Differences should be brought out into the light of day, writes Stan Keable of Labour Party Marxists

Delegates were no doubt perplexed to find two rival publications with the same name – Labour Briefing – on sale at TUC congress in Brighton this week. Both journals argue for socialist ideas in the Labour Party and both claim to be the continuation of 32 years ofLabour Briefing as a pluralist forum for the Labour left, trade unionists and campaigners.

Following the democratic decision of the July 7 Briefing AGM to make it the journal of the Labour Representation Committee, the genuineLabour Briefing (labourbriefing.org.uk) is therefore produced by the LRC. The LRC is led by John McDonnell MP, has 1,200 or so individual members and around 150 affiliated organisations, including national trade unions, and a democratic structure.

The other version – the self-styled “original” Labour Briefing(labourbriefing.co.uk) – has no democratic structure. It is a spoiler launched by six comrades for whom the LRC is “too leftwing” or “ultra-left”. They continue to treat Briefing as their personal property, despite the open invitation to participate in the LRC’s new editorial board. Other comrades who argued against the merger have nevertheless accepted the democratic decision, to their credit. Jon Lansman, for instance, was a signatory of the anti-merger motion, but has now joined the editorial board.

Despite its much greater resources, it has to be said that the LRC’s initial 12-page TUC special looks like the poor relation, when compared with the 16-page “original”, with its gloss paper and the traditional Briefing banner, only slightly amended – the words “the original” appear in small print in the dot above the ‘i’ of Briefing. We must do better with the Labour Party conference issue, LRC comrades!

Feigning exclusion, the six splitters – Lizzy Ali, Stephen Beckett, Jenny Fisher, Richard Price, Christine Shawcroft and John Stewart – say they formed the LB Co-op to act as “a custodian of Labour Briefing to protect it against being taken over by a hostile group”. Their version, we are promised, will be “an independent voice and forum for socialist ideas in the Labour Party and trade unions”. The editorial excuses their irresponsible split by repeating the mantra of a “hostile takeover”, despite the fact that the merger proposal originated in theBriefing editorial board itself, most of whom were LRC members. It wrongly accuses the pro-merger comrades of “contempt for Labour Party members”, on the basis of a paragraph in LRC joint secretary Pete Firmin’s successful AGM resolution: “Briefing is predominantly sold within the Labour Party to Labour Party members. This is a weakness, as membership of the party has been decimated, and the Labour left is almost invisible to the outside world.” But surely this is merely a truthful estimate of our current weakness.

Although a few LRC members have expressed the view that the splitters should be expelled, and never again supported in any Labour Party election, most are more sensible. They want Christine Shawcroft to return to the LRC fold, but will support her in any case. “There is a long list of people I would not vote for before I got to Christine,” wrote one comrade.

In the “original” September special issue, comrade Shawcroft criticises the “tendency on the left to write off the bulk of party members … in a game of ‘prolier than thou’”, which “manifested itself on the Briefingeditorial board occasionally” and “led to Briefing drifting away from ordinary party members and away from our original mission of encouraging members to speak for themselves”. Christine argues effectively that the party membership should not be written off. “The ultras” are wrong, she says, to claim “that the fact that David [Miliband] got more votes in the constituency section than his little brother is proof of the inherent conservatism of party members”. In his electioneering, David did not announce “that he was the son of Tony Blair”. “He stood on false pretences, and members were taken in”.

These arguments are all well and good against those who would give up the fight to democratise the party, establish rank and file control over the party bureaucracy, open the party up to include all working class and socialist organisations and tendencies, and win it for the interests of the working class majority and socialism. They are not reasons for splitting from the LRC, whose aim is precisely to transform the Labour Party, not abandon it. As the genuine, LRC-controlledBriefing underlines, “The LRC is a democratic, socialist body working to transform the Labour Party into an organisation that reflects all sections of the working class.”

Having backed the successful motion at the July 7 Briefing AGM that the journal should “become the magazine of the Labour Representation Committee”, many LRC members, as well as Briefingreaders and supporters not in the LRC, are variously “outraged”, “disappointed” and “sad” on Facebook and Yahoo at the decision of the six anti-merger comrades to flout the majority decision. However, before getting too righteous about the “disgraceful behaviour” of once “trusted comrades” who “ignore democratic decisions”, etc, we should remember that the boot might well have been on the other foot, so to speak, had the vote gone the other way. Some pro-merger comrades made it very clear before the Briefing AGM that “we have had enough”, and “we will walk” if necessary. Indeed, Graham Bash had walked out of the editorial board as early as February.

