The Socialist Party on sexism in the labour movement
By Cathy Nugent (from the AWL website and their paper Solidarity)
In an online article the Socialist Party’s Hannah Sell tries to convince activists not to sign the statement initiated by Unison activists Marsha-Jane Thompson and Cath Elliot (“Our movement must be a safe place for women”).
“Safe Place for Women” is an unarguable appeal to the left and labour movement to stand in solidarity with women who are victims of male violence, especially when an incident takes place within our own movement.
Sell cannot directly contradict that sentiment so she takes the line “context is everything”. She says the statement will be used by the right-wing in the labour movement, and society, to witch hunt the left. It will distract from fighting capitalism and women’s oppression.
Readers who are familiar with the Socialist Party (SP) will recognise two of their techniques here.
First, using the line “You can’t say that against the left/the SP/the union because the right wing will use it” as a way of shutting down debate.
Second, the “sledgehammer and nut” approach. A tediously long exposition of how capitalism perpetuates women’s oppression precedes the “dangerous distraction” argument.
But what of the details of Sell’s right-wing backlash?
Sell says the Savile scandal has created a febrile atmosphere which will make an attack on the left more likely. That’s possible but, as Sell herself says, far, far better that such scandals are out in the open and discussed.
Second, Unison’s right-wing leaders and their friends in the Labour Party will seize upon this statement to attack the left… because that is what they do. But if it wasn’t this issue, it would be something else, surely?
Third, the Daily Mail etc. will seize on anti-left criticisms because of “a correct fear by sections of the ruling class that, given the profound crisis of capitalism, the socialist movement will be able to become a mass force in the coming years.” I hope that is true. But more likely this Marxist “prediction” is randomly inserted here to boost the argument. Read the rest of this entry »
“I’m Caroline Leneghan”: the RMT and domestic violence
Above: Hedley verbally attacks a Jew who dared challenge him; another chosen victim, close to his lumpen heart…
Utterly appalling:
Today (8 Mar 2013 -SS) I would like to show my solidarity with women all over the world on International Women’s day and to raise the issue of domestic violence against women. The RMT have released a model domestic violence policy for the transport industry which I hope gets rolled out to every employer.
I’m Caroline Leneghan, I’m a member of the RMT and assistant Branch Secretary of my RMT branch. Until recently I was in a relationship with the RMT Assistant General Secretary Steve Hedley. During the relationship I experienced physical and mental domestic violence which made me feel hopeless to challenge. In January I reported a violent assault to the police that took place the previous year. On this occasion he kicked a pot of paint at me, threw me around by my hair and pinned me to the floor repeatedly punching me in the face. The extent of my injuries meant I couldn’t go out for weeks. I had severe bruising and swelling to my face and body and he had pulled out clumps of my hair. I have decided to make a public statement about this because of his public position in the union and because I want to encourage other women to come forward who have faced similar abuse.
Additionally, as I am a member of the RMT I felt that it was important to raise my assault with the RMT. I believe that he will continue to perpetrate abuse and is a threat to female members. I want to continue my activism within the union but I do not feel safe to do so unless this matter is dealt with properly.
When I raised the assault with the union, I was subjected to what is known as as ‘victim blaming’. I was distressed and astonished at the questions I was asked and the investigating officer displayed a total lack of respect and sensitivity, and a lack of understanding of domestic violence. The investigator tried to make a link between my mental health and the assault and deemed it appropriate to inquire about my personal history, but has not deemed it necessary to look into Steve’s, despite the fact that it is his behaviour that is being called into question and not mine. The investigatior attempted to focus his attention on anything about me which could exonerate or mitigate Steve’s behaviour.
I was also shocked that the investigator asked to explain how someone of Steve Hedley’s build and proficient at boxing did not cause me more injuries. The investigator also accused me of causing the injuries myself. It is outrageous that when a woman reports an assault it would be considered feasible that she severely beat up her own face and further to also attempt to make a link with her mental health is collusion with the tactics of manipulation that abusers use to silence their victims. I felt degraded and that I had done something ‘wrong’ in reporting the attack.
