Funding the Future

Wes Streeting wants to fund 200 new NHS health centres through PFI. But the Public Finance Initiative was a disaster in the past – locking hospitals and schools into decades of expensive contracts. Profits were privatised while risks and debts were socialised. This video explains why PFI 2.0 is a betrayal of the NHS, why it costs more, and why the government should fund health centres directly using its own currency.

In this first podcast style interview between me and Steve Keen, the author of 'Debunking Economics', Steve recounts how early encounters with neoclassical and neoliberal economics, and the realities of firm behaviour, led him to reject economic fairy tales and become a rebel. His politics shifted too, from Vietnam-era conformity to organising for a political economy curriculum. Today his priority is climate change. Economists’ models have trivialised existential risk and hobbled action with myths about government finance. Steve broadly agrees with MMT’s “spend first, tax later,” but challenges Warren Mosler’s theories on trade, all of which mean that in the longer term he plans a wider assault on comparative advantage. And, at the end of the interview, we may clear that this is the first of what might be a number of conversations with Next up a discussion on double-entry as the missing economic grammar and how and why he created his RAVEL software to model it.

We are told that central banks are neutral and above politics. The truth is, they’re not. Central bank independence was created to remove responsibility from politicians and hand power to unelected bankers. This video explains why the idea is a con trick, how it undermines democracy, and why it’s time to put money back under democratic control.  

Fiscal rules are not laws of economics. They are political straitjackets designed to stop change. Every Chancellor since Gordon Brown has used them to limit public spending, block climate action, and enforce permanent austerity. The result? A weaker NHS, failing schools, inadequate housing, stagnant wages, and rising inequality. It’s time to abandon fiscal rules and rebuild democracy with fiscal freedom.

Some claim modern monetary theory (MMT) proves that tax doesn’t matter. They’re wrong. Tax is not about funding government spending—it’s about controlling inflation, creating demand for currency, and sustaining democracy. In this video, I explain why without tax, MMT collapses.

Stablecoins are being sold as safe, secure cryptocurrencies. In reality, they are shadow banking in disguise – with the same risks that nearly destroyed the global economy in 2008. Nobel Prize–winning economist Jean Tirole is worried, and so am I. If these private tokens collapse, the public will pick up the bill. It’s time to call stablecoins what they are: a threat to financial stability and democracy.

Politicians love to talk about “taxpayers’ money.” But here’s the truth: every pound in circulation is created by the government or banks licensed by it. This video explains why a £5 note is really a promise from the state, not something you or I created. If we stop believing in the myth of taxpayers’ money, we can start demanding real accountability for how government spends its own money.

Labour has an economic problem – and appointing Minouche Shafik as Starmer’s senior economic adviser will not fix it. Shafik represents the neoliberal technocracy that has failed for decades. She may talk progressive language, but her loyalties lie with the institutions that defend the elite. Labour is out of ideas, still clinging to a broken model that fuels inequality, debt, and ecological collapse. In this video, I explain why Shafik’s appointment shows Labour is paralysed – and why we need modern monetary theory, tax justice and democratic accountability instead.

History shows it clearly: austerity creates the conditions in which fascism thrives. When governments strip away public services, weaken safety nets and deepen inequality, people lose hope in democracy and turn to authoritarian “strongmen.” From Weimar Germany to modern Britain, austerity is the midwife of fascism. The only way forward is investment, trust and care.

Is Modern Monetary Theory just Keynes rebadged? Many think so—but they’re wrong. This video compares Keynesian ideas on borrowing and balanced budgets with MMT’s claim that governments create money when they spend. Understanding this difference changes how we think about debt, inflation, and what governments can really do.