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There are contradictions in Paul Mason's view of Starmerism
To nobody’s benefit, not even his own, the once-radical commentator Paul Mason is selling Starmer’s timid immobility as somehow left-wing. It won’t work, explains NICK WRIGHT
Paul Mason argues for continued membership of Nato and the IMF, giving full support to Starmer’s non-confrontational style of centrist leadership

WE have become accustomed to the phenomenon by which the literary labour of Paul Mason, with the inevitability of a natural process, gives rise to its own negation.

After acquiring an enthusiasm for Jeremy Corbyn’s leadership of the Labour Party the lapsed Trotskyite — reacting to the disruption of a Labour rally by pro-EU elements — tweeted: “I am sick of these astroturf elitists … it’s all prep for a millionaire funded ‘centrist party’ that will unleash illegal wars, benefit cuts and drive wages to the bottom.”

Months later he was arguing in the New Statesman for a second EU referendum just as the millionaire-funded Change UK centrist party was created precisely to facilitate that very thing.

  • Cut the substantial majority of carbon emissions by 2030 (82 per cent)
  • The creation of one million green jobs (74 per cent)
  • Closing tax loopholes enjoyed by private schools (73 per cent)
  • An increase in income tax for those earning over £80,000 (71 per cent)
  • Renationaliseation of mail, rail, energy and water (67 per cent)
  • The repeal of anti-trade union legislation (64 per cent)
  • Scrapping tuition fees (61 per cent)
  • The extension of full voting rights to all UK residents (61 per cent)
  • The establishment of a publicly owned generic drug company (60.5 per cent)
  • Compensation for the WASPI women (57 per cent)
  • The introduction of maximum pay ratios of 20:1 in the public sector (56 per cent)
  • The aim of a 32-hour working week within a decade (51 per cent)
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