These actions contribute to a culture where perpetrators of violence are never punished for their behaviour. It is a well known fact that women do not come forward when they have faced abuse because they fear the treatment they will get. Since receiving help from Victim Support I have learnt that it is common for perpetrators of domestic abuse to deflect blame for their actions onto their victims and attempting to discredit their claims and to shame them into remaining silent.
I think it is important to say that I am a proud member of the RMT because I thought it was committed to fighting for justice and equality for all workers. I had hoped that it would take seriously a claim against a senior elected representative and treat me with respect when I have made such a serious allegation. I am shocked and saddened that instead I have had to undergo a character assassination. No aspect of my life has been spared from scrutiny, using any detail, no matter how sensitive, used in a horrible and insensitive manner to undermine my claim.
I am writing this because I feel it is imperative that all organisations on the left take a look at themselves and question whether they are doing all they can to support their female members and fight sexism and abuse, in all its guises. I believe that we need strong unions and organisations like the RMT to fight all forms of inequality in society. It cannot do this if it allows sexism to go unchallenged and it fails to investigate its elective representatives seriously.
Women do not have equality in the labour movement or the left. This is a struggle and a fight that goes on everyday at work/ in our unions/ at home/ in meetings, etc. To women; we are what militant trade unionists look like. The labour movement continues to heroises a macho, aggressive archetype of what a good trade unionist looks like. Recently highlighted problems on the left (e.g. the SWP rape case handling) have demonstrated the need for radical change. A support group made up of women from the left and labour movement to support women and challenging abuse and sexism should be set up.
In the past week my case against him was dropped by the police due to falling foul of their timescale for submitting a complaint. Steve has made an official statement to the RMT that the case was dropped and he was found innocent and exonerated. This is completely untrue. The investigating officer said the CPS would not prosecute because the incident had not happened in the past 6 months. Furthermore, I have been told that, had I reported it within 6 months, they would have had enough evidence to charge him with common assault. But due to the lapse in time, they instead had to arrest him on suspicion of ABH. However, the CPS sets a very high bar for chances of conviction (I was informed that they will only bring forward to trial cases that they believe have a 90 per cent chance of conviction).
Please note: *trigger warning*. I’ve included these photos because I feel I need to show people how ludicrous his story that I beat myself up is.
If you would like to contact me please email leneghancaroline@gmail.com
(NB: Shiraz Socialist has had cause to comment upon Mr Hedley before: here; this creature must be removed from all positions within the labour movement, forthwith).
The politics of Hugo Chavez – in his own words
The Brit Left and the EU: sleepwalking towards racism and nationalism
Will the “left” play into Gove’s hands on Europe?
Since the 1960′s it has been an article of faith for most of the British left to sort-of oppose the EU and its foreunners, starting with the Common Market. The basis of this ‘sort-of’ opposition has sometimes been superficially leftist (“it’s a bosses club,” etc), sometimes psuedo-democratic (“Brussels bureaucrats,” etc), but always fundamentally foolish and reactionary: based on the ludicrous notion that separating a country from the rest of Europe will insulate it from the laws and trends of global capitalism. Very occasionally, the more fanatical of the “left” opponents of the EU let slip their real agenda: a Westphalian defence of the nation state and opposition to all forms of supranationalism.
The results of this confusion on the “left” have usually been pretty irrelevant, as the anti-EU agenda has always been set by the nationalists and racists of the hard-right. But it has resulted in grotesque spectacles like the No2EU campaign, the Socialist Party and the RMT supporting the People’s Pledge, an anti-EU campaign drawn up by right-wing Tories.
