Whilst the economic crisis internationally was ushered in by the sub-prime scandal in the US, in Britain the economic crisis first came on to the scene with the collapse of Northern Rock – a bank without a single subprime mortgage on its books. Mick described how these individual incidents are for all intents and purposes merely accidental but that they triggered a full-blooded economic recession due to the deeper malaise of the capitalist system. For the apologists of capitalism of course the old mantra that the City is full of irreproachable wealth creators has simply been replaced with a new mantra that a handful of “spivs and speculators” have wrecked an otherwise healthy system. They were wrong on both counts: the bankers never produced a single thing of real value nor did a handful of bad eggs spoil things for everyone else. Marxists have always understood that capitalism as a whole tends to produce crises of overproduction and no amount of cheap credit could solve that fundamental problem.

Now most workers find themselves in hard times and are increasingly questioning the legitimacy of the economic system which got us into this situation. As one audience member pointed out, the reaction of the working class to the recession has been contradictory. Whilst there is undoubtedly a simmering anger directed towards the real architects of this crisis, about half of Britain’s workforce has accepted wage cuts in the hope that redundancies can be staved off in the long run. For the same reason strike figures alone fail to reveal the prevailing mood. The European election results on the other hand illustrated the deep seated disillusionment which exists among traditional Labour voters. As Mick pointed out: Labour polled worse even than the Cornish nationalists in Cornwall, and complete meltdown at the next general election looks likely. The collapse in Labour’s support however in no way supposes that there’s much enthusiasm for the Tories. On the contrary, even the Shadow Chancellor George Osborne admits that after three months in power they’ll be the most unpopular government since the war. They intend to put the boot in – whether they’ll get away with it is another matter.

The lively discussion which followed carried on until well after closing time. Despite the lean times everyone dug deep at the end of the meeting and a sum of £70 was raised in a collection. Another £30 worth of literature was sold including a number of copies of the book “What is Marxism?” From the floor a comrade from Wakefield captured the spirit of the meeting in paraphrasing Oscar Wilde: “under capitalism everyone is looking into the gutter when we should be looking to the stars.”