JOHN MAJOR's campaign of 'Back to Basics' in British standards of morality and financial probity has been exposed as a hypocritical sham which has rocked the Tory's increasingly weak government. But current 'Back to Basics' Tory policies represent a massive attack on the working class and women in particular.
The fathering of illegitimate children by Tory MPs became a matter for public scandal and outrage because of the explicitly moral nature of the campaign launched by the Tories at their annual conference last October, a campaign aimed in particular at single mothers.
'Back to Basics' began as a clarion call from the right of the Tory Party. While right wingers like Education Secretary John Patten had long been vocal on morality, for example warning against the loss of a belief in sin, defeat over Maastricht prompted the ory right into an explicit moral campaign.
In the run up to Conservative Party Conference in October, ministers such as Treasury Chief Secretary Michael Portillo, Welsh Secretary John Redwood and Social Security Minister Peter Lilley made a series of speeches calling for a mixture of greater self-reliance, less dependency, more selective welfare benefits and the like.
The problems of the British economy were to be dealt with by cutting taxes and slashing the welfare state. Single mothers became a particular target of Conservative abuse, blamed in a series of speeches for an increase in juvenile crime, falling educational standards and living off the welfare state.
'Back to Basics' was not just a farce in which an ideological attack launched on single mothers and absent fathers collapsed in the popular perception that 'Ministers appeared to have been fathering more children in secret love nests than the medieval popes', as the Guardian put it.
'Back to Basics' was a desperate atWomen fiaht back against racist laws tempt by a desperate government to paper over fundamental problems for British capitalism in dealing with its historic decline as an imperialist power, and the very real crisis it has been jettisoned into by the economic choices of the Conservative Government. It was an attempt to provide ideological support for a whole series of measures aimed at cutting the welfare state and propping up the traditional family.
'Back to Basics' also represents an attempt by the Conservatives to reconcile the irreconcilable. Long before Major assumed the Tory party leadership the Conservatives had been grappling for a family policy which would reconcile its traditional rhetoric with its increasingly confident free market ideology.
As the Party of traditional values the Tories have governed over fourteen years of soaring crime, crisis in the economy and the erosion of the traditional family: as a proportion of all families, single parent families nearly doubled between 1976 and 1991, from 10 to 19%. Fewer than one in four British households now conforms to the traditional image of a married or cohabiting couple with children. 'Back to Basics' was an ill thought out attempt by the Conservatives to deal with a dilemma of their own making.
Bankrupt
The changes wrought on British society by monetarist policies have left the economy "technically bankrupt' according to Ken Livingstone MP. They have produced fundamental shifts in employment patterns which have undermined the traditional family values the Tories claim to support and which many in their constituency base fiercely defend.
The expansion of the service sector after the Second World War, with women as a key component of this workforce, and the erosion of Britain's manufacturing base, in which most men worked, means that women now make up 49% of the labour force. Since 1970 90% of all new jobs created in Britain have gone to The number of women at work exceeds the number of men in 11 regions of the country. Male unemployment is at 14.1% of the workforce, the highest level since the 1930s. By contrast just 5.6% of the female workforce is unemployed, but half of women workers are in part-time jobs, often very poorly paid.
Women's entry into the labour force, and high unemployment among men, undermines the traditional family. Recent television documentaries have shown that many young women in areas of high unemployment, such as the pit valleys in Wales, and the steel towns in Northern England and the St Mellon's housing estate in Cardiff, see little use in having young men live with them and their children.
Single mothers are now a 'normal' part of society, representing 20% of all households. The acceptance by many people that single mothers do a good job looking after their kids and that the traditional family cannot simply be glued together again is shown by the response of a police officer on St Mellon's to Redwood's po litical attack in July: 'We spend half our time sorting out domestic disputes on the estate, removing violent fathers. The thought of forcing absent fathers back is pie in the sky?
But the breakdown of the traditional family under Tory policies, and in response to women's increased economic independence, has caused anxiety among some of the more progressive representatives of the ruling classes, who are afraid of a breakdown in society, as shown in the increase in crime.
Even before the outbreak of Conservative hysteria aimed at single mothers, the 'Observer' had said: "The sad truth (is) that children brought up by a lone parent are more likely to be poor, do badly at school, have a drug or drink problem and end up in jail'.