There is some evidence to suggest that the saner (or more cynical, depending on how you look at it) elements of the anti-EU “left” are aware of what a foolish stance they’ve adopted, and are doing so mainly for opportunistic reasons. But, opportunist or not, the anti-EU “left” seems likely to soon be put on the spot. With the eurosceptic Tory right (encouraged by Michael Gove) on the offensive and polls showing a majority of UK voters wanting to exit, Cameron seems almost certain to go into the next election offering a referendum on continued membership. And given Miliband’s craven appeasement of the eurosceptic right, Labour may well do the same. Then it will be make-your-mind-up-time for the UK’s anti-EU “left.”
I described the UK “left” opposition to Europe as “sort-of” opposition because it rarely spells out where it stands on the central issues: do they welcome and support the re-erection of barriers between nation-states and a “repatriation” of powers, resulting in the abolition of swathes of employment protection legislation? Most of the anti-EU “left” limits itself to “no to the bosses’ Europe” sloganising, thus avoiding the central issue. They have their cake and eat it: they chime in with populist-nationalist sentiment amongst the most backward sections of society (including lumpen elements of the working class) while suggesting that they’re not really anti-European, just against the “bosses’” character of the EU.
As if the EU is somehow less capitalist, anti-worker and neo-liberal than its component member states. In Britain more than any other EU country we have seen successive governments, Labour and Tory, repeatedly objecting to EU policy and legislation as as too soft, too “social”, too concerned with civil liberties and workers’ employment rights. That wilkl be the basis upon which the anti-EU camapaign around a referedum will be conducted.
So now we have to ask the idiot -”left”: do you really want to see the EU broken up? Think about the consequences seriously, for once in your lives.
The freedom for workers to move across Europe would be lost. “Foreign” workers in each country from other ex-EU states would face massively increased, and state-approved, racism.
There would be a big reduction in the productive capacities of the separate states, cut off from broader economic arenas.
Governments and employers in each state would be weaker in capitalist world-market competition, and thus would be pushed towards crude cost-cutting, in the same way that small capitalist businesses, more fragile in competition, use cruder cost-cutting than the bigger employers.
There would be more slumps and depression, in the same way that the raising of economic barriers between states in the 1930s lengthened and deepened the slump then.
Nationalist and far-right forces, already the leaders of anti-EU political discourse everywhere, would be “vindicated” and boosted. Democracy would shrink, not expand. The economically-weaker states in Europe, cut off from the EU aid which has helped them narrow the gap a bit, would suffer worst, and probably some would fall to military dictatorships.
Before long the economic tensions between the different nations competing elbow-to-elbow in Europe’s narrow cockpit would lead to war, as they did repeatedly for centuries, and especially in 1914 and 1939.
The left should fight, not to go backwards from the current bureaucratic, neo-liberal European Union, but forward, towards workers’ unity across Europe, a democratic United States of Europe, and a socialist United States of Europe.
Open letter to the UK left: Do you want the EU to break up?
Open letter to the UK hard-left, from the Alliance for Workers Liberty:
RMT anti-EU protesters (Photo: Andrew Wiard )
Dear comrades,
Do you really want the European Union to break up? The majority of Greek workers do not. In the 6 May election, 70% voted for parties opposed to the cuts, but polls show that 80% want Greece to stay within the EU and within the euro.
The party that did best in the election, the left coalition Syriza, says that a left government in Greece should refuse the cuts, call the bluff of the EU leaders — who may want cuts, but also want to stop the eurozone breaking up — and enforce a renegotiation.
They want a united Europe without cuts. So do we. If the Greek left wins a majority, and the EU refuses to concede, then we want a workers’ government in Greece which will break with EU leaders but not “leave Europe” — which will instead fight to spread workers’ rule across Europe.
Yet for decades now most of the British left — and the left in a few other European countries, such as Denmark — has agitated “against the EU”. The agitation has suggested, though rarely said openly, we should welcome and promote every pulling-apart of the EU, up to and including the full re-erection of barriers between nation-states.
