The musical paper, NME, last week put its support firmly behind Jeremy Corbyn. They’ve put on YouTube this interview with the great man by their editor-in-chief, Mike Williams.
Williams states that the other parties are ignoring the needs of young people, with the exception of Corbyn. In the course of the interview, Corbyn talks about how support for Labour is surging because, now that we’re in the election period, the reporting has to be a little fairer, and so people are for the first time hearing what Labour’s policies actually are.
He talks about how children are having their future damaged through growing up in high rent, poorly maintained housing, attending schools that are having their funding cut so they are releasing teachers and teaching assistants.
He talks about how Britain spends less on its welfare support than other nations. This is unacceptable, as we are not a poor nation. He states that he intends to correct this by putting more on corporation tax, but 95 per cent of the people of this country will not be paying anymore.
He also talks about how student debt is also damaging young people’s future. It harms their credit rating and makes it difficult for them to get a mortgage. As you have to be earning over £21,000 before paying it back, it means that many people don’t earn enough, and so, as many people also move abroad, it means that there is a mountain of public debt that’s piling up.
He states that Labour will make tuition free for those beginning uni in 2017/18, but acknowledges that there is a problem with existing students, who have already accumulated a debt. He sketches out various ways Labour may try to reduce it, but acknowledges that at this point he can’t give a definitive answer, because an election has only just been called.
Corbyn and Williams also talk about how the Tories are running down public services, including the welfare state, through massive cuts, in order to give massive tax breaks to big companies, which leave the rest of us worse off.
He rebuts May’s dismissal of Labour’s proposals as ‘utopian’, and makes that dry observation that this the first time he’s heard her use the word. Clearly, he has a low opinion of her intelligence and vocabulary.
As the NME is a music paper, Corbyn also talks about Labour’s proposals to protect and nurture music and young musical talent. About 40 per cent of the music venues in London have closed. Corbyn states that he intends to rectify this by putting more funding into live music venues and music education. There will be an additional £160 million given to schools, which will enable schoolchildren to learn an instrument. He also wishes to give money to councils so they can provide affordable practice spaces to aspiring musicians. In this way, he hopes to encourage the music industry to take up the pool of talent that there will be.
Williams tackles him on the subject of pacifism, and asks him why he has said he will put more money into defence. Corbyn states that he believes in and works for peace, but there is the question of what you would do in a war like the World War II and the need to attack enemies like the Nazis. However, he states he has set up a shadow minister for peace and disarmament, and that if Labour wins he will turn this into a ministerial position.
The two also talk about what will happen to the NHS if Labour don’t get into power. How close is it to collapse? Corbyn states that it is very close to collapse already, and that if this goes on, it will become a health service of last resort to people who cannot afford private healthcare. If that happens, you will have the system where the poor will have to receive care from emergency rooms, a prospect he finds appalling.
Williams asks him what will happen if Labour doesn’t win. Corbyn says in reply that Labour will, but people need to get out and vote.
As for the whole question about young people versus old people, he states that he does not believe politics should be so compartmentalised. He describes a public meeting in which he spoke to a wide cross-section of the community, the young, the old, gay, straight, Black and White. We should be talking, he says, about intergenerational support. The young need the wisdom of the old, and the old need the inspiration of the young.
Williams also asks him the burning question that people have been poring over for the past 20 years: which was better, Blur or Oasis. Corbyn things a bit, and then says Oasis, but then says that what he really should have said, was that he’d refer it to a focus group. But he doesn’t do focus groups.
This is an excellent interview. Corbyn is quiet spoken, in command of the facts and figures, optimistic, but not complacent, and with very clear ideas how to make life better in Britain for everyone, not just the poor. And he has the honesty to admit that Labour doesn’t yet have a fixed policy when it comes to the debts students now have built up. You won’t hear such honest from May. All you can expect from her is lies.
All the Tories will give us, by contrast, is more poverty, more starvation, and all to give more money to the rich.
We can stop them.
For peace, a just Britain, and an end to Tory poverty and misrule, vote Labour on June 8th.
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