Green councillors should not cross Unison picket
I am not posting this to say how wonderful my own political party is, in fact I am quite anxious about how the new leader/deputy leader structure will play out…my fear is it will take us down the European Green Party route of ‘nu green’. I hope I am mistaken!
My point of course is to alert any other left organisations with councillors to support the picket lines.
Brighton and Nottingham Green Party Councillors have publicly promised to respect Unison picket lines on 16 and 17 July. The Green Party Trade Union group calls on all Green party Councillors to follow this lead (if they have not already done so) and publicly give their support to the Unison strikers.
At the recent Green Party Trade Union Group Conference Caroline Lucas argued that The Green Party has become the true
champion of the Labour movement“The Green Party’s record of championing Trade Union priorities, from defending public services from privatisation through to
promoting a Living Wage, demonstrates that the Greens are the real party of social justice,”GPTU calls on Green councillors to demonstrate by supporting the Unison strike that Caroline Lucas’ words aren’t just rhetoric.
Go to http://www.unison.org.uk/ for more information.
see also http://gptublog.blogspot.com/
GMB statement
If your place of work has an official picket line and you are intimidated by the picket and unable to safely cross it, you should notify your employer immediately
Comment by Simon — 14 July, 2008 @ 4:58 pm
Thats a sadly typical instruction isn’t it.
Comment by johng — 14 July, 2008 @ 5:09 pm
I’ll always remember a Phil Evans cartoon:
Those in favour of the strike raise your hands. Those against slither to the front and raise your right claw.
Oh them were the days…
Comment by johng — 14 July, 2008 @ 5:10 pm
Simon/John
Can you please explain how the GMB should have phrased that statement without breaking the law.
Comment by Andy Newman — 14 July, 2008 @ 5:43 pm
They’re not obliged to say anything like that on their leaflets legally. I’m not criticising them for not calling on their members to respect other unions picket lines. I’m criticising for instructing their members to report other trade unionists to their employers should they be ‘intimidated’ (in other words asked not to cross a picket line).
Comment by johng — 14 July, 2008 @ 7:26 pm
>>> Can you please explain how the GMB should have phrased that statement without breaking the law
You truly are an absolute blight on the workers movement.
Comment by Randy Newman — 14 July, 2008 @ 7:37 pm
JOhn
The GMB statement does not ask for other TU members to be reported to management, it says that if you feel intimidated then you should inform your manager that you are not going to cross the picket line and you will not be going to work.
Comment by Andy Newman — 14 July, 2008 @ 7:46 pm
of course the headline should have read “Green councillors will cross unison picket lines”.
Comment by martin ohr — 14 July, 2008 @ 8:02 pm
The GMB national leadership is supine. It is not ‘legally’ bound to say ‘don’t cross picket lines at all it’s simply chosen to just as it chose not to ballot its members on the strike issue. So any blog claiming to be ’socialist’ should cpndemn ‘em surely? In my branch, 30 have left the GMB to join UNISON in order to support the strike
Comment by terry james — 14 July, 2008 @ 9:41 pm
The NUT’s acting general secretary has not gone quite so far as the GMB but has more or less advised members to cross the UNISON and Unite picket lines. There was no need to say anything on the issue and it’s a clear indication that the union’s current leadership wished to maintain a political continuity with the old one. It’s the obvious responsibilty of any socialist to argue for respecting the picket line and defying the anti-union laws.
Comment by Liam — 14 July, 2008 @ 10:24 pm
#9 yada yada yada
Yes, We had a report at our last branch committee of 11 Unison mebers who have just joined the GMB from Swindon Borough Council because we are more miltant than them - what goes around comes around.
there is no point in socialists competing over which unions are better than others. The situation with the GMB and this strike is very confusing, with different regioons saying different things - and yes I wish we were backing the strike as well.
Comment by Andy Newman — 14 July, 2008 @ 10:26 pm
This is how it should be done, from the NUJ’s Jeremy Dear:
To all NUJ members in local government
Many of you working in local government will be joint members with Unison. I wish you every success with your industrial action this week. You deserve a fair pay award.
For those working in local government who are not joint members or freelance members not covered by the ballot, the anti-union laws make it unlawful for the NUJ to urge you to support Unison’s action or take any action which would put you in breach of your contract.
In past disputes staff and freelance NUJ members have however themselves taken a decision to act alongside their Unison colleagues and respect picket lines in the best traditions of the trade union movement.
I am sure all NUJ members will make a similar decision and uphold those principles of solidarity to seek to secure an improved pay deal for all.
In the event that any NUJ member suffers any detriment as a result of taking part in the current action they should contact their national official. In an emergency call 020 7278 7916 or email info@nuj.org.uk.
Jeremy Dear
General Secretary
Comment by NUJer — 15 July, 2008 @ 1:02 am
Working in a local government building, I will not cross a picket line, even though it is not my union who is on strike, therefore I am not legally protected by the ballot. Is that the last word? I don’t think so.
UNISON have negotiated with other unions to put out a statement that indicates that their union will support them in the event of any victimisation by the employer should they refuse to cross a picket line on grounds of conscience (solidarity isn’t mentioned in case it is interpreted legally).
That is entirley different than suggestting that it will be down to intimidation.
Having said that, I think much of the left has a fetish about picket lines, as if we’re awaiting another Saltley Gates. The Teachers’ strike was most successful because of the marches and rallies, particularly in London that showed our strength and raised everyone’s activity above the very local. Recalling the London weighting, UNISON were very poorly turned out for their central London event back in 2003 and it is important that tomorrow is stronger as much of the public sector campaign rests on them.
Comment by Stuart G — 15 July, 2008 @ 7:36 am
#11 Andy, that’s a pretty childish response. One of the few winning arguments that militants can have with the union bureaucracy for them supporting strikes is that strikes lead to increased membership in the short term, and it’s right that we should highlight where recruitment has increased due to industrial action.
Comment by martin ohr — 15 July, 2008 @ 8:02 am
Martin #14 - “One of the few winning arguments that militants can have with the union bureaucracy for them supporting strikes is that strikes lead to increased membership in the short term”
absolutley.
My point is that if you look at the bigger picture over the longer term, it would be a mistake to claim that Unison is a union with a better track record of supporting strrikes than the GMB. And that there is a problem with people almost advocating the poaching of members, which is what Terry James seemed to be doing at #9.
Comment by Andy Newman — 15 July, 2008 @ 9:47 am
I can remember in the Local Government strikes of the late 1980’s the strategic use of ‘intimidate’. The posties in particular used to turn up chat with us for fifteen minutes or so and then depart saying ‘I feel terribly intimidated’ (without delivering the post). Just remembered that.
Comment by johng — 15 July, 2008 @ 10:49 am
Thank you JOhn.
That is exactly the point I was making up above at #7.
The GMB cannot ask its members not to cross picket lines. What we can do is point out that people who feel intimidated by a picket line need not cross it, and some officers might even have an unattributable private word with shop stewards and suggest that their membebrs might be shrinking violets who have a very low threshold of intimidation.
Comrades have completely lost the plot if they think we should be “condemning” the GMB for creating a frameowk where it is easier for GMB members to respect picket lines, just becasue the GMB has the common sense not to openly flout the law.
Comment by Andy Newman — 15 July, 2008 @ 11:20 am
Oh no. I’ve given Andy left cover.
(joke!).
Comment by johng — 15 July, 2008 @ 11:31 am
Point being though that, if workers often find a way of getting around these things (and with these disputes likely to become a feature of the scene its useful to know how), its also true that its much better if union leaderships find more principled ways of getting round it as a number of examples above suggest that they have. Its not the late 1980s anymore, and the tensions which are leading to union leaderships with a rotten record to advocate solidarity in a slightly less mealy mouthed way (some of the tensions above) its not outoforder to prefer the less to the more mealy mouthed. We have to deal with the law but we shouldn’t naturalise it. I mean its bizarre nonsense really.
