Meeting held on Tuesday 5 January 2016
8 people were present and 4 gave their apologies
We reflected upon what might be hopeful in the year 2016.
- There was some encouragement from the outcomes of the recent Paris conference, although great disappointment that recent Tory policies (including cutting subsidies to alternative energy) were counterproductive.
- The possibility that Momentum might encourage political activity, especially amongst the young.
- There appeared to be a flourishing of alternative economic perspectives (eg New Economics Foundation, Rethinking Economics, SPERI)
- Increasing links between various pressure groups (eg Avaz, 38 deg., Global Justice)
- The expertise of authorities was increasingly open to question
- Social media had much potential for political action, but not necessarily progressive and can replace proper expertise with trivial understandings. Trivialisation also characterizes much of the mass media.
- The referendum on EU could be a cause for hope, but much uncertainty here, and continued discussion focused on EU membership.
The group feeling was mostly (but not exclusively) in favour of UK membership of EU. The reasons for this varied from a principled wish to cross boundaries and expand our identity as “Europeans” to a considered judgement that the various institutional arrangements of the EU were more positive than negative in terms of progressive change. The main criticism of these arrangements viewed the EU as primarily serving the interests of big business. We discussed whether UK would be more – or less – controlled by corporate interested in or out of the EU framework, but had different views about this. A discussion of the main criteria which might inform our judgement about whether or not to remain in the EU included its contribution to:
- a sustainable environment
- greater equality
- wealth creation
- employment
- connections across national boundaries