Labour structures and programme

After Corbyn’s second victory

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The failed coup presents the left with an unparalleled historic opportunity. James Marshall of Labour Party Marxists outlines a programme of immediate tasks and long-term strategic goals.

Despite the unremitting hostility of the mass media, despite the MPs’ no-confidence motion, despite the ‘anti-Zionism equals anti-Semitism’ smearing, despite the court battles, despite the gerrymandering exclusion of 130,000 members, despite the ongoing witch-hunt, comrade Corbyn has trounced citizen Smith.

The right has already been adjusting its approach accordingly. The 169-34 Labour MP vote calling for a return to the pseudo-democratic practice whereby the Parliamentary Labour Party elects the shadow cabinet – scrapped under Ed Miliband in 2011 – is not an attempt to “heal wounds”. Nor is it a peace offering to Jeremy Corbyn. No, manifestly, it is a continuation of the policy of “relentless rebellion” against Corbyn’s leadership.

The PLP right eyes the national executive committee as a vital field of struggle in the organisational, constitutional and policy battles to come.

The shadow cabinet is allocated three NEC seats and the right feared that the left stood on the threshold of establishing a functional majority. But, though the NEC narrowly rejected Tom Watson’s proposal to give the PLP its way over shadow cabinet elections, the 16-14 vote on Scotland and Wales might hand the right a workable majority.

Scotland and Wales will both have NEC seats – with a full vote. However, they will have to be frontbenchers. Kezla Dugdale and Carwyn Jones are the most likely to take these seats.

Another victory for the right on the NEC came with the agreement to “clamp down” on “online abuse”. New members will be expected to sign a code of conduct or be barred.

The Corbyn camp has also promoted proposals at the NEC: two more trade union seats, plus a councillor, a Scotland and a Wales NEC seat … elected by the membership. The left would be expected to win the lot.

Similar Corbynista moves are afoot for the Liverpool conference to take the MP and MEP 15% nomination threshold back down to 5%. In 2015 that would have comfortably allowed Corbyn to stand for leader. He would not have had to rely on the “morons” to “lend” him their votes.

Of course, what the PLP right dreads, above all, is submitting to a genuine reselection process in the run-up to the next general election. By the same measure, anything towards that end, no matter how partial, is to be welcomed, at least as far as the LPM is concerned. Most constituency members are itching to see the back of traitor MPs.

There has been much chatter in the media about a PLP split. Needless to say, however, the right remains haunted by Ramsay MacDonald’s 1931 National Labour Organisation and then the ‘Gang of Four’ of Roy Jenkins, David Owen, Bill Rodgers and Shirley Williams, who broke away exactly 50 years afterwards to form the Social Democratic Party. MacDonald’s NLO instantly became a tame Tory satellite. It finally dissolved in 1945. As for the SDP, it merged with the Liberal Party in 1988 and shared the same sorry fate. From the early 1970s till even the late 80s, of course, the political centre enjoyed something of a revival. No longer. At the 2015 general election the Lib Dems were decimated. They remain to this day marginalised and widely despised. Given the punishing logic of the first-past-the-post election system, it is therefore highly unlikely that the rightwing PLP majority will do us a favour and walk.

Conceivably, the PLP right wing could go for electing their own leader (not the hapless poseur, Owen Smith) and constituting themselves the official opposition. The result would be two rival parties. A rightwing Labour Party with by far the bigger parliamentary presence. Then, on the other hand, a leftwing Labour Party with trade union support, but a much smaller number of MPs. That way, the right would get hold of most of Labour’s £6.2 million Short money and come first when it comes to asking parliamentary questions.

However, a de facto split surely guarantees their expulsion and the selection of alternative, official candidates. Most traditional Labour voters are expected to remain loyal, not to opt for some SDP mark II. Premising such a split, a recent YouGov poll gave a Corbyn-led Labour Party 21% of the total vote and a “Labour right party” just 13% (and the Tories 40%, Ukip 11% and the Lib Dems 6%). 1)yougov.co.uk/news/2016/08/02/who-gets-keep-voters Doubtless, such arithmetic explains why Ed Balls, former shadow chancellor, dismisses the idea of a breakaway as “crazy”. 2)The Telegraph September 1 2016

Political suicide certainly exerts no appeal, as far as most rightwing Labour MPs are concerned. The one thing they truly believe in is their own career. So, the chances are that the right will dig in, use its base in the bureaucratic apparatus, amongst councillors, MPs, MEPs, etc, and fight till the bitter end.

Tasks

John McDonnell has been holding out an olive branch, talks of welcoming back Owen Smith into the shadow cabinet and pulling together to fight the “real enemy”, the Conservatives. 3)https://www.politicshome.com/news/uk/political-parties/labour-party/news/78857/john-mcdonnell-calls-his-mate-owen-smith-rejoin In the mind of team Corbyn doubtless that constitutes clever tactics. Divide the implacable anti-Corbyn MPs from those merely fearful of losing their seats. Divide the MPs who want an effective opposition to the Tories from those who really are Tories.

An appeasement policy presumably based on Seumas Milne’s wonkery. Back in January 2016 our director of communications produced a problem-solving spreadsheet of Labour MPs. Leaked to The Times two months later, it showed just 85 MPs who could be considered “core group negatives” or “hostile”. Another 71 MPs were supposedly “neutral but not hostile”. Just 19 MPs were put in Corbyn’s “core group”, while 56 were classified as “core group plus”. 4)The Times March 23 2016 Needless to say, though, comrade Milne’s calculations were violently wrong.

After all, in June 2016, 172 Labour MPs actually signed the no-confidence motion. Then, after that, we had the 169-34 vote on shadow cabinet elections. These two PLP moments accurately photograph the real dimensions of the “core group negatives” or “hostile” camp. There might well be those who can be considered “neutral but not hostile”. Their numbers are, though, vanishingly small. What of the Corbyn camp? The “core group”, together with the “core group plus”, nowhere near adds up to 75 MPs. No, there are little more than 40 of them … in total.

Practically, we need less spiel about olive branches, coming back and uniting. Instead, the membership must be organised, educated and galvanised. Not just to vote Corbyn. Not just to defend Corbyn. But organised, educated and galvanised for war in the wards, constituencies, committees and conferences.

There must be a strategic recognition that the right will never reconcile itself to the Corbyn leadership. Let alone the growing influence of the radical, socialist and Marxist left. And because the PLP right will pursue its civil war to the bitter end, we must respond by using all the weapons at our disposal.

In our view the Labour left has seven immediate tasks.

  1. Fight for rule changes stipulating that all elected Labour representatives must be subject to mandatory reselection. Reforming trigger ballots is a step in right direction, but not enough. MPs must be brought under democratic control: from above by the NEC; from below by the CLPs.
  2. We need a sovereign conference once again. The cumbersome, undemocratic and oppressive structures, especially those put in place under the Blair supremacy, must be rolled back. The Joint Policy Committee, the National Policy Forums, etc, must go as a matter of urgency.
  3. Scrap the hated compliance unit and “get back to the situation where people are automatically accepted for membership, unless there is a significant issue that comes up” (John McDonnell). 5)http://labourlist.org/2016/02/mcdonnell-and-woodcock-clash-over-plan-to-scrap-member-checks/ The compliance unit operates in the murky shadows, it violates natural justice, it routinely leaks to the capitalist media. Full membership rights must be restored to all those cynically suspended or expelled. More than that, welcome in those good socialists barred from membership because, mainly out of frustration, they once supported Green, Tusc or Left Unity election candidates.
  4. The stultifying inertia imposed on Momentum must be ended. That can only happen through democracy, trusting the membership and allowing the election of and right to recall all Momentum officials. Neither politically nor organisationally has Jon Lansman proven to be a competent autocrat. He has stopped Momentum meetings, he has blocked Momentum attempts to oppose the ‘anti-Zionism equals anti-Semitism’ smears, he has done nothing to get Momentum to fight the ongoing purge. End the control-freakery. Membership lists and contact details must be handed over to local branches. Then we can begin to organise, educate and galvanise Corbyn’s supporters.
  5. Securing new trade union affiliates ought to be a top priority. The FBU has reaffiliated. Excellent. Matt Wrack at last came to his senses. He took the lead in reversing the disaffiliation policy. But what about RMT? Let us win RMT militants to drop their support for the thoroughly misconceived Trade Unionist and Socialist Coalition. Instead reaffiliate to the Labour Party. And what about the NUT? Why can’t we win it to affiliate? Surely we can … if we fight for hearts and minds. Then there is PCS. Thankfully, Mark Serwotka, its leftwing general secretary, has at last come round to the idea. The main block to affiliation now being the Socialist Workers Party and the Socialist Party in England and Wales. Yes, PCS affiliation will run up against the Trade Disputes and Trade Unions Act (1927), introduced by a vengeful Tory government in the aftermath of the general strike, whereby civil service unions were barred from affiliating to the Labour Party and the TUC. The Civil and Public Services Association – predecessor of PCS – reaffiliated to the TUC in 1946. Now, however, surely, it is time for the PCS to reaffiliate to the Labour Party. True, when we in the LPM moved a motion at the February 2015 AGM of the Campaign for Labour Party Democracy calling for all trade unions to be encouraged to affiliate, we were met with the objection that it would be illegal. However, as NEC member Christine Shawcroft said, “What does that matter?” Here comrade Shawcroft, a close ally of Corbyn, shows just the right fighting spirit. Force a another change in the law.
  6. Not only should we commit ourselves to securing further trade union affiliates. Within the existing affiliates we must fight to win many, many more members to enrol. Just over 70,000 affiliated supporters voted in the 2015 leadership election. A tiny portion of what could be. There are well over four million who pay the political levy. 6)D Pryer Trade union political funds and levy, House of Commons briefing paper No00593, August 8 2013, p8 Given that they can sign up to the Labour Party at no more than an online click, we really ought to have a million affiliated supporters as a minimum target figure.
  7. Every constituency, ward and other such basic unit must be won and rebuilt by the left. The right has done everything to make them cold, uninviting, bureaucratic and lifeless. The left must convince the sea of new members, and returnees, to attend meetings … and drive out the right. Elect officers who defend the Corbyn leadership. Elect officers who are committed to transforming our wards and constituencies into vibrant centres of socialist organisation, education and action. As such our basic units would be well placed to hold councillors and MPs to account.

