“RAGE AGAINST LABOUR”?? - WHOSE SIDE ARE YOU ON? WHAT PLANET ARE YOU ON?
There is an interesting discussion here from Councillor Susan Press, about the recent Convention of the Left and demonstration in Brighton. (It is perhaps worth mentioning that although she refers to the SWP, other commenters have suggested that the specific chants she objected to were not from the SWP, but perhaps from other far left groups)
Susan writes:
I’ve just been reading ( a bit late) some of the responses to the Convention Of The Left in Brighton over at Socialist Unity. I think a lot of the comments were unfair, and wholly negative. Yes, the event could have been bigger, the demographic was a bit narrow, but overall it was successful in bringing together disparate left groups to have a discussion in a friendly way and I believe it will be the base for joint working on issues down in the south.
This spirit of comradeliness seems to irk some folk. Which frankly mystifies me. And, speaking as a white, middle-aged socialist I get a bit sick and tired of people having a pop at events lagely comprised of the above as if somehow being over 50 were a crime against humanity. Would you prefer us not to turn up at all?
What also disturbed me were suggestions that that the Sunday demonstration, which frankly was hijacked by the SWP chanting inane and sometimes offensive slogans, was a better way of demonstrating solidarity and support. For what? I could not help asking as a woman next to me hysterically screamed “Gordon Brown, you are scum” over and over again . I was not alone in regarding this as childish, disturbing and wrong. Which is why I sidestepped away from the banshee-like wailing.
The original point of that demo, convened by several unions including my own, was NOT to “Rage Against New Labour” but to march on the theme of “Jobs, Education,Peace.” A constructive message which sadly got rather lost in the name-calling.
One of the many attributes which people like Tony Benn have always had is a refusal to downgrade political disagreement to personal abuse. To use the cliche, policies, not personalities.”
And when you get alleged socialists chanting “Labour Out” with undisguised glee then you have to ask what planet they are living on. Or if they actually care what happens to the working-class in their zeal to out-left each other. Maybe there are some on the very far left who do not care whether we get a Tory or a Labour Government - for those of us in the Labour Left I hope the position is very different.
This Government has scored own goal after own goal in its quest to keep Middle England on board and yes there are some Labour MPs who are indistinguishable from Tories. They remain in the minority.
In the past two years on this blog I have repeatedly said that the labour movement, and the Labour Party, is far more than New Labour. And that calls for a new Party are a blind alley.
Yes I’m angry that the Government did not see it was alienating its core supporters with much of its policy agenda. But we have just a few months to try and win that back. By putting pressure on from below, getting the TUC to campaign on the Peoples Charter, and killing the myth of “compassionate Conservatism” , we can do far more than tarring all Labour Mps with the same brush, and helping the Tories by standing no-hope candidates.
The SWP’s tactic of righteous but bilious anger is “a tale of sound and fury, signifying nothing” other than iconoclastic , nihilistic rage which will only help Cameron to an even larger majority.
The approach of the Convention, to work together on the issues which unite us, rather than open up unnecessary divisions, is sane, honest and far more worthy of support.
Ok, there are a few things worth commenting on here. Firstly, Susan is referring to this picture article on Socialist Unity, so it would have been a courtesy for her to link to it. Firstly, because as I wrote yesterday, if left blogs link to each other then that benefits all of us collectively to have more traction; but secondly, because then her readers could have come and judged for herself. She gave the impression that Socialist Unity had taken an ultra-left position to the Labour Conference, when we had not.
Those quibbles aside, Susan has a very important argument about the demonstration on the Sunday. This was a lobby called by trade unions seeking to persuade a Labour government to adopt policies for “Jobs, Education and Peace”. From Susan’s account this official labour movement initiative was effectively hijacked by yahoos with an entirely different message, who then drowned out the Trade Unions’ message.
Let us be clear. Slogans like “Labour Out” and “Gordon is Scum”, in the context when the left are a million miles from being able to pose any credible alterntaive to the Labour Party help only the Tories, and the right wing. Seeking to associate these slogans with those trade unions trying to influence the government towards polices that will benefit their members makes their job harder, and will be used as an argument against trade unions adopting an independent political role.
Susan is correct that the Labour Party and the labour movement are far more than New Labour, but she is wrong to dismiss modestly sucessful electoral initiatives like Respect and the Green Party, which within limited parameters are able to promote ideas of anti-imperialism and uncompromising environmentalism that are marginal in the Labour Party itself.
For sure, on a UK national scale, the choice for the next election will be between Tory and Labour, but that is not the dominant dynamic in Scotland nor Wales, and not the case in a handful of seats in England where there is a credible progressive challenge. These credible Respect and Green Party challenges should be supported by the left; but elsewhere, especially in marginals, we should work to ensure the best possible Labour result. The Tories haven’t win the next election until the votes are cast - they can still be stopped.
Picture courtesy of Harpy Marx
I have just been looking at the latest copy of Lucha Indigena, the indigenous struggle newspaper from my friend in Peru Hugo Blanco…it has very graphic pictures of the dead massacred by a right wing death squad in Colombia.
Many indigenous people in Peru were killed by the government on 5th June….the countries that New Labour are closest too in Latin America are Peru and Colombia…a lot of people have died because of new labour so people can get quite emotive.
Still I guess it will even be worse under the Tories…so lets build some alternatives.
Comment by Derek Wall — 7 October, 2009 @ 1:21 pm
The chant (song, actually) I heard was
Gordon Brown, you are scum
You took money off my mum
led by several teenagers (one of who has SWP parents - I don’t know if she’s a member or not). I don’t know whether it referred to the abolition of the 10% tax band, or the cuts in benefits for single parents, or the single-status deals offered by Labour councils that reduce women workers’ wages by thousands of pounds, or…
But they weren’t wrong, were they? The New Labour government has repeatedly attacked working class women - and calling them are scum for doing so doesn’t seem disproportionate.