Mike Phipps, who played a pivotal role in winning support for the merger, explained convincingly to the September 8 meeting of Greater London LRC why it was necessary. Briefing, Mike said, has been in long-term decline, because the Labour left has been shrinking. There was a real danger that Briefing would become unviable, like Voice of the Unions, which had been absorbed byBriefing. The 2011 AGM was attended by only about 25 comrades. On the other hand, the LRC was growing and needed a journal. About 80% of the Briefing editorial board were LRC members, Should the same overstretched team produce two journals? Nothing was “forced through”, as the “original” Briefing claims; indeed Christine Shawcroft, a leading opponent of the merger motion, chaired the AGM. Both sides had mobilised, and the AGM was unusually well attended. The vote was very close: 44 to 37, with three abstentions. Several of those pulled in to oppose the merger were won over during the debate.

So the merger was necessary. But I disagree with Mike’s insistence that the split was about personalities, not politics. On the contrary, the personal clashes on the editorial board were fuelled by political conflicts. While the splitters use red-baiting to ingratiate themselves with the so-called centre of the party, the LRC is looking outwards to win all trade unions to affiliate to Labour, and to campaigns like Occupy, in the hope that they will supply new blood in the struggle to transform Labour. As Pete Firmin’s merger motion said, “class struggle is the agent of change in the Labour Party”.

The reluctance of Briefing cadres to publish their disagreements in the pages of their own journal made it difficult for readers and supporters to discern the unarticulated political differences which gave rise to the eruption of personal hostilities on the editorial board at the start of 2012. As the bulk of the editorial board were LRC members, a merger with the LRC might have seemed non-controversial. But the splitters have been uncomfortable about their association with the LRC, especially its left wing, fearing it will endanger their alliance with the so-called centre of the party, especially the Campaign for Labour Party Democracy and the Centre-Left Grassroots Alliance, which between them got Christine Shawcroft successfully elected to the NEC. Their true colours can be seen in the despicable display of McCarthyite red-baiting in their editorial, where it is alleged: “… members of the LRC – aided by members of the Communist Party of Great Britain, which produces the Weekly Worker – attended the AGM of Labour Briefing and forced through a vote …”

The splitters’ “original” Briefing hypocritically claims to be “a non-aligned magazine which is open to all” and that it was set up because readers “did not want to be shut up by the LRC”. But aren’t they the ones who, at the January 2012 editorial board meeting, opposed publication of my letter, mildly critical of sectarian comments by Christine Shawcroft? In her short report on the 2011 LRC AGM, Christine had light-heartedly wished the Alliance for Workers’ Liberty, the New Communist Party and Labour Party Marxists – all affiliates of the LRC – would “go and play in someone else’s organisation”. The argument over whether to publish the letter caused a row, and Graham Bash withdrew from the editorial board, unable to remain in the same room as Jenny Fisher. But my letter was published and freedom of expression was upheld – despite the objections of those who now claim to be “open to all”.

Protecting ‘ordinary workers’ or ‘ordinary party members’ from real debate in the hope of not scaring them away does not prevent splits. Spoon-feeding readers with pre-digested consensus obstructs the necessary clarification of ideas for both readers and leaders. Ideas remain undeveloped. True, arguments for and against the merger ofBriefing with the Labour Representation Committee were carried in single-page articles twice, in the last two issues of the pre-split journal, in June and July. But this was too little, too late. And, although the merger decision was made by a democratic vote, a two-hour debate cannot substitute for the extensive written polemic required for clarification. To the extent that a culture of freedom of expression is not adopted, the same political frictions will inevitably continue to fester in the dark, not only between the rival journals, but within each camp.

Though merger with the Labour Representation Committee was agreed at the Labour Briefing AGM, ugly accusations have followed. Stan Keable of Labour Party Marxists reports

Peter Firmin’s motion to the July 7 Labour Briefing annual general meeting – that Briefing should “become the magazine of the LRC” – was carried, and the alternative motion moved by Jenny Fisher that the magazine should continue to be “run by our readers” was defeated, by 44 votes to 37 with three abstentions, after what comrade Firmin described as “by and large a healthy debate”. By this slim majority, the AGM agreed to “transfer Briefing to the LRC with immediate effect, with the aim of a relaunch at this autumn’s Labour Party conference”.