Far reaching

Our main goal should not be the attempt to win the next general election by courting the capitalist media, concocting some rotten compromise with the right, let alone going for a “broad political alliance” with the Liberal Democrats, Greens, Scottish and Welsh nationalists. A well trod road to disaster. No, our main goal should be to transform the Labour Party, so that, in the words of Keir Hardie, it can “organise the working class into a great independent political power to fight for the coming of socialism”. 7)Independent Labour Party Report of the 18th annual conference London 1910, p59

Towards that end we need rule changes to once again permit left, communist and revolutionary parties to affiliate. As long as they do not stand against us in elections, this can only but strengthen us as a federal party. Today affiliate organisations include the Fabians, Christians on the left, the Co-operative Party … the Jewish Labour Movement and Labour Business. Allow the SWP, SPEW, CPGB, the Morning Star’s CPB, etc, to join our ranks.

Moreover, programmatically, we should consider a new clause four (see box). Not a return to the old, 1918, version, but a commitment to working class rule and a society which aims for a stateless, classless, moneyless society which embodies the principle, “From each according to their abilities, to each according to their needs”. Towards that end the Labour Party should commit itself to achieving a “democratic republic”. The standing army, the monarchy, the House of Lords and the state sponsorship of the Church of England must go. We should support a single-chamber parliament, proportional representation and annual elections. All of that ought to be included in our new clause four.

The PLP rebels are out and out opportunists. Once and for all we must put an end to such types exploiting our party. Being an MP ought to be an honour, not a career ladder, not a way for university graduates to secure a lucrative living.

A particularly potent weapon here is the demand that all our elected representatives should take only the average wage of a skilled worker. A principle upheld by the Paris Commune and the Bolshevik revolution. Even the Italian Communist Party under Enrico Berlinguer applied the partymax in the 1970s. With the PCI’s huge parliamentary fraction this proved to be a vital source of funds.

Our MPs are on a basic £67,060 annual salary. On top of that they get around £12,000 in expenses and allowances, putting them on £79,060 (yet at present Labour MPs are only obliged to pay the £82 parliamentarians’ membership subscription rate). Moreover, as leader of the official opposition, Jeremy Corbyn not only gets his MP’s salary. He is entitled to an additional £73,617. 8)https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leader_of_the_Opposition_(United_Kingdom)

Let them keep the average skilled workers’ wage – say £40,000 (plus legitimate expenses). Then, however, they should hand the balance over to the party. Jeremy Corbyn, John McDonnell, Diane Abbott ought to take the lead.

Imposing a partymax would give a considerable boost to our finances. Even if we leave out our 20 MEPs from the calculation, it would amount to a £900,000 addition. Anyway, whatever our finances, there is the basic principle. Our representatives ought to live like ordinary workers, not pampered members of the middle class. So, yes, let us agree the partymax as a basic principle.

Given the huge challenges before us, we urgently need to reach out to all those who are disgusted by corrupt career politicians, all those who aspire for a better world, all those who have an objective interest in ending capitalism. Towards that end we must establish our own press, radio and TV. To state the obvious, tweeting and texting have severe limits. They are brilliant mediums for transmitting simple, short and sharp messages. But, when it comes to complex ideas, debating history and charting political strategies, they are worse than useless.

Relying on the favours of the capitalist press, radio and TV is a game for fools. True, it worked splendidly for Tony Blair and Alistair Campbell. But as Neil Kinnock, Gordon Brown and Ed Miliband found to their cost, to live by the mainstream media is to die by the mainstream media.

No, to set the agenda we need our own full-spectrum alternative.

The established media can be used, of course. But, as shown by the run-up to the anti-Corbyn coup, when things really matter, we get hardly a look in. Indeed the capitalist press, radio and TV were integral to the anti-Corbyn coup. There are, of course, siren voices to the contrary. Those who think we can win over The Guardian, the Mirror, etc. 9)Eg, Owen Jones The Guardian September 16 2015 But, frankly, only the determinedly naive could not have anticipated the poisonous bias, the mockery, the hatchet-jobs, the implacable opposition.

Once we had the Daily Herald. Now we have nothing. Well, apart from the deadly-dull trade union house journals, the advertising sheets of the confessional sects and the Morning Star (which is still under the grip of unreconstructed Stalinites).

We should aim for an opinion-forming daily paper of the labour movement and seek out trade union, co-operative, crowd and other such sources of funding. And, to succeed, we have to be brave: iconoclastic viewpoints, difficult issues, two-way arguments, must be included as a matter of course. The possibility of distributing it free of charge should be considered and, naturally, everything should be put up on the web without paywalls. We should also launch a range of internet-based TV and radio stations. With the abundant riches of dedication, passion and ideas that exist on the left, we can surely better the BBC, Al Jazeera, Russia Today and Sky.

Of course, the Jeremy Corbyn-John McDonnell leadership faces both an enemy without in the PLP and an enemy within in their own reformist ideology. They seriously seem to believe that socialism can be brought about piecemeal, through a series of left and ever lefter Labour governments. In reality, though, a Labour government committed to the existing state and the existing constitutional order produces not decisive steps in the direction of socialism, but attacks on the working class … and then, as we have repeatedly seen, beginning with the January-November 1924 MacDonald government, the re-election of a Tory government.

History lessons

Naturally, knowing our history, real Marxists, not fake Marxists, have never talked of reclaiming the Labour Party. It has never been ours in the sense of being a “political weapon for the workers’ movement”. No, despite the electoral base and trade union affiliations, our party has been dominated throughout its entire history by career politicians and trade union bureaucrats. A distinct social stratum, which in the last analysis serves not the interests of the working class, but the continuation of capitalist exploitation.

Speaking in the context of the advisability of the newly formed CPGB applying to affiliate to the Labour Party, Lenin had this to say:

 

[W]hether or not a party is really a political party of the workers does not depend solely upon a membership of workers but also upon the men [sic – JM] that lead it, and the content of its actions and its political tactics. Only this latter determines whether we really have before us a political party of the proletariat.

Regarded from this, the only correct, point of view, the Labour Party is a thoroughly bourgeois party, because, although made up of workers, it is led by reactionaries, and the worst kind of reactionaries at that, who act quite in the spirit of the bourgeoisie. It is an organisation of the bourgeoisie, which exists to systematically dupe the workers with the aid of the British Noskes and Scheidemanns [the executioners of Rosa Luxemburg and Karl Liebknecht]. 10)VI Lenin CW Vol 31 Moscow 1977, pp257-58

 

An assessment which still retains its essential purchase. The PLP is a 172-strong bourgeois party, which acts “quite in the spirit of the bourgeoisie”. However, the election of Corbyn, the “core group” of 19 pro-Corbyn MPs, the massively expanded membership, gives us an unparallelled historic opportunity to refound the Labour Party as a party that “is really a political party of the workers.”

Today the Labour Party is a chimera. Instead of a two-way contradiction between the leadership and the membership, we now have a three-way contradiction. The left dominates both the top and bottom of the party. That gives us the possibility of crushing the rightwing domination of the middle – the councillors, apparatus and PLP majority – from below and above.