Now it’s not certain that the EU/ ECB/ IMF troika will dare cut off funds to the Greek government, and force it into “defaulting” on its debt (failing to make payments on the debt when they’re due). If Greece defaults, it is not certain that it will quit or be forced out of the euro.
If Greece quits the euro, it’s not certain that the exit will set off an unravelling of the whole eurozone. And even if the whole eurozone unravels, the underlying EU structure could remain solid.
An argument can be made — debatable, but not absurd, and not necessarily “anti-EU” — that realistically a Greek government would do better now to negotiate an orderly exit from the euro, rather than to plunge on towards a high probability of forced and chaotic exit.
The economist who has argued most strongly for Greece to negotiate an exit from the euro, Costas Lapavitsas, also insists that he is not calling for Greece to quit the EU.
Yet the possibility of a serious unravelling of the patchwork, bureaucratic semi-unification of Europe, slowly developed over the last sixty years, is more real today than ever before. The decisive push for unravelling, if it comes, will probably be from the nationalist and populist right.
And that calls the bluff of a whole swathe of the British left.
For decades, most of the British left has been “anti-EU” as a matter of faith. In Britain’s 1975 referendum on withdrawing from the EU, almost the whole left, outside AWL’s forerunner Workers’ Fight, campaigned for withdrawal. Since then the left has hesitated explicitly to demand withdrawal. It has limited itself to “no to bosses’ Europe” agitation, implying but not spelling out a demand for the EU to be broken up.
The agitation has allowed the left to eat its cake and have it. The left can chime in with populist-nationalist “anti-Europe” feeling, which is stronger in Britain than in any other EU country. It can also cover itself by suggesting that it is not really anti-European, but only dislikes the “bosses’” character of the EU.
As if a confederation of capitalist states could be anything other than capitalist. As if the cross-Europe policy of a collection of neo-liberal governments could be anything other than neo-liberal.
As if the material force behind neo-liberal cuts were the relatively flimsy Brussels bureaucracy, rather than the mighty bureaucratic-military-industrial complexes of member states. As if the answer is to oppose confederation and cross-Europeanism as such, rather than the capitalist, neo-liberal, bureaucratic character of both member states and the EU.
As if the EU is somehow more sharply capitalist, anti-worker, and neo-liberal than the member states. In Britain more than any other country we have seen successive national governments, both Tory and New Labour, repeatedly objecting to EU policy as too soft, too “social”, too likely to entrench too many workers’ rights.
As if the answer is to pit nations against Europe, rather than workers against bosses and bankers.
When Socialist Worker, in a recent Q&A piece, posed itself the question, “wouldn’t things be better for workers if Britain pulled out of the EU?”, it answered itself with a mumbling “yes, but” rather than a ringing “yes”.
“Socialist Worker is against Britain being part of a bosses’ Europe”. Oh? And against Britain being part of a capitalist world, too?
Britain would be better off in outer space? Or walled off from the world North-Korea-style? “But withdrawing from the EU wouldn’t guarantee workers’ rights — the Tories remain committed to attacking us”. Indeed. And just as much so as the EU leaders, no?
As recently as 2009, the Socialist Party threw itself into a electoral coalition called No2EU. Every week in its “Where We Stand” it declaims: “No to the bosses’ neo-liberal European Union!”, though that theme rarely appears in its big headlines.
The RMT rail union, in some ways the most left-wing union in Britain, backed No2EU and today backs the “People’s Pledge”. This “Pledge” is a campaign to call for parliamentary candidates to demand a referendum on British withdrawal from the EU, and support them only if they agree.
It was initiated by, and is mostly run by, right-wing Tories, but fronted by a Labour leftist, Mark Seddon. It is backed by many Tory MPs — and by some Labour left MPs such as Kelvin Hopkins, John Cryer, and Ronnie Campbell, and by Green MP Caroline Lucas.