Comment by johng — 15 July, 2008 @ 11:45 am
John
There is a massive difference between the GMB and NUJ (see #12 above) in terms of local government. Firstly the NUJ must have a miniscule number of members affected, the GMB has tens of thousands: secondly the council won’t really care if some press releases aren’t written, they do care if the bins aren’t collected and the recycling centres are shut.
So Jeremy Dear can pretty much say what he wants, the GMB cannot. And it would be foolish and irresponsible to put ourselves outside the law.
It all comes down to what organisation people have on the ground, and as you say what tactical use they make of the word “intimidation”. People are not going to discuss on a blog what private advice GMB officers may have given to shop stewards.
Comment by Andy Newman — 15 July, 2008 @ 11:57 am
ok fair enough, i have no desire to go head to head with the GMB over a form of words.
Comment by johng — 15 July, 2008 @ 11:58 am
“it would be foolish and irresponsible to put ourselves outside the law.”
this is bollocks Andy. The GMB should ask members to respect picket lines.. its called solidarity and yes it makes organised workers stronger. It really is a sign of the times that Andy seems to think it is really out of order for a union general sec to ask his members to support other workers. Andy, is this the RR position now, Trade Unions should not break the law!!! suppine as usual
Comment by ll — 15 July, 2008 @ 1:11 pm
by the way
the tanker drivers..yep they broke the law, there was solidarity from othe drivers and companies……..no legal action taken and a win hands down. Now if andy had his way.. another great defeat, when will you ever learn Andy.
Comment by ll — 15 July, 2008 @ 1:13 pm
“Its not the late 1980s anymore” - isn’t the problem, though, that the level of solidarity is far less now than it was then?
Comment by Nas — 15 July, 2008 @ 1:19 pm
ll - can you please tell us which National Executive members of the SWP in the NUT or Unison or Unite have openly told NUT members not to cross picket lines. Can you tell us which SWP office holders in post office have openly called for solidarity action or for walking out without a ballot? The truth is that they have worked around the law and have generally been very careful not to give management and the courts a clearcut case against particular individuals. So less of the bluster. Does it not occur to you when you write that the tanker drivers received “solidarity from… companies” that matters are not fitting neatly into your pattern of an ever militant rank and file coming up against an ever treacherous trade union leadership?
Comment by Nas — 15 July, 2008 @ 1:25 pm
I don’t think thats straightfowardly the case Nas. The situation is different in all sorts of ways. One of the differences being that we’re entering a period where for the first time since the 1970s we’re being told that we have to ‘tighten our belts’ (not the first time we’ve had to tighten our belts mind you, but that these old 1970s government and media slogans are now openly being espoused). The pattern of crisis and recession everyone is now talking about creates peculiar pressures for both unions and government. In the late 1980s you saw a series of disputes breaking out around a much more incohate set of factors to do with a small revival in confidence as the political fortunes of the Tories dipped (thats at least how I remember it). Today under a Labour government desperately trying to hold the line on pay settlements, and politically in free fall, I think the pressures on trade union members, leaders and government are much more severe. Hence the re-emergence of a rhetoric of solidarity in some unions at the same time as they seek to cut the legs of some of their own militants. Everything seems sharper.
Comment by johng — 15 July, 2008 @ 1:34 pm
against an ever treacherous trade union leadership?
There’s nothing treacherous about the leadership - to be traitors they would need to be workers.
Many of them are scumbags, Dave Prentis would be far more useful as animal feed, but traitors they are not.
Comment by Jill St Custard — 15 July, 2008 @ 1:57 pm
I think for all that, johng, you’ve missed the point, which was a very limited one: The levels of action and solidarity were far higher in the late 1980s into the 1990s than they are now. Far higher. Put to one side timeless vulgar Marxist assertions about the economic situation “sharpening things”. Instead, look at the facts. The number of strike days in the late 80s and early 90s was much higher than today. There were more all out strikes. There were more strikes of three or more days duration rather than one. Collections for striking workers were more common than they are now, so were rallies of strikers. Crucially, there were a number of victories.
You talk about a “rhetoric of solidarity” today - but rhetorical is exactly the problem. Oh - and the “small revival of confidence” as you put it, was in fact the moment when the movement against the poll tax did for Thatcher. The SWP was late in cottoning on to that (not a sectarian point, but important for what follows) largely, IMO, because you saw community action, which was taking place, as subordinated to the demand for workplace action, which wasn’t. To be honest, in my view not just the SWP, but others are making the same mistakes today in exaggerating workplace organisation and struggles, and counterposing them to other forms.
Comment by Nas — 15 July, 2008 @ 2:10 pm
Incidently its never been the case that the SWP has understood the relationship between the rank and file and trade union leaders as simply one of treachery versus militancy. This tends to be more the property of orthodox trotskyists obsessed with the problem of leadership. There are periods where the bureacracy is to the left of its membership, and during the 1980s militants across Europe sought to utilize bureacratic mass strikes to raise the level of confidence and combativity within the rank and file. The Trade Union Bureacracy needs a certain level of militancy in order to be able to bargain with employers, but see’s striking bargains as its central purpose (and so will also seek to turn off militancy when its fulfilled its purpose). Confronted by a serious social crisis which threatens business as usual it will often panic and behave in contradictory ways. Of course individuals may be exceptions to this rule.
Duncan Halla’s review of Cliff and Gluckstein’s ‘Marxism and the Trade Unions’ provides a succint summary:
http://www.marxists.org/archive/hallas/works/1986/04/notmyth.htm
Comment by johng — 15 July, 2008 @ 2:13 pm
“a Labour government desperately trying to hold the line on pay settlements” - again, johng. Is there any evidence that the government is desperate over holding down pay? I can’t honestly see it. It is desperate in the entire political field, but in relation to trade union struggle? Of course that can change. Price rises are already having a big political effect and that might be manifested in serious moves to push up pay. But at the moment, I can’t see why the governemnt shouldn’t just ignore the two day council strike and rely on it fizzling out. On the political front, things are far more dire for Gordon Brown. But from what the SWP leadership appear to be saying, it is no longer the field of politics, but the field of workplace battles that is central. I can understand the intra-SWP reasons for saying this (there’s no need for us to rehearse the arguments) but I honestly cannot see any evidence in British society for that approach.
Comment by Nas — 15 July, 2008 @ 2:19 pm
johng: I accept that the SWP has had a more nuanced approach. But I was responding to ll, who, certainly does not have such an approach. If they are one of your members, they’re not a great advert. Meanwhile, the whole left could do with an honest discussion about the state of workplace and trade union organisation and struggle.
Comment by Nas — 15 July, 2008 @ 2:22 pm
Didnt Rees try that with the fighting union con!
where did that get us all
Comment by Anonymous — 15 July, 2008 @ 2:28 pm
The SWP was certainly mistaken in cottoning on much too late to the dramatic significance of the movement against the poll tax, and indeed suffered as a consequence. Its also true that during the public sector strikes of that year, in retrospect, we over-estimated their significance (although it might be argued that one should always throw oneself into large scale industrial action of this kind). It is quite likely that the (initial) underestimation of the significance of the poll tax revolt was tied into a belief that political crisis when it came would reproduce what was for a generation of militants, the formative experiance of the industrial militancy of the 1970s. All this I would grant.
However it would be a serious mistake, in my view, to believe that because the last time there was a political revival it did not find any reflection in sustained trade union militancy, after the most sustained period of working class defeat in modern British history (the Thatcher years), that this will be neccessarily the case today. Of course its true that the language of class struggle was more familiar then (it was of course more recent). Its also true that collections for strikes were more common. But what kinds of strikes were these? Bitterly defensive set-piece confrontations, from British Steel to Warrington, the Miners Strike, through to Wapping, in which the most powerful sections of the working class were decisively defeated one after the other, in what were dubbed ’salami tactics’. Even if the language of class was more familiar even to younger workers, the direct experiance of these kinds of defeat created a momentum of helplessness and retreat all down the line, punctuated by the occassional attempt to stop the rout.
