In the name of God the Compassionate, the Merciful, is the formula a Muslim recites at the beginning of any and all undertakings. It is likewise the fundamental starting point of Islamic economics. Compassion and mercy are two elements without which our humanity is lost, and if our humanity is to be maintained within any system, these two elements are required. Capitalism never had these elements and never wanted them as they interfered with its primary policies of maximum accumulation and maximum profit.

Islam rejects these aspects of capitalism. Islam rejects the ethos whereby the measure of human worth is degraded to a toting up of bank balances. We as Muslims reject that system of economics whereby millions of human beings have to starve to death and suffer utter deprivations in order that a country can pay off extortionate interest payments on foreign debts. We also reject that system of economics whereby a food mountain in one part of the world is refused to the starving in another, so that the international price of this or that commodity is not threatened.

Islam, the religion of serenity, humanity and practicality, seeks the alleviation of economic degradation and suffering and seeks to re-establish human beings at the centre of its economic considerations with the furtherance of humanity as its ultimate goal. And as humanity cannot progress one iota towards contentment without a recognition of God, Who lies at the very heart of that humanity, Islam seeks the implementation of the revealed instructions of God as its day to day practice.

Therefore, as God is compassionate, His revealed system of economics is compassionate. He informs us:

 'I, Allah, am the best knower. This book, there is no doubt in it, is a guide to those who keep their duty (Qur'an, 2;1-2) ... Those who swallow usury cannot arise except as he whom the evil one has demented by his touch. That is because they say trading is like usury. But Allah has allowed trade and forbidden usury. ... Allah will blot out usury and cause charity to prosper.... 0 you who believe, keep your duty to Allah and relinquish what still remains due to you, if you are indeed believers. But if you do not, then expect war from Him and His messenger; and if you repent then you may keep your capital. Wrong not and you shall not be wronged. ... And if the debtor is in difficulty let there be a postponement till he is in ease, though if you remit it as alms it would indeed be better for you, if you only knew.' (Qur'an 2;275-280). 

God is just, therefore His Qur'an promotes justice and ethics in our commercial and economic activities. 

'O you who believe, when you contract a debt for a fixed term, commit it to writing. And let a scribe record it between you with fairness.... And let him who owes the debt dictate the terms, and also observe his duty to Allah, his Lord, and not diminish anything from it."" (Qur'an 2;282)

As God is Wise, the economic system in Islam is supremely practicable and conducive to human survival insisting on recognising human efforts and labour as the primal element and not capital, which should be a useful servant and not the cruel master it has become under the present system devoid of mercy. Islam recognises the link between economics and the relationship it defines, and the socialisation of the individual operating within that system. The alienated relationships defined by the institutions of interest are dehumanising resulting in the primacy of money as a self-reproducing all powerful entity which subjugates the human being and his skills to the status of a commodity to be hired or fired at will. Islam rejects this concept most vehemently.

Interest, or usury for the two are the same, is not only socially destructive, but it is without question economically unstable, inequitable and all too often leads to war. Every truthful Western economist and every great thinker has denounced interest and those who profit by it. Adam Smith, David Ricardo, John Ruskin, John Maynard Keynes, Rodger Scruton, have all criticised the ethos of usury. Abraham Lincoln of course was assassinated because he had the public interest as his priority, when he issued his greenback dollars in line with the constitution of the United States which had enshrined in it the exclusive right of the state to introduce all currency into circulation free of interest, a right which has been denied to us since 1694 with the establishment of the Bank of England, and to the American people since 1913 with the setting up of the privately owned Federal Reserve. The privatisation of money took place in England almost three hundred years ago following the inglorious revolution funded by the Amsterdam banking families and their dream-ticket king, William of Orange, who with the now confirmed financial support of the Amsterdam banking families established in perpetuity our national debt. This had grown from the original 1.3 million in 1694 to a staggering 171,000 million by 1985/86. Mrs. Thatcher has, believe it or not, doubled it since 1979 when it stood at around 84,000 million.

Lord Robert Boothby in his book 'The New Economy' published in 1944 states that:

"it was a tragedy to watch the nation savaging herself trying to maintain an economic system and theory, which had long since ceased to have any validity", 

and before his retirement he wrote to Mr. Arthur Swan regarding the foreword to his as yet unpublished magnum-opus 'The other Road to Serfdom' that the only way out of our present difficulties was a complete reform of our monetary system which he had been trying to bring about for 64 years.

It has often been the case that anyone who dared to question the validity of the interest system in the past was assassinated or slandered in order to preserve its hegemony, and as the Holy Qur'an is the last remaining obstacle in the way of total global control, it has naturally come under fire from these self same institutions which emasculated the Christian opposition to the abandonment of the laws of usury some 160 years ago. Thus the attack on the veracity of the Qur'an, the angel of revelation and the prophet Muhammad is evidence of this continuing crusade to extinguish its standing in the eyes of close to one fifth of the world's population and discourage the ever growing interest in this book among the disillusioned thinking people from the traditionally non-Muslim population.

It is no longer acceptable or wise to disregard the conclusions reached by these patriotic pillars of Western civilisation who through sound reasoning and compassion recognised the destructiveness and irrationality of this institution which was condemned by God from the beginning: the institution of interest.

