Anti-Semitism, Momentum

Cowards, careerists and Corbyn diehards

Momentum MP Navendu Mishra claims to be in favour of a Gaza ceasefire. Despite that he followed Starmer’s orders to abstain, reports Carla Roberts

In how much trouble is Keir Starmer over Palestine?

Some commentators have been very excited about the fact that a total of 56 Labour MPs ended up voting against the whip and the instruction to abstain on the Scottish National Party’s ceasefire amendment. And, yes, 10 frontbenchers were duly sacked from their positions, most prominently Jess Phillips, the vicious anti-Corbyn MP for Birmingham Yardley, who wrote: “On this occasion I must vote with my constituents, my head, and my heart, which has felt as if it were breaking over the last four weeks with the horror of the situation in Israel and Palestine.”[1] (Makes you wonder on which “occasions” she consciously voted against her constituency, head and heart – a few votes during the Corbyn years spring to mind). No doubt, her role in the witch-hunt and her support for Labour Friends of Israel[2] will ensure that she will be back on the front bench before long, as will some of the other ‘rebels’.

It would be a stretch to call this vote a ‘rebellion’ – it was more of a small, controlled display of disapproval. Not even all 34 members of so-called Socialist Campaign Group managed to vote in favour. A couple of them at least had an excuse: Olivia Blake had a doctor’s appointment and was paired; Kim Johnson was on a “prearranged parliamentary overseas visit”;[3] and Mick Whitley had a “family emergency”.[4] All three of them let it be known publicly that they would have voted in favour of the SNP’s motion.

Labour left

Not so Navendu Mishra, MP for Stockport and formerly Momentum regional organiser (and supported by many on the official Labour left). On November 15, the day of the vote, he had the audacity to post on Twitter: “I stand with Labour Friends of Palestine’s call for a ceasefire and enduring peace. I will continue to make that case within Labour and to government, so that humanitarian aid reaches civilians and the siege ends.”

But then he did as ordered by Keir Starmer! In other words, the man is lying through his teeth. “Labour Enemy of Palestine Navendu Mishra is a fraudulent liar: he actually abstained on the ceasefire vote, meaning he has the blood of 5,000 Palestinian children on his hands,” rages Asa Winstanley on Twitter.[5]

It is very doubtful that Mishra fell for Starmer’s last-minute attempt to appease some of his ‘leftwing’ MPs (it is all relative now) by tabling an amendment that called for “longer humanitarian pauses” instead of a ceasefire. No, the man is an out-and-out careerist who does not want to endanger his position of parliamentary private secretary to Angela Rayner – after all, he was only appointed in September 2023 and, unlike Phillips, cannot rely on being in Starmer’s good books. His lack of a backbone really should not come as a surprise. In December 2018, at the height of the anti-Semitism smear campaign in the Labour Party, he actually posted a selfie in front of a protest by the Jewish Labour Movement.

If the Socialist Campaign Group had any bottle, it would expel this toxic careerist weasel immediately. But then it stopped playing any kind of useful role a long time ago. Not even Momentum (which “proudly” endorsed Mishra to become an MP in 2019 and an NEC member in 2020[6]) has sunk that low and has been calling on all supporters to write to their MPs to demand a ceasefire. Of course, they do not have it in them to criticise their erstwhile creature publicly.

It is very obvious that Starmer has succeeded in clearing the Labour Party of any principled opposition. The ‘left wing’ is now entirely neutered and most ‘left’ MPs have stuck to Starmer’s orders not to speak at demonstrations and protests in solidarity with Palestine. John McDonnell MP is something of an exception, perhaps because Starmer knows he is very popular in his constituency of Hayes and Harlington, which he has been representing since 1997. And, having shown during the anti-Semitism smear campaign that he is all too willing to dance to the right’s tune, he can easily be tolerated as a sort of eccentric old uncle.

Choppy waters

Of course, the political situation in the Middle East does continue to present Keir Starmer with some choppy waters, even if those are not caused by the left. He committed a major blunder when he backed Israel’s decision to cut off the water, electricity and food to the Gaza Strip. “Israel has that right,” he said over and over again in his now infamous interview on LBC Radio.[7] But after some serious criticism from across the board, he rowed back just in time, “clarifying” that, actually, he believes pretty much the opposite.

Increasing numbers of ‘normal people’ can see that the “war” is in fact a very one-sided mass slaughter. According to the not very neutral polling company, YouGov (founded by Liz Truss’ former sidekick, Nadhim Zahawi MP), 58% think that there “definitely should be a ceasefire”, another 18% said there “probably should be”.[8] So 76% of the population are more principled than Starmer.

In his speech during the November 15 debate in parliament, Starmer explained what his position is really about. He wants to be seen “working with our international allies”, because that is “what you would expect from someone who wants to form the next government”. He added: “Leadership is about doing the right thing. That is the least the public deserves. And the least that leadership demands.”

By aping the position of Joe Biden, Starmer does exactly what Tony Blair did so successfully: he is showing that he can run capitalism just as well as the Tories. Better, in fact, seeing as they are in severe crisis. By not rocking the capitalist boat, Keir Starmer can sit and watch Rishi Sunak’s increasingly wild efforts to save his sinking ship.

Sunak’s latest announcements of some possible minor tax cuts were a vague effort to ‘bury’ the latest horror stories from the parliamentary Covid inquiry – to no avail: Sunak has now personally been named as driving the second Covid wave with his disastrous ‘Eat out’ campaign, according to the government’s chief scientific advisor, Sir Patrick Vallance. “I think it would have been very obvious to anyone that this inevitably would cause an increase in transmission risk, and I think that would have been known by ministers.” He also said that scientists were “not aware” of the scheme until it was announced.[9]

Bar some major political upset, Keir Starmer will be the next UK prime minister – not because he is so popular, we hasten to add, but because the Tories are so despised. The Labour Party currently stands at 47%, according to a meta survey of all the polls, with the Tories on only 23%.[10]

Rupert Murdoch can tell which way the wind is blowing – his papers, The Sun and The Times, have been gradually, but markedly, shifting their support to Starmer’s Labour. And, of course, Suella Braverman can tell – that rat jumped ship in rather dramatic fashion, orchestrating her own dismissal with increasingly weird and desperate announcements. When her rants about “hate marches” and “lifestyle choices” failed to do the trick, she attacked the police for their ‘softness’ towards Palestine demonstrations. That’s a big no-no for any home secretary and she really did not leave Sunak any other option but to throw her overboard – straight into her cushy lifeboat.

Socialist Worker[11] and The Socialist[12] have both made rather sweet attempts to try and convince their readers that it was in fact themselves who did the damage: “the hundreds of thousands of people who have taken to the streets in the last month for Palestine … have forced Rishi Sunak to sack Braverman,” writes Socialist Worker. The Socialist proclaims: “The anti-war movement – whose demonstrations she tried and failed to ban – has scored a victory!”

Nothing more but wishful thinking, sadly. No, Cruella has managed to row free of the toxic Sunak and will be busy building her own leadership campaign. To paraphrase The terminator, she’ll be back.

Stillborn

But Keir Starmer, we are told by many on the left, is deeply unpopular ‘out there’ – very few will want to go leafleting or canvassing for him. There is an element of truth in that – but it matters not.

For a start, the big donors are back. The last quarter saw, in fact, an historic “record”: Of the £10.4 million received between June and August 2023, only £2.7 million stemmed from “public funding and donations from trade unions”. But there was a £3 million donation from David Sainsbury and £2.2 million from Autoglass billionaire Gary Lubner.[13] Starmer does not need the membership and he certainly does not need the left.

The snazzily-named ‘Organise Corbyn Inspired Socialist Alliance’ (OCISA)[14] has now officially launched its campaign to “unseat Starmer” in his constituency of Holborn St Pancras: it is calling for candidates to apply to stand against Starmer at the next general election – on Corbyn’s ‘For the many’ programme. The organisers think that they have a realistic chance of overturning Starmer’s majority of 48.9% by using the “digital community”. This method, they think, is so fool-proof that they want to spread it to all areas “where the action of individual attack on the MP becomes necessary”.

The small text on the website explains “the mechanics of harvesting the vote”, which are:

a matter of technologists who can provide the platform for the votes to be harvested. These votes are applied in two ways, under the model proposed. Primarily to harvest the vote for the candidate, but secondly to make the policy choices and managerial issues relating to the company itself, so that it becomes self-governing by the membership and democratic in nature. This gives it the necessary weight and credibility to approach the constituency.

Clear enough?

Of course, there are a number of campaigns already in existence who want to do exactly that – with slightly less eccentric and technocratic language. The electoral front of the SPEW, the Trade Unionist and Socialist Coalition, has called on other groups to “join us to co-host a convention to organise a working class challenge at the next general election”.