Importantly it was also the case that Thatcher did succede in restructuring British capitalism off the back of this, and was able to provide a measure of economic stability inherited by Blair, which is now disintergrating under Brown. Arguments against ‘crisis mongering’ have their place, but in a situation were a government has visibly lost hegenomy over economic questions, a hegenomy which was vital to sustaining its electoral project, its foolish to dismiss the importance of these shifts. Despite the economic dislocations of the Major years around housing etc, Inflation was not becoming a major issue, and nor were trade unions being expected to police their members to avoid recession.
That is the situation today. Its already here today, which is why we’re seeing a set of public sector strikes and possibly more on the way. Much of the argument suggesting that class struggle politics were dead rested not only on the shattering of patterns of solidarity, but relative economic stability, bolstered by the promises of consumer capitalism (you can read this kind of boosterism on all sides during the Thatcher years and after). If we are in fact entering a period where this all changes all bets are off. And clearly both leaders of industry, the government, and many of the trade union leaders believe this is the case. This has not been true since the 1970s.
Comment by johng — 15 July, 2008 @ 2:32 pm
In terms of evidence one can just look to the repeated statements on the issue, the feverish speculation about Labour’s new problems with funding etc, all of which have the question of the unions at their centre. This does strike me as a real shift. The crisis of Brown’s legitimacy politically is closely tied to the loss of confidence in his ability to manage the economy. It was this (never of course in reality the product of any of his marvelous schemes but the product of a more global conjuncture) that provided the glue which held togeather the Blair project, and allowed it to weather the political shocks of the war. Perhaps we’re reading and watching different media, but this does seem to be a decisive shift.
Comment by johng — 15 July, 2008 @ 2:41 pm
Johng - you’re still missing the point, and confusing periods. The latest of the big battles you mention, Wapping, was over by 1987, ie the beginning of the late 80s which is what we were discussing. So let’s discuss the battles that took place in the late 80s into the 90s. They include the local government dispute which built up to three a three day strike during which both the London Underground and London busses were one strike on the same day. They include wildcat walkouts at carplants. They include indefinite action in parts of the civil service. The density of trade union organsiation was much higher than now. The practice of solidarity was more deeply ingrained.
I’m not saying that there will be no reflection of the political crisis the government is embroiled in in workplace struggles. Who would be so rash to make such a prediction? What I’m saying is that the assessment of where things are is exaggerated, terribly exaggerated. Part of that exaggeration is due to an internally driven turn to industry by the SWP leadership rather than a one arising from a proper assessment.
I also think you are mystifying the picture and preventing meaningful comparisons. It’s true that the 1990 to 1992 did not see inlfation being a major issue and it’s also true, as the Marxist verity has it, that generalised inflation creates the *conditions* (but not necessarily the reality) of generalised confrontations (not necessarily strikes called by unions, by the way). But your implication that unions were therefore not being expected to police their members (because that’s really only what happens when unions are told they need to help avoid recession) is apolitical and wrong. The years 1990 to 1992 saw an immense effort to curtail union and other struggles - the poll tax in particular - by the Labour party and the union leadership in order to pursue a highly political objective, the election of a Labour govenment, which, the overwhelming wisdom was at the time, could come in only if Labour was seen to be moderate.
johng: I think the SWP characterisation of “80s bad for working class politics”, “90s better”, “noughties, the birth of new anti-capitalist radicalism which is filtering into class struggle” is just wrong. There might be big explosions of working class stuggle. But they are not happening now. The strike this week is not on the brink of some huge upswing. And, crucially, there is no reason to suppose that the form of struggle will be the official strike called by public sector trade union leaders. Exaggerating the impact of strikes and overly focusing on workplaces and industrial action at the expense of other arenas and politics is the bigger danger. I say that, because the far left as a whole has done that for the last quarter of a century.
Comment by Nas — 15 July, 2008 @ 2:55 pm
Of course there are political rows about the unions funding Labour. It poses the political question of who the unions should fund if not Labour. To which the answer is political. It’s not, “let’s go on strike alongside the PCS”. In other words, it requires systematic engagement in the field that the SWP leadership has now deprioritised.
When you say a real shift, what do you mean? Shift from what to what? The issue, as framed by you, was the shift from a political crisis confronting this government to it being manifested in *industrial action* not in further political confrontations such as unions withholding money. My point is exactly that the main arena of confrontation is political.
Comment by Nas — 15 July, 2008 @ 3:00 pm
Well on a number of things we just disagree. I happen to think the understanding you criticise is broadly correct. There was a revival of militancy in the late 1980s which I stated petered out. It turned out to be a false dawn. But the political commotions around the poll tax revolt were real enough, as were the beginnings of a breakdown in the concensus around neo-liberalism in the second half of that decade. The activism around this fed into the anti-war movement on a global scale. The difference between the situation in the 1980s and the situation today is best summed up by the experiance of the Sarkozy government. Many predicted that this would issue in a return of Thatcherism (or in the French case its instantiation). Nothing like that happened or is indeed likely to happen. For the simple reason that the crisis we are facing today is largely the product of the success of the previous restructuring. The ruling class is no longer confident about a strategy which has been tried and found wanting. Hence what some establishment commentators have called the absence of ‘big ideas’(the equivilant of the shift from Keynsian to Monertarist ideology perhaps).
I understand that you believe that the emphasis on these industrial battles is purely internally driven. The difficulty with this is not only that the economic situation has been on the radar of the SWP for quite some time, but that its not just the SWP who have noticed this. The shift from what to what, is a shift from a period of severe political crisis undergirded by economic stability, to the quite open speculation that economic stability is likely to disapear. Your quite right that there is no automacity around this, but wrong not to recognise that this shift is actually part of the political crisis you mention. A German academic called Habermas spoke of the way the apparent stability of modern capitalist states could be called into question by failing economic performance: given the way in which economic performance has fast become the sole language of legitimacy in modern mainstream politics (not an innovation of neo-liberalism on his view but of the welfare state, which neo-liberalism inherited).
The great stability of advanced capitalist democracies is premissed on the stability of the economy, in a way which rules out other sources of legitimacy. This is central to the crisis currently facing the Brown government, and given the absence of alternative sources of legitimacy, and the lack of any real control political parties have over economic performance, this is potentially quite serious. When you have programs on Newsnight in which economists and captains of industry try to explain that whilst wage demands are understandable they will produce economic catastrophe, we are no longer simply discussing economics but politics. Of course its true that there was policing of unions for electoral ends (lest I be misunderstood this is indeed a central part of the story of the 1980s, and some of the talk about ‘economism’ was itself part of that policing, were politics was understood purely in terms of either a Labour victory, or indeed any kind of electoral arrangement to get the Tories out, including alliances with the then SDP and Liberal Party).
The point is that this is not what is going on now. Its about the political survival of not just this government but future ones. The big debate in the trade union movement is likely to be about whether to rescue Brown or bury him. We should kick him while he’s weak in my view, as this will strengthen us whichever kind of government comes in next. Your right that this requires a political response, and right that the SWP is weakened by the mess up over Respect in this scenario. This was openly discussed at Marxism. Nobody argued that apolitical militancy was a solution, but it was recognised that we therefore face an uphill task in what is a very serious situation. Your just wrong to imagine that we think an electoral alternative is not a vital part of the struggle. Its just that we have to concede that for the time being things are very difficult for us on this front. Thats just the reality. That doesn’t mean making a virtue out of neccessity. But nor does it mean simply abstaining on the political questions that arise.
Comment by johng — 15 July, 2008 @ 3:32 pm
One small point. When you say that ‘the left’ has been pursuing strategies like this for three decades your just wrong. Its true that small far left organisations have been pursuing strategies like this for three decades, but the bulk of the left in Britain, until relatively recently, inside the Labour Party, have pursued politics much more akin to those you advocate. I’m always struck by how old fashioned the calls for a ‘new politics’ sound. They’ve been the dominant politics amongst the better sections of the Labour left and the Trade Union bureacracy for the best part of a couple of decades. This is perhaps, ‘bending the stick’ a bit, but its worth considering. The only novelty is that its now being argued in a situation where such politics can no longer find a comfortable home in the Labour Party. Obviously this horrible split has created tensions but I have no problems with working with people who hold such politics (and indeed for most of the last five years saw the possibility of working with such people as a great opportunity). But these politics are not in any real sense novel. SWP members in the early eighties cut their teeth (admittedly sometimes in an overly sectarian way during this period) against the grain of these type of politics. The currents around Bennism and beyond the fragments etc. As I’ve often indicated the sudden re-appearence of the more right wing version of this kind of politics around revamped versions of Marxism Today, have been a bit disorientating. But I’m unsure, off the blogs, how real this tendency is. Of course it never went away in sections of the trade union bureacracy.
