The constitutional role of the Opposition checks the power of Government and makes sure that power does not go to their heads. It sometimes means backing them when they do the right thing as in helping the Libyans liberate themselves from tyranny.
The Opposition is not short of policies to criticise. It is like shooting fish in a barrel. Top of the list is economic strategy from which so much else flows.
The looming picture is grim. Public sector cuts and sharp increases in basic services from rail to energy plus pay freezes and pension increases are depriving the economy of tax revenue and spending power.
Given the reliance, especially in the North East, on public sector contracts this is stalling growth and the hope that the private sector will mop up unemployment is not happening.
Small businesses are finding it difficult to secure loans from the banks despite the government's Project Merlin. The strategy is failing and the government is flailing.
As always when capitalism fails it is the most vulnerable who suffer. The groups suffering most stretch to include the majority of us. The old, the young, the jobless, the disabled and women are in the front line of an audacious attempt to use the crisis to give more power and influence to small elites.
The price is that a quarter of our children will grow up in poverty and the gap between the rich and the poor is at its widest for 40 years. But Barclays makes £11.6bn profit and pays only £113m in corporation tax. Some 98 out of the top 100 FTSE listed companies are avoiding £18bn in tax.
In these circumstances, I look to history for inspiration and, in particular, to the Jarrow Crusade of 75 years ago. They were not prepared to take their fate lying down but organised themselves to expose the injustice of joblessness. Sadly, just like today they were turned away empty handed.
History repeated itself in the 1980s. Britain suffered successive recessions with de-industrialisation needlessly destroying coal mining and shipbuilding. We abandoned billions of tons of coal under our feet and dismantled the manufacturing base that was producing some of the most technically advanced and safest mining machinery in the world.
We did it because the markets demanded it. They said that British coal was too expensive. They said we needed cheap coal to deliver cheap power, and the government's response was that unemployment is a price worth paying along with the devastation of local communities with people descending into drugs, drink and crime. The legacy is that we are now uncertain about keeping the lights burning this winter.
We need to challenge the failed and failing orthodoxy that all mainstream parties have supported. We need a new crusade that puts people at the heart of economic policy.
There can and must be a better economic system that encourages responsible and long-term enterprise and uses all levers to provide a healthy platform for individuals to make the most of their potential - a humane system that combines individual liberty with collective provision. We should see ourselves as capable of deciding what lives we can lead and not just leave it to chance.
Newcastle Chronicle and Journal
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