But can interest really be that bad, are there any direct, tangible effects of interest whereby we can determine its impact? Yes, there are. So many in fact that it is hard to see the wood for the trees. If you have a mortgage and are beginning to feel the pinch, you may wonder why on earth with your mortgage repayments it is you who has to foot the bill for Mr. Lawson's futile attempts to reduce inflation by ever increasing interest rates when the solution is elsewhere? Why are you having to pay for his mistakes? Or why is it that when the third world has in aggregate terms paid off the original capital loaned to them many times over, through interest payments they are still being bled dry by the continuing burden of debt repayment? Why is it that Sudan, which five years ago was a food exporter, ploughed up its food producing areas to grow cotton to earn foreign currency in order to pay off its debts, and let its people starve? This is the legacy of interest. As Winston Churchill said, 

'never in the field of human conflict has so much been owed by so many to so few.' 

These cardinal points of Islamic economics operate within a financial system of profit and loss sharing. Money is lent on a basis whereby the lender will take a reasonable percentage of the profits of any venture together with any loss. Under an Islamic system of economics not only the one with capital to invest participates in the profits but also the workers who should always be part of the equation. They should be able to directly benefit from their hard efforts by having a profit share or bonus.

The attempts by money lenders under our present system to turn us into latter day serfs, keeping us just on or above the poverty line, even well below it in some cases, must be brought to an end. It is unjust under any system to allow people to profit by fraud and extortion. An economy based on profit or loss sharing with the crown or state resuming their rights to issue our legal tender free of interest as it was before (and it works) as already admitted by many eminent and impartial economists would be far more stable, efficient and vastly more equitable than the present day situation.

It has been said 'when all else fails read the instructions', and Islam has had the best instruction book for 1400 years which Ibn Khaldun in his masterwork 'al-Mukaddima' pointed out in 1377AC as acknowledged by Hugh Trevor Ropor and Arnold Toynbee who wrote: 

'Ibn Khaldun has succeeded in drawing conclusions which are of living interest for us today. They have a real bearing on our current problems, practical and theoretical. It would, indeed be no exaggeration to say that this is the most comprehensive and illuminating analysis of how human affairs work that has been made anywhere.' (from the preface to an English translation of lbn Khaldun's work published by Routledge Kegan Paul).

On taxation Ibn Khaldun states that it should be noted that at the beginning of a just dynasty or government large returns are achieved through small tax assessments, but as the government becomes unjust small returns are achieved through large tax assessments.

Keynes for example, categorically advocated such a system in order to alleviate unemployment, inflation and to preserve our traditional industries which we now see either closed or in the process of closing due to their marginal efficiency of capital being undermined by the infantile analysis that interest can cure inflation which is like saying that henceforth petrol will be used to put out fires, and while ever good men and women remain silent we must all remain trapped in this house of madness with its dubious logic and pride which prevents them from recognising that their actions spread the economic equivalent of AIDS (Acquired Investment Deficiency Syndrome). This will, unless counteracted soon, drag us all jointly and globally into an abyss of debt and misery for the majority on behalf of the few. Contrary to "Ivan (the terrible) Boesky" greed is not healthy.

In 1932 Neville Chamberlain, chancellor of the exchequer, fixed the bank rate at 2% and set up the exchange equalisation account which prevented the flow of capital and credit overseas and rather than have money lying idle at 2%, people had to do something constructive with it by investing in this country and its people. It was during this period that we saw the biggest domestic building boom this country has experienced in so short a time. This 2% rate was maintained until the early 1950's. Its removal then set the stage for our current problems and those of the 2nd and 3rd worlds.

This fraudulent system of creating credit out of thin air and confidence was developed by the Goldsmiths in the mid-17th century. When they discovered that they could issue credit based on the treasure in their strong rooms to a ratio of nine to one and that ratio still persists to this day where cash in the tills which the banks obtain free of interest forms the basis of this top heavy unstable mechanism. To illustrate how it works based on actual figures extracted from the Bank of England in 1689, although it only had 35,000 in its tills, it still issued bank notes up to the value of 1,657,000. This same mechanism would work of course without the interest factor, and as it already has worked for the past 300 years or thereabouts on the basis of the state providing 10% of the money in circulation at zero interest, it is obvious that it would be of tremendous benefit to the whole economy if the state issued the other 90% as well to industry, commerce and our public services free of unwarranted debt, only expecting a return of the capital amounts. We have had prepared a redemption scheme for the city of Cheltenham based on figures provided by the treasurer's office which would provide a solution for all councils in the United Kingdom and, were it adopted, provide a formula for the resolving of the nation's debt. Courtesy of Mr. Arthur Swan in Cheltenham, copies are available from our party office for everybody to clearly see that interest is the public enemy number one.

Therefore, the institution of interest must be stopped, and replaced with a just system which is economically coherent and equitable, a system of profit and loss sharing with a strong emphasis on forgiveness and mercy which Poland will need just as we need it and every man, woman and child on the face of the earth. The existing banking network could once more transform into an honourable institution concerned with the safe keeping and most efficient investment of real wealth.