Comment by johng — 15 July, 2008 @ 3:53 pm
John
None of that seems to be informed by any appreciation of the actual debates going on in the actually existing unions. it is all utterly abstract.
Comment by Andy Newman — 15 July, 2008 @ 3:58 pm
JOhn G: “The only novelty is that its now being argued in a situation where such politics can no longer find a comfortable home in the Labour Party.”
The penny finally drops for John G?
the political space opening up is the area of left social democracy that has been vacated by the Labour party. that is where we need to pitch our tent.
Comment by Andy Newman — 15 July, 2008 @ 4:00 pm
johng: I’m sorry, but can you not just engage with the facts about the state of working class struggle and organisation in Britain. The flight to generalities - which are in fact banal journalistic commonplaces - such as Sarkozy not being like Thatcher or the absence of “big ideas”. The level of industrial struggle is extemely low in Britain (don’t go generalising on a European or global scale, Greece is not Britain). The unions don’t have to bury Brown, Brown is buried and his interring has had nothing to do with trade union action. I know the latest SWP mantra is “don’t rally round Brown”, but what does this actually mean? Who is rallying around Brown? Is Mark Serwotka rallying around Brown? No. But his union is losing ground in every single industrial confrontation. The fundamental reason why there is not an explosion of action over pay is not that trade union leaders have refused to stop funding the Brown government. For all the words you expend the “shift” that you maintain is so important amounts to nothing other than the fact that there is a further factor of economic uncertainty. That’s not news. And it doesn’t do to invest it with the power to call into question the legitimacy of this and future governments. Isn’t its effect better understood in Britain as leading to most people now believing that the Tories and not Labour would be better at running the economy. It’s more mundane, I know. But it has the virtue of proceding from what mass consciousness is rather than from what we would like it to be.
The problem with the perspective you and the SWP have adopted is not that the things you describe are not possibilities. They are. It’s that it is one dimensional and truncates events. And they are not the more likely possibilities. (Hence, in my view, the SWP refusal to engage in a discussion about the actual level of working class struggle and strength as opposed to what has become a hallmark of SWP analysis over the last decade - never mind the width, feel the quality: never mind the actual numbers in unions, or numbers of strikes, or numbers of stewards, or anything else that is measurable; look instead at the mood, the underlying ebb and flow of the global crisis of legitimacy, the anger, the anecdote… all amplified in the echo chamber of the SWP’s internal life.)
Put bluntly, the SWP’s perspective has hopelessly exaggerated the strength of the working class movement and the left. The relative weight of left and right wing forces was tested in the London elections. We know the result. The response from the SWP is more exaggeration. Your own contribution talks of the issue being “the political survival of not just this government but future ones”. What does this mean? It smacks of catastrophism.
The big debate in the trade union movement is actually whether unions can be relevant and can regain even some of the social weight they have lost. That’s the actual debate, not the fantasy debate some of us might like there to be.
Lastly, to clear up a couple of rhetorical errors of yours. I didn’t say the SWP turn to industry was purely internally driven. Merely that it was largely so and that the turn could not be justified on the basis of an objective assessment of working class struggle and organisation. You’ve given no objective assessment, just phrases from the leadership of the kind that attend most turns in most left wing organisations. Nor did I say that the SWP believed that an electoral alternative is not a vital part of the struggle. I merely said, accurately, that you have deprioritised it. I must say, if you thought it was that vital, your leaders ought to have done a better job of preserving the one you were in.
For, to return to the 48 hour strike this week. It will pose for some people the question of who to look to for political representation, who to vote for. Respect is in a position to make a modest contribution to the answer. Respect will be as supportive of the strike as the SWP. It has elected representatives who have already spoken out in support of the strike and, crucially, the underlying political justification for it. In East London Respect is part of trying to bring together unions and communities around the issues of food and fuel price rises. None of this is remotely right wing. And to be clear, all this is happening at exactly the moment Respect sets out its plans for what is likely to be the general election in 2010.
Comment by Nas — 15 July, 2008 @ 4:09 pm
“For all the words you expend the “shift” that you maintain is so important amounts to nothing other than the fact that there is a further factor of economic uncertainty. That’s not news.”
Probably Nas this is where we disagree. As to your accusations of class struggle and political boosterism, I just disagree on the basis of experiance. At Marxism this was not at all the tone. If my own comments contradict this then that is my fault not the SWP’s.
In terms of Andy’s intervention: The penny dropped a long time ago. With the small proviso that I’m not a left social democrat. Whaddya, Whaddya. I’m a swoppie.
One of my difficulties with the current bitternesses is that in normal circumstances, and even in these abnormal circumstances, I have zero problems with working with people who are. And truth be told, outside of the context of the arguments about respect, i don’t find that most left social democrats have a problem in everyday contexts working with me.
The distance between the blogs and the everyday is sharpest here.
Comment by johng — 15 July, 2008 @ 4:19 pm
Oh and yes, probably at the moment you do find yourself better placed electorally. I never denied this, and indeed pointed out that our weakness here is a real problem for us (openly acknowledged at Marxism). Obviously though the fact that you don’t read my ramblings in detail is wholly understandable (I don’t!).
Having said that, I do have some real problems about the kinds of conclusions your lot draw from this (which I suspect is not the perogative only of SWP members). But I’m not greatly excercised by it. My honest opinion about your project is good luck to you. I don’t happen to think its the way foward, but as Kevin Ovendon suggested people like me should, I regard your lot in the same way as I’d regard any left independent operation. With a small addition of bitterness natch.
But I don’t really think its the way foward. And that should be about it. The fact that there is a lot of personalised bitterness notwithstanding. I think we should all try and overcome that dimension rather then wallowing in it. Shit happens, as they say.
Comment by johng — 15 July, 2008 @ 4:28 pm
johng: Anybody who had anything to do with the SWP last summer knows exactly the level of exaggeration of industrial matters. There was endless exaggeration about the significance of the CWU dispute. If you want to collapse all your claims and perspectives into trying to maintain that it all revolves around understanding the fully import of the current economic uncertainty, fine. I have to say that fits the awful charicature of the far left. As for you working with what you call left social democrats. Fine. The issue for your party is whether you collectively will be trusted not to behave like you did this time last year in response to a minor argument in Respect. To give you one example: the people denounced as organising a “sectarian” rally for Ken Livingstone. Do you think they are enamoured of the SWP? If the SWP wants to try to reestablish working relations, it would be a good idea to recognise that the mishandling of the debate in Respect led to a series of appalling errors. From your tone, and that of many other SWP members, there appears to be a collective sigh of relief that the whole Respect experience is over. If so, it would be as well to say so. I’m sure most people in Respect would accept that.
Meanwhile, experience will show whether which perspective is more grounded in reality. I can write the Socialist Worker reports of the two day strike this week in advance, however, including taking ignorant comments by mainstream journalists about “the biggest strike since the 1970s” or somesuch and echoing them, forgetting that it’s only a couple of years ago that you were hailing a bigger strike as the biggest strike since the 1970s. It’s the carelessness with regard to the facts that undermines even the correct insights the SWP makes. And it’s not helped by the fact that the number of people in the movement whose views you take seriously is terribly small.
Instead of you saying what you think will be the big debate in the trade unions, how about talking to a large and truly representative section of trade unionists, officials and others, and not just the hardest of the hard left. It’s easily done. But what it reveals will, I suspect, not make comfortable reading for those trying to promote the SWP line.
Lastly, I know it’s one of your themes to talk about how confrontational blog discussions are. Well, I’m afraid that is also not news. But you shouldn’t imagine that the trade unions are some ocean of civility in which no one calls out the SWP on claims and positions which they think are damaging.
