Iceland found that austerity isn’t the only answer | Letters

The policy is a deadly obsession that has long passed its sell-by date

William Keegan reminds us that austerity was, and is, a policy choice ("We all need a stiff drink to swallow Hammond's austerity", Business, last week). It is based on "the Conservative party's obsession with shrinking the size of the state and minimising the so-called 'tax burden'"", a "burden" that Keegan also wisely reminds us "helps to ensure we have decent hospitals, schools and infrastructure generally".

This is a deadly obsession that has long passed its sell-by date. Ask a Conservative to defend it and they will reply by asking you if you want to end up like Greece, "a failing state". The answer to that can be found in Raoul Martinez's superb new book, Creating Freedom: Power, Control and the Fight for Our Future. He retells the story of Iceland, whose banking collapse was worse than any, but whose people refused to allow its government to accede to the IMF's austerity demands.

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