Ditto ‘Transform’, the merger of the rump Left Unity and the Breakthrough Party, which will be launched on November 25 in Nottingham. Point 8 of their 10 “core principles” explains that they want to “contest elections”.[15] As an aside, this already looks like a stillbirth: we hear that Kate Hudson and Andrew Burgin, ‘leading lights’ of Left Unity, are growing cool on Transform – for a start, should LU be disbanded in the process, the comrades would lose their affiliation to the European Left Party. Of course, this only exists on paper, as Left Unity has never recovered from its disastrous decision not to join the Labour Party during the Corbyn years – pretty much its entire membership did, leaving a corpse behind. But for some people, such titles matter.

[1]. www.theguardian.com/politics/2023/nov/15/heavy-heart-jess-phillips-letter-of-resignation-in-full.

[2]. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Labour_Friends_of_Israel.

[3]. twitter.com/KimJohnsonMP/status/1724733642906161660.

[4]. twitter.com/MickWhitleyMP/status/1724813483496087885.

[5]. twitter.com/AsaWinstanley/status/1725086171573768585.

[6]. www.facebook.com/PeoplesMomentum/posts/momentum-is-proud-to-endorse-navendu-mishra-mp-for-bame-nec-rep-navendu-has-dedi/1099914590353927.

[7]. www.youtube.com/watch?v=5HQYfsUAf3s.

[8]. www.thenational.scot/news/23867576.huge-majority-brits-support-israel-hamas-ceasefire—poll.

[9]. www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-67479548.

[10]. www.statista.com/statistics/985764/voting-intention-in-the-uk.

[11]. socialistworker.co.uk/news/bravermans-gone-now-get-the-rest.

[12]. www.socialistparty.org.uk/articles/117947/15-11-2023/braverman-gone-tories-in-turmoil-editorial-of-the-socialist.

[13]. www.theguardian.com/politics/2023/sep/07/labour-boosts-election-war-chest-with-record-quarter-for-donations.

[14]. ocisa.org.uk/the-plan-to-unseat-starmer.

[15]. transformpolitics.uk.

Democracy and the Labour Party, The left

Doubling down on genocide

Sir Keir’s Chatham House speech shows exactly where he stands. But, asks Kevin Bean, where will the official Labour left go, given the massive popular movement against Israel’s war on Gaza? An uncertain tincture of courage combines with continued fear for careers and expense accounts

If anyone had any doubts over where Sir Keir Starmer stands in relation to Israel’s war on Gaza, then his Chatham House speech would certainly have removed them: he lines up with US imperialism and the rest of the western imperialist powers in solidly backing the Zionist state’s genocidal assault on the Palestinian population of the Gaza Strip. He does not support a ceasefire – that would leave Hamas intact and still a potential threat to Israel – but he is sympathetic to a “humanitarian pause” and relief efforts by the “international community”.[1]

It was, of course, a carefully crafted speech in which there were the obligatory hypocritical references to the humanitarian crisis unfolding before our eyes, combined with cautionary reminders that states should always follow ‘international law’, when launching attacks on civilian populations! Sir Keir is a lawyer, you understand, and he knows all about these things. He also knows about bourgeois politics and, as the leader of British capitalism’s second eleven and widely expected next prime minister, he chose his words judiciously. After all, he has been setting out his stall in this way since becoming Labour leader, demonstrating that his new order really does represent a clear break with the old Corbyn regime.

Sir Keir could do nothing else because he was addressing several different audiences, with the most important being in Washington DC. However, Starmer also wanted to reassure the British capitalist class and the political establishment at home that he could continue to channel his inner Tony Blair by standing firm behind Israel and holding the line, irrespective of internal party criticism or successive mass demonstrations in London against Israel’s war. A little further down the list is the electorate and the various media that frame the limits of acceptable political debate so as to shape ‘public opinion’. In this respect the speech was no different from countless others he had made since 2020, in which he carefully triangulated with the Tories and showed he was a safe pair of hands who could be relied upon to uphold the Atlantic alliance, the capitalist system and the constitutional order.

The speech certainly did its job with the ruling class at home and abroad, receiving positive approval and editorial support where it matters.[2] Noisy protests by anti-war activists simply served to reinforce the message. Labour wants to be the next government, Labour wants to be trusted by the USA no matter who is in the White House.

So in that sense Sir Keir managed to steady the ship, but a lot of questions still remain about how the crisis in Gaza will impact on the Labour leadership and the party as a whole. Let us go back to the Labour conference in early October. The leadership was clearly in control and, apart from some purely symbolic votes on rail and utility nationalisation, the pro-capitalist Labour right swept the board. Nowhere was this more clearly illustrated than in Starmer’s conference speech, in which he unequivocally backed Israel … and, of course, condemned anti-Semitism. The staged standing ovations and staged applause served to highlight the contrast with previous conferences – was it really only four years ago when delegates waved Palestinian flags and enthusiastically grabbed copies of Labour Party Marxists because of Moshé Machover’s lead article denouncing Israel as a racist endeavour?

Throughout the witch-hunt against the Labour left and the smear campaign to equate anti-Zionism and opposition to Israel’s repression of the Palestinian people with anti-Semitism, the Palestinian cause acquired a huge political significance. The Labour leadership used loyalty to Israel to demonstrate its unswerving fealty to imperialism and the US hegemon, and to draw a clear symbolic boundary between itself and the Labour left, which has been totally cowed for the last four years, having surrendered to the leadership all along the line. Nowhere has this abject cowardice been more openly on display than on the key questions of war and peace in foreign policy – remember the way members of the Socialist Campaign Group withdrew their support from a mildly critical Stop the War statement on Ukraine following the merest hint of Sir Keir’s displeasure?

Initially the same was true about the Labour left’s response to the war on Gaza, with only the most circumspect comments during PMQs in the Commons on the civilian casualties and ‘the humanitarian crisis’ caused by Israeli attacks.[3] So confident was the party leadership and apparat that the official Labour left was servile, quiescent and effectively online. The HQ bureaucracy further clamped down on internal debate on Gaza in Constituency Labour Parties and even banned councillors and MPs from participating in protests against the war.[4] But the huge turnout on local and regional demonstrations, especially the huge numbers in London, the last one being 500,000-strong, that seems to have breathed some little courage into the official Labour left.

New challenge?

The size and character of the demonstrations, drawing in new layers of young people and mobilising the widest sections of the Muslim population, has surely had an impact on the previously quiescent and largely silent Labour left in parliament and beyond. Members of the SCG such as John McDonnell and Andy McDonald have spoken alongside Jeremy Corbyn and Diane Abbott, and left trade union leaders Mick Lynch and Mick Whelan on the last two national demonstrations. Other signs of opposition to the leadership’s line have been letters and statements of protest from CLPs and significantly Labour groups in local government. There have also been a large number of resignations from Labour councillors and individual party members, which have had a significant local impact; in Oxford resignations of councillors have cost Labour its majority and control of the local authority.[5]

Starmer’s unequivocal support for Israel’s siege of Gaza and his support in a radio interview on October 11 for cutting water and fuel supplies to the Palestinian population acted a catalyst for much of the criticism, which began to extend beyond the ‘usual suspects’ of the Labour left to include London mayor Sadiq Khan, Greater Manchester mayor Andy Burnham and Scottish Labour leader Anas Sarwar.[6]

Frontbenchers

Perhaps the most serious challenges in parliament to Starmer’s line on Gaza was the early-day motion signed by 39 Labour MPs calling for the lifting of the siege, along with a number of other individual statements by Labour frontbenchers calling for a ceasefire.[7] Closer examination of the texts and the nature of the ‘support’ shown, such as retweeting Labour for Palestine statements, shows definite equivocation by shadow cabinet ‘rebels’, but, given the disciplinary measures taken previously against MPs for merely sharing such statements, this growing body of opposition to Starmer does have some real significance.

