Skip to main content
Work with the NEU
A privatised New Jerusalem
The PM is hijacking the memory of the post-war settlement with talk of 'building back better' after the pandemic. What nonsense, writes SOLOMON HUGHES

KEIR STARMER’S main line of attack against Boris Johnson on Covid-19 has been “get a grip of the crisis.” But Johnson hasn’t pursued his disastrous, privatised approach to Covid-19 because a better one slipped through his fingers.

Johnson isn’t throwing money at Serco and Mitie and Randox because he couldn’t “get a grip” on the cash. It isn’t a mistake — it’s what the Tory government wants to do.

Johnson made this very clear in his main speech at the Tories “virtual” conference in October.

The 95th Anniversary Appeal
Support the Morning Star
You have reached the free limit.
Subscribe to continue reading.
Similar stories
Health Secretary Wes Streeting speaking at the launch of the Government's 10-year health plan during a visit to the Sir Ludwig Guttman Health & Wellbeing Centre in east London, July 3, 2025
Features / 11 July 2025
11 July 2025

US General Stanley McChrystal has been invited to advise on creating a ‘team of teams’ for healthcare transformation. His credentials? He previously ran interrogation bases where Iraqis were stripped naked and beaten, reports SOLOMON HUGHES

Prime Minister Keir Starmer leaves the end of a press conference on the Immigration White Paper in the Downing Street Briefing Room in London, May 12, 2025
Features / 19 May 2025
19 May 2025

ALAN SIMPSON warns that Starmer’s triangulation strategy will fail just as New Labour’s did, with each rightward move by Labour pushing Tories further right

COSY CLUB: Akshata Murty has been appointed a trustee of the
Features / 11 April 2025
11 April 2025
Why is the Labour government so addicted to giving government jobs to Tories when it spent so long trying to oust them? In the hope the favour is returned the next time the Tories return to power, writes SOLOMON HUGHES
Features / 17 March 2025
17 March 2025
Behind Starmer’s headline-grabbing abolition of NHS England lies a ruthless drive to centralise control so that cuts of £6.6 billion can be made — even if it means reducing cancer services and clinical staff, writes JOHN LISTER