Major issues facing the world – even the fate of capitalism itself – are to be debated at St John’s Academy, Marlborough later this month with the Bishop of Salisbury, the Rt Rev Nick Holtam in the chair.
A high powered panel will be present to discuss the way the behaviour of banks and leading bankers is scandalising the world, the countries of the Euro Zone facing ever increasing debt mountains, high unemployment and austerity and the growing gap between the richest and the poorest societies.
Also on the agenda will be the very future of the planet, which is threatened by climatic changes bringing flood, or drought and famine plus the way anti-capitalist demonstrators have been challenging the principles of capitalism in the heart of the City of London and Wall Street.
And the really big question will be whether the time has come to fix – or even replace — the capitalist system that has driven the growth of our economies and ever improving standards of living since the Industrial Revolution?
Indeed, has the short-term imperative of ever increasing growth that drives economic policy, made our way of life unsustainable? Is Capitalism broken and is it time for urgent public discussion of the way forward?
Marlborough’s rector, Canon Andrew Studdert-Kennedy, who last year spent months talking to bankers in the City, has revealed details of the event, which is to be held at St John’s at 7pm on Wednesday, September 19.
“The Bishop of Salisbury, the Rt. Rev. Nicholas Holtam, is to preside over what promises to be a lively and topical debate about the most urgent issue of our time – can Capitalism be made good?,” he told Marlborough News On Line.
Taking part in the debate will be:
Hugh Pym – chief economics correspondent for the BBC, who was educated at Marlborough College. Pym was a BBC radio journalist from 1986 to 1987, then producer of Business Daily at Channel 4, 1987–1988. He was a BBC special correspondent covering economics until 2008, became acting economics editor and then the BBC’s chief economics correspondent.
The Rev Will Morris – global tax policy director for General Electric, chair of the CBI’s tax committee and associate priest at St Martin’s in the Fields, where the Bishop of Salisbury was vicar before his latest appointment. A former US Treasury official, he recently wrote a paper entitled “Not just “how” but “why”: a personal reflection on business ethics and the crisis.”
Stewart Wallis – executive director of the New Economics Foundation since 2003 and an advocate for transition to a new economic system. He worked for Oxfam from 1992 to 2002, for which he was awarded an OBE. The New Economics Foundation is a British think tank founded in 1986 with the aim of working for a “new model of wealth creation, based on equality, diversity and economic stability”.
Symon Hill – Christian activist, journalist and associate director of the Ekklesia think tank. He has written The No-Nonsense Guide to Religion. His new book, Digital Revolutions: Activism in the age of the Internet, is due to be published in the spring.
Last February, he was dragged by police from the steps of St Paul’s Cathedral as he prayed during the eviction of Occupy London Stock Exchange. He previously worked for the Campaign Against Arms Trade and was involved in taking the government to court over Saudi arms deals.
Further information from Rosemary Cook rcook@pheasant-cottage.com, 01672 810129.
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