Anti-cuts protest this Saturday 4 December
Article published: Friday, December 3rd 2010
Anti-cuts protestors will target a number of locations in Manchester city centre this Saturday 4 December as part of a national day of action which aims to highlight corporate responsibility for the coalition government’s public sector cuts.
The ‘Scroogey Santa’ event will consist of a mobile demonstration taking a tour of various companies who have lobbied the government for the massive wave of swingeing cuts which are due to come in next year.
On the Christmas naughty list will be: telecommunications giant Vodafone, accused owing around £6bn to the treasury which was subsequently written off by Revenues and Customs; billionaire and Topshop owner Sir Philip Green who, despite locating his business group in Monaco to avoid paying UK taxes, was invited by the government to advise on where it could make efficiency savings; and tax-shy Boots, who see nothing wrong in taking their profits to a Swiss tax haven. Barclays Bank, which benefits from indirect support of the financial sector and Vodafone will also be on the list of those corporations who have been badly behaved this year.
A spokesperson for Manchester Anti-Cuts, a new group in the city which has called the protest, said:
“It’s clearly the season of goodwill! Even in these times of austerity, the government remains generous to its friends and supporters in the corporate world. Private companies are profiting from new government contracts while others are getting away with avoiding millions in tax. Now that’s what I call a Christmas bonus! In comparison ordinary people are getting a veritable lump of coal this Christmas.”
This new wave of protest across the country comes following occupations and blockades of Vodafone stores around the country in early November. Demonstrators highlighted that the £7bn being cut from the welfare budget could almost be covered by the money owed by the company, which was accrued after it had attempted to use tax loopholes in 2000 to avoid paying tax on a takeover of a German engineering firm.
The latest call-out was launched by UKUncut, a national network of groups co-ordinating anti-cuts actions and distributing literature which questions the reasons behind the cuts, in particular the ideas of the necessity and inevitability of the austerity measures – while exploding what they say is the myth of us ‘all being in it together’.
Manchester Anti Cuts invite you to join us at 3pm at Picadilly Gardens when we will begin the protest. Manchester Anti Cuts is an independent action group formed in response to the Con-Dem coalition’s cuts. We meet on a weekly basis, and participate in a variety of different campaigns against the cuts – which we believe are neither inevitable nor equitable.
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