The referendum call is a soft-soap demand for British withdrawal, based on the hope that a majority would vote to quit. (In a recent poll, 55% of people agreed with the statement “Britain should remain a full member of the European Union”, but 55% also agreed with the statement “Britain should leave the European Union”, so…)
Even the demand for withdrawal is a soft-soap, “tactical” gambit. In principle Britain could quit the EU without disrupting much. It could be like Norway, Iceland, Switzerland: pledged to obey all the EU’s “Single Market” rules (i.e. all the neo-liberal stuff) though opting out of a say in deciding the rules; exempt from contributing to the EU budget but also opting out from receiving EU structural and regional funds.
That is not what the no-to-EU-ers want. They want Britain completely out. They want all the other member-states out too. A speech by RMT president Alex Gordon featured on the No2EU website spells it out: “Imperialist, supranational bodies such as the EU seek to roll back democratic advances achieved in previous centuries… Progressive forces must respond to this threat by defending and restoring national democracy. Ultimately, national independence is required for democracy to flourish…”
For decades “anti-EU” agitation has been like background music in the left’s marketplace — designed to soothe the listeners and make them more receptive to the goods on offer, but not for attentive listening. If the music should be played at all, then it should be turned up now.
But do you really want the EU broken up? What would happen?
The freedom for workers to move across Europe would be lost. “Foreign” workers in each country from other ex-EU states would face disapproval at best.
There would be a big reduction in the productive capacities of the separate states, cut off from broader economic arenas.
Governments and employers in each state would be weaker in capitalist world-market competition, and thus would be pushed towards crude cost-cutting, in the same way that small capitalist businesses, more fragile in competition, use cruder cost-cutting than the bigger employers.
There would be more slumps and depression, in the same way that the raising of economic barriers between states in the 1930s lengthened and deepened the slump then.
Nationalist and far-right forces, already the leaders of anti-EU political discourse everywhere, would be “vindicated” and boosted. Democracy would shrink, not expand. The economically-weaker states in Europe, cut off from the EU aid which has helped them narrow the gap a bit, would suffer worst, and probably some would fall to military dictatorships.
Before long the economic tensions between the different nations competing elbow-to-elbow in Europe’s narrow cockpit would lead to war, as they did repeatedly for centuries, and especially in 1914 and 1939.
The left should fight, not to go backwards from the current bureaucratic, neo-liberal European Union, but forward, towards workers’ unity across Europe, a democratic United States of Europe, and a socialist United States of Europe.
Socialist Party perspectives document
“Fortunately, the left unions – the PCS, NUT, UCU – remain in the frame and are prepared to do battle.
“The magnificent conference organised by PCS Left Unity at the beginning of the year did the job in mobilising the resistance from below to the sell-out of the right-wing trade union leaders.”
Mind you, it’s nowhere near as entertaining as this.
H-t: Matthew
The SWP at its best…and worst
What’s this got to do with the SWP? Well, according to employment minister Chris Grayling, it’s all the fault of “a small group of long-standing militant activists from the far Left… (running) a big internet campaign that is being run by an organisation that is a front for the Socialist Workers Party.” At one point, the preposterous Grayling even accused the SWP of hacking his email – an allegation he has since had to withdraw.
The claim that the campaign is simply a handful of SWP’ers is repeated in more detail in today’s Sunday Telegraph, which names SWP full-timer Michael Bradley, party member Julie Sherry and Right To Work chairperson Sam James, as key figures.
Now, I have not been personally involved with the present incarnation of the Right To Work Campaign (it’s a relatively recent revival of the original 1970′s campaign), but it’s obvious that it is being largely run, financed and directed by the SWP. You could even, perhaps, call it a “front”: in principle, what’s wrong with that? In fact, congratulations to them – it’s by far the most useful and progressive activity the SWP has been involved in for many, many years. But I can also guarantee you that people other than SWP’ers are involved, and even the Torygraph acknowledges that the Socialist Party’s Youth Fight For Jobs and the non-aligned UK Uncut are part of the campaign.
