• WE have watched the failure of Carillion, the plundering of pension funds to pay fat-cat bonuses and the squeeze on living standards for the lower paid.

Conservative supporters celebrated the sale of council houses to sitting tenants and we all wonder why there is such a shortage of homes to rent. Above all, we perhaps wonder why we keep electing governments which promote austerity.

Part of the problem is that politicians and those with influence seem to think they know all the answers and do not listen. Not listening to residents turned Grenfell Tower from a misuse of money into a tragedy causing 71 deaths.

Whittington Hospital trust wants to make as much money as possible from its land deal, and does not listen to concerns of ordinary people. Islington and Shoreditch Housing Association wants to maximise profit from St Mary’s Path estate and risks not listening to the legitimate concerns of tenants.

This feeling of infallibility and the inability to listen runs right through UK politics. Former Greek finance minister Yanis Varoufakis once remarked that, if the progressive left in the UK were serious about taking power, Labour wouldn’t stand against Caroline Lucas in Brighton, just as the Green Party stood down against Labour in Ealing and campaigned for the Labour candidate in a marginal seat.

Islington Labour Party would clearly like to unseat Caroline Russell, when she is an excellent councillor, generally supportive of good ideas, but a challenge to their feeling that “Labour knows best”. Not satisfied with an opposition of one, it would like to become an elected dictatorship that listens to nobody.

This pettiness, inability to listen and claims of infallibility turn so many people away from politics. However, one thing we all can agree on is that, whoever you vote for at the May council elections, democracy needs a good turnout to provide opposition and challenge.

As columnist Andrew Rawnsley remarked: “The biggest mistake we make about democracy is to take it for granted.”

MIKE CROWSON
Islington Green Party