No wonder the Tories, the army top brass and the bourgeois media want an immediate end to the Corbyn leadership. In this context, note David Cameron’s genuinely impassioned entreaty to Corbyn during one of their set-piece PMQs jousts: “It might be in my party’s interest for him to sit there. It’s not in the national interest. I would say – for heaven’s sake, man, go.” 11)The Guardian June 29 2016 Tory MPs cheered to the rafters the “for heaven’s sake, man, go” phrase. It is, of course, directly borrowed from that great bourgeois revolutionary, Oliver Cromwell. Most Labour MPs kept glumly silent. But obviously they agreed – having the day before voted 172-40 for the no-confidence motion.

In the exact same spirit, Sir Nicholas Houghton, the outgoing chief of the defence staff, publicly “worried” on the BBC’s Andrew Marr show about a Corbyn government. 12)The Mirror November 8 2015 There were accompanying press rumours of unnamed members of the army high command “not standing for” a Corbyn government and being prepared to take “direct action”. 13)The Sunday Times September 20 2015 Prior to that, a normally sober Financial Times ominously warned that Corbyn’s leadership damages Britain’s “public life”. 14)Financial Times August 14 2015 So, in the event of a Corbyn-led government, expect a “very British coup”.

Of course, in the medium to long term we Marxists want the abolition of the Bonarpartist post of leader. In the meantime, however, we favour Corbyn using to the full all the dictatorial powers accumulated by Ramsay MacDonald, Clement Attlee, Neil Kinnock and above all Tony Blair. From bitter first-hand experience, former Labour MP Alan Simpson writes: “When Blair talked of ‘an unbroken line of accountability’, he meant everyone, and everything, being accountable to him.” 15)http://www.redpepper.org.uk/inside-new-labours-rolling-coup-the-blair-supremacy We need a similar ruthlessness from Corbyn. Indeed, when dealing with the 172 rebel MPs, he too should borrow from the revolutionary Oliver Cromwell:

 

Is there a single virtue now remaining amongst you? Is there one vice you do not possess? Ye are grown intolerably odious. You were deputed here to get grievances redressed, are yourselves become the greatest grievance. Go, get you out! Make haste! Ye venal slaves be gone! Go! In the name of god, go! 16)http://www.emersonkent.com/speeches/dismissal_of_the_rump_parliament.htm

 

Corbyn’s much publicised admiration for Karl Marx, his campaigning against Israel’s occupation of the West Bank, opposition to US-led imperialist wars, call to junk Trident and nuclear weapons, his commitment to increase the tax take from transnational corporations, the banks and the mega rich, his Platonic republicanism, even his timid mumbling of the royal anthem – all mark him out as completely unacceptable to the British ruling class. It does not want him as the leader of the official opposition. It certainly does not want him as prime minister.

Of course, there is the danger that the Corbyn-McDonnell leadership will have their agenda set for them by the attempt to establish PLP unity. Put another way, in the attempt to placate the right, it will be the right that sets the political agenda. We have already seen the abandoning of principles, staying silent and putting them onto the backburner. Eg, John McDonnell’s pusillanimous statements on Ireland. Eg, Jeremy Corbyn’s refusal to defend the victims of the ‘anti-Zionism equals anti-Semitism’ witch-hunt. Now there is the call from the Corbyn-McDonnell leadership to have a “sensible” discussion on immigration. After the EU referendum McDonnell says we are no longer obliged to defend the principle of the right of people to free movement (he was disgracefully backed by Unite general secretary Len McCluskey). Such a course is meant to pander to working class EU exiters. But it disorients, demobilises and demoralises Corbyn’s base.

Outside

What about those on the left who stand on the sidelines? Eg, members of SPEW, SWP, the Morning Star’s CPB, Socialist Resistance and Left Unity? Do not dismiss them. Do not shun them. Instead they, or at least their cadre, should be viewed as a potential asset. If they throw themselves into the fight to transform the Labour Party, I am sure they would make an outstanding contribution. Necessarily, towards that end, there has got to be thoroughgoing self-criticism … beginning at the top.

If Peter Taaffe, general secretary of the Socialist Party in England and Wales, wants to be treated seriously, it is obvious what he must do. Firstly, openly and honestly, admit that his characterisation of the Labour Party as a bourgeois party, as being no different from the US Democratic Party, was short-sighted, impressionistic and fundamentally mistaken. Secondly, he should immediately put an end to standing candidates against Labour. Close down the Trade Unionist and Socialist Coalition forthwith. Thirdly, comrade Taaffe must own up that his repeated attempts to get trade unions to disaffiliate from the Labour Party amounted to sabotage. He should tell his comrades in RMT, PCS, NUT, etc to join us in calling for affiliation or reaffiliation. Unless he does that, a suitable replacement should be found.

The Socialist Workers Party is little different. Charlie Kimber, its national secretary, claims to “stand shoulder to shoulder with all those seeking Corbyn’s re-election”. 17)Party Notes September 12 2016 But the SWP has likewise dismissed the Labour Party as a trap, backed Tusc, supported trade union disaffiliation and opposed affiliation. Indeed comrade Kimber sees the Corbyn re-election campaign as little more than an opportunity to “build for the ‘Unwelcome the Tories’ demo in Birmingham on Sunday October 2 and the ‘Stand up to Racism’ conference the week after on Saturday October 8”. 18)Party Notes August 22 2016 Myopia still rules.

Charlie Kimber says that what really matters is not changing the Labour Party, but “strikes and demonstrations”. A Bakuninist, not a Marxist, formulation. Because the Labour Party is historically established, because it involves all big unions, because it has drawn in hundreds of thousands of new members, because it provokes bourgeois fear and anger, what is happening in the Labour Party is, in fact, a far higher form of the class struggle than economic strikes, let alone ephemeral protests or fake front conferences. In fact, the civil war raging in the Labour Party is a highly concentrated form of the class struggle.

Then there is the Morning Star’s Communist Party of Britain. When not promising to shop “entryists” to our witch-finder general, Iain McNicol, we have, in essence, a continuation of the SWP’s movementist politics. Morning Star editor, Ben Chacko, wants to focus attention not on decisively winning the civil war in the Labour Party. Idiotically, even at this crucial stage, he sees “a task far bigger than the Labour Party”. Fighting for a mass revolutionary party? No. Forging the links necessary for establishing a new workers’ international? No. What comrade Chacko, laughably, wants is “organising at a local level in groups such as the People’s Assembly, Keep Our NHS Public, Black Activists Rising Against Cuts and many more”. 19)Morning Star September 10-11 2016

Where we in the LPM strive to elevate local struggles to the national and the international level, comrade Chacko’s sights are set on “saving an A&E or a youth club”. That he does so in the name of Marxist politics and creating a mass movement on the scale of the Chartists shows an inability to grasp even the A in the ABC of communism.

Hopefully members of SPEW, the SWP, the Morning Star’s CPB, Socialist Resistance and Left Unity will as a matter of urgency deal with their sectarian, their benighted, their nincompoop misleaders and join us in the history-making struggle to transform the Labour Party.

References

References
↑1 yougov.co.uk/news/2016/08/02/who-gets-keep-voters
↑2 The Telegraph September 1 2016
↑3 https://www.politicshome.com/news/uk/political-parties/labour-party/news/78857/john-mcdonnell-calls-his-mate-owen-smith-rejoin
↑4 The Times March 23 2016
↑5 http://labourlist.org/2016/02/mcdonnell-and-woodcock-clash-over-plan-to-scrap-member-checks/
↑6 D Pryer Trade union political funds and levy, House of Commons briefing paper No00593, August 8 2013, p8
↑7 Independent Labour Party Report of the 18th annual conference London 1910, p59
↑8 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leader_of_the_Opposition_(United_Kingdom
↑9 Eg, Owen Jones The Guardian September 16 2015
↑10 VI Lenin CW Vol 31 Moscow 1977, pp257-58
↑11 The Guardian June 29 2016
↑12 The Mirror November 8 2015
↑13 The Sunday Times September 20 2015
↑14 Financial Times August 14 2015
↑15 http://www.redpepper.org.uk/inside-new-labours-rolling-coup-the-blair-supremacy
↑16 http://www.emersonkent.com/speeches/dismissal_of_the_rump_parliament.htm
↑17 Party Notes September 12 2016
↑18 Party Notes August 22 2016
↑19 Morning Star September 10-11 2016
Labour structures and programme

Seven immediate tasks for the Labour left

1. Fight for rule changes stipulating that all elected Labour representatives must be subject to mandatory candidate selection. Reforming trigger ballots is a step in right direction, but not enough. MPs must be brought under democratic control: from above by the NEC; from below by the CLPs.