On the day, the AGM debate was thankfully free of the silly online accusation that the whole purpose of the merger proposal was personal: to exclude Jenny Fisher, Christine Shawcroft and others from Briefing’s editorial board (EB). In fact the June LRC national committee meeting had already agreed (subject to Briefing voting for the merger) to invite all existing EB members to sit on the interim editorial board “with full rights, including voting”, alongside those appointed by the NC. Subsequently, they will have the same right as anyone else to a seat on the EB – six to be elected by the LRC AGM (probably in December), and six by the national committee, to give “a balance of independence from, and accountability to, the NC”. Cooptees will not have a vote, in order “to maintain the supremacy of those elected”. It goes without saying, of course, that this NC plan may be varied by the LRC AGM itself.

This democratic structure will, hopefully, bring transparency and accountability to the editorial board, in place of the present ‘tyranny of structurelessness’ which leaves control in the hands of those in the know, or the most tenacious volunteers. “At present,” said the successful resolution, “Briefing is run by a small group of people … its structures and procedures are not very transparent and accountable.” And in the discussion on the two motions, Andrew Berry pointed to the “accountability deficit in Briefing”. Norette Moore – who, as a recent secretary of Greater London LRC, might reasonably be expected to know – said she had not previously attended a Briefing AGM because this was “the first time I heard that it is open”. I myself was similarly surprised, a few months ago, to discover that AGMs were open to readers, and that anyone at all could attend and vote. A fact not advertised, and presumably unknown to most of the roughly 950 Briefing readers.

Under these circumstances, it is perhaps inevitable that personal frictions arise and working together may become intolerable to the individuals concerned – in this case between comrades Jenny Fisher and Graham Bash. It was comrade Bash’s withdrawal from the EB in February, also withdrawing the use of his home as the EB’s office and meeting place, which triggered the revival of the 2008 proposal that Briefing should merge with LRC. But behind personal conflict there are usually political differences, and it was wrong for comrade Shawcroft to ask readers to oppose the merger on the basis of personal loyalty, as she did online, dividing the two EB camps into “carvers and carvees”.

Despite the much proclaimed commitment on both sides of the merger debate to continuing Briefing’s pluralist tradition of carrying articles from different political trends, it is evident that airing differences in public – actually a most healthy thing to do – is regarded by most as an embarrassment. In the online debates prior to the AGM, quite a few comrades bemoaned “wasting time on internal disputes”, while there are real issues “out there”. At the AGM, Simon Clark (for example), while arguing for the merger, said that the LRC “needs a paper, not debate”, and an ex-Islington councillor thought it “sad to dispute amongst ourselves”. But unless ideas are openly expressed and thrashed out in the light of day, they fester in an undeveloped form in the dark, and only burst into public view in the rotten form of a crisis – as on this occasion.

During the four years since the merger proposal was previously raised, the idea was not developed and thrashed out in the pages of the journal itself – the logical thing to have done. If that had happened, readers could have become familiar with the arguments and the issue need not have exploded onto a surprised readership in the form of a personality clash. In the period leading to the AGM, Briefing did not even carry the text of Peter Firmin’s merger motion, though it was submitted to the April EB meeting. Pre-AGM discussion in the journal was limited to a single page for each side in the June issue, and again in the July issue, but there were no readers’ letters on the merger proposal. So the main debate raged on the Facebook pages of Briefing and LRC, where facts and arguments were gradually dragged into the light – but only for those with the time and tenacity to dredge their way through hundreds of messages.

‘Historic’ delay

Chairing the AGM, comrade Shawcroft, drawing attention to the day’s agenda, announced somewhat casually and unconvincingly that the merger proposal (or “takeover”, as she called it) made this “a historic meeting”. Nevertheless, the proposed agenda allocated only an hour and twenty minutes out of four hours to this issue – to be preceded by two hours for four guest speakers and discussion. A comrade from Labour Party Marxists proposed that the “historic” merger proposal – “the reason there is such a big turnout today” – be taken seriously and moved to the top of the agenda. Only if time permitted should we hear the guest speakers. But comrade Shawcroft overruled the proposal, and invited the comrade to challenge the chair’s ruling, which would require a two-thirds majority. However, John Stewart asked if more time could be given to the two motions, and the chair agreed to start the item 30 minutes earlier.

