Prime Minister Tony Blair, speaking in Hackney, East London, on September 18th, uttered words that have been taken by many as a sign that the real agenda of ‘New Labour’ is reverting to the norms of ‘Old Labour’. He said:-

‘We must search for true equality, equal status and opportunity. It must be a Britain in which we continue to redistribute wealth and opportunity to the many, not the few.’

Well, the only suprising thing about these words is that anyone should be surprised at them. For several years, Britain has been subjected to the illusion that New Labour represents the ‘moderate’ centre-left of politics, by contrast with the more militant left leanings of Blair's predecessors. In fact, Tony Blair's government, is in real terms by far the most left-wing government that Britain has ever had. Only by cleverly concealed image-manipulation has it contrived to convey a different impression. Now that Blair - in the face of a virtually impotent Tory opposition - is starting to feel unassailable, he no doubt believes that he can reveal his left-wing agenda all the more unashamedly.

Marxist inspiration

Redistribution of wealth! Is that not basically a communist concept? Translated into real terms, it amounts to taking away from the wealth creators in order to give to those who contribute little, if anything, to produce wealth. The latter should not be confused with people who, beginning from social and economic disadvantage, raise themselves to better living standards by intelligence and hard work. These do not need ‘wealth-redistributing programmes’ to help them; they can and do succeed by their own efforts, as millions have. ‘Redistribution of wealth’ is something entirely different. It is based on an idea that the achievers in society have no more right to the good things in life than the non-achievers. Karl Marx put it succinctly when he coined the phrase: "from each according to his ability, to each according to his needs." Marx's portrait appears less prominently on Labour Party walls these days, but his spirit burns in Labour hearts as strongly as ever.

But there is much more than this to the creeping bolshevism of New Labour. In many different ways, Blair's party is showing its dedication to the ideals of red revolution, even if it may have discarded some of the externals.

One of the major principles of the bolshevist new order as propounded by Lenin was its opposition to patriotism and its undermining of the nation-state. Though the Soviet Union under Stalin often honoured this principle more in the breach than the observance (Soviet Russia frequently was in practice nationalist whilst in theory internationalist), the original makers of the revolution were rootless cosmopolitans who sought to bring down borders and establish a world-government. All the policies of Blair & Co. point in this direction. British history is denigrated in our schools. Native children are taught to be ashamed, rather than proud, of their nationality - in faithful accordance with Lenin's teachings.

Race equality a communist idea

Just as in Soviet Russia.

But it goes further. Under the Soviet system, ideological conformity was enforced by every available device of power: the mass media, the schools, the law, and the penal system. Dissenters - though they have committed no normal crimes - were imprisoned for ‘thought crimes’, deviations from the officially approved ways of thinking. We are headed along that road in Britain today. The new name for this totalitarian thought control is ‘political correctness’, but the mentality that produces and enforces it is no different. Those jailed for non-conformity - usually in matters concerning race - are not yet great in number, but have no fear: Blair & Co are just biding their time to stiffen laws in this sector which will result in many more losing their freedom if they dare to express ‘forbidden’ thoughts on the subject.