investment - and will not produce all the socially desired results. The next step is to reverse all the social expenditure cuts and begin a massive programme of public works in health, education housing, etc. The resolution passed by this year's ASTMS conference demanding a £1,000 million injection of state funds into the health service can be the first step in this.
Reduction of prices of essential commod ities and release of resources for investments through radical taxation of the rich and cuts in defence expenditure: While the protection of working class incomes against inflation is a vital part of any economic strategy for the present crisis, it is also clear that every attempt must be made to keep prices down - particularly on essential commodities. A combination of price freezes and subsidies is the way to achieve this. In order to prevent the subsidies from having inflationary effects in other sectors of the economy, they must be financed through radical taxation of the rich and slashing of defence expenditure.
The resources which could be released through these twn measures are gigantic. For example, the Cambridge Political Economy Group has calculated that without any extra taxation on incomes below £75 a week, and with actual increases in pensions and pay for workers doing onerous or dangerous jobs, around £1,400 million could be generated. More radical measures on fewer people could also have great effect -for example, eliminating the income merely of the richest 9,000 would release more resour ces than are at present spent by all local authorities on personal social services such as old We would propose as the best means the adoption of the TUC target of penal taxation on all incomes over £10.000.
DEFENCE CUTS Equally as vital as taxation on the rich are the cuts in defence expenditure. This is politically necessary - a first aim of any socialist government must be to create the conditions to weaken and disband the counter-revolutionary standing army - while economically it would release huge resources. A real socialist plan would have no trouble in doubling or trebling the £1,000 million cuts in defence proposed by the Tribune group.
The resources released through defence cuts and taxation of the rich would also provide part