Regardless of whether it’s fair to call Right to Work a “front” for the SWP, the dramatic success of the campaign (Tesco, for instance, have now abandoned the unpaid work experience scheme and announced its own programme paying £7 per hour) proves that a determined, well organised campaign focussing on an issue of immediate relevance to working class people, can achieve real results – something we perhaps tend to forget after years of defeats and setbacks.
Sadly, at yesterday’s Unite Against Fascism (UAF) national conference, the SWP were back to their usual form:
“There has been quite a bit of fuss, including inside the SWP, about the lack of democracy in UAF, and so this year – for the first time since the campaign’s founding in 2003, believe it or not – there were elections for the national committee. However even this small step was largely a formality or, to be blunt, a fake. Rather than a proper open election for a multi-member committee, candidates had to be nominated for a variety of individual positions (chair, vice chair, secretary, assistant secretary, parliamentary officer and so on).
“Obviously this will have discouraged people from standing – and, lo and behold, there was only one candidate for each position. (Many of them were nominated by “Love Music Hate Racism” and “One Society Many Cultures” – “organisations” which decide these things how, exactly?) However this was only achieved by excluding Justin Baidoo, a young socialist and trade unionist from South London wishing to challenge SWP full-timer Martin Smith for assistant secretary, on a technicality. (See here.) The chair of his union branch had sent in the nomination, but failed to send in the reaffiliation form.
“Given this is the first time UAF has held elections, and given there were no other contested elections, you might think something could be done? Wouldn’t it have been positive to have a real election? But no, rules are rules – that is, when they allow the UAF leadership to carve out opponents. I guess it would have been particularly embarrassing for the SWP to have Martin Smith attacked from the left by a young, black socialist. (I should say that Justin chose not to get up on the floor of the conference and demand a vote on his exclusion – which I think was a mistake.)
“Nonetheless, surely the election still went ahead, with participants having the chance to vote for ‘Re-Open Nominations’? Don’t be silly! The ‘candidates’ were simply declared elected. I wondered if some SWPers cringed at this total absence of democracy.”
Read the rest here.
RIP Rob Windsor
It is with very great sadness that we have to report the death earlier today, of Rob Windsor, Socialist Party member and former Coventy councillor.
Rob died a few weeks after a liver transplant operation that he had long awaited with hope and anticipation; he’d hoped it would restore his health and allow him to get back to living life to the full and campaigning for the politics he had devoted much of his life to. Tragically, that was not to be.
I met Rob for the first and (as it turned out) only time, shortly before the operation, and his excitement and optimism were palpable. My partner and I were immediately struck by what a warm, humourous and kindly person he was.
Rob was councillor for Coventry St Michaels ward between 2000 and 2004, when he lost the seat to Labour, and again from 2006 until 2010. He was one of the Socialist Party’s most prominent members and a close comrade of Dave Nellist’s. He won tremendous respect in Coventry as a champion of issues affecting local people, like opposing the Council’s plans to demolish disabled flats in Swanswell, opposing plans for a city academy and defending the NHS. Until his health began to fail, he was a tireless grass-roots campaigner who spent hours going door-to-door “on the knocker” canvassing working class people in St Michaels.
Our sympathy and condolences go out to all Rob’s comrades, family and friends and especially his wife, partner and comrade, Isla.
Farewell, comrade Rob.
Shallow slogans won’t defeat the Con-Dems
The text under such headlines in Socialist Worker and The Socialist varies, and sometimes does not really fit the headlines, but the headline message is common and frequent.
You can see why SWP and SP think the message will be catchy. Strikes against cuts? Good. More of them? Better. Bring down the Tory/Lib-Dem government? Excellent. Combine the two ideas in a snappy phrase? Has to be even better.
Increased mobilisation and agitation could destabilise the government. Deeper economic crisis could destabilise it. Since the crash of 2008, governments have fallen in Belgium, the Netherlands, Denmark, Ireland, Portugal, Spain, Italy, and Greece.
