I have listened with growing concern to the growth mantra from Keir Starmer and Rachel Reeves. We are to have growth, no matter what the cost to our country or to our environment. Airport expansion? No problem. You fired all your workers and rehired lower-paid workers? Very naughty – we’ll pass a law to prevent that, but you can buy us off with some investment and we’ll help you make even more money. Anti-competitive and monopolistic? As long as you promise growth, we’ll ease the way.
Now with sinking heart I hear the tired refrain of slashing regulation (Keir Starmer will promise to slash red tape as he hosts investment summit, 14 October). Yes, regulation can be overdone; yes, it can have unintended consequences. But regulation is created because of a problem, usually a very serious problem that has proved impervious to any voluntary measures. Have we learned nothing from the Grenfell fire or our financial crises?
This Labour government seems addicted to trotting out the solutions that have been tried and failed in the past (mostly by the Tories), expecting different results. Need growth? Slash red tape. Need more houses? Gut the planning process; build on the green belt and set targets. These things won’t have any more impact this time around, because the causes and constraints are complicated and deep-seated (such as the cost of land, the shortage of skilled workers and the reliance on a few very large builders in the case of housing).
What I expect from a Labour government is that they would always be asking the question: growth from what? And for whom? What I conclude from Monday’s investment summit is not that the UK is open for business but that it is up for sale.
Carol Rahn
London
Did the prime minister miss the brilliant article by Alex Blasdel (Slash and burn: is private equity out of control?, 10 October). He wrote with spine-chilling detail of the “buy, strip and flip” tactics of companies like Blackstone, the world’s biggest private equity firm, and many others that have driven hitherto thriving companies into bankruptcy.
Those, like Blackstone, invited to hear the PM’s pledge on Monday to slash red tape for investors must be rubbing their hands with glee. Macquarie are here again too, the Australian bankers who took over Thames Water, loaded it with debt, paid billions from the debt to investors, and didn’t do the basic work of updating old pipes and sewage treatment works. Then walked off with the profits.
Is there a whiff of naivety in the government’s fixation on growing the economy by offering contracts to an already under-regulated sector that practises such experienced sleight of hand in their private grand-scale greed? The £60bn of investment announced by Rachel Reeves on Monday may cost us all dear.
Anna Ford
London
I am sure that the 800 former employees of P&O Ferries who were summarily fired in March 2022, and their families, fully agree with Angela Rayner and Louise Haigh’s criticisms of DP World (P&O Ferries’ owner pulls news of £1bn port investment after ministers criticise firm, 11 October). Sadly, UK governments are quick to overlook previous transgressions by the likes of the United Arab Emirates and Saudi Arabia as soon as a wad of cash is waved in front of their eyes.
Bashyr Aziz
Pelsall, West Midlands