Although passions were sometimes high, significant political differences between the two sides were difficult to discern. Both sides were clearly committed to the struggle within the Labour Party, but at least some of the anti-merger wing wanted to keep a certain distance from the LRC – because they want to keep a certain distance from the non-Labour left. The anti-merger comrades did not dispute the description of Briefing in comrade Firmin’s four-page motion: “Briefing has a unique role in providing a broad, non-sectarian voice for the left, which orientates politically towards the Labour Party and fights to channel the demands of the broader movement and campaigns towards the party and a Labour government.” But the motion also emphasised the importance of the class struggle outside the Labour Party and, while comrade Firmin said “the Labour Party is the agency of change”, he added that “class struggle is the agency of change in the Labour Party”. Richard Price, in contrast, exhibited a severe case of Labour Party sectarianism, fulminating against LRC joint secretary Andrew Fisher for resigning from Labour like so many comrades (though he later rejoined), over the Labour government’s 2003 invasion of Iraq. And the LRC, he complained, had split the Grass Roots Centre Left slate and allowed Luke Akehurst onto Labour’s NEC. So there are those who consider the LRC ultra left, eg, comrade Stewart, who penned the anti-merger page in the June issue of Briefing, admitted that “the LRC is too left for me”.

Ian Ilett, speaking in favour of the merger, saw the political difference as either “working in the Labour Party, waiting for the class struggle to come in” (anti-merger), or “going out to the class struggle” (pro-merger). Indeed, comrade Jenny Fisher’s emphasis, in moving the anti-merger motion, saw Briefing’s role almost purely within the Labour Party. “Some in the LRC,” she said, “want to build the LRC as an alternative movement.” Briefing “isn’t an organisation: it’s a magazine”. And, pretending that Briefing does not have its own politics, she added: “Don’t tell the Labour left the answers – they have ideas themselves.” Briefing should “give space to the newly elected left on Labour’s NEC and national policy forum”. Its role should be “to make the left visible, not to lead it”.

With all their talk of pluralism, of giving a voice to all strands of the Labour left, the anti-merger wing of Briefing seems satisfied with the left being divided, so that Briefing can carry on its “non-aligned” role of supposedly being everyone’s voice. These comrades do not want organisational unity – which, however, is vital to the task of defeating the pro-capitalist bureaucracy and transforming the party into a pro-working class, socialist party. Reflecting the sad division of much of the left, in or out of Labour, into bureaucratic-centralist sects which forbid public discussion of political differences, they support this backwardness by believing that pluralist organisation, where minorities can express their views, is impossible. Pluralism versus organisation.

Hence, the pejorative term, “house journal”, that was used by a number of anti-merger comrades. Comrade Fisher clearly expressed this view in a Facebook posting: “I still don’t see how the LRC can produce a pluralist and open magazine if it is the magazine of only one organisation – its mouthpiece, aiming to build that organisation (unless one assumes that organisation is the pluralist left, rather than part of it).”

Perhaps the trump card of the anti-merger wing was veteran Labour CND comrade Walter Wolfgang, who told us that Briefing is needed because “Tribune is not always consistent”. But Briefing “must be independent of an organisation … To make it a house journal would be to murder it.” However, the pro-merger trump was John McDonnell, who, after pleading for everyone to accept whatever decision was made and leave the room as comrades, reluctantly admitted that he had been won away from his previous agnostic position by the arguments of Mike Phipps and was now convinced that merger was “beneficial for the movement overall”.

Red-baiting

On July 8, the day after the AGM, instead of accepting the democratic decision of the Briefing AGM, comrades Fisher and Shawcroft issued a press release which, unfortunately, reverted to many of the acrimonious terms and arguments used online before the relatively cordial debate at the AGM. Labour Briefing is to “close down” and the LRC intends to launch “its own house journal, using the same name”. Despite the majority vote by the Briefing AGM on a motion from members of the Briefing editorial board, the press release has it that “members of the LRC – aided by members of the Communist Party of Great Britain, which produces the Weekly Worker – attended the AGM of Labour Briefing and forced through a vote …” The merger is “a hostile takeover which is tantamount to political asset-stripping”, the press release continues. “Those readers who have been robbed of their magazine are now the human collateral damage in the LRC’s turn to empire building.”