It seems that the Labour leadership was wrong-footed and initially drew back from confronting the opposition head on – after all it extended far beyond the official left and some in the party’s apparat feared that the usually reliable ‘Muslim vote’ might greatly diminish, with this section of the electorate refusing to back a party so clearly committed to supporting a genocidal attack on the Palestinian people. Some might be tempted, as in 2006, to look elsewhere. Thus, in an attempt to smooth things over, Starmer loyalists spoke publicly about understanding the ‘concerns’ of the critics and hoped that a ‘clarification’ of the leadership’s position could head off the growing criticism.[8] In media briefings before the Chatham House speech Wes Streeting and Chris Bryant prepared the ground by talking about ‘engaging’ with the critics on Gaza and addressing their specific issues.[9]

While there were some nods to the concerns of his critics, combined with the usual platitudes about a “humanitarian pause” and “international law”, Sir Keir’s Chatham House speech was in truth just a restatement of his pro-Israeli stance. Furthermore, in subsequent comments and interviews he doubled down by opposing any talk of a ceasefire and emphasising that his main aim was to support Israel without reservation in its Gaza war and its objective of crushing Hamas, whatever the cost to the civilian population. Just to show that he meant business and that the olive branches he had offered before Chatham House were merely a holding operation, the party bureaucracy followed it up by suspending SCG MP Andy McDonald for a speech he made at the national demonstration on October 28.

McDonald’s crime was to use an amended form of the widely used slogan, ‘Palestine will be free, from the river to the sea’: this slogan, identified by Suella Braverman and other supporters of Israel as ‘an anti-Semitic chant’, was changed by McDonald to read: “We will not rest until we have justice. Until all people, Israelis and Palestinians, between the river and the sea, can live in peaceful liberty.”[10] In this modified form it can be variously interpreted as supporting a one- or two-state solution, or merely a pacifistic call for an end to violence, but what it most definitely is not is anti-Semitic! However, in drawing on a slogan so dishonestly identified by the leadership as anti-Semitic, McDonald was putting it up to Sir Keir and testing the limits of Starmer’s patience with critics.

We know the political agenda that the pro-capitalist leadership of the Labour Party works to; in terms of Israel’s war in Gaza that has been very clearly set out in the House of Commons, as well as in the Chatham House speech. We also know how the Labour right and their media friends continue to use the big lie equating opposition to Israel’s occupation and oppression of the Palestinian people with anti-Semitism. Starmer will not row back on his pro-imperialist strategy of lining up with the US and ‘the west’: that is one of the cornerstones of his politics and will remain so.

No, the more important question is how the official Labour left will respond to his continued defence of Israel’s war and his attempts to crush opposition to it within the Labour movement. Having discovered the merest hint of a backbone in making the mildest of mild criticisms of the Starmer line, will the SCG and the other remnants of the official left now go further and really open up an attack on his policy? The suspension of Andy McDonald is a real challenge to the Labour left: after three, four years of laying low, of apologising, of grovelling, of advising quietness, will they risk really aligning themselves with the truly massive movement that has sprung into existence against Israel’s genocidal war in Gaza?

All they have to lose are their parliamentary careers, their expense accounts and their not inconsiderable salaries. But there is a world to win l

[1]. www.theguardian.com/politics/2023/oct/31/keir-starmer-israel-hamas-ceasefire-may-risk-further-violence.

[2]. www.thetimes.co.uk/article/the-times-view-on-sir-keir-starmers-stance-on-the-israel-gaza-conflict-heat-of-battle-x0cdl5ptx; and www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2023/oct/31/the-guardian-view-on-sir-keir-starmers-speech-it-wont-end-the-divisions-in-labour.

[3]. www.bbc.co.uk/news/live/uk-politics-67145789.

[4]. www.itv.com/news/2023-10-14/labour-leaders-tell-mps-and-council-leaders-not-to-attend-palestine-protests; and skwawkbox.org/2023/10/14/labour-bans-mps-from-attending-pro-palestine-demos-warns-members-they-may-be-expelled.

[5]. www.bbc.com/news/uk-england-oxfordshire-67180642.

[6]. www.lbc.co.uk/news/sir-keir-starmer-tries-to-clarify-comments-on-gaza-israel-lbc-interview; and  www.theguardian.com/politics/2023/nov/01/hundreds-of-labour-councillors-urge-keir-starmer-to-back-gaza-ceasefire.

[7]. edm.parliament.uk/early-day-motion/61430/protecting-civilians-in-gaza-and-israel.

[8]. www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2023/oct/29/labour-must-beware-of-tearing-itself-apart-over-the-horrific-conflict-in-gaza.

[9]. www.politics.co.uk/news/2023/10/30/keir-starmer-gaza-ceasefire.

[10]. Ibid.

Democracy and the Labour Party, Inside the Labour Party, The left

Don’t mention apartheid

Sir Keir bans Labour banners at Palestine demonstrations, Jeremy Corbyn appeals to ‘international law’, while the Campaign Group of Socialist MPs sticks to empty platitudes, reports Carla Roberts

A few short years ago, Labour Party conferences were awash with Palestine flags. In 2018 and 2019 in particular, there was a sea of hundreds of them, many handed out by Labour Against the Witchhunt. In both years, there were also motions passed that were highly critical of the Israeli government.[1]

Even in 2021 – when Sir Keir had already been in charge for over 16 months – a motion was passed that heavily criticised the “ongoing Nakba in Palestine”, “the deadly assault on Gaza” and the “de facto annexation of Palestinian land”. Furthermore, the motion contained this interesting formulation: “Conference also notes the unequivocal 2021 reports by B’Tselem and Human Rights Watch that conclude unequivocally that Israel is practising the crime of apartheid, as defined by the UN.”

Fast-forward two years. The Liverpool conference could not have been more different. In the run-up to the stage-managed event, Labour HQ unilaterally removed the words “end apartheid” from the title of a fringe event organised by the Palestine Solidarity Campaign, leaving the title ‘Justice for Palestine’ in the conference guide.[2] The PSC protested, but to no avail, and was eventually told that using the word “apartheid” – a formulation also used by that radical leftie group, the United Nations (!), to describe Israeli policy[3] – is now “detrimental to the party”.

As an aside, it depends, of course, on how you define ‘apartheid’. The situation in Palestine is entirely different from the former apartheid regime in South Africa, where a small white ruling class massively exploited the black population. Israel’s aim, however, is not exploitation – more like mass expulsion. It wants to ethnically cleanse the occupied territories and get rid of all Palestinians.

Funnily enough, among the speakers at the PSC event was former shadow chancellor John McDonnell, a keen defender of the policy of ‘zero tolerance’. He and Momentum founder Jon Lansman were the key people in Jeremy Corbyn’s team responsible for the disastrous tactic of trying to appease the right by apologising over and over again for the myriad of false and weaponised claims that the party was overrun by anti-Semites. The PSC meeting went ahead with the shortened title, but it would have been very ironic if McDonnell had become a victim of the anti-Semitism smear campaign after all.

It is, of course, not just Keir Starmer who has bent over backwards to the pro-Israel agenda of the establishment. Unite general secretary Sharon Graham allegedly tried to force the cancellation of a Unite Palestine solidarity conference fringe event. But, because she did not seem to have the guts to have her name attached to such an attack on free speech, the meeting went ahead unchallenged.[4]

Touching calls

After conference, Starmer and his enforcer, general secretary David Evans, turned up the heat some more. On October 11, Starmer stated that he backs Israel’s decision to cut water, food and medicine supplies to Gaza – “Israel has that right”, he repeatedly said, before ‘clarifying’ that, “obviously everything should be done within international law, but I don’t want to step away from the core principles that Israel has the right to defend herself”.[5] Well, you can’t have it both ways. Punishing a civilian population is clearly a war crime, as defined by the Geneva Convention. But international law is clearly very stretchy.

Jeremy Corbyn too has issued almost touching calls for “peace”, “moral principles” and for politicians to “defend international law universally and equally”.[6] He seems to believe in some form of neutral and just ‘international law’ that stands above all the squabbles in the world. If only it was enforced properly. No, Jeremy, just think about who has written ‘international law’ or indeed enforces it and to what purpose. The war against Iraq was entirely legal – they just made up a bunch of lies to make it just about acceptable at the time. The US government, the EU and virtually all western imperialist governments are unequivocally supporting Israel – and have been for decades. Why on earth appeal to such laws and organisations?

Then, on October 13, Labour general secretary David Evans sent an email to all constituency and branch secretaries warning that MPs, councillors and other representatives should not take part in any of the pro-Palestine demonstrations that were taking place the next day:

Elected representatives have been given strong advice not to attend any of these events, and I would urge you to exercise similar caution. Not only is this in the interests of our members’ safety, but also to avoid placing colleagues in a position where they may share a platform with, or are close to, individuals that threaten to undermine the values and principles of the Labour Party.

In the event that individual members are in attendance at these protests and demonstration, I ask that no Labour Party banners are taken along. Individuals will not have the ability to control who they will be photographed alongside, and this risks threatening the Labour Party’s ability to campaign against any form of racism and discrimination.

The email further outlines that “attempts to table motions at meetings that are prejudicial or grossly detrimental to the Labour Party and risk infringing the Labour Party’s Codes of Conduct on Anti-Semitism and Islamophobia” will, “consistent with previous precedent, be ruled out of order”.