Comment by Nas — 15 July, 2008 @ 4:39 pm
these comments seem to have gone a long way away from the original post [which was about green support for the trade unions - and should surely be supported]
Comment by john nic — 15 July, 2008 @ 4:45 pm
well it is good to see this from the Greens, but it was also good to see Derek Wall being open about some of the problems involved. As to Nas: you know worst things happen at sea mate. Lighten up.
Comment by johng — 15 July, 2008 @ 4:50 pm
johng: oh dear. Here was I thinking that you might be able engage in a sensible discussion about the state of the working class movement in Britain. What happens? You get disagreed with and out comes a call to lighten up. Instead of silly windups, maybe you should serious up. Better still, get out more and listen to wider voices in the working class movement.
john nic: it’s true the discussion has gone a long way from the post about Green councillors not crossing picket lines. Green councillors should not cross picket lines. Beyond that, I’m not sure there’s much discussion to be had about that issue. There is, however, a lot of room for discussion on the left about whether tomorrow’s strike is part of a “shift” in the overall political picture in Britain. I think that’s a worthwhile discussion and not one so far removed from the original post to make it incongruous to have here.
Comment by Nas — 15 July, 2008 @ 5:07 pm
I think Nas, that for most people, there was a surfeit of ’serioused up’ contributions from me for one afternoon. There is a difference between the current situation objectively faced by most activists (very serious) and the continued bitterness of this internecine warfare (not very serious). That was the central point. It would benefit everyone to be aware of the difference whether on your side or on mine.
Comment by johng — 15 July, 2008 @ 5:25 pm
One point Nas made were I was in error. I should have said the big debate on the left in the trade union movement, not the big debate in the trade union movement as a whole. Yes I think the left has to be a bit more modest and realistic about the audience it thinks its addressing.
Comment by johng — 15 July, 2008 @ 5:31 pm
But that doesn’t make any sense JOhn.
You said the debate shoudl be whether or not to ditch Brown. Now you say that you only meant the debate in the left of the unions. But surely the left in the unions never bought Brown in the first place?
Comment by Andy Newman — 15 July, 2008 @ 5:40 pm
Thats true Andy. But I think there will be a polarisation around this question. Just in the day to day. I’ve already come across it. I mean people are genuinely worried (understandably enough).
Comment by johng — 15 July, 2008 @ 5:45 pm
That’s right, Andy. Don’t forget that many Blair fans are for dumping Brown. What Johng and the SWP (if he representes them) are doing is setting up a false debatebetween themselves and others in a very small trade union left who are to be denoubced for “rallying round Brown” if they don’t follow the SWP lead, just as so many were denounced over the London elections. Meanwhile, there are real debates taking place. It’s truly astonishing that they find no expression in the SWP’s publications. Instead, they’ve (as have others like the SP) gone for the box marked Social Contract, and pulled out some verities from there. So the SWP can pretend it’s in heroic isoolation pretending it, and Mark Serwotka, are resisting the mythical pull to rally round Brown while, in reality, serious people on the left are trying to deal with the actual relations of political forces.
Comment by Nas — 15 July, 2008 @ 5:54 pm
Gosh is that what I’m doing Nas? You learn something every day.
Comment by johng — 15 July, 2008 @ 6:26 pm
Yes, johng, that’s my claim - that you are taking differences of emphasis in a small left and turning them into a line of division that doesn’t really exist, except in the SWP’s perspectives. Now, can you justify, with reference to real developments not assertions in Socialist Worker, the salience of this rally round Brown argument? I think all the evidence shows it’s peripheral to developments. Why’s the SWP right and how am I wrong?
Comment by Nas — 15 July, 2008 @ 6:40 pm
My experiances with ordinary members Nas. Thats all.
Comment by johng — 15 July, 2008 @ 6:50 pm
That’s not enough to support those claims, johng. My experience is that most “ordinary members” of trade unions, or, more widely, workers, are potically disengaged and uninterested in Brown’s survival. This isn’t 1977 with 30,000 CP-influenced stewards. Where is this rally round Brown argument articulated in print, in conferences, from leading trade unionists, officials and lay, in the course of which disputes, from which general secretary? It’s a myth. It’s not a feature of a coherent analysis.
Comment by Nas — 15 July, 2008 @ 6:57 pm
Its not a myth with people i speak to. who do you speak to?
Comment by johng — 15 July, 2008 @ 7:02 pm
Is Prentis saying we must rally round Brown? No. He’s uttering rhetoric about union funding for Labour. Do you think on any picket line tomorrow that there will be a clash between calling for more action and people saying we must rally round Brown? No. There’s likely to be a range of responses and discussions reflecting a limited strike in these circumstances. There won’t be a polarisation over Brown. The SWP is making this question an artificial polarisation, for the benefit of itself.
Comment by Nas — 15 July, 2008 @ 7:06 pm
johng: you have to do better than anecdotes. Where’s the evidence that the movement is polarising over the fate of Gordon Brown?
Comment by Nas — 15 July, 2008 @ 7:08 pm
I’m just gobsmacked. Are you actually claiming that you have’nt had a conversation with anyone worried about the prospect of the Tories coming back?
Comment by johng — 15 July, 2008 @ 7:17 pm
Don’t be silly, johng. Of course I’ve had such conversations. Rallying round Brown hasn’t featured. The question remains where’s the evidence for the claim that resistance to this government is being curtailed by the salience of a call to rally round Brown? Is that really a major reason why the NUT voted only for a one day strike?
Comment by Nas — 15 July, 2008 @ 7:32 pm
johng inventing reality again, there’s a surprise. Anymore witchhunts of the SWP in the last week Johng? Nobody’s rallying to Brown. He is the empitome of a Billy No-mates at the moment. Political poison to be associated with (who does that remind you of?) The left should be pushing their programme as the right are doing.
Comment by David Ellis — 15 July, 2008 @ 7:49 pm
David go back to sleep. Nas, you seem to be tilting at straw men. I suggested that this was likely to be an argument, and one of the reasons was the conversations I was having, which you are having as well. You are the one who elevated this into some kind of SWP conspiracy (which was actually a bit of a bizarre move). For what its worth I think you underestimate how big an argument this is likely to be, even amongst sections of the left. It is of course precisely an argument to be combatted.
Comment by johng — 15 July, 2008 @ 7:53 pm
johng: the actual debate in the unions and among Labour MPs seems to much more about whether and when to dump Brown. Rallying round Brown indeed.
Comment by Nas — 15 July, 2008 @ 7:56 pm
Can you for once, johng, back up your (and the SWP’s) prognostications about imminent major lines of division with reference to the actual labour movement, rather than a feeling (that happily coincides with the party line) arising from talking to a few people. Whatever happened to coming to a scientific view of reality (and please don’t be very silly and claim I don’t believe in giving any weight to anecdotes like yours)
Comment by Nas — 15 July, 2008 @ 8:05 pm
nas you can sometimes be a little ungracious and silly. but i’m sure your a nice person really.
Comment by johng — 15 July, 2008 @ 8:08 pm
johng: try dealing with the debate, please. I think the SWP claim that the movement is polarising over whether to “rally to Brown” is baloney. You don’t. Why? What are trade unionists saying and doing at every level that supports the SWP’s claim? Not ungracious, just asking for claims to be backed up. If they’re not you can’t complain if others on the left regard your claims as dogma.
Comment by Nas — 15 July, 2008 @ 8:20 pm
fine there nas. you invent the dogma, then ask other people to defend it. its a great method of debate. entertaining though.
Comment by johng — 15 July, 2008 @ 8:26 pm
In my area, there is an absolute faultline between those people who are breaking from Labour and those who are determined to minimise our influence. We’ve seen leaked emails instructing reps to not allow “outside forces” to influence pickets “for their own ends.” Last week, Dave Prentis told Mark Serwotka that they didn’t want to coordinate action because “the Tory councils are the enemy, not the goverment.” This is one of the key reasons why UNISON wanted Local Government out but not Health. By trotting out Local Government for a set-piece strike (with the threat of escalation), UNISON hopes to secure a slightly improved offer, a renogitation of the Health deal and as little long-term disruption as possible.