Susan’s distaste wasn’t shared, incidentally, by other LRC members, who stayed on the demo until the end, and joined enthusiastically in the chanting. For a rather better account, see here.
Comment by chjh — 7 October, 2009 @ 1:24 pm
The ‘Labour Labour Labour Out Out Out’ slogan was chanted by a small number of SP Youth. I don’t agree with it but I understand why politicised teenagers might want to chant it.
It therefore follows that Susan’s attack on the SWP is ill-informed My understanding is that the SWP pushed the protest through various unions and found a resonance, I belive the idea is to put the spotlight on Labours awful policies (something that unites the Labour and Non Labour Left) rather than call for the LP to be roasted on the fires of hell for its evil deeds. The idea that it was ‘highjacked’ shows a complete lack of understanding of the process that led to it (Right to Work Meeting, Vestas and Visteon support, motions through NEC’s).
If the activist left is diverging between two strands: lesser evilism on the one hand and laying the basis for extra parliamentary opposition on the other, then lets find a way of doing it without misrepresting each others positions. And taking things to personally Susan.
Lets be clear, it is not the lefts fault that so many voters now dispise Labour, and if you doubt the mood in the unions try visiting a CWU picket line.
Comment by FFLP — 7 October, 2009 @ 1:26 pm
#2
chjh
The article you link to from Harpy Marx proves nothing, the fact that there is a strand of ultra-leftism within the Labour Party itself has never been in doubt. T’was ever thus.
Comment by Andy Newman — 7 October, 2009 @ 1:34 pm
Excellent use of the term “yahoos”, Andy.
Comment by Jonny Mac — 7 October, 2009 @ 1:39 pm
#4 I wasn’t trying to prove anything by linking to the Harpymarx article, other than some other LRC members disagreed with Susan Press’ take on the demo.
I’ve remembered the rest of the song, by the way:
Gordon Brown, you are scum
You took money off my mum
You take money off the poor
Spend it on your bloody war
And that’s ultraleft how?
Comment by chjh — 7 October, 2009 @ 1:41 pm
To add to chjh’s comment, the song - to he tune of This Old Man - went:
Gordon Brown, you are scum, you took money off my mum
[bit I can’t remember] spend it all on war. We don’t want you any more!
It was being sung by a bunch of kids - I thought they were great. It was very good to see a mix of very youthful demonstrators and a fine array of union banners on the demo.
FFLP explains very well how the demo was organised and built. Susan Press obviously thinks anyone chanting slogans she has not personally approved of must mean the protest was ‘hijacked’. That is bollocks.
Susan Press reminds me of the secretary of the writers’ union in Brecht’s poem The Solution.
After the uprising of the 17th June
The Secretary of the Writers Union
Had leaflets distributed in the Stalinallee
Stating that the people
Had forfeited the confidence of the government
And could win it back only
By redoubled efforts. Would it not be easier
In that case for the government
To dissolve the people
And elect another?
Susan, you have perfectly demonstrated how completely out of touch you are with ordinary working class people and illustrated why it is depressing to find the Convention of the Left filled with finger-wagging middle-class types like you. Well done!
Comment by agitator — 7 October, 2009 @ 1:42 pm
chjh - what a pity we haven’t got a nice sound clip of the original to verify exactly how it went…
It was fun though!
Comment by agitator — 7 October, 2009 @ 1:44 pm
I actually enjoyed that demo, there were lots of chants and were they really that wrong? I don’t know the proportion to SWPers to others, esp. in the student section but frankly I didn’t care as it was vibrant and dynamic. And indeed slogans like, ‘They say bankers we say wankers’ is pretty much spot-on.
“Let us be clear. Slogans like “Labour Out” and “Gordon is Scum”, in the context when the left are a million miles from being able to pose any credible alterntaive to the Labour Party help only the Tories, and the right wing.”
Aren’t people allowed to let off steam even if that may seem ‘ultra left’? People are angry with what NL have done, aren’t people allowed to display that anger or is that wrong again especially young people. I mean, they are only slogans chanted on a demo they won’t determine whether there’s any ‘credible alternative’ to NL and the Tories.
People are angry with NL with this ongoing onslaught against working class people from welfare reform to the attacks on the welfare state and public sector.
Comment by HarpyMarx — 7 October, 2009 @ 1:44 pm
I think the point made by FFLP is crucial - the left bears no responsibility for the likely forthcoming defeat of Labour. We have had twelve years of privatisation, cuts (which began in the civil service long before the economic crisis, there are people I work with who have suffered effective pay cuts for the last three years, never mind the coming round of pay freezes), war and attacks on civil liberties. I find it quite bizarre, and a kind of act of denial, for Labour supporters to say “next time it will be different” (how many terms in office does Labour need to do anything worthwhile?) and “the Tories will be worse” (quite possibly, but they’ll need to go some way to top two disastrous wars and the worst economic crisis in living memory). Yes there are good people in the Labour Party, but they make little difference to how a Labour Government behaves, which is little different to how a Tory Government will behave. Let’s raise our sights to something better.
Comment by Nick Bird — 7 October, 2009 @ 1:51 pm
“The article you link to from Harpy Marx proves nothing, the fact that there is a strand of ultra-leftism within the Labour Party itself has never been in doubt. T’was ever thus.”
Dearie me!! You have got it in for me haven’t you comrade with this unsubstantiated personal attack…..