And, just to make sure that nobody gets away with any such nonsense or has posted something online “detrimental to the party”, the email reminds the snitchers of just how to snitch: “If you or someone else considers that a Labour Party member has breached our rules, this should be reported to us here …”[7]

It was, of course, under the leadership of Jeremy Corbyn that such ‘guidance’ emails started to come in thick and fast. His general secretary, Jennie Formby, was so keen to be seen to implement the demands of the pro-Zionist lobby that she sent out numerous emails ‘advising’ members not to pass motions, for example, against the witch-hunt or in support of Chris Williamson, who was the only Labour MP who dared to stand up to the vicious campaign to conflate anti-Zionism with anti-Semitism. Overly eager branch and CLP secretaries and regional officers (most of them on the right, although there were not a few official ‘lefts’ among them) were only too happy to interpret the advice as outright ‘bans’. Labour Against the Witchhunt did a good job explaining the facts,[8] but many members were too scared to stand in solidarity with their smeared and vilified comrades. That was the point of it all, of course: self-censorship.

And, boy, does it work! It worked under Corbyn, when Labour left campaigns like the short-lived Don’t Leave, Organise and Howard Beckett’s even shorter-lived Labour Left for Socialism refused to associate publicly with anybody who had been expelled or suspended from the party. Needless to say, this policy helped to lead to their quick demise, especially after people like Beckett were themselves suspended.

And it continues to work now: I have not heard of a single Labour MP addressing any of the Palestine demonstrations around the country. They all seem to have toed the party line. A bunch of cowards the lot of them – especially the so-called Campaign Group of Socialist MPs. Their only effort so far has been an early day motion condemning Hamas and echoing calls for a humanitarian ceasefire. We know many of them are strong supporters of Palestine, but they probably feel even stronger about their own careers.

And, because the campaign to smear all criticism of Israel as anti-Semitic was so successful in the Labour movement, it quickly spread beyond it. It was not designed to get rid of Corbyn – that was just a very welcome side effect from the point of view of the Zionist lobby. The key aim was always to prepare for exactly the situation we are currently witnessing: Israel’s campaign of ethnic cleansing going into overdrive.

But the campaign in the Labour Party and the left’s appeasement certainly helped to prepare the ground for today, where critics of Israel can be gotten rid of in record time. Innocent until proven guilty? Forget it. Now the smallest whiff of alleged anti-Semitism (actually anti-Zionism) is enough to get people suspended, sacked, their livelihoods ruined.

Just in the last week, there have been dozens of examples that show how the right to free speech has been hollowed out in the attempt of the establishment to back Israel hook, line and sinker:

More victims

  • Cartoonist Steve Bell has just lost his job at The Guardian. The paper confirmed that it “will not be renewing his contract” after he submitted what they claim is an anti-Semitic cartoon of Benjamin Netanyahu. It shows Israel’s leader operating on his own stomach with boxing gloves on: the cut is in the outline of the Gaza Strip. Bell says his artwork was inspired by a famous cartoon of David Levine showing US president Lyndon Johnson with an operation scar on his belly in the shape of Vietnam. The Guardian, however, does not believe him. Oversensitised like all bourgeois media outlets, it has taken the cartoon to be a reference to the Jewish moneylender, Shylock, in Shakespeare’s Merchant of Venice, who demands “a pound of flesh” of Antonio’s if a loan is not repaid within three months. That seems to be quite a stretch, to put it mildly.
  • On October 16, former British ambassador and journalist Craig Murray was arrested at the airport by UK security forces under the Prevention of Terrorism Act, on his return from Iceland. His phone, laptop and other electronics were seized and he “doesn’t expect he will get them back”. He said he was questioned about his attendance at the Palestine demo in Iceland. He was also questioned about his involvement in the Assange campaign and “whether he is paid for such work”.[9] Inconvenient campaigners and journalists like Kit Klarenberg have similarly been detained in recent months.
  • Ofcom has just suspended its online safety director, Fadzai Madzingira, after the vile website, Guido Fawkes, published screenshots from her private Instagram account, in which she called Israel an “apartheid state” and wrote: “As if it wasn’t bad enough already, the UK is also set to participate in the ethnic cleansing and genocide of Palestinians. Shame on this vile colonial alliance. #freepalestine.” [10]
    It is difficult to imagine that any employment tribunal would not dismiss these posts as a valid form of free expression. But Madzingira’s career prospects are certainly looking gloomy after such an exposure.
  • After a fire alarm went off during a pro-Palestine rally at the School of Oriental and African Studies, the university suspended a number of students who took part in the demonstration. Later, members of the Palestine Society “that were not present at the rally were issued formal warnings through disciplinaries by the university, demonstrating this is a targeted act of political repression against the Palestine Society”.[11]
  • Even more seriously, counter-terrorism police in Brighton have arrested Palestinian Hanin Barghouti, an elected women’s officer at the University of Sussex students’ union, for the speech she gave at a pro-Palestine demonstration the day after Hamas’s attack. This is what she said:

Yesterday was a victory. For freedom fighters to break out of a 15-year blockade so successfully under the inhuman genocide of Israel was so beautiful and inspiring to see. It shows the world that we will always fight and always resist and we need to celebrate these acts of resistance, because this was a success. Revolutionary violence initiated by Palestinians is not terrorism – it is self-defence.[12]

Communists would disagree with calling the Hamas attack “a victory” or particularly “beautiful” – but clearly, this is a young Palestinian woman deeply moved by what has just happened in her home country. It would be absolutely appalling to charge her with ‘an act of terrorism’.

However, worse is probably still to come. Immigration minister Robert Jenrick has announced his plans to “withdraw visas and deport anybody who commits hate crimes or supports Hamas”.[13] Seeing as “aggressively waving” or “wearing” the Palestinian flag could – according to Suella Braverman’s letter to the police[14] – now be constructed as proof of support for Hamas, that is a pretty low threshold. Some backbench MPs have called for pro-Palestine demonstrations to be banned altogether, “as in other countries” – though Braverman and co will probably be aware that that would guarantee a record turnout at such events.

[1]. labourandpalestine.org.uk/labour-conference-policy-2018.

[2]. labourlist.org/2023/10/labour-conference-apartheid-israel-event-palestine.

[3]. news.un.org/en/story/2022/03/1114702.

[4]. skwawkbox.org/2023/10/14/exclusive-graham-unite-tried-to-force-cancellation-of-palestine-solidarity-fringe-at-lab-conference.

[5]. www.middleeasteye.net/news/israel-palestine-war-keir-starmer-criticised-right-cut-gaza-water-power.

[6]. twitter.com/jeremycorbyn/status/1712432374800081022.

[7]. skwawkbox.org/2023/10/14/labour-bans-mps-from-attending-pro-palestine-demos-warns-members-they-may-be-expelled.

[8]. www.labouragainstthewitchhunt.org/campaigns/there-is-no-ban-on-moving-motions-in-support-of-chris-williamson-mp.

[9]. twitter.com/BrownNaila/status/1713994017866661890.

[10]. order-order.com/2023/10/16/ofcom-online-safety-director-is-vociferously-anti-israel.

[11]. www.surveymonkey.co.uk/r/Y9TYWJ5.

[12]. www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-12627203/woman-arrested-student-praised-hamas-speech-brighton-university-sussex.html.

[13]. i News October 15.

[14]. www.gov.uk/government/publications/police-chiefs-asked-to-protect-communities-from-provocations/letter-to-chief-constables-in-england-and-wales-following-the-israel-hamas-conflict-accessible.

The right

Two-term chatter being heard

James Harvey reports on the stage-managed Labour conference, the courting of big business and unconditional support for Israeli colonial oppression

Apart from the incident involving Yaz Asmawi, the People Demand Democracy protestor, who covered Sir Keir Starmer with green glitter (and which he was able to turn to his advantage with a stoic one-liner on the differences between ‘protest’ and ‘power’) the Labour conference went completely according to plan for the party’s machine.

Everyone on the platform and in the hall was on message, while delegates enthusiastically cheered and gave the required standing ovations for fairly mundane rhetoric and largely content-free speeches. It was the very model of a modern party conference – more of a carefully choreographed theatrical performance than a political event, with carefully framed sets and Union Jack backdrops and almost flawlessly managed throughout. Even the unscripted ‘defeats’ on energy and rail nationalisation were used to good effect by the Labour leadership to demonstrate that, whatever the conference proposed, it would be Sir Keir who disposed.

