Campaigning for independence
The First 100 Days of a Scottish Socialist Government
by Raphie De Santos - 07-03-2011
As the build up to the Holyrood elections approaches the major political parties are putting forward their modest economic proposals for what they would do if they formed the next Scottish government. But what could a government do to radically change the landscape of Scotland to transform it from a country of mass unemployment and cuts to one where people had a bright future, communities were regenerated, the austerity that people are facing is reversed and instead the social needs of society is met? What follows are the measures that such a government could take in its first 100 days in office to take Scotland along that road.
Taxation
We would shift taxation from the poor, low and middle income groups to the top earners and rich. This would start by replacing the council tax with a progressive local income tax raising an extra £1.6 billion a year. For the super-rich whose assets are not taxed we would levy a tax of 10% a year on these assets finding an extra £1.6 billion a year. We would make the basic income system more progressive with the tax rate increasing as peoples income increased which would generate an extra £2.5 billion a year in revenues. Corporations have seen the rate tax they pay on profits fall from 52% to a planned 24% over several decades. Restoring taxes on profits to their original level would increase tax revenues by another £2.5 billion per year. We would abolish VAT on essential goods like clothes, fuel and food while increasing the rate on luxury goods.
All these measures together would bring in another £8.2 billion – a 25% increase in the Scottish public spending budget allowing an expansion in public services not cuts.
Pay and Unemployment
We would raise the minimum wage to £10 an hour and create 100,000 new jobs – 50,000 of them for our young unemployed - through our newly set up national Renewable Energy, Transport and Housing enterprises. Training would be provided through newly established Enterprise Training colleges across Scotland. This would within 100 days cut unemployment in half and eliminate youth unemployment completely.
Education
As well as setting up the Enterprise Training colleges we would make higher education free for all Scottish students with no future graduation tax and there would be financial grants for all. Student loans for Scottish students would be written off.
Energy and Utilities
We would take these industries back under common control and ownership. All prices would be frozen as well as the scarping of VAT on them. We would provide petrol subsidies for rural and island communities. Finally, we would develop our renewable energy industry using Scotland’s vast natural energy resources. This would be done by setting up a National Renewable Energy Enterprise.
Food
Basic food items would have their prices frozen. There would be free school lunches for all primary and secondary pupils ensuring every child in Scotland had at least one healthy meal a day.
Transport
All Scottish public transport would be taken under common control and ownership and made free to use. A National Transport Enterprise (NTE) would be set up to develop our public transport. This would include the design, construction, installation of the rolling stock and the running of infrastructure of the public transport network. The Enterprise Training colleges would be used to give the skills that people required to work in the NTE.
Housing
We would insulate and make energy efficient all existing public housing and provide grants for private housing to do this reducing energy bills for the family and the nation. We would convert empty houses, offices and other buildings into energy efficient social housing. Many of these buildings are owned by the banks and we would turn non-performing loans that are racking up losses into socially required homes with a future stream of rental income and assets owned by the country as a whole. Once this had been completed we would build the required number of new socially energy efficient houses to meet the remaining unsatisfied housing demand. This whole process would be carried out by a newly established National Housing Enterprises with regional and local branches.
Defence
We would withdraw from Afghanistan and Iraq and reduce defence spending to the level which provides for genuine defence of Scotland including the removal of nuclear weapons form Scottish soil. This in total would save us an additional £2 billion a year.
Pensioners
We would raise the state pension to £150 per week and make housing, transport, utilities, culture and sport free for all pensioners.
North Sea Oil
North Sea Oil would be taken under immediate common ownerships and control. This would provide revenues of £50 billion a year for fifteen years while over the same period the country is transformed to a non-fossil fuel based economy. The revenues would go directly into the new Peoples Social Enterprise Bank and would be used to fund the transport, energy and housing projects.
Debt and the Banks
In exchange for our share of the national debt - £83 billion – we would take an equivalent part of the UK banking system under common control and ownership. This would give Scotland capital of £47 billion and assets of £417 billion which would be used to pay the debt off and the balance would go into the Peoples Social Enterprise Bank to fund national, local and regional projects. The bank would have branches nationally, regional and locally and would employ Scotland’s current bank workers to oversee and administer the funding of all the projects and provide basic banking services for individuals, small businesses and corporations.
Currency
We would set up our own currency, the Scottish Currency Unit (SCU), free from the control of the Bank of England, City of London or the European Central Bank, allowing us to set our own borrowing costs and determine what we wanted to spend on public services. The currency would be convertible into oil based on the US dollar SCU exchange rate. We would work together with other small countries to set up a fund to defend our currencies from speculative attack.
Assemblies
We would establish regional and local assemblies with members elected by workplaces and communities and accountable to them. These assembles would carry out an audit of the regions’ and communities’ needs and feed this through a plan to the Scottish parliament so that resources could be allocated by the National Enterprise bodies to meet the genuine needs of Scotland. The assemblies would audit and oversee the use of the Peoples Social Enterprise Bank’s funds to ensure that they were being properly used and deployed.
Ambition
This is an ambitious project but Scotland has the resources, the wealth and the people to carry it out. In 100 days we could start to transform Scotland form a land of poverty, unemployment and austerity into one of hope as we start to build a sustainable future that meets all our needs. It is a future worth campaigning and struggling for.
The views are the authors own and not of any other person or organisation.