2. We need a sovereign conference once again. The cumbersome, undemocratic and oppressive structures, especially those put in place under the Blair supremacy, must be rolled back. The Joint Policy Committee, the National Policy Forums, etc, must go as a matter of urgency.

3. Scrap the hated compliance unit and “get back to the situation where people are automatically accepted for membership, unless there is a significant issue that comes up” (John McDonnell). 1)http://labourlist.org/2016/02/mcdonnell-and-woodcock-clash-over-plan-to-scrap-member-checks  The compliance unit operates in the murky shadows, it violates natural justice, it routinely leaks to the capitalist media. Full membership rights must be restored to all those cynically suspended or expelled. More than that, welcome in those good socialists barred from membership because, mainly out of frustration, they once supported Green, Tusc or Left Unity election candidates.

4. The stultifying inertia imposed on Momentum must be ended. That can only happen through democracy, trusting the membership and allowing the election of and right to recall all Momentum officials. Neither politically nor organisationally has Jon Lansman proven to be a competent autocrat. He has stopped Momentum meetings, he has blocked Momentum attempts to oppose the ‘anti-Zionism equals anti-Semitism’ smears, he has done nothing to get Momentum to fight the ongoing purge. End the control-freakery. Membership lists and contact details must be handed over to local branches. Then we can begin to organise, educate and galvanise Corbyn’s supporters.

5. Securing new trade union affiliates ought to be a top priority. The FBU has reaffiliated. Excellent. Matt Wrack at last came to his senses. He took the lead in reversing the disaffiliation policy. But what about RMT? Let us win RMT militants to drop their support for the thoroughly misconceived Trade Unionist and Socialist Coalition. Instead reaffiliate to the Labour Party. And what about the NUT? Why can’t we win it to affiliate? Surely we can … if we fight for hearts and minds. Then there is PCS. Thankfully, Mark Serwotka, its leftwing general secretary, has at last come round to the idea. The main block to affiliation now being the Socialist Workers Party and the Socialist Party in England and Wales. Yes, PCS affiliation will run up against the Trade Disputes and Trade Unions Act (1927), introduced by a vengeful Tory government in the aftermath of the general strike, whereby civil service unions were barred from affiliating to the Labour Party and the TUC. The Civil and Public Services Association – predecessor of PCS – reaffiliated to the TUC in 1946. Now, however, surely, it is time for the PCS to reaffiliate to the Labour Party. True, when we in the LPM moved a motion at the February 2015 AGM of the Campaign for Labour Party Democracy calling for all trade unions to be encouraged to affiliate, we were met with the objection that it would be illegal. However, as NEC member Christine Shawcroft said, “What does that matter?” Here comrade Shawcroft, a close ally of Corbyn, shows just the right fighting spirit. Force a another change in the law.

6. Not only should we commit ourselves to securing further trade union affiliates. Within the existing affiliates we must fight to win many, many more members to enrol. Just over 70,000 affiliated supporters voted in the 2015 leadership election. A tiny portion of what could be. There are well over four million who pay the political levy. 2)D Pryer Trade union political funds and levy, House of Commons briefing paper No00593, August 8 2013, p8  Given that they can sign up to the Labour Party at no more than an online click, we really ought to have a million affiliated supporters as a minimum target figure.

7. Every constituency, ward and other such basic unit must be won and rebuilt by the left. The right has done everything to make them cold, uninviting, bureaucratic and lifeless. The left must convince the sea of new members, and returnees, to attend meetings … and drive out the right. Elect officers who defend the Corbyn leadership. Elect officers who are committed to transforming our wards and constituencies into vibrant centres of socialist organisation, education and action. As such our basic units would be well placed to hold councillors and MPs to account.

References

References
↑1 http://labourlist.org/2016/02/mcdonnell-and-woodcock-clash-over-plan-to-scrap-member-checks
↑2 D Pryer Trade union political funds and levy, House of Commons briefing paper No00593, August 8 2013, p8
Witch-hunts and expulsions

The Keith Vax affair: An old-fashioned tabloid scandal?

Sex between consenting adults should be their business, says Harley Filben

Spare a thought for Keith Vaz – a man who, having weathered a brief flurry of scandals in the early noughties, might have thought himself in the clear. He certainly seemed to us the sort of Teflon-coated careerist who thrived under the Blair and Brown regimes; who would retire at a time of his choosing to become Lord (Keith) Vaz of Somewhere-Or-Other: the full lifecycle.

Much of that, of course, is still perfectly possible. Yet it seems a great deal further away, after his resignation from the chairmanship of the home affairs select committee following allegations that he had consorted with male prostitutes, offered to buy them cocaine (he seems to have had the good sense, or taste, not to indulge himself), asked them to bring amyl nitrite to a carnal encounter, and – quite understandably – spent much of a tedious select committee session examining young gentlemen on Grindr.

Add it all up, and it’s catnip for tabloids. Rent-boys, poppers and blow; what’s not to love?

Vaz’s misfortune in all this consists, in part, of his being – at 49 – a little too old. He started contesting seats in 1983, the same year as the infamous Bermondsey by-election, which saw a vile wave of anti-gay bigotry mobilised against Labour candidate Peter Tatchell; he was elected in 1987 in Leicester East, with the culture war over sexuality raging. This was certainly a time at which – for the aspiring politician – a wife was a very important accessory. Today, things are certainly not as bad, at least for candidates in most urban constituencies; there are many openly gay MPs, although the married and civilly-partnered probably still have a better time of it on the whole. (It is probably also true that those in search of casual sexual encounters will find paying for it more and more necessary, as the years roll on by.)

Thus Vaz has ended up cornered – a bisexual, presumably, for longer than the last month (although sexuality is, of course, a more fluid thing than is often acknowledged), he has been forced to repress one side of his sexuality as a concession to mores far stronger in his day than they are in 2016. In still earlier – and even more barbaric – times than the 1980s, homosexuals were hunted down in the state apparatus and other ‘sensitive’ senior positions in society as a ‘security risk’, given that they could be blackmailed. Vaz’s experience reminds us that there is more than a grain of truth to that impulse: for, as soon as you have to conceal your innermost urges, you will always be at risk of exposure and potentially personal ruin. Vaz’s political career may well survive this, as it would not have done 20, 30 or 50 years ago; but his private relationships may not.

For every victim of blackmail, there is a blackmailer. In this case, however, victim and perpetrator alike are not individuals, but collectivities. The beneficiaries, in this case, are obvious – the tabloid press. The benefits are, on one level, equally obvious: as noted, there is nothing more tabloid-friendly than a politician making the beast with three backs with some young gentlemen of the night. That kind of thing sells papers. It’s a prestigious scoop, and hacks at the Mirror are no doubt as chuffed to break it as those at The Sun are livid about missing it.

Yet there is a wider issue, which consists of the fact that these ‘incidents’ in their totality amount to a permanent threat against elected politicians, prominent officials and the like. Keith Vaz did not want to end up like Peter Tatchell; the next fellow will not want to end up like Keith Vaz. Just as the police thrive in a society in which more or less everyone is guilty of some trivial infraction – speeding, smoking weed, pirating Game of thrones – and thus can be interviewed under appropriately heavy manners at all times, so the press gains much of its power from hypocritically imposing a deformed and unattainable morality on its subjects.

There are other beneficiaries, of course – the more sincere guardians of public morality. Historically the most prominent among such people were conservative Christians of various stripes, but the multicultural breakthrough, and related endeavours, have fragmented moralism most spectacularly. There are, of course, other religions to consider (Islamist-inspired campaigns against strip clubs in east London spring to mind), but equally new secular contenders.

Thus, prominent among the voices calling on Vaz to resign as select committee chair was that of a pressure group – Nordic Model Now. NMN, as the name suggests, is a group advocating the implementation of laws similar to those in Sweden that criminalise the purchase of sex (but not the sale). NMN is entirely non-transparent about who is involved (“a diverse group of women from a wide variety of backgrounds”), but seems to have crawled out from the rotten caucus of anti-sex feminists and evangelical groups, who ally to provoke panics over prostitution and sex trafficking.

The last great ‘achievement’ of the home affairs select committee under Vaz, after all, was a long inquiry into prostitution that – much to the dismay of these creatures – ended with a report explicitly opposed to the criminalisation of sex purchase and explicitly commending the “success” of decriminalisation of prostitution in New Zealand.1)See the conclusions here: www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm201617/cmselect/cmhaff/26/2602.htm Some now want the report thrown out, on the basis that Vaz had a vested interest in the result.

