THE return of Glasgow’s in-person May Day was of course a mixture of relief and sadness for the comrades lost over the last couple of years. But is was also a welcome opportunity to share experiences of the ongoing crisis for working people, as well as ideas to build a civil defence against the actions of big business and the governments they run.

Speaker after speaker eloquently put to the rally their experiences of the cost-of-living crisis and naturally the disgusting attacks on workers by P&O were very much at the forefront of people’s minds.

The truth is of course that the cost-of-living crisis isn’t new in the slightest. When foodbanks began to grow after the 2008 banking collapse, their existence and growth was met with shock and a degree of shame by many commentators.

Since then, those foodbanks have grown in use and in number exponentially with barely a shrug of the shoulders from governments or the capitalist press — they’re now an accepted part of everyday life, an accepted part of social security.

Likewise, the outrageous attacks on workers at P&O are new only in their boldness, but that employers are willing and seemingly able to behave in this way will come as no surprise to many of us in the trade union movement.

Alongside this, we are now into our second decade of deep cuts to local government in Scotland. The retreat of statutory services over that period is now almost complete, the statutory services themselves now stand on the brink of collapse. Many of us will have seen this process unwind at close quarters and for many years many of the cuts, though very real, remained less visible to the public. They’re visible now all right.

The ongoing and disproportionate cuts to local government can no longer be met with stern letters to the minister, or asking nicely. That strategy has manifestly failed. The challenge must be taken to the doors of Holyrood and ministers must be made accountable for the damage done.

But we must be clear, cuts to local government are not just about the damage done, but the damage to come.

In a period of rocketing prices, it is local government that could have been best placed to provide communities with a civil defence against such forces, but instead it is reduced to a rump barely able to maintain what it has.

There are of course beacons of light out there and Labour North Ayrshire council under the astute leadership of Joe Cullinane has managed to employ Community Wealth Building to make the best it possibly can of the situation, but nonetheless the crisis remains and deepens with every passing day.

Meanwhile back in Glasgow, the streets are the dirtiest I’ve ever seen, the roads are crumbling, funding for our libraries is precarious to say the least, workforce morale is on the floor and we have an SNP leadership that has demonstrated repeatedly that it is incapable of engaging with the issues beyond the folksy rhetoric of denial or outright attacks on trade
unions.

The city doesn’t need “gussying up,” it needs a wholesale change in direction, it needs leadership and above all, it needs to put up a fight.

I never believed that such a fight would ever come from the SNP and they have set about proving my point in Glasgow over these last five years. Having come to power claiming that their closer relationship with the Scottish government would bring the city dividends, it has simply demonstrated the supine nature of their party in local government.

Supine with government, but happy to roar like lions when attacking their workers.

From conveners simply not meeting with trade unions, to unions being accused of using far-right rhetoric for daring to campaign on Glasgow’s cleansing crisis, to even turning what should have been a positive situation moving towards the settlement of equal pay into a battle to stop them reneging on a deal; it has been a case study in complacency and incompetence.

As we head into Thursday’s local government elections, rightly, local issues are at the fore.

Roads, transport, cleansing, libraries, community halls are all being talked about on the doorstep. As socialists though, it must be our job to not only defend these services to the best of our abilities, but to also commit the cardinal sin in local government of talking about the bigger picture — we must join the dots.

These multiple crises define capitalism. They are not an aberration, not some passing phase before we return to a world where we can all afford good food, homes to live in, the energy to heat them, excellent public services and we go back to our secure well-paid jobs. We must be clear that that world never existed but, equally, we must be clear that it can.

Matt Kerr is a Labour councillor for Cardonald ward, Glasgow.