Labour to support replacing G20 with new global body to focus on poor nations and climate change
John McDonnell signalled the party is ready to consider proposals for a new Global Economic Coordination Council
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Your support makes all the difference.John McDonnell has signaled Labour’s support for the replacement of the “unrepresentative” G20 with a new global body to give a voice to poor nations and focus international attention on the battle against climate change.
Speaking at a conference in London on Saturday, Mr McDonnell will call for a wholesale shake-up of the existing structure of global economic institutions to deliver greater democracy at the international level.
He will condemn the “grotesque gentleman’s agreement” sharing out the leaders’ jobs at the World Bank and International Monetary Fund between the US and Europe which has led to the “bizarre spectacle” of George Osborne putting himself forward to be managing director of the IMF.
The shadow chancellor will say that Labour is “interested in exploring further” proposals put forward in 2009 by economist Joseph Stiglitz for a Global Economic Coordination Council to replace the G20.
Sitting at UN Security Council level, the new body would be “globally representative” in a way which the G20 - whose membership is limited to the world’s major economic powers- is not, he will say.
“The reality is that for too long the World Bank and IMF have failed to throw the entire weight of their resources and expertise into tackling climate change,” Mr McDonnell will tell Labour’s inaugural International Social Forum.
“The World Trade Organisation is in crisis in many ways, including as a result of the US’s blocking of appointments to its appellate body. It has not done enough to ensure integration of trade measures and measures to combat climate change.
“The work of the IMF, the World Bank, and others has diminished people power – contributing to a loss of political agency – especially in the global South.
“We are witnessing the latest wielding of that power. There is a grotesque ‘gentleman’s agreement’ that the IMF and Bank will be led by a European and an American. That’s the gentleman’s agreement that has produced the bizarre spectacle of George Osborne, architect of UK austerity, sticking his hand up to be the next managing director of the IMF.”
Confirming that Labour is interested in exploring the Siglitz plan for a Global Economic Coordination Council, he will say: “We need good ideas as well as an unleashing of people power.
“People who push back against the current form of neo-liberal globalisation are sometimes painted as reactionary nationalists.
“The suggestion is that there can be only two sides - defenders of existing right-wing globalisation and xenophobic nationalists.
“But we have to reject this false binary depiction. I believe and assert that another internationalism is possible.”
Meanwhile, Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn is to accuse the government of deepening the north-south divide as he promises a “record investment blitz” for the north of England.
Addressing the Durham Miners’ Gala on Saturday, he will say that since the launch of the Northern Powerhouse in 2014, transport spending per head had gone up twice as much in London as in the North, while the North has fared worse that the South in terms of council funding and primary school class sizes.
Writing in the Northern Echo ahead of his speech, the Labour leader said: “Labour will superpower a new industrial revolution for the north with a record investment blitz.
“Where the mines fuelled the first Industrial Revolution, renewable energy will deliver Labour’s Green Industrial Revolution and 400,000 new jobs.
“As the miners were given shovels and axes to dig for coal, Labour will give the North the tools and support it needs so you can deliver your future.”
Mr Corbyn will confirm the shadow chancellor’s promise of a new £250 billion National Transformation Fund unit in the North, as well as the party’s commitment to regional development banks and new rail links from Liverpool to Hull and the North East.
He will accuse the coalition and Conservative governments of the past decade of having “devolved austerity and super powered it to northern communities”.
And he will claim that Tory leadership favorite Boris Johnson’s plans for tax cuts for those earning over £50,000 will “increase still further the wealth gap with the South”.
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