Well, Andy I wasn’t going to give you the satisfaction in a reply on that but hey, thanks for the compliment and this coming from a socialist feminist who has spent 24 years (on and off) in the LP.
If that makes me ultra left then so be it when it come to it I know what side I am on. Not with individuals who speak left then vote right, who shaft the poor over welfare reform, who support vicious barbaric illegal and unjust wars based on the interests of imperialism and the global ruling class, globalisation and neoliberalism….contracting out, privatisation….and bailing the banks out where the working class ends up paying the price of the crisis of capitalism.
If that makes me ultra left…………….
Comment by HarpyMarx — 7 October, 2009 @ 1:55 pm
#9, of course people are allowed to ‘let off steam’. But if they are wrong politically that should also be said. These slogans after all are rooted in a certain political view, namely that Labour should lose and therefore the Tories should win. That deserves constructive political critique, because it is wrong.
Comment by Mikey — 7 October, 2009 @ 1:55 pm
PS I let off effective political steam by doing things that are correct.
Comment by Mikey — 7 October, 2009 @ 1:56 pm
Three cheers for #13.
‘Letting of steam’ (a safety valve?) and the chanting of slogans usually deters thinking and presents only the appearance of activity.
Comment by SteveG. — 7 October, 2009 @ 2:09 pm
Love the picture; it’s great to see young people doing their thing! so what about scum slogans, what’s the problem? Scum, scab even rat seem appropriate to me.
He Brown in his party speech declared war on 16- and 17- year old mothers on benefits, saying from 2012 they would all be offered a place in a network of shared ‘supervised homes’ where they would learn about responsibility and how to ‘raise their children properly’.
“I stand with the people who are sick and tired of others playing by different rules or no rules at all”.
These remarks not only reinforce the myth about single mothers, but is a clear demonstration of a Labour Party that is bullying the young, who have laid down their lives in wars for oil and suffer more than any section of our society when it comes to any future prospects in terms of jobs. Being a young person today is much harder than when I left school and must be a sheared and constant worry for all parents, and this workhouse attack is an absolute disgrace from Brown.
So who is Brown to call the young scum!
Comment by Jim — 7 October, 2009 @ 2:48 pm
This is a side track issue the issue of the slogans.I wasnt on the march but would have if I had been able to get down to Brighton.Someone on a march or demonstration will always sing or shout something that someone else doesnt like just as someone may well easily offend someone in a blog.God forcid!That happens!
The fact is in this case is that Susan Press is a member of the Labour party and believes in continuing the not so good fight in my opinion to reclaim the party for the Left.
Having recently attended the Jack Jones memorial event at the Royal Festival Hall, it is quite clear that a considerable number of Labour politicians and trade union bosses, past and present would somehow and incredible have us believe that we are in fact living under a socialist Labour government.They call it as Blair or Brown might call it socialism in a modern setting in modern times.I think not.Neil, yes kneel Kinnock, the failed former ‘Labour’yes LABOUR opposition leader was energetically singing away at the Internationale like New Labour ever existed
Clearly there is a vast amount of delusional thinking going on within these parts.The fact remains that 12 years of New Labour corruption, lies and deceptions, disappointments and betrayals have left the majority of the electorate sickened.
12 years of continued neo liberal privatising all and everything capitalism and bloody murderous and hugely costly tax payer funded imperialist wars which has simply benefitted the affluent and socially mobile working and middle classes, the rich and filthy rich leaving millions of predominantly working class people throughly alienated and disillusioned.
To repeat ad nauseum New Labour has alienated millions of their own voters such that they will no longer vote for the party.It has alienated hundreds of thousands of their own members such that they have left and continue to leave the party in disgust.It has alienated possibly millions of trade union members such that they no longer vote for the party nor want to be members of it nor want to continue fund it when it directly atacks those members pay and working conditions.
If elements within the party and trade union twisted and perverse hierachy want to urge us to applaud New Labour ‘necessary’ brutal attacks on the Public sector and Public sector workers and the welfare state with crippling cuts then they are hopelessly out of touch and completely deluded.Likewise if the last remnants of the Left in the party think we should simply put up and shut up and vote New Labour while choking on our own vomit then think again.
Where the RMT and the FBU have led other trade unions must surely follow.The struggle for Left unity and the creation of a new Left party continues however painfully and slowly.The fight back against New Labour cuts and the capitalist crisis continues and is ongoing.
Where that leaves most people by election day who knows?Tories or New labour.A curse on both their houses.
Comment by FLEABITE — 7 October, 2009 @ 3:10 pm
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1218637/Another-Blair-house-Cherie-pays-1m-cash-mews-home-thatll-property-number-six.html
Who says Labour can’t lift people out of poverty?
Lord Mandelson 21,000-quid Patek Philippe watch and Cherie’s property empire …
Voting Labour is perhaps best described as ‘aspirational’ we think!
Comment by snitch and snatch — 7 October, 2009 @ 3:13 pm
Raging against Labour is ultra-left? Or has this assessment more to do with Andy’s political shift to the right?
Comment by Tim — 7 October, 2009 @ 3:17 pm
This article angered me a bit (the Councillor’s, not Andy’s that is :P). The whole thing came across as a bit condescending, with mind conjuring an image of the woman pointing fingers and the like, and more importantly completely out of touch with what ordinary people are feeling.
I had a few criticisms of the demo, namely that it lacked a clear political strategy and was basically a “rage”, but it was still good in itself, full of energy and lots of youth. Writing it off and condemning it for criticising Labour, who the hell does she think she is? The Labour Party have turned its back on all those people on that demo and beyond, and all this woman can say is we should blindly support Labour and ANY criticism is counter productive?! Lets see how far that argument flies with the majority of working class people or on the pickets line.