This red-baiting and fingering comrades as Communist Party members, reminiscent of McCarthyism and the worst aspects of the Labour Party in the cold war period, is repeated uncritically by Jon Lansman in his July 9 Left Futures blog, where he presents what appears to be a neutral, journalistic report – failing to mention that he was one of the signatories of the anti-merger motion, or the unmissable fact that comrade McDonnell spoke in favour of the merger.

I have as yet received no reply from comrades Fisher and Shawcroft to my two questions, asked in the light of their hostile press release: Are you planning to launch a rival magazine, as some have suggested? I hope not. Will you write for the coming issues of Briefing? I hope so.

The proposed merger of Labour Representation Committee and Labour Briefing will be decided at Briefing’s AGM this Saturday. Stan Keable of Labour Party Marxists reviews the discussion so far, and backs the merger

As the annual general meeting of Labour Briefing is upon us, an online debate is raging around the AGM motion to make LB the journal of the Labour Representation Committee. The idea is not new. A similar motion was moved four years ago by comrade Susan Press, but it only gained minority support. This time the merger motion is supported by a majority of both the LB editorial board (EB) and LRC national committee. At the May national committee meeting which agreed “to take the magazine on” by 17 votes to 7, LRC chair John McDonnell MP emphasised that this is “not a hostile takeover bid”, but the LRC is “waiting in the wings” if the Briefing AGM backs the merger.

The common-sense arguments for merger are sound. Like all leftwing journals, Briefing’s future is at risk; its activists are diminishing and growing older; its financial survival is uncertain. There is an overlapping core of activists and leaders sustaining both LB and LRC. The politics of both are ostensibly very close – for left unity, directing the left to the task of transforming the Labour Party and the trade unions towards socialism. A journal without an organisation should merge with a growing left unity organisation without a journal.

EB member Mike Phipps makes the argument well in the July issue of Briefing (‘Briefing: expand or die’): “Rather than going to more meetings than are necessary wearing different hats, why not put the two together?” The LRC is “committed … to the pluralist traditions and Labour orientation of Briefing. That’s non-negotiable … But as to political disagreements … we already have these in Briefing … And we should welcome them …” Warning that the EB and production team may not “just continue to renew itself”, comrade Phipps reminds us of the sudden disappearance of Voice of the Unions: “… once the number of people falls below a critical mass, publication will simply cease. It may not be long before Briefing reaches that position.”

Although personal conflicts and frustration have evidently played a part in triggering the merger proposal on this occasion, readers and subscribers should reject the silly argument that the purpose of the proposal is personal – to “exclude”, “oust” or “carve out” certain members of the outgoing editorial board, whose term of office expires at the AGM in any case. No individual has a right to a place on the EB. If the merger proposal falls, a new EB will be elected at the AGM. If it succeeds, the composition of the new EB will be decided through the democracy of the LRC.

Instead of personal conflicts, we must examine the political differences, if we can find them, which motivate the reluctant minority who vociferously oppose this common-sense proposal. Ignoring the spurious arguments that an editorial board responsible to LRC could not possibly function effectively, the political concerns of the anti-merger minority seem to be threefold: Briefing’s orientation to the Labour Party, its political pluralism, and its “organisational pluralism” or independence.

Would merging with LRC weaken Briefing’s orientation to the Labour Party?

Not at all. LRC rule 3 states that its aim is to “appeal for support … to all socialists outside the Labour Party, who it will encourage to join or rejoin the Labour Party”. Comrade Jenny Fisher, however, writing against the merger in the July Briefing (‘Not ready for slaughter’), argues that the overlap between the LB and LRC “has probably held Briefing back”, because of the LRC’s “purist approach”. Its ‘no cuts’ campaign “got nowhere and stopped dialogue about the left in local government”. She continues: “The Labour left … needs a forum for debate and organisation: it is that vacuum Briefing should fill.” Here Jenny quite rightly mentions the need for organisation – but this is a need which Briefing does not fill, with its ‘non-aligned’ status. If she thinks the LRC’s tactical approach to the anti-cuts struggle is wrong, that should be argued through the democracy of the LRC – it is not an argument against organisation.

Would merging with the LRC undermine the pluralism of Briefing?