This is utterly tendentious. For a start, select committees are not unanimous mouthpieces for their chairpersons – are they all punters? For seconds, Vaz is a longstanding supporter of the Nordic model; assuming that he agrees with the report as written, then he has changed his mind, but simply glancing at the names called before the committee on this matter will reveal as nonsense the idea that it was systematically biased towards decriminalisation advocates – quite the reverse. NMN and its friends had an open goal in front of them – we politely suggest that they managed to miss the target because it is a violation of basic formal logic to criminalise only one side of a transaction. In the end their model is a proposal designed to assuage feminist consciences and conform to the strictures of Christian agape love, rather than empower prostitutes; thus its extraordinarily thin evidence base and the propensity for its advocates (especially when it comes to the supposed plague of sex trafficking) to just make shit up.2)For an old but admirably forensic takedown, see N Davies, ‘Prostitution and trafficking – anatomy of a moral panic’ The Guardian October 20 2009

It is worth going into this not only because the issue itself is an important one, and for the left highlights a difference of principle (to wit: is liberation the conscious self-activity of the masses, or the rescue of the masses by benevolent policemen?). There is also, in fact, something deeply corrosive about sex scandals as such; it is one thing for a tabloid to publish a kiss ’n’ tell, and quite another for people – be they writers for the same tabloid or others – to turn that kiss ’n’ tell into an instrument of some political hobby horse of theirs. The effect is to encourage people at large to view political questions through ‘non-political’ spectacles, and thus to depoliticise politics, and finally to open the way to demagoguery of a more basic kind.

The best prophylactic against this, of course, is to build up its opposite – a political culture where opposing perspectives meet on the grounds of their disagreement, rather than shuffling about in committee rooms and doling out opportunistic press releases.

 

References

References
↑1 See the conclusions here: www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm201617/cmselect/cmhaff/26/2602.htm
↑2 For an old but admirably forensic takedown, see N Davies, ‘Prostitution and trafficking – anatomy of a moral panic’ The Guardian October 20 2009
Anti-Semitism, Videos, Witch-hunts and expulsions

Video: Anti-Semitism and Anti-Zionism

Moshé Machover and Tony Greenstein discuss the question of the anti-Semitism ‘scandal’ in the Labour Party as part of Communist University 2016. Tony, a Jewish socialist, is fighting his suspension from the Labour Party for alleged ‘anti-Semitism’  and blogs here.

Communist University 2016 was co-sponsored by the Communist Party of Great Britain and Labour Party Marxists. CU 2016 took place from August 6-13 in London. The views in these videos do not necessarily represent the views of either organisation. More videos from Communist University 2016 are available here.

Momentum

For democracy in Momentum – Teesside Momentum

Momentum Teesside calls for Momentum to set the standards for democracy and transparency in the Labour Party.

At our meeting yesterday, we approved the following motion calling on Momentum nationally to put into practice the principles of democracy and transparency that it advocates for our party, the Labour Party:

(1) Momentum Teesside supports Momentum’s aim to “Transform Labour into a more open, member-led party, with socialist policies and collective will to implement them in government” and its stated commitment to “working for progressive political change through methods which are democratic, inclusive and participatory”.

(2) We are proud that Momentum Teesside activists have led the way in promoting these principles in local Constituency Labour Parties and branches, and have sought to organise events for Labour members to debate the vital issues facing our party where CLP leaderships have resisted these principles.

(3) We welcome the now well-developed database and communications capacity of Momentum – ie, mailing lists, social media and website.

(4) However, we note that agendas, documents and minutes for decision-making committees at national and regional level are still not published by the organisation nor distributed to members. We regret that Momentum members have sometimes learned about decisions made by the organisation, many weeks after they were taken, through media outlets that may be hostile to Momentum, without having been informed by the organisation itself.

(5) Momentum Teesside believes that the fight to democratise the Labour Party cannot be separated from the way in which Momentum organises its own activities. Momentum as an organisation should therefore practise what it preaches to the Labour Party in its own internal decision-making processes, which should be seen to be fully democratic, accountable and transparent. There must be a presumption of openness in a member-based democratic socialist organisation.

(6) We call upon Momentum to publish on its website agenda papers and minutes for all its decision-making bodies, as well as the names of their elected officers and committee members. We call upon Momentum to require that all regional decision-making bodies and local branches adopt the same good practice regarding publication, providing support and training where necessary to help achieve this.

————

Further details of motions and actions agreed at our 13 September meeting are available in the minutes published at https://goo.gl/ahETgv.

 

History, Transform the Labour Party, Witch-hunts and expulsions

End the bans and proscriptions

Once the Labour Party was characterised by tolerance and inclusion, all working class organisations were welcome – no longer. James Marshall of Labour Party Marxists explores the history.

We in the Labour Party are in the midst of a terrible purge. Four examples.

  •   Bakers, Food and Allied Workers Union general secretary Ronnie Draper has been suspended from membership and thereby prevented from voting in the Labour leadership election. Why? An unidentified tweet.
  •   Tony Greenstein is likewise suspended. A well known Jewish anti-Zionist, he faces baseless charges of being an anti-Semite. His real crime is to oppose the state of Israel … and Labour’s pro-Zionist right wing.
  •   Then there is Jill Mountford, an executive member of Momentum. She has been expelled. Once again, why? Six years ago, in the May 2010 general election, the comrade stood for the Alliance for Workers’ Liberty against Harriet Harman. A protest against the acceptance of Con-Dem austerity politics, albeit based on a stupid dismissal of the Labour Party as virtually indistinguishable from the US Democrats. However, since then comrade Mountford vows she has supported only Labour candidates.
  •   Perhaps the most ridiculous disciplinary case is Catherine Starr’s. Having shared a video clip of Dave Grohl’s band she ecstatically wrote: “I fucking love the Foo Fighters”. The thought police nabbed her under the ban on “racist, abusive or foul language, abuse against women, homophobia or anti-Semitism at meetings, on social media or in any other context.”1 Yes, using the word “fucking” in any context, can, nowadays be deemed a breach of the Labour Party’s norms of behaviour.

Unsurprisingly then, there are thousands of Drapers, Greensteins, Mountfords and Starrs. And it is clear what general secretary Iain McNicol, the compliance unit and the Labour right are up to. Create a climate where almost any leftwing public statement, past action or use of unofficial English can be branded as unacceptable, as threatening, as violating the Blairite ‘safe spaces’ policy. Then bar, ban and banish the maximum number of Jeremy Corbyn supporters. Swing things in favour of Owen Smith. True, the right’s chances of success are remote. The odds against citizen Smith are far too great. Nonetheless, this is clearly what the purge is all about.

Meanwhile, despite his massive £2.1 million donation to the Liberal Democrats in June, Lord David Sainsbury, a minister under Tony Blair and Gordon Brown, is, at least as things stand today, free to vote in the leadership election. Nor are former Tory or Ukip members suspended or expelled. That despite their undisputed past support for non-Labour candidates. And, of course, there are those MPs who have been throwing one lying accusation after another against the left. They are Nazi stormtroopers. They are anti-Semites. They are Trot infiltrators.

The same MPs have attempted to undermine Jeremy Corbyn’s leadership at every turn. Now, having failed with the anti-Semitism campaign, they are furiously using the capitalist media to spread rumours of an imminent split and getting hold of the Labour Party’s name, offices and assets through the courts. They have gone untouched. A crime in itself.

Unlike John McDonnell we do not complain of “double standards”. We in Labour Party Marxists forthrightly oppose the suspension and expulsion of socialists, leftwingers, working class partisans. All of them, without exception, ought to be immediately reinstated. Whatever our criticisms they are assets who should be valued. It is the treacherous right, the splitters, who deserve to be purged.

There is surely nothing uncontroversial about a Marxist making such a case. After all, the ongoing civil war in the Labour Party is a concentrated manifestation of the struggle of class against class. Labour’s much expanded base faces an onslaught by the pro-capitalist apparatus of Brewer’s Green bureaucrats, MPs, MEPs, councillors, etc. Under such circumstances we Marxists are obliged to actively take sides.

What then should we make of Robert Griffiths, general secretary of the Morning Star’s Communist Party of Britain? He grovellingly wrote to Iain McNicol to assure him that the CPB “does not engage in entryism”.1)My emphasis – see https://andrewgodsell.wordpress.com/2016/08/29/labour-suspension-appeal-process More than that, comrade Griffiths parades his spinelessness:

According to reports in The Guardian and other media outlets … Labour Party staff have produced a research paper [that] links the Communist Party to ‘entryism’ in the Labour Party. In particular, that research paper cites a report made to our party’s executive committee [that] on June 25 declared that “defending the socialist leadership of the Labour Party at all costs” should be a priority for communists. Nowhere in that executive committee report … do we propose that our members join or register with the Labour Party. “At all costs” is a rhetorical flourish that cannot, obviously, be taken literally!