Compared with previous years the corporations were everywhere: Goldman Sachs, Boeing, Google sponsoring special events. At evening receptions CEOs shmoozed with shadow cabinet members. The FT even dubbed it “Liverpool Davos”. And the money is pouring in from companies and rich individuals, now that “Labour is the party of all businesses”: £8.6 million of it so far in 2023 (more than trade union contributions).

In that sense, this year’s Liverpool conference was just the latest stage in the Starmer project to make Labour the preferred eleven for capitalism and demonstrate his credentials as a reliable, alternative prime minister. With the chaos of Boris Johnson and his “fuck business” approach, the shambles of Liz Truss and Rishi Sunak’s complete lack of strategic thinking (apart from a desperation to avoid a drubbing in 2024), Labour’s managers think they have it in the bag … unless there is some kind of almighty blunder. So steady as she goes is the message.

With just over a year expected before the next election, the Labour leadership has to persuade the largely mythical ‘centre ground’ of Labour’s ‘responsibility’ and ‘credibility’: code for Tory voters. Sir Keir’s electoral strategy of triangulation was clearly on display in shadow chancellor Rachel Reeves’ speech on the economic programme of the next Labour government, as well as framing the leader’s keynote speech on October 10.

Charm offensive

Reeves built on the pro-business line that she had been setting out in interviews with the Financial Times and during her charm offensive in the boardrooms over the past three years, with promises of fiscal discipline and responsibility: economic growth would not be generated through higher taxation and the unsustainable stimulus of government borrowing, but through a new relationship with business and a state-backed National Wealth Fund – to all intents and purposes, a rebranding of the Blair government’s ‘private-public partnerships’, albeit in the very different and much less favourable capitalist economy of the 2020s.

For this commitment to ‘realistic politics’, she was rewarded by the endorsement of former Bank of England governor Mark Carney and the rather favourable response from other business leaders, who saw her as a politician and potential future leader they could work with. So, after the disorder and uncertainties of the Corbyn years, the capitalist class can be reassured that rightwing ‘order’ has finally been restored.

If Rachel Reeves set out the pro-capitalist framework of the next Labour government’s economic programme, essentially maintaining the status quo with vague commitments to growth and “rebuilding Britain”, it was left to Sir Keir to draw the threads together to reach the “inner soul of the British people” and provide potential Labour voters with an uplifting vision of “getting Britain’s future back”. His speech was received rapturously in the conference hall and attracted a record number of standing ovations, with the shadow cabinet team and others on the stage acting as a claque, engaging in a competitive form of sycophantic gymnastics to see who could stand up most frequently and more quickly than the rest. The anthemic dance music, and Starmer’s return to the stage after finishing his speech for an encore with his wife, only added to the theatrical atmosphere and the echoes of 1990s New Labour.

The content and the rhetoric of the speech also referenced Blairism, drawing on the ‘achievements’ of the Blair government and using a similar language of reform, renewal and rebuilding. There were few specific policy commitments beyond a promise to “bulldoze” planning restrictions to enable new development, create new towns and build 1.5 million homes – alongside nebulous proposals on local devolution of power away from Westminster and more ominous references to ‘reform’  (privatisation?) in the NHS and other public services.

This was a pre-election speech, in which the Labour leader was trying to set a tone, whilst leaving few hostages to fortune that could be dragged up by the Tories when the campaign proper begins. With his references to realism and the difficulties ahead, it was obvious that Starmer was promising very little.

Pro-imperialist

As if we needed any reminders, what we learnt from the speech is that the next Labour government will be the most rightwing and explicitly pro-capitalist in the party’s history.

Not only will it meet the needs of British capitalism and the dictates of the market domestically, but it will be a loyal servant of the constitutional order at home and the interests of British imperialism and the US hegemon internationally. Starmer underlined this with his references to the role of the 1945-51 Attlee government in founding Nato and Labour’s support for ‘the west’ during the cold war and beyond.

Starmer’s unconditional support for the Israeli state’s attack on Gaza and its continued oppression of the Palestinian people drew a very symbolic standing ovation, serving as a visual reminder that the massed Palestine flag waving at conference during the Corbyn years is now safely a thing of the past, though Labour has not gone quite as far as home secretary Suella Braverman in calling for police action against anyone displaying a Palestinian flag in public.

Naturally, Starmer repeated the big lie about anti-Semitism in the Labour Party under the Corbyn leadership, and smeared the left with his conflation of support for Palestinian rights and hostility to Jewish people. Thus, Starmer reassured the ruling class in London and Washington that the left had been finally defeated and that it was now his Labour Party, unquestionably loyal to the status quo at home and abroad, and ready to serve capitalism in whatever way was deemed necessary.

There was a hastily arranged demonstration outside the conference centre organised by local supporters of the Palestinian struggle, but in the conference itself the left kept its head down and raised not a peep on this issue. So, as well as providing the Labour leadership with an opportunity to stand solidly behind Washington and its Israeli client state, the bombing of Gaza also shows how far the Labour left has fallen and how retreat has degenerated into a political rout.

With Sir Keir meeting foreign prime ministers and heads of state, big money pouring into the coffers, success in by-elections and huge leads in opinion polls, there is now the real prospect of a Labour government. There is even talk of two terms and burying the Tories for a generation. The nonsense peddled by sections of the left that Sir Keir did not really want to beat the Tories, did not really want to get into No10 can be seen for what it really was all along – nonsense.

What passes for the official left therefore hides itself under vague calls for ‘boldness’: John McDonnell, Sharon Graham and Andrew Fisher being typical. ‘Left’ MPs do not want to be seen rocking the boat. The threat of deselection hangs over the head of every one of them. None wants to share the terrible fate of Jeremy Corbyn and Diane Abbott and find themselves without their parliamentary salary and expenses accounts. True, Momentum claims conference victories over energy and rails – due, in fact, to the trade union bloc vote – but as an organisation it was a much diminished force. In internal elections – National Constitutional Committee, Conference Arrangements Committee, National Women’s Committee – candidates of Labour to Win trounced the Centre-Left Grassroots Alliance by a margin of around 3:1. The World Transformed was itself a turgid and timid affair, though on the final day there was an informed session on solidarity with the Palestinian rebellion presented by the British chapter of the Palestinian Youth Movement.

The question of solidarity with the Palestinian struggle will, of course, be to the fore for the working class movement in Britain and internationally, especially given the way that US imperialism and its Nato clients have rallied behind Israel’s war. Like the Tory government, Sir Keir has attempted to delegitimise support for Palestinian rights and opposition to Israeli repression by smearing the left and the Palestinian solidarity movement with false accusations of anti-Semitism. In that he is, disgracefully, being urged on by the likes of the Alliance For Workers’ Liberty and turncoats such as Paul Mason – from Workers Power to warmonger. He desperately wants to become an MP and – who knows? – eventually defence minister in a Starmer government.

Elections in the Labour Party, The left

Not much left of the left

So many rival projects and not a serious idea amongst the lot of them. A week ahead of the Liverpool conference, Carla Roberts looks at what little remains of the once mighty Corbyn movement

The soft left has been in political and organisational disarray for some time, but its lack of purpose is perhaps symbolically expressed by the ‘Stop Starmer’ campaign.

Supported on Zoom by a number of individuals linked to the Not the Andrew Marr show, it has organised a protest for October 7, the day before the start of Labour Party conference – not in Liverpool, mind, where the conference will take place, but outside Sir Keir Starmer’s constituency office in London. The campaign is supposed to “bring people together who oppose the Labour leader” and “highlight the danger of a Starmer government”. Apparently, Starmer is “the most untrustworthy political leader this country has seen”.[1]

Quite a statement. But is Starmer really worse than the notorious liar, Boris Johnson? What about Tony Blair, who launched a war against Iraq based on outright lies? Or Winston Churchill, the guy who sent the army and tanks against striking miners in Wales? To paraphrase Harry Truman: show me a politician, and I’ll show you a crook.

Yes, Keir Starmer was the one who had to do the dirty work of cleansing the Labour Party after its infection with Corbynism. Would Yvette Cooper have been doing a less nasty job? Wouldn’t she have jumped on the anti-Semitism smear campaign to weed out the left? Would David Lammy not have grasped the opportunity to suspend Corbyn and his allies in the Parliamentary Labour Party? Would Andy Burnham have stopped short of proscribing critical organisations like Labour Against the Witchhunt? We know the answer.

