The Deadly Grift of Deregulated Special Economic Zones
The grift of deregulated Special Economic Zones is that they are set up to help developing countries achieve a stable economy and alleviate poverty. State aid (which is public money) is used to kickstart a country's economy.
The EU has 82 SEZs but these are strictly regulated to stop govts of member states from giving State aid (public money) as profit motives to corporations. The European Commission enforces this to ensure a level playing field in the EU’s single market, preventing member states from distorting competition by favouring their own industries.
State aid under WTO rules provides a mechanism for members to challenge them if they harm trade interests, often through dispute settlement or countervailing duties. Article 107 of the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union says that if State aid distorts competition or the free market, it is classified by the European Union as illegal state aid.
The UK now has 74 deregulated SEZs plus 12 Freeports initiated by Sunak and Truss, signed off and now fully backed by Keir Starmer's changed Labour Party.
Brexit ensured that the UK left the EU's regulatory orbit for a laissez-faire approach to economic growth by installing a corporate political model which allows companies to self-regulate under Adam Smith's 'Invisible Hand'. This is crucial to understanding why the UK's public sector is now being eclipsed by corporations such as US Blackrock who have launched an 'Infrastructure Imperative', and are making serious incursions into the public sector.
On November 21st 2024, Keir Starmer casually announced on Twitter a Govt partnership with Blackrock.
Lord Evermore (with Starmer's support) announced during a webinar with 700 corporate lobbyists that they were to be given 'governance powers' while the UK Govt would take a 'secondary position'. This was music to the lobbyist's ears, as for decades think tanks like the IEA, The Heritage Foundation, Policy Exchange, and the ATLAS Network (a right-wing think tank that creates right-wing think tanks) have sought to dismantle big govt by breaking it down into more 'manageable pieces', and where better to do this than in deregulated free zones?
Free zones carve out regions of a country and set up a deregulatory framework within their boundaries, this is tailored specifically for corporate hegemony, and in the most extreme cases with separate laws from the host country, these are branded as 'localised freedoms''.
Devolution in this context is synonymous with deregulation, collective sovereignty (people power) is replaced with corporate sovereignty (the asset classes power).
When Starmer, Reeves, and Rayner talk of removing the 'regulatory burden, stopping the blockers, and cutting red tape' they are following the neoliberal playbook to the letter. It should be noted that the UK's 86 free zones unlike Thatcher's SEZs are now embarking on something they couldn't do when the UK was an EU member, that is give public money to their corporate friends to facilitate economic growth for the 1%.
The fact that those on benefits, those struggling to live from paycheck to paycheck, those juggling two or more jobs, those facing council tax rises, and astronomical energy bills will be expunged in the same way that the left were expunged from Starmer's changed Labour Party is anathema to these ghouls.
Public services are deemed 'small potatoes' by right-wing libertarians, their goal is 'countrypreneurship', no more Prime Ministers, no more Presidents, CEO’s will be chosen to run countries like a business. The UK Govt just like the US Govt is being hollowed out from within by oligarchs, why? Because governments are being primed to be will replaced with Sovereign Corporations aka SovCorps.
The UK is going to be privatised and Zone Fever is the template for doing just that.
If this comes to pass you can bet your bottom dollar that there is no way the UK will be allowed back into the EU. This will not be stopped by the electorate or the politicians but by the Blackrocks of this world. They'll bloody well own us and ain't a thing you can do.