But let’s tease the issues through. Making the government fall is not necessarily a step forward. In Portugal and Spain, for example, the toppled administrations were replaced by regimes akin to Tories; in Greece and Italy, party administrations have been replaced by “technocrat” administrations designed to be less vulnerable to popular resistance to the cuts they push through.
In Britain the fall of the government would probably mean it being replaced by Labour. That would be a step forward. The new government, though under Ed Miliband pro-capitalist, would be more easily pushed by working-class pressure, and that working-class pressure, against a Labour government, could more directly shake up and transform the labour movement.
But it would not be adequate, even for winning the immediate battle on pension cuts. Balls and Miliband have refused to promise to reverse the coalition government’s measures, and will not budge from that refusal without intense and organised political mobilisation within the labour movement. Slogans which present toppling the government as the supreme prize to be won by increased strikes are thus a snare.
The SWP and SP headlines suggest to the casual reader that a good turnout on 30 November could force Cameron from office. In the small print SWP and SP recognise that more is needed.
Earlier this year SW suggested a general strike. “If the pressure gets intense enough, it can lead to the kind of united action that really does have the power to bring down the Tory/Lib-Dem coalition — a general strike” (22 March).
The suggestion has now faded to an exercise in “imagining”. “Imagine the impact if millions more said they would come out — and then decided to stay out…” (1 October). But the thought still seems to be that “smashing the Tories” is not what 30 November can achieve, but what a future general strike could win. The SP suggests something similar, though by way of saying: “we must prepare for a two-day strike as the next stage of the escalating action”.
In other words, the headlines mean: “We want more strikes. And if the strikes become really big, as big as we want, then they can win the supreme prize: topple the government”.
They mean that if strikes rise to a high pitch, capable of winning large concessions, then socialists will have presented the ruling class in advance with a convenient let-out. “You’ve made your point. Calm down, and we’ll call a general election”.
Having presented forcing a general election as the ultimate prize, the socialists will have weakened themselves in the battle that will follow, when we will have to argue against the Labour leaders’ inevitable story that the crisis means that they can’t change much, or quickly, from the Tories’ plans. Specific, “hard” demands for the strike, like “fair pensions for all”, are sharper in that situation than the apparently-radical “bring down the government”.
It is also far from certain that Labour would win the general election. When the great May-June 1968 general strike in France was finally stifled, in part with the promise of a quick general election, De Gaulle’s right wing won that 23/30 June election with an increased majority. Millions of strikers disappointed by the failure of the general strike to change society then voted for “the party of order”.
Even if Cameron lost the election, the replacement might well not be Labour but a Labour/ Lib-Dem coalition. Ed Miliband signals that he is angling for that.
To take the working class forward politically, the negative call for “kicking out the Con-Dems” or “smashing the Tories” has to be linked to a clear positive call for a Labour government, not a new coalition, and for the unions and the working class to organise for sharp demands on the Labour leaders. The call must be linked to politics, not just more strikes.
Neither the SWP nor the SP makes that link. The SP refuses to vote Labour or to fight for unions to reshape Labour. (Its article under the headline “Force Cameron Out!” ends by quarter-suggesting that it envisages an SP government replacing him. The last of the article’s concluding list of demands is: “Support the Socialist newspaper and join the Socialist Party”).
The SWP is not so dogmatic. But as of now it says nothing about Labour except to make the obvious points about Ed Miliband’s poor politics. As used by both SWP and SP, the “smash the Tories” or “kick out the Con-Dems” slogans are further examples of flim-flam “agitationalism” — socialists trying to catch the wind by shouting popular “anti” slogans without spelling out clear positive alternatives.
And to present flim-flam “agitationalist” aims as the best thing that the best development of strikes could achieve is harmful for the development of purposeful, clear-headed working-class action to win definite advances, and of serious political action.