Anyone who thinks Prentis’ policy is anything other than to rally round Brown or whichever other Labour mug who’s got his job by the next election is spending far too much time reading off opinion polls.
Comment by Randy Newman — 15 July, 2008 @ 8:28 pm
more concerned that we get more than 20% of council workers actually out on strike over the next two days which will not be easy, were hardly been knocked down on the way to the exit
honesty comrades honesty and if that fails blame the leadership
Comment by Tom — 15 July, 2008 @ 8:34 pm
johng: you really aren’t seriou are you.
RN: accepting what you say at face value, where does the argument “rally round Brown” have any influence among people on strike tomorrow in persuading them, err, not to strike. Are you really also claiming that the pro-Brown Unison bureacracy, which is rallying to the dear leader, called tomorrow’s strike Because it wanted to, to embarrass the Tories when in fact the images of schools shut and perhaps bins not emptiedb will impact on, err, Brown and call forth comparisons with the Winter 0f Discontent? This isn’t an analysis - it’s making this up as you go along.
Comment by Nas — 15 July, 2008 @ 8:37 pm
Nas, perhaps I’m not, but your argument seems oblivious of very every day realities and how abstract arguments hook up the real world. There is also no contradiction between a union bureacracy calling strike action because it needs to defend its credibility with the same union bureacracy being pro-Brown. And its also true that such contradictory ideas are not restricted to union bureacracies (if they were they probably wouldn’t hold them). Not to understand this is a bit disturbing quite frankly. There is a whiff of monty python’s argument sketch in all this though, so I’m not that disturbed. I’m sure you wouldn’t argue like this with normal folk (ie not the hidious swp enemy).
Comment by johng — 15 July, 2008 @ 8:52 pm
Firtsly, I think it is hard to generalise.
The political dynamic in Unison is quite different from that in UNITE or the GMB. And it is different again in USDAW. let alone the unions that have brken from labour - FBY and RMT, or where the breaking from labour is a real debate, ike in the CWU.
But I don’t know what John G means really be a “rally around Brown argument”.
My limited experience - but talking to officers as welll as lay members - is that there is a great deal of concern that labour will lose the next election because of its right wing course, and therefore a tactical discussion about how to influence labour towards policies that will reward the core vote.
Now for Derek Simpson or dave Prentis winning a labour government may be more important than winning stuff for their members, but i can think of others who recognise that maintaining their membership in the current climate depends upon them having a reputation they are prepared for a ruck wiith management if necessary. “Rallying around brown” has no purchase with that.
Comment by Andy Newman — 15 July, 2008 @ 9:00 pm
Now I am completely confused what John is arguing:
John G says:
” There is also no contradiction between a union bureacracy calling strike action because it needs to defend its credibility with the same union bureacracy being pro-Brown. “
well duh. In the absence of any credible alternative, then what do you think the unions are going to do? If all you mean by “rally around Brown” is that the unions are going to work for a labour victory at the next election, welcome to planet earth.
But very few of the union leaderships are “pro-Brown” as such, the debate is over how a labour victory can be achieved, how much of a liability Brown is, how labour can be persuaded to adopt more pro-working class politics and what can be done generally to steer the ship away from the rocks.
The radical but pragmatic left should also share largely the same agenda in the unions. The key thing we shoudl be encouraging is for the unions to take an active role in politics in recognistion of the utter failure of the Labour Party to represent our members. Now that is a debate well worth encouraging, and is why I am adamantly opposed to disaffiliation
Comment by Andy Newman — 15 July, 2008 @ 9:20 pm
Exactly, Andy. This is the debate around Warwick 2 and has been for the last six months.
If it needs spelling out for johng, here it is: the argument “this is our government” was transmitted through very many conduits between 1975 and 1978. No one has presented any evidence that that argument is swaying people now. Rather, I think what’s swaying people is something more basic - the absence in living memory of any substantial victory by a group of workers or a trade union in a national dispute (the tanker drivers don’t count, they register only with already committed left wing activists, it’s not like 1978 when, only four years earlier the miners had destroyed the Heath government).
So, I think this drawing of battle lines between who is, to use johng’s phrase, prepared to kick Brown while he’s down (I mean please - line up behind the Tories, SNP and BNP) and those who are apparently “rallying to Brown” misses the point entirely. And verities about contradictory ideas in the trade union bureaucracy are no substitute for starting off from reality, and ending with it.
Warwich 2 is not about rallying round Brown. It is about trying to change direction, modestly. And because it is modest it will fail. This is the debate before what might well be a catastrophic result for Labour in Glasgow next week. These are the actual debates, johng. They don’t fit into the neat pattern of the SWP and those who work with it (Mark Serwotka) standing up to the goverment on the one hand and everyone else, from George Galloway through John Cruddas to, well, whoever you need to polemicise against next, collapsing into this mysterious primary physical force and “rallying around Brown”.
Lastly, johng, I’m sure you accept that RN’s intervention is of the kind of crude otho-Trot denunciation of union leaders which you said was not part of the SWP’s tradition.
Comment by Nas — 15 July, 2008 @ 9:30 pm
There are two issue up for discussion tomorrow. One is how this strike can be used to defend workers against the erosion of their living standards. The other is how the strike gives the opportunity to develop resistance to the anti-union laws. From both of these things is created the space for a discussion on political representation and it’s not something that Respect has raised as forcefully as it could have.
Comment by Liam — 15 July, 2008 @ 9:53 pm
Liam: that’s interesting. What do you think should have been done to raise it more forcefully?
Comment by Nas — 15 July, 2008 @ 9:55 pm
Nas #75: “Warwich 2 is not about rallying round Brown. It is about trying to change direction, modestly. And because it is modest it will fail.”
Well in a sense it will fail, because i) the Labour Party is too wedded to neo-liberalism to be changed; ii) even were that not the case, it would be hard to convince the parliamentary party that the risks of staying on course were greater than the risks of changing direction.
But in another sense it can only be a good thing, becasue the process of seeking to change the Labour party’s direction is a positive step for the unions in the direction of developing an independent political voice.
With regard to Liam’s point, I am not sure that Respect has sufficient weight to make any impact on the debate over the industrial action at the national level, though what our councillors do is important at a local level I guess.
Comment by Andy Newman — 15 July, 2008 @ 11:19 pm
Andy: I agree with that. I also had a look at the four pager Socialist Worker has produced for these strikes. There is not one word about developing an electoral alternative to New Labour, nor do we find any combatting of what we were told was fast becoming the central dividing line in the movement, the call to “rally round Brown”.
All there is is a piece about Labour being dependent on union money and the need to press union leaders to press the Labour Party to deliver some of the unions’ policies. It really seems that the SWP is adrift - floating from one thing to another and hoping that everyone else forgets what they were saying only yesterday. There is absolutely nothing in this Socialist Worker special to offer or argue for any concrete way forward.
Comment by Nas — 15 July, 2008 @ 11:36 pm
so the rr 4 pager is better then?
Comment by ll — 15 July, 2008 @ 11:56 pm
No ll, of course yours is bigger.
Comment by Nas — 16 July, 2008 @ 12:07 am
Sell the paper and blame the leadership
its a stock response
oh and cry sell out
I thought we had moved beyond this Comrades
but it easier than winning workers to socialism as presently they are looking to the Tories or had you not noticed (slight problem that)
Comment by Simon — 16 July, 2008 @ 7:30 am
Andy suggests (rightly) that there is considerable concern about the Tories getting in, and then Nas agree’s with him by arguing that there isn’t because of the absence of conduits. Its a bit confusing really.
Comment by johng — 16 July, 2008 @ 9:32 am
” because of the absence of conduits. Its a bit confusing really.”
JOhn, I have no idea what a conduit is, or what the absence of them might mean.
You really do waffle using the most opaque language.
Comment by Andy Newman — 16 July, 2008 @ 9:39 am
Its not my language Andy its Nas’s. Have a go at him not me.