People are angry, disenfranchised and want real change. This demo was one example of that. The ever decreasing turnout and increasing vote for the BNP another. And sadly none of the three major parties can change that and seem only capable of making it worse.
The Left in or call for a vote to the Labour Party need to come back with a strategy to how they plan reclaim it or how they can make a difference. Otherwise, your calls to keep voting Labour will simply fall on death ears, no matter how many times you tell them the Tories are evil. And if you can’t do that, then one way or another we do need to talk alternatives.
Comment by Socialist V — 7 October, 2009 @ 3:32 pm
It really is quite perverse when the likes of Unite boss Tony Woodley sings the praises of the “Labour” government leading the World in justice and fairness,for example, apparently in defence of persecuted Colombian trade unionists when the very same “Labour” government sends weapons and arms, military trainers to ‘assist’ alonside the US and Israel, ‘assist’ the murderous colombian military, linked and intertwined with the equally murderous right wing death squads and sings the praises of the ‘democratic’(SICK !) Uribe regime.Just how sick is that!
Twas ever when New Labour came into government in 1997 on a landslide victory to announce an ‘ethical foreign’ policy which, for example,in reality entailed business as usual in support of British imperialist interests, simply continuing9previously done by the tories and Labour governments before them) to send support and weapons to arm and back the Suharto dictatorship(itself brought to power in a military coup involving a vast bloodbath in 1965 with US,UK and Australian backing) in Indonesia thus perpetuating, the suffering of the majority of Indonsesian people, the occupation of East Timor and West Papua (still ongoing) and the genocide of the East Timorese(still suffering the appalling legacy) and West Papuan people (still ongoing).
Likewise Israel, Likewise Colombia, Likewise Eygpt Likewise Saudi Arabia etc etc etc
Comment by FLEABITE — 7 October, 2009 @ 3:32 pm
New Labour’s near total silence on the murderous coup dictatorship in Honduras is defeaning.
Comment by FLEABITE — 7 October, 2009 @ 3:36 pm
‘Jobs, education and peace’ but not ‘rage against Labour’? At the moment, I’m not sure how you can fight for the first three without feeling at least a bit of the second.
And ’some Labour MPs are indistinguishable from the Tories.’ those would be the ones in the government, I guess, threatening further privatisation and huge cuts in public spendingwhilst throwing endless amounts of cash at another doomed colonial adventure in Afghanistan.
Wasn’t there unfortunately, but sounds like a great demo.
Comment by dennis — 7 October, 2009 @ 3:57 pm
It comes to a pretty pass when Andy finds it neccessary to refer to young people on a demo as “yahoos” in order not to offend the great and the good. It wasn’t ever thus.
Incidently I disagree, for various reasons, with the idea that there is now no distinction between Labour and the Tories. But the idea that I would denounce those outraged by the behaviour of Labour in order to assauge the feelings of those who are still members of it…
You must be joking.
Comment by johng — 7 October, 2009 @ 3:57 pm
#11
Luoise, I didn’t bring you into this, chjh used you as an example of LRC members who have a positive assessment of this sort of anger being expressed in what i regard as a politically counter-productive way. So it is not “unsubstanitated” the issue of substance is a clear political disagreement. Nor is it a “personal attack” to criticise someone’s political position
You say:
Well, this was a demonstration called by various trade unions to seek to sway Labour Policy over jobs, peace and education. You have been in the movement long enough to understand that the message from the unions will be harder to argue when it is associated with people chanting “Labour Out”, and “Gordon Brown is Scum”.
It depends what you want out of politics. I want to see progress towards a more equitable society, and think we need to work to intervene in the political process, social movements, and trade unions to further that ambition.
“Letting off steam” is not a political act, it is personal gratification.
Comment by Andy Newman — 7 October, 2009 @ 4:23 pm
‘Well, this was a demonstration called by various trade unions to seek to sway Labour Policy over jobs, peace and education’.
The Labour party, particularly under the leadership of Blair and Brown, have treated the unions with utter contempt over the last twelve years. Why now, when the governing party is on it’s way out of office, do you think that the message from the unions will be heard at all by this utter discredited government? It’s no wonder why people are angry and wish to show their utter contempt back.
Comment by Theo Saurus — 7 October, 2009 @ 4:46 pm
# 23 - There is no intention on the part of Andy to avoid offending “the great and the good”, just a reasonable hope that we could probably do better than mouth childish insults.
The ‘denouncement’ is probably as real as the ‘outrage’ of the sloganeers.
Comment by Dave — 7 October, 2009 @ 4:47 pm
Front page news. Tired old committeewoman irretrievably bound by a withered umbelical cord to Labour’s corpse is shocked by display of anger from a new generation and is joined in her sneering by those who think China and Obama are the way forward and take every opportunity to have a swipe at “ultralefts”.
Continued in different variations in stories 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7…
Comment by Mike — 7 October, 2009 @ 4:51 pm
Nice ageism.
Comment by @ #27 — 7 October, 2009 @ 4:55 pm
28* Nothing wrong with a bit of ageism against the 50 something
attendee of Convention of the left, who defends the govt responsible for iraq and afghanistan.
But then she did say ‘Yes I’m angry that the Government did not see it was alienating its core supporters with much of its policy agenda.’
Not killing people in imperialist wars, impoverishing millions with its welfare cuts, harming millions with its privatisation policies, or scapegoating millions and feeding racism with its british jobs, and british houses.
But then I suppose a labour Councillor has something to defend, just don’t pretend its the interests of the majority of people in the Uk.
Comment by non-partisan — 7 October, 2009 @ 5:15 pm
#29
“I suppose a labour Councillor has something to defend, just don’t pretend its the interests of the majority of people in the Uk.”