EB member John Stewart questioned the pluralism of the LRC in his June Briefing article, ‘Briefing should keep its independence’. He asks: “Would an article advocating support for one of the leading lights of the soft left [like his 2007 backing for Jon Cruddas as Labour deputy leader] be included in a future LRC Briefing?” However, while his version of pluralism reaches out to the right of the LRC, unfortunately it does not extend leftwards or to those outside the Labour Party. In the same article, somewhat naively, he expresses his fears that an LRC Briefing might open its pages to “the New Communist Party and the Morning Star Supporters Group” – both non-Labour affiliates of the LRC. And, he complains, “another affiliate, Labour Party Marxists, repeatedly criticised Briefing chair Christine Shawcroft in print during the Labour Party NEC election campaign”. The criticism “in print” to which comrade Stewart objects was my friendly, but mildly critical, letter published in the February issue of Briefing itself – despite the opposition of comrade Stewart, whose ‘pluralism’ is evidently of the censoring kind.

Comrade Fisher, too, exhibits an unhealthy antipathy to the LRC’s non-Labour left. Instead of recognising the necessity of drawing them into the struggle to transform the party, she accuses the LRC of working with other left groups “on their own terms, without making the Labour Party central – hence its reliance on non-affiliated trade unions”. Of course, LRC could and should do much more to campaign for trade unions to affiliate, and to combat the destructive campaign for disaffiliation led by groups like the Socialist Party in England and Wales. That is an essential part of our struggle to transform Labour. By the same measure, we should not write off or disown those expelled from the party by the bureaucracy for their views, or for standing up for democratic principles – like the RMT union, or individual expellees like Tower Hamlets comrade Stephen Beckett, thrown out of the party for backing Lutfur Rahman and Labour Party democracy, and defying bureaucratic diktat. Paradoxically, comrade Beckett is in the anti-merger camp at present.

“In short,” continues comrade Fisher, “Briefing builds the Labour Party; the LRC builds the LRC so it can be part of forming a new party of labour of which the Labour left may be a part” (my emphasis). This may be a minority view in the LRC, but it is a misrepresentation to present it as LRC policy. As Mike Phipps points out in his ‘expand or die’ article, “The LRC has changed: anti-Labour elements are marginal …” Making LB part of LRC would surely strengthen its orientation to Labour further. Transforming the party is a necessary task for the left, and we need to be as united as possible, including organisationally united, in order to tackle the job. Reaching out to the non-Labour left and non-affiliated unions is an essential part of our orientation to Labour.

Of course, we do not know what the future holds for the Labour Party. If we begin to be successful and the left gets stronger, the right may abandon ship – like the ‘gang of four’ who split from Labour to found the Social Democratic Party in 1981, and later merged with the Liberals to form the Lib Dems. Better if we had kicked them out. The Blairite project to break the trade union link and transform the party in the wrong direction, into a purely bourgeois liberal party, may one day succeed. But, speculation aside, as things are, we must do everything to build a strong, well organised left and to rid the party of openly pro-capitalism, anti-working class factions like Progress, with its £400,000 per annum income (£260,000 from Lord David Sainsbury alone), which should have no place in the workers’ movement. We must transform Labour so that it stands clearly on the side of working class struggle and for socialism.

Would merging with the LRC curtail Briefing’s political pluralism?

At the June 30 LRC NC meeting, an anti-merger leaflet in the names of Jenny Fisher, Stephen Beckett and Christine Shawcroft made the curious claim: “Labour Briefing’s tradition of pluralism is a political and an organisational one: pluralism in the sense of being non-aligned and working with others. Briefing was often called the ‘in-house journal of the Labour left’. That’s different from the ‘house journal of the LRC’.” So, here we have the invention of the concept “organisational pluralism”, ascribing Briefing’s ability to publish a range of left views to its supposed independence of any particular organisation – as if it were not an organisation in its own right. By contrast, the argument goes, if Briefing belongs to another organisation – the LRC – it loses its independence and its ability to carry a range of views.

I am sure the comrades have not grasped the disastrous implication of this naive idea: it legitimises the splitting disease of the left, and the false idea that a socialist political organisation must neither contain differing views nor be open to outside views. If you disagree, you must split and form your own organisation. That is how the left arrived at its present divided state. Championing “organisational pluralism” simply defends the unfortunate status quo. So it is OK that the left is split into many organisations, some in the Labour Party and some outside it, dispersing our uncoordinated efforts and competing for members and scant resources.

No, it is not OK. We need not merely open discussion, so we can learn from each other, so minority views can be heard and understood, so minorities can become majorities. We also need democratic organisation, so majority views can determine collective, effective action.

