frustration and anger I have heard in earlier meetings at colleges in Ealing and Hackney.

This next generation of Londoners don’t get the support they need from the Mayor.

Whereas the devolved administrations in Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland argued that “the proposed approach to public spending reductions by the UK government runs the risk of delivering significant economic and social harm and [we] urge the UK government to reconsider its proposals,” the leader of devolved government for London said the government was “absolutely right to make cuts and you know we in the government in London have been making very substantial cuts for the last two years,” adding: “I don’t think there’s any part of government across Whitehall that’s moved so far and so fast to make cuts.”

When it came to last year’s student demonstrations London’s mayor preferred to focus on a tiny minority involved in violence rather than support overwhelming public opinion and defend thousands of London families deeply concerned by the hike in fees.

And as James Mills of Save EMA said recently, Boris Johnson has said not a word on EMA but a lot on bankers.

The Mayor’s office argue that he has no remit over education. But he has a clear remit to stand up for Londoners. And having no remit over Kent and Essex doesn’t stop him proposing an airport in the Thames Estuary.

If the Conservative Party is not stopped in its tracks then its reforms will take root and point our society further and further away from the investment, skilled jobs and decent housing the country needs.

That’s why I will be marching with Labour’s young members in London on March 26th. We should be protecting the prospects and life opportunities of those we depend on to deal with the challenges of this century.

Bring your Labour Party banners from all parts of London and join me in marching with London Young Labour to make the case for a fair alternative based on investment for the future.

– Find London Young Labour and Ken on the demonstration on 26 March – follow London Young Labour on Twitter: @LDNYoungLabour
– Follow Ken’s campaign on @Ken4London
– Follow the TUC demonstration on @March26March