Class War election candidate vowing to stir things up

A parliamentary candidate for Lichfield and Burntwood has revealed he is only standing in order to stir things up.

Class War, which was founded in 1982 by Ian Bone was originally a satirical anti-establishment newspaper, but in 2014 it became a registered political party.

Their policies include doubling benefits, increasing pensions, imposing a 50 per cent mansion tax on the wealthiest in society and abolishing the monarchy and all public schools.

They will be represented in Lichfield and Burntwood by Andy Bennetts.

The 40-year-old explained that the movement realised it needed to become active in politics in order to continue the struggle against the establishment.

He said: “I became active in politics in the 1990s. I have been involved in anti-facist and anarchist movements before and I know quite a few people from Class War.

“We became a political party just to fight the 2015 general election. I’m standing because I thought the safe seat of Lichfield and Burntwood would be the perfect place to stir things up.

“As a party we don’t expect to win or even keep the deposits for the six seats we are contesting at this election. People said we needed some policies, so we made them up on the spot. Don’t vote it is a waste of time.

“Class War started out as a newspaper in the 1980s, but with wealth inequality set to rise across Britain we decided we needed to take the fight to the establishment in the political arena.”

Bennetts expressed his anger at conventional politics.

He believes all politicians are robots and that none of them say what they actually think.

“All of the other candidates are going to hear things from me that they aren’t going to like,” he promised.

“Everything politicians say now a days is just spin, spin and more spin – they don’t say what they actually think, it’s just all robotic drivel sent to them by the party machine.”

The Class War party candidate for Lichfield believes that the political system is completely broken.

Bennetts says a financial system that encourages people to acquire more and more debt is doomed to end in failure.

He added that the banks lending recklessly to individuals was the sole reason for the financial collapse in 2008.

The member of a workers co-op said: “Our system is based on people getting themselves into more and more debt. That’s what happened in 2008 – the banks lent irresponsible to the point where no-one could afford to pay back their loans.

“There are three ways to prevent people from taking on unsustainable debt. Option one is for businesses to pay their workers higher wages, which will reduce their profits so that isn’t going to happen. Option two is for people to stop spending completely, which will cause the entire British economy to collapse.

“Or option three, which is happening at the moment is for people to take on more and more debt just to meet their basic living costs, which in the long-term is unsustainable.”

The candidates standing in the Lichfield constituency in May are:

• Andy Bennetts – Class War
• Michael Fabricant – Conservatives
• Robert Pass – Green Party
• John Rackham – UKIP
• Paul Ray – Lib Dem
• Chris Worsey – Labour