Annual general meeting

Saturday July 7, 12 noon, University of London Union, Malet Street, London WC1. Open to Labour Briefing readers.

www.labourbriefing.org.uk

What political differences lie behind the heated arguments in the Labour Representation Committee and Labour Briefing? Stan Keable of Labour Party Marxists reports on the proposed merger, and counsels against irresponsible splits

More heat than light has been produced by the online exchanges on the Facebook pages of the Labour Representation Committee and Labour Briefing following the May 26 LRC national committee meeting. By 17 votes to 7 the NC endorsed an executive committee merger motion – that the LRC and LB should combine, to their mutual benefit: an organisation without a journal should get together with a journal without an organisation. The proposal will depend on the July 7 AGM of LB, which will debate a similar motion from editorial board member and LRC joint secretary Pete Firmin. While opponents of the merger are calling it a takeover, and warning that it will precipitate a split in both organisations, some pro-merger comrades are hinting that they may abandon Briefing if they do not get their way.

Irresponsible splits are the debilitating disease of the left. They are a crime against the struggle for unity which the left and the working class movement needs, and which both LRC and LB claim to stand for. I would urge comrades on both sides to clearly present their arguments so as to ensure that LRC members and LB subscribers and readers are fully engaged. I myself – a member of LRC and a subscriber to LB – only obtained a copy of the LRC motion three days after the NC had voted for it. And I only read about the merger proposal in the ‘for’ and ‘against’ single-page articles in the June issue of LB, which arrived in the post on the very morning of the May 26 NC meeting.

How did such a situation arise, in two mutually supportive, pro-Labour Party, left unity groups? Both seek to unite the left and to democratise and transform the Labour Party. But democracy begins at home, in our own organisations, and depends on open discussion. The problem seems to me to lie in the reluctance to air our differences in public. Many rank-and-file comrades have expressed dismay at the heated conflict which has broken out online between leading comrades, where previously differences had not been apparent. This surely points to the short-sightedness of the view that we should hide our differences, not ‘wash our dirty linen in public’, that publishing criticism will frighten away potential supporters, that we should ‘leave our guns at the door’, and so on.

In his pro-merger LB article, comrade Firmin argues that the merger will give Briefing “a bigger base, bigger readership and wider audience” and that there is “much overlap of both political views and personnel (and even more so of supporters)”. The LRC is “in need of its own publication”, but “to start one in competition with Briefing would be a duplication of effort”. LB fights to “channel the demands of the broader movement and campaigns towards the party and a Labour government”, he says approvingly, while the LRC is “committed to fighting for the Labour Party to support the resistance …”. Implicitly criticising LB for being one-sidedly orientated towards the party, to the neglect of the extra-parliamentary mass struggle, he argues: “Labour Briefing … needs to recognise that there is a layer of activists who see Labour as a neoliberal party, some seeing little point in relating to the broader labour movement at all … socialists … have to win their activists to our ranks, pointing out how political gains can be achieved through the labour movement …”

Some comrades have asked me whether the merger plan will be put to the next LRC AGM. But Pete’s proposal is “to transfer Briefing to the LRC with immediate effect, with the aim of a relaunch at this autumn’s Labour Party conference”.

Editorial board member John Stewart put the case in the June issue for LB “retaining its independence … unless others can demonstrate the superiority of their proposals”. “Briefing’s durability” – it’s been around since 1980 – “gives it a stability lacking in the LRC”. Comrade Stewart doubts “LRC claims … of over 1,000 members and dozens of affiliates”. But, although it is not a precise measure, the two Facebook pages seem to back up the claim: LRC – 1,463 and rising; LB – 120.

Comrade Stewart displays an unconscious hypocrisy with respect to democracy and open discussion. On the one hand, he worries that an article like his 2007 piece “advocating support for one of the leading lights of the soft left” – namely, John Cruddas – would not “be included in a future LRC Briefing”.

On the other hand, he holds up the bogey that LRC affiliates – the New Communist Party and the Morning Star Supporters Group – might be given space to support “the invasions of Hungary and Czechoslovakia … and the governments of North Korea and China”. And worse: “Recently, another affiliate, Labour Party Marxists, repeatedly criticised Briefing chair Christine Shawcroft in print during the Labour NEC election campaign.” Well, firstly, it was comradely criticism, which Christine accepted. Secondly, if criticism of leaders is out of order, I have to ask comrade Stewart what exactly he thinks is wrong with North Korea or China.

