Edward Torsney

This week saw a seismic shift in global relations as Donald Trump made it clear that he felt Europe had taken advantage of the US for too long. In dramatic style he shut Keir Starmer down mid sentence in a live press conference. Starmer was repeating the same line as successive British Prime ministers – that we enjoy a “special relationship” with the US. But this appeared to anger Trump and he interjected with two words: “That’s Enough!”. Starmer, visibly shocked and embarrassed, immediately “put wood in’t ‘ole” and shut his trap like a good little scivvy.

But what did Trump mean when he said “that’s enough” to British Prime Minister Keir Starmer? Did he mean “That’s enough talking”, “That’s enough of your ‘friends and allies’ narrative”? Or did he mean “that’s enough of the fabled ‘special relationship’ between the US and UK”?

Trump slapped Starmer down like a CEO to a junior upstart with ideas above his station. With those two words: “That’s enough” , the UK became a jilted lover, an abused partner thrown on’t scrap heap. America’s had enough of our opinions, our national interests, our sovereignty and independence. Now’s time we feel t’yoke o’ debt to America!

For the past 40 years, the neoliberal ideology of shrinking the state and handing over control to private enterprise has resulted in successive governments (both Tory and Labour) selling the family silver to American corporations. Recently Starmer and health secretary Wes Streeting   established SEZ’s (special economic zones), selling half the country off to Blackrock for a few scraps of investment. They’ve done the same with the NHS, now owned mainly by American private healthcare companies. In fact most of our state, utilities and services are now owned by billionaire American investors – and who owns American investors now? Answers on a postcard – first name: “Donald”.

Throughout this process we’ve been led to believe these investors are benevolent benefactors, providing the funds we need to run our country for very little profit. But the reality is that we’ve been taken for fools, it’s the biggest con in history. The PFI (Private Finance Initiative) scheme introduced to attract investors to provide funds to build hospitals and healthcare facilities is a good example. The National Health Executive states that between 1997 and 2016, we accrued a debt of £82bn (factoring in interest) to private companies and in return only received £13bn worth of investment in buildings and facilities. Most of these companies were American. An investigation carried out by The Independent newspaper stated that, as of 2018, we owed these private companies £300bn and had received services and facilities with a total worth of only £54bn.

So through the NHS PFI scam we owe America at least £250bn and since PFI has been massively accelerated under Starmer and Streeting we can assume this figure is much, much higher now. 

So when Trump says “That’s enough”, what he’s really saying is: “I own you, I own your country, you do as I say. No more Mr. Nice Guy – it’s payback time!”

Trump claims Ukraine owes America around $300bn, and for that he wants all of Ukraine’s massive stores of yet-to-be mined minerals. Considering our debt to America, I dread to think what Trump will demand in return, but make no mistake: we’re entering a dark era in British history where America will claim their pound of flesh. The question is though: now that they own everything, what will they take? Blood?