So the CPB should not be taken at its word. It will not defend the Corbyn leadership “at all costs”. And, prostrating himself still further before the witch-finder general, Griffiths continues:

Should you or your staff have any evidence that Communist Party members have joined the Labour Party without renouncing their CP membership, or engaged in any similar subterfuge, please inform me, so that action can be taken against them for bringing our party into disrepute.2)https://21centurymanifesto.wordpress.com/2016/07/12/communist-infiltration-of-labour

Let us be clear about what is being said here: in the middle of a brutal civil war, with the Labour left facing a concerted witch-hunt, the CPB’s Robert Griffiths wants to be seen as standing shoulder to shoulder with Iain McNicol. He even offers to help McNicol out in hunting down any CPB member who has decided to become a registered Labour Party supporter. To my personal knowledge there are more than a few of them. Anyway, not to leave a shadow of doubt, Griffiths signs off “With comradely regards”. A giveaway as to where his true loyalties really lie.

Following Tom Watson’s dodgy dossier, alleging that “far-left infiltrators are taking over the Labour Party”, Griffiths issued a follow-up statement. Again this excuse for a communist leader reassures McNicol that membership of his CPB is “incompatible with membership of the Labour Party by decision of both party leaderships”.3)Morning Star August 12 2016

Origins

How exactly Griffiths’ organisation arrived at its ban on Labour Party members joining the CPB and the ban on CPB members joining the Labour Party need not concern us here. Presumably its roots lie in the constitutionalism embraced by the ‘official’ CPGB with its turn to the cross-class politics of the popular front. This was sanctioned by the 5th Congress of the Communist International in 1935 under Stalin’s direct instructions.

Yet the CPB claims to be the unbroken continuation of the ‘official’ CPGB, going back to its foundation in 1920. Nonetheless, as we shall show, it is clear that that a fundamental break occurred. No less importantly, the same can be said of the Labour Party.

From its origins our Labour Party was a federal party. A united front of all working class organisations with, yes, especially at first, decidedly limited objectives.

JH Holmes, delegate of the Amalgamated Society of Railway Servants, moved this truly historic resolution at the 1899 TUC:

That this Congress, having regard to its decisions in former years, and with a view to securing better representation of the interests of Labour in the House of Commons, hereby instructs the Parliamentary Committee to invite the cooperation of all cooperative, socialistic, trade unions and other working class organisations to jointly cooperate on lines mutually agreed upon, in convening a special congress of representatives from such above-named organisations as may be willing to take part to devise ways and means of securing the return of an increased number of Labour members in the next parliament.4)BC Roberts The Trade Union Congress 1868-1921 London 1958, p166

His resolution was opposed by the miners’ union on the basis of impracticability, but found support from the dockers, the railway servants and shop assistants unions. After a long debate the resolution was narrowly carried by 546,000 to 434,000 votes.

The TUC’s parliamentary committee oversaw the founding conference of the Labour Representation Committee in February 1900. The 129 delegates, representing 500,000 members, finally agreed to establish a distinct Labour Party in parliament, with its own whips, policies, finances, etc.

An executive committee was also elected. It would prepare lists of candidates, administer funds and convene an annual conference. Beside representatives of affiliated trade unions, the newly formed NEC would also include the socialist societies: the Fabians, the Independent Labour Party and the Social Democratic Federation. In fact, they were allocated five out of the 12 NEC seats (one Fabian, and two each from the ILP and SDF). Given the small size of these socialist societies compared with the trade unions, it is obvious that they were treated with extreme generosity. Presumably their “advanced” views were highly regarded.5)BC Roberts The Trade Union Congress 1868-1921 London 1958, p167

True, for the likes of Keir Hardie the formation of the Labour Party marked something of a tactical retreat. He had long sought some kind of a socialist party. However, to secure an alliance with the trade unions he and other ILPers were prepared to formally limit the Labour Party to nothing more than furthering working class interests by getting “men sympathetic with the aims and demands of the labour movement” into the House of Commons.6)Quoted in R Miliband Parliamentary socialism London 1960, p17

The delegates of the SDF proposed that the newly established Labour Party commit itself to the “class war and having as its ultimate object the socialisation of the means of production and exchange” – a formulation rejected by a large majority. In the main the trade unions were still Liberal politically. Unfortunately, as a result of this vote, the next annual conference of the SDF voted by 54 to 14 to withdraw from the Labour Party. Many SDF leaders came to bitterly “regret the decision”.7)M Crick The history of the Social Democratic Federation Keel 1994, p97

It should be recalled that neither Marx nor Engels had much time for the SDF nor its autocratic leader, Henry Hyndman. The SDF often took a badly conceived sectarian approach. Instead of linking up with the trade unions, it would typically stand aloof. Eg, faced with the great industrial unrest of 1910-14, Hyndman rhetorically asked: “Can anything be imagined more foolish, more harmful, more – in the widest sense of the word – unsocial than a strike?”8)M Crick The history of the Social Democratic Federation Keel 1994, p230 Of course, it is quite possible to actively support trade unions in their struggles over wages, conditions, etc, and to patiently and steadfastly advocate radical democracy and international socialism. Indeed without doing just that there can be no hope for a mass socialist party here in Britain.

However, the SDF is too often casually dismissed by historians. Eg, Henry Pelling describes it as “a rather weedy growth in the political garden”.9)H Pelling Origins of the Labour Party Oxford 1976, p172 True, its Marxism was typically lifeless, dogmatic and with Hyndman mixed with more than a tinge of anti-Semitism. Thus for him the Boer war was instigated by “Jew financial cliques and their hangers on”.10)M Crick The history of the Social Democratic Federation Keel 1994, p159 Yet the SDF was “the first modern socialist organisation of national importance” in Britain.11)M Crick The history of the Social Democratic Federation Keel 1994, p8 Karl Marx disliked it, Fredrick Engels despaired of it, William Morris, John Burns, Tom Mann and Edward Aveling left it. But the SDF survived. There were various breakaways. However, they either disappeared like the Socialist League, remained impotent sects like the Socialist Party of Great Britain, or could manage little more than establishing a regional influence, as with the Socialist Labour Party on Clydeside. Meanwhile the SDF continued as the “major representative” of what passed for Marxism in this country till 1911, when it merged with a range of local socialist societies to become the British Socialist Party.12)M Crick The history of the Social Democratic Federation Keel 1994, p8

Not that sectarianism was entirely vanquished. The first conference of the BSP voted, by an overwhelming majority, to “seek direct and independent affiliation” to the Second International.13)M Crick The history of the Social Democratic Federation Keel 1994, p248 In other words, not through the Labour Party-dominated British section of the Second International.

However, despite that, the BSP began to overcome its Labour-phobia. Leading figures such as Henry Hyndman, J Hunter Watts and Dan Irving eventually came out in favour of affiliation. So too did Zelda Kahan for the left. Withdrawal from the Labour Party, she argued, had been a mistake. Outside the Labour Party the BSP was seen as hostile, as fault-finding, as antagonistic. Inside, the BSP would get a wider hearing and win over the “best” rank-and-file forces.14)M Crick The history of the Social Democratic Federation Keel 1994, p255

Affiliation was agreed, albeit by a relatively narrow majority. Efforts then began to put this into effect. The formal application for affiliation was submitted in June 1914. And in 1916 – things having been considerably delayed by the outbreak of World War I – the BSP gained affiliation to the Labour Party. Note, the BSP also in effect expelled the pro-war right wing led by Hyndman.

Labour debates

Interestingly, the International Socialist Bureau – the Brussels-based permanent executive of the Second International – meeting in October 1908, had agreed to Labour Party affiliation … and thus, given its numbers, ensured its domination of the British section. For our present purposes the exchanges between the dozen or so national party representatives gathered in Brussels are well worth revisiting.

According to the rules of the Second International, there could only be two types of affiliate organisations. Firstly, socialist parties “which recognise the class struggle”. Secondly, working class organisations “whose standpoint is that of the class struggle” (ie, trade unions).15)VI Lenin CW Vol 15, Moscow 1977, p233

During these times the Labour Party positively avoided calling itself socialist. Nor, as we have seen, did it expressly recognise the principle of the class struggle. However, despite that, the Labour Party was admitted to the August 1907 Stuttgart congress of the International. My guess would be that it had observer status. Why was it admitted? Lenin characterised the Labour Party as an “organisation of a mixed type”, standing between the two types defined in the rules. In other words, the Labour Party was part political party, part a political expression of the trade unions. Crucially, the Labour Party marked the break from Liberalism of the vitally important working class in Britain. That could only but be welcomed.