The caption to the picture selected to accompany comrade Stewart’s article gives us a pointer to the politics that appear to be involved in this dispute: “Tony Benn addresses delegates to the 2008 Compass conference at Briefing’s fringe meeting. John McDonnell MP refused to attend because of John Cruddas’s association with Compass” (the rightwing Labour pressure group “committed to help build a Good Society”).

However, we should not judge the opposition to immediate merger by the limitations of John Stewart’s arguments. But what does he mean by saying that his “greatest concern” is “that an LRC takeover may lead to negative developments on the wider Labour left”? Apparently those against the merger believe that a journal can only be genuinely “pluralist” if it is not controlled by any one group. The anti-merger leaflet, backed by comrade Christine Shawcroft and distributed at the May 26 LRC NC meeting, makes this clear.

“It’s no good saying that ‘LRC Briefing’ would be ‘pluralist’: there’s plenty of ‘pluralist’ magazines trotting out their own line; and plenty more ‘pluralist’ magazines debating the ‘pluralist’ lines within their own organisations. Above all: who will take a commitment to ‘pluralism’ seriously if you close down a pluralist magazine and set up, using its name, the magazine of your own organisation?” The implication is that LB, at present, has no political line of its own, and if it adopted a line, that would diminish the range of (left) opinions willing to write for it. If “LRC Briefing” is also to be “a journal of debate within LRC” with space for both majority and minority opinions, “will it be made clear what is the majority position? Hang on a moment – where has that ‘pluralism’ gone, then?”

“Briefing’s genuine pluralism”, the leaflet claims, would be “killed off” if it were “directed exclusively by the NC of a single organisation on the left”. So what kind of left unity should we strive for? Instead of fighting to unite the left politically and organisationally, do the authors of the anti-merger leaflet advocate preserving the disunity of the left, so that the diverse tendencies can enjoy fair and equal access to the pages of LB?

This defeatist horizon seems to be a fetish arising from a unity moment in Briefing’s history. “When the [Workers Revolutionary Party] collapsed in the 1980s,” explains the leaflet, “Labour Herald called for unity of left publications. At a meeting of Herald, Briefing, International and Socialist Viewpoint, Graham Bash announced: ‘I am all for unity. Let’s have a joint magazine. The only preconditions are that it is called Labour Briefing and that no one group has control.’” The leaflet complains that Graham has not explained his reasons for abandoning “Briefing’s ethos”.

I cannot speak for comrade Bash, but there is an obvious justification for his change of heart: the circumstances have changed. The unification of several left journals to survive hard times for the left after the defeat of the 1984-85 miners’ Great Strike may well have been a positive step, but today we need to build a higher level of unity.

Comrade Christine Shawcroft has fully identified with the leaflet’s contents. I should like to hear the views of the other six NC members who voted ‘no’: Ted Knight, Jon Lansman, Gary Heather, Claire Wadey, Lois Radice and Miles Barter. And I should like to hear all NC members declaring against irresponsible splits. In other words, if you lose the vote, stay together. Accept majority decisions, insist on minority rights.

Come on over

Motion carried by 17 votes to 7 at the May 26 LRC NC

The EC notes that members of the Labour Briefing editorial board will be putting a motion to their AGM to transfer Labour Briefing to the LRC.

The EC notes the proposal by members of the Labour Briefing editorial board and if the motion is passed at the Labour Briefing AGM (on July 7), we would agree to take the magazine on.

The EC notes that Labour Briefing – like the LRC – has always followed a pluralist line, promoting discussion within the labour and trade union movement. We would pledge to maintain that tradition.

We also believe that having a magazine associated with the LRC would be beneficial for the following reasons:

• It would create more space for discussion and debate within the LRC and wider movement.
• It would give the LRC more visibility, and would help us to recruit and retain membership and affiliation.
• It would assist in organising the Labour left and trade union movement.
• We could develop a coordinated and integrated communications strategy, incorporating the website, magazine, email, Twitter and Facebook – as well as to reach LRC members who are digitally excluded.

In taking on Labour Briefing, the LRC would agree to maintain its pluralist traditions and coverage of Labour Party, trade union, social and international struggles. We believe becoming a magazine hosted by the LRC would broaden the base of Labour Briefing and help it to develop as a useful tool in organising the labour movement left.

We believe that the correct structure to run the magazine would be an editorial board accountable to and delegated from the national committee, though with the authority to coopt (subject to NC approval).