A single mother in Keighley is being evicted
from her residence with two months notice. The ‘owner’ of the property does not
claim any fault on the part of the worker; calling her an exemplary tenant.
The move is sound business; house prices may fall so it would be better to cash
in now and let someone else (e.g. someone poorer) take the loss. Yet this woman
is a nurse suffering attacks at work by privatisations, and a mother of four
with no other housing options.
This is the nature of capitalism; inhuman, profit before people. This incident
is by no means isolated; around the country the crisis in the capitalist system
will be another burden on the shoulders of the workers while the bosses worry
about their slightly reduced profits.
Last month Michael Roberts wrote a brilliant article on the ‘Credit crunch!’ at
the end of which he gave voice to all our fears of a return to 1929-33; while I
do not wish to claim we are in anything like as bad a situation the only
response for the person in this example is debt. Debt to buy her own house
after years of renting, debt because of the terrible prospects under private
health-care and debt because of global capitalism which on a national scale
will only deepen the growing capitalist crisis.
It is clear that capitalism will not and cannot solve the current crisis in a
way that will not cause great suffering to the working class; the only solution
is nationalisation of key industries under a socialist planned economy.