At the October 1908 meeting of the ISB, Bruce Glasier of the ILP demanded the direct recognition of the Labour Party as an affiliate. He praised the Labour Party, its growth, its parliamentary group, its organic bonds with the trade unions, etc. Objectively, he said, this signified the movement of the working class in Britain towards socialism. Meanwhile, as a typical opportunist, Glasier lambasted doctrinaire principles, formulas and catechisms.

Karl Kautsky, the Second International’s leading theoretician, replied. Kautsky emphatically dissociated himself from Glasier’s obvious contempt for principles, but wholly supported the affiliation of the Labour Party, as a party waging the class struggle in practice. He moved the following resolution:

Whereas by previous resolutions of the international congresses all organisations adopting the standpoint of the proletarian class struggle and recognising the necessity for political action have been accepted for membership, the International Bureau declares that the British Labour Party is admitted to International Socialist congresses, because, while not expressly accepting the proletarian class struggle, in practice the Labour Party conducts this struggle, and adopts its standpoint, inasmuch as the party is organised independently of the bourgeois parties.

Kautsky was backed up by the Austrians, Édouard Vaillant of the French section, and, as the voting showed, the majority of the socialist parties and groups in the smaller European countries. Opposition came first from Henry Hyndman, representing the SDF. He wanted to maintain the status quo. Until the Labour Party expressly recognised the principle of the class struggle and the aim of socialism it should not be an affiliate. He found support from Angele Roussel (the second French delegate and a follower of Jules Guesde), Ilya Rubanovich of Russia’s Socialist Revolutionary Party and Roumen Avramov, delegate of the revolutionary wing of the Bulgarian social democrats.

Lenin spoke on behalf of the Russian Social Democratic Labour Party. He agreed with the first part of Kautsky’s resolution. Lenin argued that it was impossible to turn down the Labour Party: ie, what he called “the parliamentary representation of the trade unions”.16)VI Lenin CW Vol 15, Moscow 1977, p234 After all, the ISB admitted trade unions, including those which had allowed themselves to be represented by bourgeois parliamentarians. But, said Lenin, “the second part of Kautsky’s resolution is wrong, because in practice the Labour Party is not a party really independent of the Liberals, and does not pursue a fully independent class policy”. Lenin therefore proposed an amendment that the end of the resolution, beginning with the word “because”, should read as follows: “because it [the Labour Party] represents the first step on the part of the really proletarian organisations of Britain towards a conscious class policy and towards a socialist workers’ party”.17)VI Lenin CW Vol 15, Moscow 1977, pp234-35

However, Kautsky refused to accept the amendment. In his reply, he argued that the International Socialist Bureau could not adopt decisions based on “expectations”.

But the main struggle was between the supporters and the opponents of Kautsky’s resolution as a whole. When it was about to be voted on, Victor Adler, the Austro-Marxist, proposed that the resolution be divided into two parts. This was done and both parts were carried by the ISB: the first with three against and one abstention, and the second with four against and one abstention. Thus Kautsky’s resolution became the agreed position. Rubanovich, the Socialist Revolutionary, abstained on both votes. Lenin also reports what Adler – who spoke after him but before Kautsky’s second speech – said: “Lenin’s proposal is tempting, but it cannot make us forget that the Labour Party is now outside the bourgeois parties. It is not for us to judge how it did this. We recognise the fact of progress.”18)VI Lenin CW Vol 15, Moscow 1977, p235

The ISB dispute over the Labour Party continued in the socialist press. Fending off charges of “heresy” from leftist critics, Kautsky elaborated his ideas in a 1909 Neue Zeitarticle, ‘Sects or class parties’. Basically he argued that, unlike Germany and other mainland European countries, a mass workers’ party in Britain is impossible without linking up with the trade unions. Unless that happened, there could be nothing but sects and small circles.19)www.marxists.org/archive/kautsky/1909/07/unions.htm

In the Labour Leader, the ILP’s paper, Bruce Glasier rejoiced that the ISB not only recognised the Labour Party (which was true), but also “vindicated the policy of the ILP” (which was not true). Another ILPer, giving his impression of the Brussels meeting of the ISB, complained about the absence of the “ideal and ethical aspect of socialism”. Instead we “had … the barren and uninspiring dogma of the class war”.20)Quoted in VI Lenin CW Vol 15, Moscow 1977, p238

As for Hyndman, writing in the SDF’s Justice, he expressed his anger at the ISB majority. They are “whittlers-away of principle to suit the convenience of trimmers”. “I have not the slightest doubt,” writes Hyndman, “that if the British Labour Party had been told plainly that they either had to accept socialist principles … or keep away altogether, they would very quickly have decided to bring themselves into line with the International Socialist Party.”21)Quoted in VI Lenin CW Vol 15, Moscow 1977ibid p239

Lenin too joined the fray. He still considered Kautsky to be wrong. By stating in his resolution that the Labour Party “does not expressly accept the proletarian class struggle”, Kautsky voiced a certain “expectation”, a certain “judgement” as to what the policy of the Labour Party is now and what that policy should be. But Kautsky expressed this indirectly, and in such a way that it amounted to an assertion which, first, is incorrect in substance, and secondly, provides a basis for opportunists in the ILP to misrepresent his ideas.

By separating in parliament (but not in terms of its whole policy) from the two bourgeois parties, the Labour Party is “taking the first step towards socialism and towards a class policy of the proletarian mass organisations”. This, Lenin optimistically stated, is not an “expectation, but a fact”. A “fact” which compelled the ISB to admit the Labour Party into the International. Putting things this way, Lenin thought, “would make hundreds of thousands of British workers, who undoubtedly respect the decisions of the International, but have not yet become full socialists, ponder once again over the question why they are regarded as having taken only the first step, and what the next steps along this road should be”.

Lenin had no intention of laying down details about those “next steps”. But they were necessary, as Kautsky acknowledged in his resolution, albeit only indirectly. However, the use of an indirect formulation made it appear that the International was “certifying that the Labour Party was in practice waging a consistent class struggle, as if it was sufficient for a workers’ organisation to form a separate labour group in parliament in order in its entire conduct to become independent of the bourgeoisie!”22)Quoted in VI Lenin CW Vol 15, Moscow 1977pp235-36

The International, Lenin concluded, would undoubtedly have acted wrongly had it not expressed its complete support for the vital first step forward taken by the mass of workers in forming the Labour Party. But it does not in the least follow from this that the Labour Party “can already be recognised as a party in practice independent of the bourgeoisie, as a party waging the class struggle, as a socialist party, etc”.

Bolshevism

The October revolution in Russia found unanimous and unstinting support in the BSP. A number of its émigré comrades returned home and took up important roles in the Soviet government. Bolshevik publications were soon being translated into English: eg, Lenin’s State and revolution. Money too flowed in.

The Leeds conference of the BSP in 1918 enthusiastically declared its solidarity with the Bolsheviks and a wish to emulate their methods and achievements. And under the influence of the Bolsheviks the BSP adopted a much more active, much more agitational role in the Labour Party and the trade unions. In the words of Fred Shaw, instead of standing aloof from the “existing organisations” of the working class, we should “win them for Marxism”.23)Quoted in M Crick The history of the Social Democratic Federation Keel 1994, p281

Needless to say, the BSP constituted the main body that went towards the historic formation of the Communist Party of Great Britain over July 31-August 1 1920. Given BSP affiliation, and the fact that in 1918 the Labour Party introduced individual membership, there can be no doubt that the bulk of CPGBers were card-carrying members of the Labour Party. Dual membership being the norm, as it was in the Fabians and ILP.

However, instead of simply informing Arthur Henderson, the Labour Party’s secretary, that the BSP had changed its name, the CPGB, following Lenin’s advice, applied for affiliation. Lenin thought the CPGB was in a win-win situation. If affiliation was accepted, this would open up the Labour Party rank and file to communist influence. If affiliation was not accepted, this would expose the Labour leaders for what they really were: namely “reactionaries of the worst kind”.

With 20:20 foresight it would probably have been better for the CPGB to have presented itself merely as the continuation of the BSP. After all, gaining a divorce is far harder than turning down a would-be suitor. Needless to say, upholding its commitment to British imperialism and thereby fearing association with the Bolshevik revolution, the Labour apparatus, along with the trade union bureaucracy, determined that the CPGB application had to be rejected.

The “first step towards socialism and towards a class policy” was thereby thrown into reverse. Instead of being a united front of the organised working class, the leadership of the Labour Party began to cohere a tightly controlled, thoroughly respectable, explicitly anti-Marxist Labour Party.

Henderson replied to the CPGB application for affiliation by saying that he did not consider that the principles of the communists accorded with those of the Labour Party. To which the CPGB responded by asking whether the Labour Party proposed to “exclude from its ranks” all those who were committed to the “political, social and economic emancipation of the working class”. Did Henderson want to “impose acceptance of parliamentary constitutionalism as an article of faith on its affiliated societies”?24)Quoted in R Miliband Parliamentary socialism London 1960, p87 The latter bluntly replied that there was an “insuperable difference” between the two parties.

