Despite its inability to fulfil its London 2012 contract,
the rise and rise of G4S is the story of the privatisation of the state and an
increasing emphasis on “threats” and “security concerns” aimed at keeping
people in thrall to authority.
G4S is no ordinary corporation. It operates in more than 125
countries and has 675,000 employees. Group turnover last year was £7.5 billion,
mostly derived from state contracts around the world, with 30% of revenues
coming from “developing markets”. Pre-tax profits were up 2.1% to £531m.
The self-styled “world's leading international security
solutions group” has cashed in on the drive by the state to divest itself of
more and more functions like prisons, crowd control and significant parts of
the police service. As the company’s website declares: “In more ways than you
might realise, G4S is securing your world.”
Of course, it’s not “our world” so much as their world – the
rich, the bankers, the state, and the corporations that G4S helps to secure.
And nowhere is “security” more on the state’s lips than in Israel , which
continues to occupy Palestinian lands in defiance of countless UN resolutions.
As a sub-contractor of the Israeli occupation, G4S,
according to the Palestinian grass roots movement Stop
the Wall, is involved in human rights abuses and violations of
international law. Through its subsidiary G4S Israel (Hashmira) it provides:
• equipment for Israeli-run checkpoints and terminals in the
West Bank and Gaza ,
including luggage scanning machines and full body scanners
• security systems to the Israeli armoured corps base of
Nachshonim
• (and operates) the entire security system of the Ktziot
Prison, the central control room of the Megido Prison and security services to
Damon prison where Palestinian political prisoners are held.
• peripheral defence
systems on the walls surrounding the Ofer prison, located in the West Bank , near the settlement of Givat Ze'ev.
• security services
to businesses in illegal settlements, including security equipment and
personnel to shops and supermarkets in West Bank settlements.
Palestinian prisoners are, of course, mostly tried in
military courts while others are held in detention under laws dating from the
British mandate. Many prisoners have taken to hunger strikes to force their
plight into the public arena. G4S also transfers Palestinians to and from
interrogation centres.
Campaigners add: “Yet Israel continues to build new
settlements and expands older settlements, stealing Palestinian land and
resources. While G4S profits from ‘securing’ these illegal settlements, the IOF
[Israeli Occupation Forces] restricts Palestinian movement and violently
repress any dissent in the name of ‘security’.”
In Britain ,
over 700 complaints have been filed against G4S over the treatment of immigrant
detainees, of which 130 were upheld. There have been 48 assault complaints.
There has been particular criticism of the treatment of detainees held at Brook
House immigration removal centre near Heathrow .
In 2010 it lost a Home Office forcible deportation contract
after the death of an Angolan deportee, Jimmy Mubenga, while being restrained
on a flight back to Angola .
A report by the Commons home affairs committee condemned G4S over its treatment
and said the number of complaints likely did not reflect the true number of
cases of abuse.
In South Yorkshire, where G4S won a £30 million contract to
take over asylum seekers housing, a sub-contractor has started evicting
people and moving them into unsuitable accommodation miles away.
G4S is laughing all the way to the bank, however. Confidential
Home Office documents
seen by the Daily Telegraph show that
fees paid to G4S for managing civilian security staff for the London Games have
soared from £7.3 million to £60 million. The same company failed to recruit
sufficient staff, leaving the government to call in the army.
It’s not just cost savings that have driven the capitalist
state to “outsource” security to firms like G4S. The aim is also to shed
responsibility for services like health, housing, pensions and education as far
as possible, creating new markets for all sorts of companies. So where does
that leave the present state’s legitimacy, its “right” to rule over us. The
Olympic security farrago confirms that it is virtually non-existent.
Paul Feldman
Communications editor
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