Comment by johng — 16 July, 2008 @ 9:43 am
No John
Nas said something that made complete sense, that the argument during the 1970s that the Wilson/Callaghan government was “our government” was widely adopted throughout the labour movement, and thus disseminated through many different ways.
That argument makes complete sense, and has the merit of being true.
You are mischevioulsy playing dumb.
The argument that Brown’s government is “our government” is not generally part of the debate, this is not becasue of lack of mechanisms for that point of view to be argued or disseminated, it is because very few people in the union leaderships actually think that.
The real terms of the debate are about how the labour government can be shifted towards a more working class agenda, one piece of evidence for which was the widespread support for Jon Cruddas in the unions for Deputy Leader.
Comment by Andy Newman — 16 July, 2008 @ 10:02 am
“absence of conduits” - you really do make stuff up as you go along, johng. Not serious at all.
Comment by Nas — 16 July, 2008 @ 10:20 am
Nas used the word conduit. I didn’t. You accused me of using ‘opaque language’. As it happens it wasn’t the word that I didn’t understand or indeed his argument (which seemed to be based on the misapprehension that Labourism is not a force because there are not today CP activists telling workers that Labour is their government. The difference here is that the far left might be in a position to put a better argument then the old CP did, if they take these arguments seriously). Rather it was how his argument squared with your argument suggesting that there is indeed a lot of concern about the possibility of the Tories coming back, and that this indeed was the main debate. In any case the most striking thing about Nas’s argument is that he seems to want to downgrade the political significance of both the economic situation and the public sector strikes, purely because the SWP think they are important, as well as, possibly, because RR is not in a position to intervene in a serious way in this arena. This is, I think, a bit silly of him.
Comment by johng — 16 July, 2008 @ 10:23 am
johng: take is slowly - I used the word conduit. Yes. Nowhere did I talk about “an absence of counduits”. You just made that up. The rest of your waffle is just that. Can you at least have the good grace to accept that you imposed what you wanted to see on the words you saw rather than reading them - including imposing a misapprehension which I don’t happen to have. And throwing in another “seems to” and accusing someone of downgrading something just because the SWP is keen on it - for the time being - is just more of your, frankly dishonest, MO. What I actually wrote was that the significance of the council strike today is precisely the political question it raises.
Comment by Nas — 16 July, 2008 @ 10:30 am
JOhn
Your arguments are so abstract that it leads you into error all the time. You clearly spend very little time talking to people in the moovement who are outside the far left bubble - trade unions officials or non-political trade union lay activists.
“Labourism” is a force, in the sense that the trade unions and probably a majority of working class voters still want a Labour government. The paradox though is that the current government is labour in name only. That is what is driving the debate in the unions - and what Warwick 2 is about, what the partial alignment around jon Cruddas in the DL election was about. So there is no “rallying around Brown”, there is instead an awakening debate in the movement about how the crisis of working class representation could be solved. this is mediated by the awareness that the Tories winning the elections would be a worse context for the unions, and hence they will work to get Brown reelected.
The likelihood of as you put it “the far left might be in a position to put a better argument then the old CP did” is pretty remote if you don’t even understand what the basic nature of the debate in the movement is!
The strikes are significant in the sense that tens of thousands of workers are taking action and posing a political challenge to the government over pay - but the dynamic of these strikes in not characterised by militancy, and although they are across the public sector they remain sectional - and I don’t foresee that being overcome.
With regard to the economic downturn, it is a serious situation, but it is not leading to a left radicalisation , it is leading to a revival of conservatism on the basis that the Tories can offer good governence, and may increase alieanation of the white working class further attracting some to the BNP. This is the more likely scenario we will be working in.
Comment by Andy Newman — 16 July, 2008 @ 10:42 am
“With regard to the economic downturn, it is a serious situation, but it is not leading to a left radicalisation , it is leading to a revival of conservatism on the basis that the Tories can offer good governence, and may increase alieanation of the white working class further attracting some to the BNP. This is the more likely scenario we will be working in.”
Andy: if this is correct it does not draw much hope for left of labour project. Looks on the basis of your view RR is a dead duck…
Comment by ll — 16 July, 2008 @ 10:49 am
Very strange. I didn’t impose anything, and nor did I make any of the claims I’m alleged to have made. As to trying to work out what your talking about Nas, what else is anyone supposed to do?
Comment by johng — 16 July, 2008 @ 11:04 am
Playing dumb again, johng. I think people can see that what I wrote is not what you say I wrote. And they can also see that when you are given the opportunity to correct something you arrogantly refuse to do so. Well, grab your Socialist Workers and head for the nearest picket line to combat the pull to rally round Brown (thing is, your paper is silent on this apparently central argument - not for the first time johng you’ve been left up a gumtree as your leaders bend the stick in another direction). If I were you, I’d stay there. It can’t be long before it’s bent back.
Comment by Nas — 16 July, 2008 @ 11:11 am
hang on hang on Nas. Andy for whatever reason decided to accuse me of using opaque language. He clearly didn’t see that you had used the word ‘conduit’. I pointed out that it was not me who had used the word, but you. Thats it. I don’t think there is a problem with using the word conduit, Andy does (or did before he realised that it was not me but you that had used it). All the rest is just absurd nitpicking.
Comment by johng — 16 July, 2008 @ 12:01 pm
JOhn
Nas was clear
you were opaque
Nas using the word conduit in a concrete and understandable context is not the same as your marxo-babble about “absence of conduits ” and perpetual faux-bewilderment
Comment by Andy Newman — 16 July, 2008 @ 12:13 pm
“the rest is just absurd nipicking” - this is your waffle for calling you out on making up what others are saying. Johng, you are such a fool.
Comment by Nas — 16 July, 2008 @ 12:22 pm
“which seemed to be based on the misapprehension that Labourism is not a force because there are not today CP activists telling workers that Labour is their government”
This is you at your most annoying and dishonest, John. Are you supposed to be a revolutionary activist? If so, argue in an honest way.
Nas used the fact that there are not tens of thousands of CP-influenced people in the movement as a way of saying the actual levels of influence on the ground are different, that the material circumstances of the far left are different, not that Labourism isn’t a force in the union movement.
What you have done is turned his argument into something ridiculous.
You do it all the time. It’s a totally dishonest and irritating form of argument, cos it means you are deliberately trying to mischaracterise your opponent’s views both to wider readers and in the argument itself.
Argue with what people say, not what you imagine they might mean.
And people are right - you consistently argue abstractions, without relating to anything that’s actually happening in the real world.
Comment by tonyc — 16 July, 2008 @ 12:26 pm
yes nas did use the word clearly and it was his clear use I was referring to. You on the other hand stated that you had no idea what a conduit was so its hard to work out how you could have recognised his clear use of it. You only said this because you thought I’d used the word, and have tried to shift the fascinating argument about what is and what is not opaque language, since you discovered it was Nas who used it.
He stated that the absence of communist party members arguing that a Labour government is our government meant that there was no evidence that we would face a similar argument. And used the word ‘conduit’ to describe the activities of those Communist Party members at that time. Whilst the absence of such a conduit is an important difference, I disagree with him that this means the argument does not exist.
And pointed out that you had stated that the argument does exist.
Out of a rather silly polemical excess on your part you’ve manufactured an entire argument. We surely have better things to discuss, and its a reminder that this kind of atmosphere is hardly helpful for anyone.
Comment by johng — 16 July, 2008 @ 12:28 pm
#41 “look instead at the mood”
The SWP declared a “new mood” in 1988, and I believe a “new militancy” in 1989. So maybe their style of political thinking hasn’t changed that much, whether you agree with it or not.
#67 “I think the SWP claim that the movement is polarising over whether to “rally to Brown” is baloney.”
In the absence of evidence that union leaders are trying to knife Brown, it seems reasonable to suppose a link between fear of the Tories and rallying round Brown.
I think a conduit is a passageway through which something can travel,like a pipe. It seems like an easy word to pick up from the context. Try looking at a dictionary?