Promises

It seems some of the organisers of this campaign feel personally hurt that Starmer has broken some of his lame promises – which he was clearly never going to deliver anyway. Starmer is not acting the way he is out of some personal spite or because he is a particularly nasty specimen of a human being. He is showing the ruling class that the Labour Party can once again be trusted to be a loyal servant of capital. Labour’s contradictory nature as a bourgeois workers’ party means that on this or that occasion it is pulled to the left – and after Corbyn, Starmer is now pulling it back to where it normally is, on the right. In other words what the mainstream media calls the ‘centre-left’. Starmer is a typical former state apparat, he comes from the left in his youth but long ago saw the light and reconciled himself to serving, not opposing the system. True, given where the world is at the moment he will probably be the most rightwing Labour PM in history. But the same goes for any other realistic alternative Labour candidate for the job. To pretend otherwise is to misunderstand what the Labour Party is and, worse, how capitalism as a system works.

In any case, socialists should never blindly ‘trust’ any ‘political leaders’. We should always critically engage and question whoever is leading working class organisations. Otherwise we are building up messiahs who have to be followed unquestioningly – a feature we see far too often on the left. Many organisations foster a culture of blind obedience, which will produce nothing but sects. A healthy working class party needs discussion and debate and a culture of free speech, where ideas can be challenged and contested. Otherwise it will wither away and die, sooner or later. And the ‘Stop Starmer’ campaign is a sign of the demoralised Corbyn left taking the short road to oblivion.

The main problem of the campaign is obviously the lack of any kind of political outlook that goes beyond ‘anyone but Starmer’. Who then? Another Labour leader? A different party? What kind of party? With what programme? This lack of a positive perspective of any kind – let alone a socialist one – has allowed all sorts of flotsam and jetsam to support the campaign. At the launch event in Conway Hall in September, for example, decent socialists like Andrew Feinstein and Audrey White rubbed shoulders with the Brexiteer and Ukip ally, George Galloway, who was able to advertise his national-chauvinist Workers Party of Britain. That is very much the opposite of useful.

The campaign is loosely linked to the snappily titled Organise Corbyn-Inspired Socialist Alliance, (OCISA)[2], which wants to stand a candidate against Starmer in his constituency of Holborn and St Pancras at the next general election on the basis of, you guessed it, the Labour Party’s 2017 manifesto. Like so many, those comrades are labouring under the illusion that it was this reformist programme in itself that inspired hundreds of thousands to support the Labour Party under Corbyn.

It seems unlikely that many of them actually read the rather turgid and dull document (which did not mention key issues like the monarchy or electoral reform, just constitutional tinkering). It was the prospect of some kind of ‘change’, however small, that excited many – and Corbyn seemed to have it within his reach to effect such change. Some local anti-cuts activist, no matter how deserving, standing on the same programme will be lucky to get more than 100 votes. Both campaigns are designed to fail, meaning that we will end up with something that is not exactly what the left needs: yet more demoralisation.

For the Many

You cannot blame Ken Loach for not trying – here he is, once again, doing his best to get some kind of organisation off the ground. He helped to launch Left Unity in 2013, which quickly went into hibernation after Corbyn was elected Labour leader in 2015. Loach joined the party and turned his back on LU, which is now involved in the new organisation, Transform. Transform also includes the Breakthrough Party, the Liverpool Community Independents and the People’s Alliance of the Left (which in turn counts the Northern Independence Party and the Socialist Party’s Trade Unionist and Socialist Coalition among its affiliates). Transform, which wants to become a party, will be officially launched on November 25 in Nottingham. For the Many, which describes itself as a “network”, will be launched on October 9 during the Labour conference. If any reader knows of any substantial political differences between those two outfits, I would be keen to hear about them.

Quite why Ken Loach is not backing Transform is slightly opaque and seems to be down to the personalities involved. Many of the organisers who are driving Loach’s project are based in Liverpool – where the Community Independents are despised by much of the more principled left. The eight former Labour councillors at the core of LCI might have voted against budget cuts on Liverpool council, but they also voted in favour of the arms fair and kept their mouths firmly shut during the anti-Semitism smear campaign. Alan Gibbons even helped push the witch-hunt when he was running Momentum under the constitution written by pro-Zionist Jon Lansman, according to which anybody expelled from the Labour Party had to be expelled from Momentum. In a classic and predictable turn of events, he was ‘let go’ from Momentum himself when the witch-hunters eventually came for him.

We hear there are ongoing and quite heated arguments over whether For the Many should reference Corbyn. Some participants have objected, we hear, not because of any political differences – but because he comes with the ‘anti-Semitism’ baggage. I would have thought that naming the organisation after his 2017 manifesto would be a bit of a giveaway, as is the involvement of his wife, Laura Alvarez. But perhaps some people can be fooled some of the time that way.

For the Many describes itself as a “grassroots alliance seeking to unite the left, based on 2016-19 Labour principles, through a network for communication and coordination”. Presumably “grassroots” here refers to a number of individuals who were meeting behind closed doors to set up the new formation over the last few months (rather than the organisations involved in Transform, who were doing the same behind a set of different closed doors). Apart from Loach and Alvarez, the other leading people involved are Andrew Feinstein (a former minister under Nelson Mandela), Audrey White (Merseyside Pensioners Association) and Naomi Wimborne-Idrissi (Jewish Voice for Labour). I would not describe them as ‘grassroots’ in any sense.

We have yet to see any programme or political statement from For the Many (if it indeed goes beyond Corbyn’s manifestoes), but if the organisers are too scared to deal with the anti-Semitism smear campaign head on then it will be of very limited value. After all, the campaign to conflate anti-Zionism and criticism of Israel with anti-Semitism is continuing to grow and has spread from the Labour movement into workplaces, town halls, schools and universities.

This kind of debate also shows that some people have learned very little from the witch-hunt in the Labour Party. Appeasing the right and their smears, lies and slanders will not make us stronger – it will help our enemies, those we have to fight politically. Beyond taking on the witch-hunt, we would argue for any new organisation to have a clear socialist programme. And by that we do not mean motherhood, apple pie and platitudes, but a Marxist programme that takes the fight for political democracy seriously.

Transform

Unsurprisingly this is something that Transform, with its 10 short ‘core principles’, does not do.[3] It does not even reach the dazzling heights of Corbyn’s manifestoes. It wants to be a “left party” – not a socialist one. There is only one reference to socialism in the widest sense: it claims that Transform “is eco-socialist, supporting transformative political, social and economic change in order to build a truly sustainable world and achieve climate justice” (my emphasis). It wants to “redistribute wealth and power from the elite to the people” – a classic Lassallean formulation that Marx famously riled against. Marxists do not fight for ‘fairness’, ‘justice’ or a more equal distribution (or the even stranger ‘redistribution’) – they fight for the working class to become the ruling class, which owns and controls the means of production.

Having set up The World Transformed after Corbyn’s election, Momentum is now merely one of the 33 ‘partners’ of this annual jamboree, which runs parallel to the Labour Party conference and has absolutely no impact on it. As always, it will be snazzily and expensively produced and has a worthy, if slightly dull, programme, with lots of ‘can do’ workshops, films and speeches by big names (Jeremy Corbyn and Jamie Driscoll among them). It is going nowhere politically, but that is exactly the point of this festival, which has taken on a life of its own. A bit of harmless fun.

Momentum itself is still trying to find its feet in the post-Corbyn labour movement. It recently reconfirmed the Lansman rule that only Labour Party members can join. Non-Labour members (including those suspended or expelled in the witch-hunt) may become “Momentum movement builders” and may support the organisation financially, etc – but without having a vote or any say.[4] Not exactly a very attractive proposition and, unsurprisingly, Momentum provides no membership figures nowadays.

Momentum excited

It has clubbed together with what remains of the Campaign for Labour Party Democracy to stand a couple of ‘joint slates’ in the various internal Labour elections coming up during and after conference. Both will also inform delegates via text messages and emails about they should be voting at conference. I would venture a guess that sooner or later those two organisations will merge – probably when enough people remember that they still have a subscription to Momentum and cancel it.

There is, however, no sense of any kind of fightback. The only thing Momentum has been getting slightly excited about is the planned abolition of the ‘equality roles’ for disabled, black and gay members in Constituency Labour Parties, proposed by Labour’s national executive committee. Of course, this is an attack from the right on what remains of the left, but we should seriously question how useful these positions really are.

In truth they are a patronising way to show that ‘we are taking the issue seriously’. Often, the opposite is the case: it leaves such matters to the ‘equality officer’ rather than making them into questions for the whole CLP. They are a reflection of the dead end of ID politics, where what you are is far more important than what you believe in or fight for.

Momentum disagrees, of course: “We must stop this – and we can!”, it proclaims in an email to anybody on its database: “To come into force, the rule change needs to be passed at Labour conference on Sunday 8th October. We urge all Labour Party stakeholders to reject this rule change on the conference floor.” If the petition on the subject is anything to go by, there is not a chance of that happening.[5] Although this is right up the street of the official Labour left, it has gathered a less than impressive 835 signatories. A figure which tells us everything about the current state of the official Labour left – and, of course, Momentum itself.

