Book description
The forthcoming General Election will be one of the most decisive in
British post-war history. If the Conservatives were to win again, it
would confirm that British democracy is a sham - that we live in a one
party state and the electorate will exact no penalty for broken promises
and the abuse of power. Will Hutton argues that the tories can no longer
be trusted: the recent economic `growth' is little more than a catch-up
from the lost recession years, while investment is still weak and
inflation high; Black Wednesday revealed the Goverments economic
incompetence; and taxes have risen by a record in post-war Britain. Tony
Blair has skilfully exploited the Tory divisions and successfully
remodelled his party: New Labour is reformist, committed to social
justice, solidarity and achievable levels of equality. The years of Tory
Goverment have revealed the shortcomings of a free-market economy: a big
shift of economic power to the employers and a sharp rise in in
equality. Will Hutton urges Labour not to embrace a Conservative agenda
in economic terms but to deal with the challenge of structuring the
free-market economy to get the best balance of growth and a good
society, and to make fundemental choices over the character of the
capitalism we want to develop.
Will Hutton was appointed chief executive of the Industrial Society
in February 2000. He was previously editor of the Observer from
March 1996 to July 1998, and then its Editor-in-Chief. A former
stockbroker, he spent ten years with the BBC and from 1983 to 1988 was
economics correspondent for BBC2's 'Newsnight'. He was economics
editor of the Guardian from 1990 and became assistant editor in
1995. He was nominated Political Journalist of the Year by Granada
Television's 'What the Papers Say' for his coverage of the 1992 ERM
crisis. His book on Keynesian economics, The Revolution That Never
Was, was published in 1986, and the bestselling The State
We're In in 1995.
He is a member of the governing council of the Policy Studies
Institute, the Political Economy Research Centre and is a governor of
the London School of Economics. He is a visiting fellow at Nuffield
College, Oxford, and is on the editorial board of New Economy. In 1995
he became Chair of the Employment Policy Institute. Will Hutton is
married with three children.