So in whose interests will it be if the Tories form the government? Don’t we all have something to defend in preventing that from happening?
Comment by Andy Newman — 7 October, 2009 @ 5:18 pm
People like Susan Press and Andy Newman are complete fantasists with very selective memories.
I’m looking forward to election night and raising a glass and a cheer when the unspeakable anti-working class privatising, warmongering big business arse-lickers get their comeuppance. All those Portillo moments to look forward to.
Comment by Doug — 7 October, 2009 @ 5:23 pm
#28 Apologies. I should have used her own self-description and said tired middle-aged committeewoman.
Comment by Mike — 7 October, 2009 @ 5:28 pm
#31
Doug, they won’t get their comeupance.
What will happen is that the some of the more odious labour ministers and former ministers might lose their seats, get a handsome financial parachute, and then a well paid job elsewhere.
The people who bear the cost of a Tory government will not be the New labour clique, but hundreds of thousands of ordinary working weomen and men, and their children. .
That is what you will be cheering on.
Comment by Andy Newman — 7 October, 2009 @ 5:29 pm
And how Andy does denouncing young people rightly outraged by the record of this appalling government as “yahoo’s” either help a new generation of socialists, or prepare them for the battles to come (under whichever government)? Its an attitude almost designed to alienate and infuriate the most important forces for social change in the country.
Comment by johng — 7 October, 2009 @ 5:40 pm
a: doessn’t defend the interests of the majority, (accepted)
b: doesn’t defend the interests of the majority (accepted)
then why should I oppose b by defending a ?
a= labour
b= tories
rather than c; politically campaigning to defend the interests of the majority, applying as much pressure to a; or b; as possible.
but then we are told labour does not = new labour,
really? well where have the other parts of the labour party
been hiding, or are they like the councillor above, can’t see how upsetting Gordon or his friends is productive, esp now as we might be able to influence them (!) after 12 years of not listening, now we are supposed to believe if only we approach it politiley enough, and inclusively enough, we have the chanmce to influence Labour Policy?????
Comment by non-partisan — 7 October, 2009 @ 5:57 pm
“The people who bear the cost of a Tory government will not be the New labour clique, but hundreds of thousands of ordinary working weomen and men, and their children.”
Yes but ordinary working men and women would bear the same cost under another Labour govt. Metaphorically speaking you’re basically asking people to choose which eye they want to be punched in. How many more terms of Lab govt will it take for you to finally realise that the are essentially the same as the Tories.
Comment by paul c — 7 October, 2009 @ 6:00 pm
#34
“Its an attitude almost designed to alienate and infuriate the most important forces for social change in the country.”
yes - the most important forces for social change - the trade unions and their activist members - are likely to be alienated and infuriated by numpties chanting “Labour Out”, and “Gordon brown is scum”
I cannot see any defence at turning up to a demonstration called by these unions over the aganda of peace, jobs and education, and using it as a platform for mindless nihilism - distracting away from the message that the unions wanted to make.
Amd “Labour Out”, that is clearly an implicit call for a Tory government, nothing is more likely to make you irrelevant and marginalised in the Labour movement.
Comment by Andy Newman — 7 October, 2009 @ 6:11 pm
Johng:
Its an attitude almost designed to alienate and infuriate the most important forces for social change in the country.
Reply:
John, you must be joking here. The most important forces for social change in the country remains the working class, not a small clique of self indulgent students who treat these demonstrations as an excuse for a jolly.
They alienate rather than attract with their silly, student stunts and slogans, and I don’t know anyone who takes them seriously.
Who does?
Comment by John Wight — 7 October, 2009 @ 6:11 pm
Boring old fart.
Comment by Theo Saurus — 7 October, 2009 @ 6:19 pm
this seems to have decended into a silly argument about youth, I am a student and I think that the whole rage against New Labour was classic SWP-lets have a nice little shout at the government.
If you think that the best way to prevent a tory government is to go around shouting ‘Labour out’ you lack clarity of judgement.
Whatever you might think about the Labour party, there is only two options for the next government, labour or Tory.
That is it. People need to start deciding which side they choose, if you carry on shouting your ultra-leftist slogans, however much you may profess to hate the tories, you have sided with the concept that they will be our next government.
Comment by YCLer — 7 October, 2009 @ 6:29 pm
YCLer
you are missing the points and clarifications made above.
The Labour and Non Labour left should start from a position of saying the reason Labour is in this mess is because its policies are wrong. Hence to Brighton protest.
If they fail to do this and merely beg people to vote Labour because they are not the Tories then they will fail to offer any meaningful pole of attraction either within or without the LP and will not lay down the basis for a left pole of attraction after the election.
If LP activists want to put the case for why left activists should return to the LP to canvass fine. Frankly when the LP is mentioned in my branch meetings it gets booed. I’d would rather spend energy recruiting people to the union.
Comment by FFLP — 7 October, 2009 @ 6:51 pm
Bloody middle class SWP student tossers - this isn’t politics its playtime. The terrifying prospect of a Tory government shows just how self-indulgent and pointless such activities are.
Comment by Charles Dexter Ward — 7 October, 2009 @ 6:58 pm
Interviews with people who actually went to the demo. No ranting, they talk sense. Not just students either. Some bloke who was in the Labour party for 35 years.
http://www.youtube.com/profile?user=adycousins#play/all/favorites-all/2/rxia1-EKFB8
Comment by Theo Saurus — 7 October, 2009 @ 6:59 pm
#37
the most important forces for social change - the trade unions and their activist members - are likely to be alienated and infuriated by numpties chanting “Labour Out”, and “Gordon brown is scum”
The trade unions and their activist members are sick of being fucked over by Labour.