[1]. Morning Star September 5 2023.

[2]. ocisa.org.uk.

[3]. transformpolitics.uk.

[4]. join.peoplesmomentum.com/?ref=mmb.

[5]. forms.peoplesmomentum.com/petition.

Anti-Semitism, The left, Witch-hunts and expulsions

Still getting it wrong

Diane Abbott has finally spoken out on Labour’s ‘fraudulent’ disciplinary process. But, asks Carla Roberts, is Sir Keir’s refusing to allow her to stand as a Labour candidate the result of racism?

It has been just over five months since Diane Abbott MP was suspended from the Parliamentary Labour Party for her crass letter to The Observer, in which she wrote that Jewish people, travellers and “redheads” – basically anybody who is not black – “are not all their lives subject to racism”. Instead she claimed they are only subject to the lesser “prejudice” and in the process equated the persecution and mass extermination of Jewish people with the teasing experienced by redheads.

Of course, Labour leader Sir Starmer was quick to pounce on one of the few remaining Corbyn supporters in parliament. Abbott immediately and humbly apologised, blaming some computer mishap that allegedly sent a half-finished letter. (We very much doubt the other half would have been any better.)

Some on the left believe that Abbott should not have been criticised for her Observer letter, because showing ‘real solidarity’ demands that we do so uncritically. Kevin Bean’s article in the Weekly Worker at the time was widely criticised for ‘attacking’ Abbott.[1] What nonsense. Of course, we continue to oppose her suspension, as all socialists should. But we do so critically, because her letter, quite frankly, was a lot of ahistorical and apolitical nonsense. A reflection of the dire identity politics that remains popular on the left, despite the fact that it so obviously weakens and splits our class into smaller and smaller groups defined by colour, sex, gender, etc.

By reducing racism to simply a question of skin colour, Abbott drew on the very same ideas of a ‘hierarchy of racism’ that her letter was ostensibly designed to counter. It is just that Keir Starmer has got the pyramid the wrong way around, you see.

Abbott was, of course, correct to state that the trans-Atlantic slave trade and apartheid in South Africa were ideologically justified on the basis of biological racism. However, the same must be said of the oppression of Irish Catholics by the British colonial authorities, and Jews – above all under the Hitler regime. Indeed, Ireland was radically depopulated through a socially caused famine and an imperial neglect that justified itself on the basis that the ‘Africanoid’ Irish were inferior compared to the fine, upstanding Anglo-Saxons. The Nazis exterminated between four and eight million Jews … along with millions of Roma, Sinti, Slavs, homosexuals and Soviet POWs by putting mass killing onto an industrial footing.

Today, Romany gypsies and Irish travellers too, while they appear to Abbott as just another type of white people, are clearly and seriously disadvantaged when it comes to poverty, education, health, life expectancy, mental illness, etc. They are undoubtedly subject to overt racism by politicians, the media, the police and often also the local population that has been whipped up into vigorously opposing the setting up even of temporary camps in their neighbourhood.

Reading through Abbott’s September 19 statement[2] published on the social media platform, ‘X’ (formerly Twitter), it becomes clear that she continues to view politics chiefly through the prism of race – and herself. At no point does she try to link her suspension from the PLP to the wider witch-hunt and the anti-Semitism smear campaign. She writes:

The internal Labour Party disciplinary against me is fraudulent. The Labour Party has not charged me with anti-Semitism because they know it is untrue. As somebody who has fought all forms of racism all my life, I would consider it a very serious allegation. Instead, it has been used to smear me, my reputation, and decades of anti-racist work.

Before her

Her – and hundreds before her, of course. Why did she not speak out when others were falsely smeared as anti-Semites – at a time when it still could have made a difference? What about the disciplinary process, when it comes to Tony Greenstein, Chris Williamson and black activists Jackie Walker and Marc Wadsworth? Was that non-fraudulent? What about the hundreds who have since been publicly smeared as anti-Semites, often because they dared to criticise Israel? What about the bans and proscriptions? What about those who have been expelled because they ‘liked’ a social media post by Labour Against the Witchhunt? The list goes on, as we all know.

“I am the longest serving black MP,” she writes. “Yet there is widespread sentiment that, as a black woman, and someone on the left of the Labour Party, I will not get a fair hearing from this Labour leadership.”

At least there is some small recognition here (the only one in her statement) that her suspension might have something to do with the fact that she is on the “left”. But the “yet” implies that she believes she should have been treated differently to others on the left, because she is the “longest serving black MP”. Perhaps that is the reason why she “remained silent about this issue until now”. This was “in the hope that “some sense of decency and recognition of the tenets of natural justice might prevail”.

So she did not say anything before, because she thought, when it comes to herself, a black woman, a different set of criteria would apply, compared to the hundreds of others who have been vilified, smeared and persecuted? That is either extremely naive or extremely presumptuous.

In any case, Abbott – just like the rest of the entirely useless Socialist Campaign Group of MPs – in the main kept her mouth firmly shut. Instead of at least trying to take on the right, the official Labour left continues to this day to appease it, begging for forgiveness for the entirely fake ‘mass anti-Semitism problem’ of the party. In reality, it was exactly this silence and apologia that has allowed the witch-hunt to take hold, fester and become as successful as it is today. Corbyn and his allies showed their enemies exactly where they should best be attacked. The SCG is now so weak that Starmer can pick the remaining ‘left’ MPs off one by one, with little or no opposition.

As a result, not only has the left inside the Labour Party been crushed, but the campaign to conflate anti-Zionism with anti-Semitism continues to grow and poison all areas of society – in the media, schools, universities, town halls, political parties, national governments and the European parliament.

The truth is that Diane Abbott’s suspension has nothing to do with anti-Semitism or indeed the colour of her skin. No, withdrawing the whip from Diane Abbott is just the latest round in Sir Keir Starmer’s campaign to show the ruling class that he really is a man they can trust. With talk of the next general election taking place in May 2024, Starmer will want to make sure that there is no chance of Abbott – or Jeremy Corbyn for that matter – coming back onto Labour’s benches.

Replace me

The question is, why does Abbott go public now, after having kept quiet for so long? It appears it has to do with her prospect of being re-elected to parliament – or, more precisely, the lack of such a prospect. Abbott believes that the shutting down of her local CLP’s executive committee and replacement of its principal officers has less to do with the recent conviction for paedophilia of the election agent of Meg Hillier (MP for the neighbouring constituency of Hackney South) and the “relevant child safeguarding issues” posed by “members in both constituencies” – but was merely done in order to “replace me as the candidate prior to the next election”. Perhaps, perhaps not.

But it seems to have dawned on her at last that Starmer will indeed not make any kind of exception for her or let her off with a slap on the wrist. “Others have committed far more grave offences,” she complains, yet they “have been immediately excused as supporters of this leadership”. A rather weak defence, you would think, but the Morning Star editorial of September 21 makes the same point – listing various unpunished “offences” by rightwing MPs:

The racism is blatant once the record under Starmer is considered. Shadow cabinet member Steve Reed accused a Jewish businessman of being a ‘puppet master.’ He apologised – no sanction. Veteran backbench MP Barry Sheerman speculated about a ‘run on silver shekels’ when two Jewish businessmen did not get a peerage. He apologised, referencing his long support for Labour Friends of Israel – no sanction …

The editorial continues:

It may be as relevant that they are factional allies of the Starmer regime, which is also trying to hound Jeremy Corbyn and Jamie Driscoll out of office. But the racism in the difference in treatment is unanswerable.

Factional – yes, obviously. But racist? Really? It is now commonplace for many on the left to accuse Starmer and the Labour Party of ‘institutional racism’. Anti-black racism, obviously – not anti-Semitism, as the accusation against Corbyn went. The Forde Report, many claim, exposed such institutional racism. Wrong. Martin Forde KC wrote that Labour was “in effect operating a hierarchy of racism or of discrimination” and that it was not taking accusations of anti-black racism or Islamophobia as seriously as allegations of anti-Semitism.[3]

We all know why, of course. Those allegations were inflated and weaponised, because that is the stick with which to beat Corbyn. Many on the left now see their job of reclaiming the said “hierarchy of racism” – but with anti-black racism on top. Diane Abbott’s Observer letter is a (not very sophisticated) reflection of that widespread adherence to ID politics (‘My experience of racism is worse than yours’).

The boring truth is that the Labour Party under Sir Keir Starmer is not institutionally racist. Just as it was not anti-Semitic under Jeremy Corbyn. As a party with a membership of hundreds of thousands, of course, there is no doubt there will be a small minority of racists (and anti-Semites), reflecting what exists in wider society. But does that mean that either the leadership or the mass of Labour activists are racist?