A good many Labour Party activists rejected Henderson’s characterisation of the CPGB as, in effect, mad, bad and dangerous to know. Nonetheless, the Labour apparatus never experienced any difficulty in mustering large majorities against CPGB affiliation. Eg, in June 1921 there was a 4,115,000 to 224,000 conference vote rejecting the CPGB.

Not that the CPGB limped on as an isolated sect. Affiliation might have been rejected, but there was still dual membership. In 1922, two CPGB members won parliamentary seats as Labour candidates: JT Walton Newbold (Motherwell and Wishaw) and Shapurji Saklatvala (Battersea North).

Subsequently, Labour’s national executive committee was forced to temporarily drop its attempt to prevent CPGB members from being elected as annual conference delegates. The June 26-29 1923 London conference had 36 CPGB members as delegates, “as against six at Edinburgh”, the previous year.25)JT Murphy, ‘The Labour Party conference’ Communist Review August 1923, Vol 4, No4: www.marxists.org/archive/murphy-jt/1923/08/labour_conf.htm Incidentally, the 1923 conference once again rejected CPGB affiliation, this time by 2,880,000 to 366,000 votes.

Nonetheless, the general election in December 1923 saw Walton Newbold (Motherwell) and Willie Gallacher (Dundee) standing as CPGB candidates. Fellow CPGBers Ellen Wilkinson (Ashton-under-Lyne), Shapurji Saklatvala (Battersea North), M Philips Price (Gloucester), William Paul (Manchester Rusholme) and Joe Vaughan (Bethnal Green SW) were official Labour candidates, while Alec Geddes (Greenock) and Aitkin Ferguson (Glasgow Kelvingrove) were unofficial Labour candidates, there being no official Labour candidate in either constituency. Despite a not inconsiderable increase in the communist vote, none were elected.26)J Klugmann History of the Communist Party of Great Britain Vol 1, London 1968, pp361-62

A ban on CPGB members standing as Labour Party candidates swiftly followed. Yet, although Labour Party organisations were instructed not to support CPGB candidates, this was met with defiance, not the connivance nowadays personified by Robert Griffiths. In the run-up to the October 1924 general election, Battersea North Labour Party overwhelmingly endorsed Shapurji Saklatvala; Joe Vaughan was unanimously endorsed by Bethnal Green SW Constituency Labour Party and William Paul similarly by the Rusholme CLP executive committee. And Saklatvala was once again elected as an MP.

The 1924 Labour Party conference decision against CPGB members continuing with dual membership was reaffirmed in 1925. And, going further, trade unions were “asked not to nominate communists as delegates to Labour organisations”.27)N Branson History of the Communist Party of Great Britain 1927-1941 London 1985, p5 Yet despite these assaults on the Labour Party’s founding principles, at the end of 1926 the CPGB could report that 1,544 of its 7,900 members were still individual members of the Labour Party.

Following the defeat of the 1926 General Strike, the Labour apparatus and trade union bureaucracy wanted the movement to draw the lesson that the only way to make gains would be through increased collaboration with the capitalist boss class – Mondism. As a concomitant there was a renewed drive to intimidate, to marginalise, to drive out the communists.

The struggle proved particularly sharp in London. In the capital city around half of the CPGBs members were active in their CLPs. And despite claiming that it was the communists who were “splitting the movement”, the bureaucracy strove to do just that. Battersea CLP was disaffiliated because it dared to back Saklatvala and refused to exclude CPGB members. Similar measures were taken against Bethnal Green CLP, where the communist ex-mayor, Joe Vaughan, was held in particularly high regard.

The left in the Labour Party fought back. The National Left Wing Movement was formed in December 1925. Its stated aim was not only to fight the bans on communists, it also sought to hold together disaffiliated CLPs.

The NLWM insisted it had no thought of superceding the Labour Party, but, instead, it sought to advance rank-and-file aspirations. In this the NLWM was considerably boosted by the newly established Sunday Worker. Despite being initiated, funded and edited by the CPGB, the Sunday Workerserved as the authoritative voice of the NLWM. At its height it achieved a circulation of 100,000. The NLWM’s 1925 founding conference had nearly 100 Labour Party organisations sending delegates.

Yet the right’s campaign of disaffiliations and expulsions remorselessly proceeded. The NLWM therefore found itself considerably weakened in terms of official Labour Party structures. Hence at the NLWM’s second annual conference in 1927 there were delegates from only 54 local Labour Parties and other Labour groups (representing a total of 150,000 individual party members). It should be added that militant union leaders, such as the miners’ AJ Cook, also supported the conference.

With the counterrevolution within the revolution in the Soviet Union, the CPGB was in many ways reduced to a slave of Stalin’s foreign policy. The CPGB’s attitude towards the Labour Party correspondingly changed. Leaders such as Harry Pollitt and Rajani Palme Dutt denounced the Labour Party as nothing but “a third capitalist party” (shades of Peter Taaffe and the Socialist Party in England and Wales).

As an integral part of this self-inflicted madness, in 1929 the Sunday Worker was closed and the NLWM wound up. In effect the CPGB returned to its SDF roots. Ralph Miliband regretfully comments that the CPGB’s so-called new line “brought it to the nadir of its influence”.28)R Miliband Parliamentary socialism London 1960, p153 Sectarianism could only but spur on the right’s witch-hunt. In 1930 the Labour Party apparatus produced its first ‘proscribed list’. Members of proscribed organisations became ineligible for individual membership of the Labour Party and CLPs were instructed not to affiliate to proscribed organisations. Needless to say, most of those organisation were closely associated with the CPGB.

However, what began with action directed against the CPGB-led National Unemployed Workers’ Movement and the National Minority Movement has now morphed into the catch-all ban on “racist, abusive or foul language, abuse against women, homophobia or anti-Semitism at meetings, on social media or in any other context”. Nowadays the Labour Party apparatus can, at a whim, expel or suspend anyone.

Surely, beginning with the Liverpool conference, it is time to put an end to the bans and proscriptions. We certainly have within our power the possibility of once again establishing the Labour Party as the united front of all working class organisations in Britain.

References

References
↑1 My emphasis – see https://andrewgodsell.wordpress.com/2016/08/29/labour-suspension-appeal-process
↑2 https://21centurymanifesto.wordpress.com/2016/07/12/communist-infiltration-of-labour
↑3 Morning Star August 12 2016
↑4 BC Roberts The Trade Union Congress 1868-1921 London 1958, p166
↑5 BC Roberts The Trade Union Congress 1868-1921 London 1958, p167
↑6 Quoted in R Miliband Parliamentary socialism London 1960, p17
↑7 M Crick The history of the Social Democratic Federation Keel 1994, p97
↑8 M Crick The history of the Social Democratic Federation Keel 1994, p230
↑9 H Pelling Origins of the Labour Party Oxford 1976, p172
↑10 M Crick The history of the Social Democratic Federation Keel 1994, p159
↑11 M Crick The history of the Social Democratic Federation Keel 1994, p8
↑12 M Crick The history of the Social Democratic Federation Keel 1994, p8
↑13 M Crick The history of the Social Democratic Federation Keel 1994, p248
↑14 M Crick The history of the Social Democratic Federation Keel 1994, p255
↑15 VI Lenin CW Vol 15, Moscow 1977, p233
↑16 VI Lenin CW Vol 15, Moscow 1977, p234
↑17 VI Lenin CW Vol 15, Moscow 1977, pp234-35
↑18 VI Lenin CW Vol 15, Moscow 1977, p235
↑19 www.marxists.org/archive/kautsky/1909/07/unions.htm
↑20 Quoted in VI Lenin CW Vol 15, Moscow 1977, p238
↑21 Quoted in VI Lenin CW Vol 15, Moscow 1977ibid p239
↑22 Quoted in VI Lenin CW Vol 15, Moscow 1977pp235-36
↑23 Quoted in M Crick The history of the Social Democratic Federation Keel 1994, p281
↑24 Quoted in R Miliband Parliamentary socialism London 1960, p87
↑25 JT Murphy, ‘The Labour Party conference’ Communist Review August 1923, Vol 4, No4: www.marxists.org/archive/murphy-jt/1923/08/labour_conf.htm
↑26 J Klugmann History of the Communist Party of Great Britain Vol 1, London 1968, pp361-62
↑27 N Branson History of the Communist Party of Great Britain 1927-1941 London 1985, p5
↑28 R Miliband Parliamentary socialism London 1960, p153

Refound Labour as a permanent united front of the working class

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