Single parent families are certainly poor. 42% of single mothers have gross weekly incomes of less than £100, compared to 4% of married couples. Lack of nursery provision makes it very hard for single mothers to work.
The seeds sown by Thatcher's 'economic miracle' are growing into the weeds of economic decay as it becomes increasingly apparent that the problems of the British economy are long term, structural and to do with the basic choice made in the Thatcher years to make a fast buck rather than invest long term in manufacturing industry.
Family in crisis
closely linked to the crisis of the tradi-. tional family. Failure to invest in manufacturing industry, erosion of working conditions, increasing use of women as a cheap and flexible workforce and the attacks unleashed on the public sector and the welfare state have all combined to create a crisis not just in the economy but in society as a whole. ing its caring functions back into the family and onto women is now a financial imperative for the Tories. Spending on social security alone currently accounts for 12.3% of GDP and has increased by 700% since 1950. In targeting the public sector as a whole and the welfare state in particular the Tories are undertaking a massive attack on the whole Women make up the majority of the public sector workforce and their jobs and working conditions have been eroded as part of the slashing of public sector spending. Redundancies, privatisations and 'marketisation' of services like health and local government have resulted in massive productivity increases for the remaining public sector service provision have been directly pitted against each other eg maternity pay being cut in order to avoid redundancies.
Women have also been massively affected as the main users of public sector services. In order to realise many of the formal equalities laid down in law, especially that of entering the paid labour force on equal terms with men, women have depended on the state to 'socialise' domestic responsibilities, such as care for the old, the sick and the young.
"17% of women are carers, saving the state an estimated £24 billion a year"
Cuts in health and social services have resulted in a 're-privatisation' of care back into the family. Psychiatric hospitals have been closed and long term hospital care slashed. 6.8 million people in Britain are carers for adult relatives or friends. 17% of women are carers and the estimated savings to the state of that unpaid caring is £24 billion.
Nursery provision in Britain is amongst the worst in Europe, maternity leave is not a universal right, the state pension age has just been equalised by raising women's retirement age to 65 and wages councils which protected the wages of millions of the poorest paid have been abolished.
Deregulation
'Back to Basics' was to be an ideological justification for further deregulation and cuts in the welfare state, individuals were to take responsibility for themce ves The attacks on single mothers and irresponsible fathers made explicit in *Back to Basics' were not new and had been most clearly embodied in the Child Support Act(CSA), introduced the previous April. At the time of its introduction the CSA seemed like an ideal way to link the Conservatives twin aims of cutting social security spending and ideologically reinforcing the traditional family.
Feminist campaigners against the Act pointed out the increased risk of violence to women from their ex-partners and argued that the Act posed the risk of renewed custody battles for lesbian Portillo: Deficit crisis drives basics fight The response of the Labour Party has been lamentably deficient. While there are rumblings of discontent around the CSA, there is little in the way of organised opposition. As with many Tory policies, the Labour Party has failed to offer a coherent alternative. The Labour Party the incident to slam 'political correctness' and teachers who 'overreact' to Little Black Sambo' books.
Failure to oppose the Tories on the family reflects Labour's wider inability to oppose them on the economy and disagreement within the Labour Party on welfare state policy. There is a growing economic consensus between Conservatives and Labour over the need to limit spending on welfare.
Refusal
Labour leader John Smith and his Shadow Chancellor Gordon Brown refuse to make firm spending commitments on Labour's behalf, arguing that spending should be on the basis of what the country can afford.
They are also introducing proposals for private funding of public services in SOCIALIST OUTLOOK No.58 12 March 1994, Page 9 As users and as workers, are in the forefront of fights to defend welfare state. their recent policy paper 'Financing Infrastructure Investment - Promoting a Partnership between Public and Private Finance'.
'Back to Basics' has represented a further stage in the implosion facing the Tories but has yet to be taken full advantage of by Labour or the working class. For the second year running, 1993 saw the lowest number of days lost through strikes since records began.
However, big increases in taxation and the announcement of a three year pay INTERNATIONAL WOMEN'S DAY freeze for public sector workers, com• bined with the open crisis of the Fories, may yet push the masses into action.
In fighting to defend the welfare state against 'Back to Basics' broad alliances of the working class and oppressed will have to be built and women's interests pushed to the forefront.