That’s why the RMT and FBU have ditched Labour, why in a recent ballot 96% of London CWU members voted to suspend funding for Labour, why the PCS is engaged in a union-wide debate about - in Mark Serwotka’s words - “building an alternative to the false choices offered by the main parties”…
Comment by agitator — 7 October, 2009 @ 7:08 pm
I agree with Susan Press about the Convention of the Left. 150 people discussing important political issues in Brighton from the SWP, SP, LRC, Green Party etc etc not an unuseful event. Its not going to change the world but it is a useful forum for an exchange of views between the far left and those in the LP - I did a quick report here http://www.permanentrevolution.net/entry/2846
I am a bit surprised that Susan Press didn’t twig that an event advertised as “Rage against the LP” and launched at Marxism 2009 was going to be a SWP day out. Impotently raging against a fortified Labour Conference isn’t everyone’s bag but it obviously turns SWPers on.
Comment by Anonymous — 7 October, 2009 @ 7:17 pm
Well it seems to me that the fact that this demo could so easily be “taken over”, just demonstrates how out of touch the TUC “leadership”, Councillor Press and Andy are.
Wake up and smell the coffee! Unless you really believe that Brown and New Labour are suddenly going to front-out the IMF or tax Big Business hard then there is going to be little difference between New Labour and the Tories. A chainsaw is going too applied to the welfare state. Local NHSs (what used to be called Primary Care Trusts) have ALREADY been told to expect a 20% cut over projected spending over the next five years - which works out to be a 10% cut a current expenditure. Given the particular political sensitivities that there is like to be around NHS other departments are likely to be hit far worst.
Far from dismissing these demonstrators in such an uncomradely manor, Andy, we should be work to build a real socialist alternative.
Comment by Richard Farnos — 7 October, 2009 @ 7:20 pm
Socialist V @19 - I am a little shocked at your use of sexist language i.e. ‘the woman…’, ‘this woman…’. This has no place on a socialist blog, or anywhere else for that matter.
In terms of the demo, it’s good to see lots of young people politicised and they are bound to be angry. We now have a generation who have known nothing else but the wars and Blair’s smarmy smugness and Brown’s more of the same. Tuition fees and no prospect of a decent job. They also have no memory of a Tory government, therefore chants of ‘Labour Out’ are inevitable.
The worrying thing is that after 12 years or so of New Labour, the left still haven’t been able to get its act together for a viable alternative. I for one am disillusioned and not sure what the answers are. We have seen the failures of the Socialist Alliance, Respect etc., the No2EU disaster, the CNWP being a total non-starter and seemingly put on the back burner.
What is the answer? What on earth happened to all the ‘unity conferences’ that had been suggested? The SWP Open Letter and the SP/No2EU seem to have come to nothing as does the AWL call for a new Socialist Alliance. It is far, far too late for anything meaningful to be put together for the General Election, so what do socialists do? Campiagn for Greens, Respect, Labour? The reality of a Tory government is pretty scary and being played out at conference in terms fo racism, homophobia and attacks on the working class. Are we just going to let it happen?
Comment by Steve — 7 October, 2009 @ 7:30 pm
I feel a bit more indulgent to the demonstrators, attacking a right wing Neo-Liberal, war mongering, incompetent Government, is understandandable if not exactly constructive.
This sloganeering is less depressing than listening to those who are willing to defend New Labour.
We should be glad some youth and students still have some fire in their guts, there is I think some good stuff from the convention of the left and I and other Greens are of course pushing the idea of more co-operation across the left.
Comment by Green Socialist — 7 October, 2009 @ 8:35 pm
“One of the many attributes which people like Tony Benn have always had is a refusal to downgrade political disagreement to personal abuse. To use the cliche, policies, not personalities”
Susan Press is right to say it should not be so personalised to Brown and Labour of course is more than just Brown.Its not personal its policies .Like the policy of PFI used and implemented by Brown transfering massive amounts of wealth from public to private its not personal.
The chanting and rage should have been about the gutles, spineless, Labour Party Members and the policies they have allowed for the past 12 years. The Labour members who remain and that have sat on its hands for 12 years whilst Labour government has waged illegal wars, increased inequality, privatised anything they could get away with. But its policies not personalities
The same Labour Party that sat back whilst Blair, supported by Brown and egged on by Murdoch, followed Bush in the bloodbath in Iraq,
The Party that Privatised NHS services, attacked the Fire Fighters, attacked Pensions. The Party which led an assault on Civil Liberties.
The Labour Government implicated in Torture, murder,detention and rendition, backed the most right wing President since Raygun. A Party that allows the poor to be penalised, asylum seekers vouchered and stigmatised, the disabled pilloried and the unemployed forced into workfare. The Government that allowed Pinochet to be wheeled away to sanctuary. Labour the Party of principle and of Digby Jones, Lord Myners, David Freud, Drayson, Mortgage Mandelson,Pandering Prescott, Welfare Purnell and Home Secretary and Penal Liberterian, Machine Gun all the Prisoners, Grace and favour, Blunkett.
This is a Labour Party that would sell its grandmother if it thought it would get the right price or a seat extra in parliament. A Party completely given over to power for powers sake, sold out lock, stock and clause four to the Bankers, the Hedge Fund and the Corporations.
One only has to look back at Browns speech in 2007 at the Mansion House. Praising the Banksters and the light touch regulation that Brown devised. A new golden age of Finance Capital, a massive illusory bubble presided over by the Labour Party which has now burst leaving behind a steaming pile of toxic shit which will lead to the destruction of jobs, services and lives. The poor will pay whilst Labour bails out their wealthy chums.
