It is all but impossible to solve climate change under capitalism.
If we are going to invest in the technologies and industries,
that we're going to need in order to fuel the green transition,
and have finance allocated to the right places to allow us to do that.
Then we are going to need a much greater role for the state and for democracy,
and for ordinary people.
Because at the moment there's a small number of people,
who make all the decisions in our economy.
If they're only incentive is to maximise profits which under capitalism it always is,
then we're just going to end up making the same mistakes over and over again.
The only way of changing that,
is to change who owns the stuff and to change who makes the rules.
Over the last 40 years the growth of the finance sector,
has completely transformed the British economy.
It's led to the growth of the city and the deindustrialisation of the country's regions.
It's led to a massive increase in private debt,
Financialisation has really shifted power in society,
away from working people and towards people who just make their living,
off the returns they get from their investments and their assets.
The only way out of this is rebalancing that power away from,
people who live off wealth and towards people who live off work.
It's not enough to just kind of tinker around the edges,
and make a couple of different policy changes.
We have to fundamentally transform the balance of power in society,
and that means actually working people taking back control.
In the aftermath of the financial crisis we had massive bank bailouts,
we had a massive quantitative easing program,
the state basically stepped in to deliver socialism for the banks.
So rather than making those people pay for the mistakes that they had made,
for the massive costs that they had heaped on ordinary people.
Our government chose to impose the cost of the financial crisis on the many.
And as a result 120,000 of people have lost their lives since the beginning of austerity.
120,000 unnecessary deaths according to the BMJ,
have been caused by a ruthless and unnecessary austerity regime.
They did it because the financial crisis,
threatened to deliver a massive pushback against the establishment.
And how could they contain that pushback?
Basically by kicking working people when they were already down.
That was what austerity was designed to do,
it was designed to say to working people,
who legitimately after the biggest crisis since the 1930s wanted change:
Stay down you can't challenge the system the system owns you.
And that is why the logic of Finance led growth is so inhumane.
But the bigger point is that we live in an economy in a political system,
where a tiny number of people all of whom know each other,
all of whom basically have the same interests,
dictates the rules for everyone else.
And they do so in a way that benefits them and a way that harms the rest of us.
Finance led growth ultimately ends up eroding the basis for its own existence,
The Thatcherite the Reaganite bargain the neoliberal model,
was premised upon the idea that you would just consistently expand property ownership,
that house prices would carry on going up forever,
and therefore because people would always expect to own a house,
they would just support the status quo, that isn't true anymore.
People of my generation many of them will never be able to afford a home.
The retreat of the state the massive increases in debt,
the massive increases in house prices,
all the kind of conditions that financed their growth has created,
is eroding the basis for its own support.
And that's why we're seeing, so much resistance now,
and that's why this moment is such a big opportunity.
Ultimately either we're going to solve these problems or we're not right.
Either we're going to deal with the climate crisis, deal with massive increases in inequality,
fix our economy or we're not and if we don't we're screwed.
I think we have a fundamental duty to talk about,
the ways in which we can change the world to build hope for the future,
and to build solidarity and a sense of collective agency.
And so much of it just depends on people realising,
that we are the ones with the power.
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