When the Conservative Party was founded in the United Kingdom in the late 17th century, the people nicknamed it the "Tory" party from the Irish torai, meaning robber. No wonder, considering it was founded to cater for the interests of the monarchy, the upper classes and the empire. The needs of the common people were excluded. The conservatives tried to shake it off but, being so appropriate, it stuck like glue, so much so that eventually they had to actually adopt it!
It was much later, at the start of the 20th century, when the Labour Party was founded that the needs of the working class were to be really addressed at Parliamentary level. But, in 1997, a Labour government led by Tony Blair was elected that negated its original ideals.
It did not just modernise its methods. It switched to Toryism in all aspects of government. Mr Blair's economic policies were officially declared as an extension of those of Margaret Thatcher, therefore Tory. Privatisation of state sectors was followed by so called "public private partnerships".
Various public works and services in education, health, transport, defence, etc. were offered to be funded by private capital, which would be repaid by public funds at higher interest rates than if the government had borrowed from the public! This was therefore a form of guaranteed subsidy to private capital, usually bound by 30-year contracts. Subcontracting of public works and services was also greatly expanded, at generous rates to guarantee easy profits to the contractors.
True to Tory economic ideology, Labour freed the Bank of England from the democratic control of Parliament so it could decide and act on its own. Profit motives now prevailed over people's social needs. Banking and finance were further deregulated and praised by Gordon Brown, Mr Blair's second, as being the proper model of how the UK should be run.
Until the crash of 2008, that is.
The high priest of deregulation, Mr Brown, was then forced to temporarily change the idols upon his altar. A staggering £950 billion of public funds were used to bail out the banking system and additional paper money was printed. These measures were simply a way of subsidising the banks by taxpayer's money but called "quantitative easing" so it would not be overtly admitted that the free market ideology had failed so miserably. The results of Labour's Tory economic policies were a government debt soon to reach some 80 per cent of GDP and a Budget deficit of 12 per cent of GDP, higher than that of Greece today!
Worse still, unemployment stood at about 2.5 million by end 2009. Income inequalities increased. In 1997, the top one per cent owned 17 per cent of the wealth of the UK. Now they own 21 per cent.
In order to carry out all these Tory tasks, Labour had to ensure a continuation of the Tory policy of restricting trade union rights, including the right to strike. As a result, workers are being forced into temporary job contracts and losing job security while corporate profitability is being secured by public funds.
Labour's excellence in Toryism peaked by Mr Blair's imperialism. The slaughter of innocent civilians and British soldiers in Iraq, the devastation caused, the military defeats suffered by the British forces and the unnecessary submission of UK foreign policy to that of the USA, are all Labour's responsibility.
Mr Blair deceived the public over the legality of the war and over the inexistent weapons of mass destruction. While the war has been funded by the taxes paid by the common people (not the banks or the corporations), Labour was neglecting the social needs of the working class. Official government figures show that, by 2008, the war in Iraq was costing the people of the UK over £1 billion annually.
Meanwhile, in education, Labour increased the tuition fees for higher education and phased out student grants. In healthcare, although it increased government spending, this has been used to fund private hospitals and an ever-increasing bureaucracy. As a result, by 2008 there were 13,000 fewer beds in hospitals than in 1997 and the National Health Service has deteriorated. In fact, it is regularly criticised in the media.
The 13 years of Labour's Tory policies have more than scarred the party. Labour's electoral support dwindled from 43 per cent in 1997 to 22 per cent of the total electorate in 2005. Party membership, which stood at over 400,000 in 1997, is now a historic low of 166,000. More and more wage earners do not identify themselves with Labour. Worse still, some have been lost to the far-right BNP as a result of this alienation.
But one suspects that this hardly bothers the careerists in charge of the party. Labour is promising a continuation of Tory policies if elected, albeit through some poorly-disguised lip service. The cure for the economic ills will continue to be administered by the market medicine-men. So the wage earner will keep subsidising the bosses. Union protests and opposition will not be heeded.
Incredibly, the British electorate may only choose between one robber and another on May 6.
(Mr Meilaq specified he was writing as a former official of the Malta Labour Party and not as an official of the General Workers' Union.)