Or simply look at this, 1 million Iraqi Civilian Dead and Labour Party Members still give Blair and Brown their support and money, and campaign time to get them back into office.
Oh its not Personal, its just that Brown and Blair could have stopped the bloodbath, or twenty Labour MPs threateningf to resign and fight byelections could have stopped the bloodbath, or a mass campaign by Labours Rank and File could have forced a real debate instead o the Labour inspired and Murdoch controlled 45 minutes propaganda and the US rigged Intelligence and the Dodgy Dossiers downloaded fronm the Internet and the undermining of the weapons inspectors who turned out to be right.
Or if thats not enough look at the gutless Labour Partys reaction to its governments refusal to call on Israel to stop bombing the civilains of Lebanon, but its not personal they were only bombs transported through this country after all…
Murdochs paying secret visits to both Brown anmd Blair not a bad thing really not worth resigning over the complete trampling of our democratic rights.
How about the NHS being privatised, how about NHS Logistics flogged off to DHL or Hewitts attempts to privatise Community services or Milburns introduction of Foundation Trusts the Trojan horses that will allow full privatisation of the NHS. Then how about Labours reintroduction of the Conservatives Internal Market and allowing the NHS to be further dismembered.How about the Labour Health Ministers who go from office to Privatisation Consultants to Medical Corporations.
Then Labour Members bleat that things will be even worse under the Conservatives??
I have worked in the NHS for 30 years and seen it AND THE WORKERS WHO RUN IT so broken and bullied by Labour that its ready to break up with Labours pals in the private companies sniffing round like a pack of hyeanas waiting for the NHS to be dismembered. Weve seen Health workers Trade Union reps , a longstanding professional Nurse, victimised and sacked for speaking out on behalf of patients whilst Labour backs the Trust bosses and allows the sacking to stand. But Labours not involved they just egged the bullying Trust managers on from a safe distance. More light touch regulation by Labour. Weve seen South Staffs hospital a Foundation Trust where management bullying and intimidation led to deaths for patients and trauma for Health Woprkers but its not personal its just Labour policies to treat us like this.
More Light touch regulations in the Energy and Water Industry too, all those toothless Corparate owned Labour Regulators like OFTWAT, wringing their hands whilst the Corporations make massive profits and put up our bills but nothing to do with Labour.
Who the hell are you Labour Party apologists trying trying to kid
But dont take my word look at your Partys recent activites.
Look at the BAE scandal Clare Short says she told Brown the Tanzanian Air Traffic Control System was a scam but he ignored her.Nothing Personal
your starving because your govrnment spend its money bribing a company for a useless system it cannot use and Labour helped it
Look at what your Party has done, look at the sell off of Qinetiq, absoloute scandal but no one brought to book
Look at the Labour threat to privatise the Post Office something they will do in the future
Look at the Labour Cabinet stuffed full of Lords and Dames from an unelected House of Lords
Look at the Labour Partys Lords, two found guilty by their peers(sic), filmed bragging about by their abilty to get amendments passed for a fee, Labour peers guilty of corruption, taking money for passing amendments and they are still Labour Party members.
Still no real reform of the Lords after 12 years and massive majorities we still have hereditary peeers in fact the only peopl elected in the Lords are the Hereditaries who elect from amongst themselves..but thats just not a problem for Labour Members.
Look at the Labour Parties Internal Democracy, a complete sham, with your conference a rally for the Ministers who are Murdoch Wannabes and Privatisation Consultants in waiting.
There is very little difference between Labour and Conservative, nothing that the Conservatives will do that Labour has not already done or will do
No its nothing to do with Labour is it?
They are just misunderstood by them horrid ultra lefties, who shout nasty things about Gordons Moral Compass.
Its not Labour Party members fault…. is it?,,, oh no.
Brown and Blair they just happen to be standing there,knee deep in blood, minding their own Cabinets, next to the US President whenever there is some killing or bombing or privatisation to be done.
And poor things the Labour Party members, they were not to blame, its so unfair, so lets give the privatising, blood soaked, BAE arse covering anti union Labour Party another fat chance.
Labour wants, still want… us, the working people,like the NHS workers who kept the NHS alive when the Conservatives tried to kill it in the 1980s and 1990s, they want us whose NHS jobs they privatise, whose unions they despise… they want us to vote for, give money too, work for and most of all send our kids to die for them in their wars.But its not personal its policies.
But its not personal and they are not the conservatives are they,,,,
Arms selling,
Neo Liberal,
Privatisers,
yes maybe,
you may have a point,
we made some mistakes,
We done a lot but theres much more to be done
We have not wrecked Pakistan and Iran yet have we
We have done a lot though havent we…..
Like going along with killing a million Iraqis but they were Labour deaths not cruel Conservatives casualties.
Labour Neo Liberals or Conservative Neo Liberals, its like a choice between Herpes or Diptheria
Comment by Anonymous — 7 October, 2009 @ 8:35 pm
Apologies that is my post 49 above pressed the trigger to soon!
Comment by Red Bandits — 7 October, 2009 @ 8:38 pm
#47 When I referred to her as a “woman”, I was making no sexist remarks and was not using it in a derogatory manner. I apologise if anyone did perceive it in this way.
I have still yet to hear anything from most Labour apologists about a concrete campaign or programme for the future. All I have seen is repeated calls to vote Labour, in case the Tories get in. But what then? Either the Tories get in and shaft us, and we have to keep fighting to get Labour in, or Labour win and shaft us, and then what? We have to fight to keep them in?! Either way, we lose. And under this tactic, we keep losing with no hope for the future.
