Everyone agrees that we have just come through the hardest winter in many a long year with record temperature levels below minus 20ºC. But are we about to enter even harder economic times?

Recently, Mervyn King the Governor of the Bank of England noted, “that UK wages were stagnant, and coupled with high inflation-this led to the longest decline in the real value of take-home pay in the UK since the 1920s”.

The MCW has previously shown here how UK is a highly unequal society with the gap between the rich and the poor greater than at any time since the end of he Second World War.

During three sunny days in Poitiers over the Pentecost weekend (22-24 May 2010) 750 delegates representing 15,000 members of the Action Catholique Ouvrière (ACO) of France exchanged their experiences of life. Confronted by their faith in the liberating message of Christ's gospel they committed themselves to continue to ‘Resist' the attacks on the poorest and most vulnerable members of French society in order to give hope to the world.

‘In a world where money is the king, where anything can be bought and sold, we have to listen to the cry of men and women, to the silence of the machines created by factory closures, to the voice of working people who are losing their jobs, to the migrant workers who are being ejected from our country. When we hear and listen to these cries, are they not the cries of love from Christ for the whole of humanity that is manifesting itself.'

At a time of very significant public sector spending cuts it is interesting to note that research undertaken by the Institute for Fiscal Studies (IFS) shows that these cuts are falling more heavily on those with low incomes than other groups. The IFS is Britain's leading independent institute on public finances and tax and has no party political affiliation. Further details can be found at http://www.ifs.org.uk

Another recent report entitled ‘Keeping the Plates Spinning' (http://consumerfocus.org.uk) on payday lending illustrates that those with few or no alternatives always pay more interest than those with greater means. Payday lending comprises of a small loan (£100 - £1,000) advanced until the next payday (usually a month). Charges are fixed at a fee per £100 and loans can generally be extended each month by paying this fee or can be repaid in full. According to Consumer Focus, which commissioned the report, the number of people using payday loans has quadrupled in the last four years to 1.2 million with £1 billion lent in 2009 alone by around seven major companies. It noted average annual percentage rates of 2,500%.

Emma Goldman (1869-1940) a Lithuanian born American international anarchist is often credited with coining the above title phrase which Ken Livingston years later used for his book "If voting changed anything they'd abolish it" (1988).

This sentiment reflects a left wing critique of liberal parliamentary democratic systems. It argues that such systems do not bring about any real structural change in the distribution of income and wealth and as a consequence political power and influence continues to rest with an economic and political elite.

Recent global events would appear to give some credence to such a critique. The current economic system puts profits for a small elite before the collective need of the whole community especially the most disadvantaged members. In a report entitled ‘Unequal Britain'1 Professor Peter Hills shows in stark terms the outcome of the obsession with the free market; ‘Britain's richest 10% are now 100 times better off than the poorest'.