Comment by skidmarx — 16 July, 2008 @ 12:34 pm
John - stop trolling. You wrote:
“Andy suggests (rightly) that there is considerable concern about the Tories getting in, and then Nas agree’s with him by arguing that there isn’t because of the absence of conduits. Its a bit confusing really.”
Nas said: “If it needs spelling out for johng, here it is: the argument “this is our government” was transmitted through very many conduits between 1975 and 1978. No one has presented any evidence that that argument is swaying people now”
Nas clearly was emphasising the absense of the argument that it was “our government” not the means by which such arguments could be disseminated. You have completely misunderstood.
So your ludicrous emphasis on the “absence of conduits” elevated the use of the word to signify something important, whereas Nas was using it in passing.
in so doing you have diverted a discussion abouot substance into a discussio n about words, becasye you are incapable of discussing politics using real world evidence and facts, for you it is all based upon moods, and appearances backed up by anecdotes.
Comment by Andy Newman — 16 July, 2008 @ 12:38 pm
“it seems reasonable to suppose” - better to look at what’s happening rather than suppose.
johng: can you not, ever, accept that you have got something wrong? Still, got to stop the rallying round Brown that is engulfing the trade union movement, which is, in fact, discussing how to change Labour’s course to the left.
Comment by Nas — 16 July, 2008 @ 12:39 pm
lord help us.
Comment by johng — 16 July, 2008 @ 12:41 pm
jI’ve just got back from a half hearted UNISON picket line at a School in Bromsgrove
Worcestershire…[and thankfully their was no sign of any ‘royal’ family. However, several UNISON members decided to act in an ‘autocratic’ fashion which I think needs to be discussed.
Despite the fact that the picket was at the rear of the school [the staff car park]
a group of about 20 mainly ‘bad boys’ who are basically ‘failed’ by the school came round nervously and tentatively… Basically they wanted to support the picket and were testing the water. I handed one of the lads a “Offical Picket” sign and offered to take a photo in a light hearted fashion… his face started to beam with a great smile at this moment of ‘inclusion’ ‘recognition’ or whatever when the UNISON rep literally shouted “NO! We don’t want the kids involved”…. ‘especially not them’.
It saddens me deeply, that our schools are tragically continuing to label and engage in heartless ’Skinnerist’ behavioural modification regimes primarily aimed at boys that seem to further undermine their self esteem and drive them onto the margins of the system.
This group of working class lads most of them the product of re combined families with problematic or non exsistent relationships with biological fathers…. relationships with mothers who have exposed them too or committed acts of violence against them… who have been left to their own devises since a very young age… These lads tentatively came towards a group of ‘Strikers’ in the hope that there might be some “common ground” and a chance of solidarity against a system that seeks to crush their spirit and individuality….
and they were rejected and excluded yet again.
This group of lads are all ‘at risk of offending’ some of them it is ‘rumoured’ are already involved in ‘gangs’ and ‘knife crime’…. interestingly enough the ‘rumours’ are completely unsubstanciated by any evidence.
In my minds eye I imagine another scenario where the overwhelmingly female picket line welcomes the spontaneous act solidarity from the male school students where a discussion about the reality of the world of ‘work’ is initiated and where these lads who have no sense of purpose or hope are give a taste of a future of solidarity in struggle for a fairer more just society.
School Students should be encouraged to organise and to express their feelings and if they want to show support for industrial action by school support staff those staff should welcome them with open arms. Surely this is an issue of ‘democratic rights’ or are ‘democratic rights’ the exclusive preserve of those over the age of 18 years??
One of the saddest things about this group of lads who wanted to join the strike… is that they have all been encouraged by their overwhelmingly female ‘educators’ [both qualified teaching staff and Teaching Assistants and ‘Behavioural Support’ workers to opt out of any academic timetables and literally ‘pushed’ [ie cajolled, manipulated] into ‘construction courses’ where they are given safety boots and farmed out as ‘labourers’ to local building firms when there is no work they are ‘timetabled’ to stay at home [usually alone] killing people on Xbox or Playstation.
Some of them are enthusiastic about the prospect of actually ‘building homes’ especially as most of them live in overcrowded ‘homes’ themselves. However, the sad reality of the currrent recession is that the chances of the these lads actually getting ‘construction’ jobs in the private sector is zero. Some of them express the desire to join the ‘Army’….I have tried to point out that Afganistan is not like ‘call of duty’ on the X Box and that when you are shot you actually do die! [perhaps this desire to ‘fight’ is not ‘reactionary’ but a natural reaction to being subjected to injustice?]
Sisters and bothers! Do not be suprised if lads like those who were rejected by a small and rather pointless picket line at a Bromsgrove School end up stabbing someone or joining the BNP. Our ‘movement’ is to a large extent complict in the marginalisation of these lads… ‘Feminism’ in the way it has been distorted by a triumphant imperialism views lads like those at a Bromsgrove school as ’scum’…. If you treat people like scum don’t be suprised if they treat you like scum in return.
Stop bullying our kids.
johng #102 You called and I answered…..
Comment by charlotte badger — 16 July, 2008 @ 12:44 pm
I am really sorry that this happended, and I am sure their are ways that the strikers could have been more sympathetic…so its an important issue to raise.
In slight defence I would say that as a result of anti TU laws not only are the pickets leggaly responsible for the actions of anyone on the picket line, they also have to keep within the guidance which states only six pickets
I see no reason why this could not have been explained to the youth
One other factor has been that when school children have joined picket lines the media have had a go at the unions (usually NUT)
Comment by Simon — 16 July, 2008 @ 12:59 pm
just back from my local UNISON/UNITE picket line at the Town Hall,very very patchy response if honest, having said that maybe 1 in 5 were temp staff
I think the pickets were correct in keeping calm and trying to explain the pay situation…but very few if any turned back..I guess those who were on strike stayed at home
Not even all the unions stewards on the picket lines
they werent blaming Brown, the Tory council, the union leadership nationally or locally….but simply could not afford to go on strike or worryingly non union
We have obviously failed to get to the heart of the matter unlike the Pensions dispute two years ago
honesty is rquired
Comment by Tim — 16 July, 2008 @ 1:07 pm
My experience was different from Tim’s - i visted the picket line at Barnstaple Civic Centre this morning and there were 20 pickets all upbeat. Only 3 UNISON members went in but these were ‘exempt’ members who all supported the strike. There were 40+ pickets at the council works unit in another part of Barnstaple, 2 schools and the town library closed.
Comment by Doug — 16 July, 2008 @ 2:52 pm
I’m at Worcestershire County Hall, hardly the hotbed of radicalism, and I would guess that less than a quarter of the staff are in. There was only one non-intimidating picket outside the main entrance though.
It’s just a shame that there is no co-ordinated action across the whole public sector.
(I’m not scabbing BTW - I work for the NHS and am temporarily located in the council building.)
Comment by Cameron Russell — 16 July, 2008 @ 3:23 pm
Clearly the revolution is going to start in North Devon.
Comment by Doug — 16 July, 2008 @ 4:14 pm
Charlotte, your story is very instructive not just in itself but because I think it points to something wider.
These strikes are tightly controlled and deliberately contained by the union bureaucracies and, to a large extent, generated by them. Their intention is other than it seems. It is a kind of tacit recognition by the bureaucrats that the tories are going to win the next election and they are putting out a very timid warning to Cameron of what, if they really tried, is possible. Of course, the tories know them all too well and won’t be in the least bit intimidated. But it is a case of marching the troops half way up the hill. It is certainly not about rallying around Brown whose pay policy along with his credibility they have abandoned defending, however modestly, along with everybody else. The troops will soon be stood down however and the result will be just more generalised cynisism and a more likely tory victory.
You were absolutely right to try to include those youth and politicise and broaden the strike. Only the single-minded determination of the working class to fight its corner can prevent a tory victory now not the half-arsed cowardice of the bureaucrats who are prepared to accept a tory victory or the enless bumbling and stumbling of Brown. It’s always possible of course that Brown will rally especially in September when middle Britain gets its tax break but at the moment it looks grim for him.
Thanks for sharing that experience.
Comment by David Ellis — 16 July, 2008 @ 5:13 pm