It is absurd to claim that the straight-laced Starmer, who is going out of his way to show that he is capable of running ‘multicultural’ British capitalism without rocking the boat, would do so by running the Labour Party in a racist manner. Black and British-Asian members of the shadow cabinet, over 40 Labour MPs from “ethnic minority” backgrounds[4] and a commitment to official anti-racism paint a rather different picture.

Of course, what goes unquestioned is national chauvinism, unity around British red, white and blue nationalism, pursuing our national interests and loyalty to the UK monarchical constitution. But then most of the official Labour left share that exact same outlook which amongst them simply passes for common sense.

[1]. ‘Race, prejudice and stupidity’ Weekly Worker April 27: weeklyworker.co.uk/worker/1440/race-prejudice-and-stupidity.

[2]. twitter.com/HackneyAbbott/status/1704149054123360651.

[3]. www.theguardian.com/politics/2023/mar/17/labour-accused-still-not-engaging-hierarchy-racism-claims.

[4]. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_ethnic_minority_politicians_in_the_United_Kingdom#List_of_ethnic_minority_Members_of_Parliament.

Inside the Labour Party, Labour structures and programme

Expect nothing from Sir Keir

Birmingham city’s declaration of bankruptcy comes after a decade and more of austerity and the systematic erosion of local government. Kevin Bean calls for a return to democracy but on a much higher level

The news that Birmingham city council, the largest local authority in the country, has effectively declared itself bankrupt – after issuing a section 114 notice, indicating that it does not have the finances to balance its budget – produced the predictable political reactions.

Announcing the notice, which restricts spending to statutory obligations on essential local services, the Labour leader of the council, John Cotton, blamed three things for the current deficit of £87 million: a £760 million bill to settle historical equal pay claims; overrunning budgets and problems with installing a new IT system; and £1 billion cuts in central government grants since 2010. The government swept aside the substance of these criticisms, arguing that it had stepped in to provide support for local authorities in the 2023-24 budget, which amounted to an increase of 9% for Birmingham.

Instead of acknowledging the long-term impact of austerity cuts since 2010, the Tories shifted the focus onto ‘governance arrangements’ in the council and the responsibility of local authority leaders to secure the “best use of taxpayers’ money”, by reminding Birmingham (and other authorities in the same boat) that “clearly it’s for locally elected councils to manage their own budgets”.

The inevitable media reaction also followed a wearingly predictable path, with the Tory press highlighting alleged examples of municipal extravagance, mismanagement and incompetence. As ever, the Daily Mail was in the vanguard, with tales of waste and political dysfunction, while the Daily Telegraph’s coverage highlighted the council leader’s holiday and trips abroad. Other commentators broadened the attack to criticise Birmingham’s ‘over-ambitious plans’ and the impact of the city’s hosting of the Commonwealth Games in 2022 on the council’s finances. Along with comments by local Tory MPs and councillors, these media attacks feed into the developing pre-general election campaign designed to show that Labour, and Sir Keir in particular, are incapable of responsible government and cannot be trusted to balance the books.[1]

The response of the Labour leadership, both nationally and locally, was similarly predictable. Its main defence was the accurate assessment of the impact of Tory austerity policies and cuts in local government funding since 2010, especially given the growing demands placed on local services. Arguing that Birmingham’s position was by no means unique – Hackney, Slough, Croydon, Northamptonshire, Thurrock, and Woking had all filed similar notices in recent years – Labour turned their fire on the Tories. This line of attack was given added weight in the days that followed by reports that over 20 councils were facing a similar financial crisis, including Tory and Liberal Democrat local authorities.[2]

Attacking Tory austerity is easy, but, as Angela Rayner reminded us in her speech to the TUC, Labour was a financially responsible party and local authorities could not expect an incoming Starmer government to loosen the purse strings and to make up for the lost years of austerity and cuts. So, as has been the case with Sir Keir’s leadership in general, Labour offers plenty of tea and sympathy to local authorities, but ‘responsibly’ dampens down any expectations of real change. It explicitly rules out restoring local services to even the inadequate levels of 2010.

Municipal socialism

The ramifications of the crisis in local government go far beyond the rather stale and uninspiring politicking that passes for bourgeois politics in contemporary Britain. Of course, the provision of good local services is vital for people, especially amongst the poorest sections of the working class. The disproportionate impact of austerity on the poorest local authorities and the grossly unequal nature of local government finance, business rates, council tax bands, assessments and central government grants has been well-documented from the 1980s onwards and provides much of the framework of the common sense of the labour movement’s politics of local government.

The defence of those services, along with the autonomy of local institutions, became key battlegrounds from the 1970s and greatly intensified in the 1980s, when the Tories imposed central government control over local government finance and forms of block grant, business rates and the nature of local taxation, such as the poll tax. In the wider context Margaret Thatcher’s approach to local government policies were part of a successful campaign to increase the share of wealth in the hands of the ruling class.

These attacks also struck at an important historical element in Labourist politics, ‘municipal socialism’, which in its turn had been built on the reforming and radical traditions of 19th century local government – as developed in Birmingham by Joseph Chamberlain and the Progressives in the London County Council. This ‘gas and water socialism’, in its own way, also drew on the civic traditions of bourgeois Britain and the evident local pride and often ostentatious displays of wealth, progress and prosperity embodied in magnificent public buildings and civic amenities. Visit any of the great industrial and commercial cities and towns that came into their own during the 19th century, such as Birmingham, Manchester or Liverpool, and you can still see the self-confidence of that period in the architecture and cityscapes they created. The contrast between that era of British capitalism’s triumph and its present-day position could not be more starkly posed than in the crisis now facing local government and the highly symbolic example of Birmingham. Sic transit gloria civitatis.

Despite some recent attempts to revive the rhetoric of municipal socialism in the form of the ‘Preston model’ or the grandstanding appeals of metro-mayors, such as Andy Burnham in Greater Manchester, given the degree of control central government exerts over local authorities, these options are extremely limited. In practice the power of local councils are circumscribed by diktat from Whitehall; the room for manoeuvre and local initiative is non-existent.

Defend services

Although Labour councillors still talk of acting to defend services and mitigating the worst effects of the Tory austerity programme, in practice this dented-shield approach is mere rhetoric. Labour councils sell off assets to buy some time and space to maintain budgets, or they try to hold down wages to ‘protect’ overall budgets at the expense of the living standards of council workers. Plenty of dents here, but no effective shield to protect vital services.

Moreover, should any Labour councillor oppose these strategies and vote against such budgets, they face losing the whip. Labour has completely bought into the presidential-style politics of local mayors and the centralisation of power in a few hands at cabinet and senior-officer level. In accepting the bidding culture and partnership politics initiated by George Osborne, metro-mayors like Andy Burnham and Steve Rotheram are essentially running the larger conurbations as agents on behalf of central government, and thus further eroding local democracy and any real accountability.

Of course, that is only to be expected of capitalism’s second eleven, the Labour leadership, but those claiming to be on left have also failed to present any real political alternative or analysis of the significance the local government crisis. The ‘official communist’ Morning Star presents a similar critique of Tory austerity to the Labour leadership, albeit with calls for the next Labour government to make up the losses suffered by local authorities since 2010.[3] Such plaintive cries for expansion and extra spending are likely to fall on deaf ears, so what then? Socialist Worker has the answer: more protests and building resistance to protect local services. All valid and necessary in themselves, but where is the politics and the alternative to the attacks on local government which have intensified over the last 40 years?[4]

That is why the communist minimum programme links the defence of local government services to the wider battle for republican democracy – from the top to the bottom of British society. Abolish the metro and city mayors, and the powerful cliques of senior officers and unelected officials, who currently shape policy in the town halls. Replace them with a real local democracy that radically devolves service provision, planning, tax raising, law enforcement and funding allocation as far down as possible, and appropriate to ward, borough, city and county levels.

By bringing together the political battle for local democracy and the demands for the economic resources to make them a reality, we expose both the political bankruptcy of those Labourites trying to make the current system work and show how mass mobilisation around the communist programme is the only real alternative to the crises in local government l

[1]. www.telegraph.co.uk/opinion/2023/09/05/birmingham-is-paying-the-price-for-labour-rule.

[2]. www.lgcplus.com/finance/moodys-warns-of-more-council-failures-in-the-near-term-13-09-2023.

[3]. morningstaronline.co.uk/article/e/labour-right-demand-new-settlement-council-funding.

[4]. socialistworker.co.uk/features/who-is-to-blame-for-birmingham-council-crisis.

Refound Labour as a permanent united front of the working class

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