Yes, they’re filthy rich, but bashing billionaires shows the depth of Jeremy Corbyn’s ignorance
THE vicious personal attacks on British billionaires by Jeremy Corbyn continue, with the Labour leader’s tweets in overdrive.
Corbyn and even the more moderate Labour campaigners such as Sir Keir Starmer must believe they are on to an obvious vote-winner in a nation riven with social inequalities, where the obscenity of food banks has soared in number.
It is a Leftist-populist strategy which in its tone looks straight out of the Donald Trump play-book.
Workhouse conditions in Sports Direct boss Mike Ashley’s Shirebrook distribution centre near Nottingham, billowing toxins from Jim Ratcliffe’s Grangemouth chemical plants and Labour’s historic resentment of Rupert Murdoch’s media empire make these individuals easy targets for socialists.
Similarly, a Labour Party obsessed with shaking up the whole system of land ownership in the UK is never going to be supportive of Britain’s biggest property owner, the Duke of Westminster, who is a direct beneficiary of a tax system biased in favour of the inherited landed estates.
Defending these very different members of the billionaire classes – Ratcliffe is the son of a Lancashire joiner whereas Hugh Grosvenor is the scion of an aristocratic dynasty – looks to be a hopeless task. But that is only the case if such super-wealthy individuals are viewed though a one-eyed socialist prism unable to see that these people also are wealth creators who contribute directly and indirectly to the tax system.
They are responsible for maintaining tens of thousands of jobs. Indeed, HMRC data shows that the richest 1pc in British society are responsible for 27pc of the taxes which fund our vital public services.
Clearly, Ashley, the burly boss of Sports Direct and Newcastle United, is no pin-up for capitalism. Aside from the well-chronicled ‘Victorian conditions’ at its warehouse in Shirebrook, the governance of his retail empire is deeply flawed. Latest accounts of his private company show extravagant personal spending including an annual bill of £2.1m on private jets and helicopters.
Yet Ashley built Sports Direct from scratch. He takes no personal salary and operates a bonus system in his stores which has delivered generous earnings to shop workers when it pays out.
He has shown faith in Britain’s beleaguered high streets, buying bankrupt companies such as House of Fraser and Evans Cycles, saving stores, brands and jobs from the knacker’s yard.
No doubt he hopes he is buying assets at a good price, but his company employs tens of thousands of people and pays £50m-plus of corporation taxes alone each year. Rupert Murdoch long has been a bogeyman of Labour’s Left. He is portrayed as a despot who ruthlessly uses his power over media outlets to disparage and campaign against Left-wing causes and who has coarsened the national dialogue. But Murdoch is also the risk-taker who created Sky, one of the few world- class creative and technology companies in Britain.
Not only did it bring football to the people through satellite television, it has become a production powerhouse employing more than 30,000 people.
Through highly acclaimed series such as Chernobyl, it has become a vital part of creative Britain. Last year Sky was sold to American media giant Comcast for £26bn in a deal which will have made all our pension funds stronger.
CoRBYN’S
labelling of Jim Ratcliffe as a simple polluter shows profound ignorance. Ratcliffe’s industrial group, Ineos, took on many of the oil refining and chemical plants which were once run by BP, ICI and other firms. Its products are key ingredients in almost everything consumed in Britain, from petrol and lubricants to food and housing. It is also a pioneer in greener energy.
If Labour doesn’t drive Ratcliffe away he is soon to embark on a major investment in building the Grenadier, a vehicle similar to the Land Rover Defender, in South Wales. The Duke of
Westminster cannot personally claim the entrepreneurship of Ashley, Murdoch or Ratcliffe. But his Grosvenor Estates employs 18,000 people on the land in Britain. Moreover, were it not for generally benevolent ownership, great swathes of the British heritage landscape would be much the poorer.
It is hard not to be outraged when the likes of Ashley fail to treat staff with respect and care. Nor can there be any excuses when Ratcliffe allegedly plans to decamp to Monaco to escape taxes when ordinary employees have no such options.
But we already have checks and balances in our political and regulatory system and an aggressive tax authority in HMRC, which is capable of cornering the avoiders.
It is only right that the wildest elements of capitalism are tamed. However, Labour’s failure to recognise that the billionaires make a huge contribution to our affluence shows a profound misunderstanding of how economies work.