I have not seen ANY perspective for the future put forward by those who keep plugging away to vote Labour. Can the Labour Party be reclaimed? And if so, how? Because right now, even when the Lab leadership knew they were going to get wiped out, they STILL refused to make any concessions to the unions or even the working class. Internal democracy is dead and everyone who rebels against the Labour line thrown out. Membership is declining massively (someone said by 2/3 since 1997?) and most people you speak to on the street despise Labour. What’s left to take back?
So when will you stop voting Labour? What do they have to do before you consider voting someone else? And if you say because there is “no alternative”, does this mean you’re aware that we need one, its just you refuse to help build it and will just let the rest of the Left get on with it and slag them off in the mean time?
Comment by Socialist V — 7 October, 2009 @ 8:55 pm
I’ve sometimes wondered what the point in chanting on demonstrations is. Often I find myself moving away from the chanting to avoid hearing something simplistic being bawled in my ear over and over and over and over and over again by someone with a loud megaphone. I do from time to time go on demonstrations, happily. But one day I was in another city and a demonstration came past and it was not at all obvious what the demonstration was for or against. No leafleters went ahead or around to communicate with the passers-by, though left party paper sellers did. The chanting was inane, the slogans meaningless. The response of passers-by was one of indifference.
That is not always the case of course, but sometimes demonstrations really only come across as a jolly for the participants rather than an attempt to communicate a view to the public.
Comment by ross bradshaw — 7 October, 2009 @ 8:57 pm
Yes - all those meetings we used to go to and hear about the terrible conservatism of the ‘old comrades’ - and that was usually anyone over 30. What is all this age-ism in the movement?
It’s not so much the slogans on the demo - The big problem is that some of these ‘young’ activists will be pulled into the SWP, encouraged to run around like headless chickens, be bullied and hectored, patronised by people with mockney accents and then either leave or be forced out, only to spend their latter years obsessed by sectarian comments on this blog.
As for ‘rage against labour’ - apart from shouting, what exactly does that involve?
Comment by old comrade — 7 October, 2009 @ 8:59 pm
Oh FFS. I’m not a student or a member of the SWP, I’m a young working man, and the biggest impact to my working conditions in recent years has been the abolition of the 10p tax band. So why should I want to defend or re-elect the government which did that?
Comment by Jon — 7 October, 2009 @ 9:16 pm
#52 Ross. Hear hear! The louder the megaphone, the emptier the head that is shouting down it, in my experience. We need to take a leaf out of the train operators’ book and have a “quiet carriage” section of every demonstration, where chanting is banned and people just amble along, calmly explaining the purpose of the demonstration to anyone who looks interested. Something needs to be done about the vendors of brightly-coloured, overpriced plastic whistles, too - I’ve seen the same blokes at all sorts of events, political and non-political, selling the same old tat to the annoyance of almost everyone…
Comment by Francis King — 7 October, 2009 @ 9:43 pm
Hi Andy
Dare I say “Great Post”. It is unusual to say the least for me to agree (mostly) with a post on Socialist Unity and Grim. I was a CLP delegate at conference and I was going to come outside and say hello to the marchers (my fellow sad sectarian Dave was suppose to be there and buy me a beer) but I was late getting into Brighton, saw the heaps of placards waiting to be picked up and couldn’t be bothered so I just hurried into the conference hall. So I missed the march which inside the hall to my knowledge no one mentioned it in any case.
But I have been on mainstream demos in the past were the ultra extremists have simply high jacked it and just p***d absolutely everyone else off with mindless chanting, postulating and grandstanding. I suspect they really just don’t realise how much damage they do to their creditability and that of the protest they have taken over.
While I don’t generally mind that this sort of behaviour on their own marches since it keeps them as fully paid up members of the lost deposit brigade I do think that this is just another own goal in the wider Labour movement. Which is a genuine bloody shame.
I feel a post a-coming…
Comment by John Gray — 7 October, 2009 @ 9:44 pm
Red Bandits - yes, of course all that’s true, but really all that the members, by and large, are guilty of is wishful thinking, of staying in an organisation in which there in no longer any mechanism for them to exert influence, hoping that some ‘ real Labour spirit’ will win through. In fact it’s MAGICAL thinking - if there’s no mechanism for influence then HOW can you bring about change? Those that defend the Labour Party should explain this to us. HOW can you influence the Parliamentary Party when you can no longer choose constituency candidates or even table motions at the party conference?
Comment by jock mctrousers — 7 October, 2009 @ 9:55 pm
“I suspect they really just don’t realise how much damage they do to their creditability and that of the protest they have taken over”
A bit like the gutless Labour Party members supporting a Party thats privatised the NHS,
lost the support of NHS workers and destroyed Iraq
Labour Party members whose blogs spout about supporting the NHS what credibilty
No more blood, money or votes for Neo Liberal Labour
Comment by Red Bandits — 7 October, 2009 @ 9:57 pm
“All those Portillo moments to look forward to.”
Yes, worth remembering that Portillo was actually replaced by Stephen Twigg who, by any conceivable metrics of competence, commitment to social progress and personal sliminess, was actually far worse than his predecessor.
Comment by lone nut — 7 October, 2009 @ 10:18 pm
lets hold a demo outside the swp conference (telephone box) condeming them for taking money from big busisness (pro PFI bankers
and as we know all bankers are…..
Comment by Tam — 7 October, 2009 @ 11:26 pm
as an nhs nurse i can tell you we still fear the tories more than Labour
were gutted by the pay freeze by the Tories - and it wont be just one year
actually are 3 year pay deal worked well dispite been dennounced by various political sects
who would have had us reject it and accordingly get a 1% rather than 2% pay rise
These little groups have no support
just how many votes do they get in elections
how many MPs or councillors
the new workers party was tried in Scotland
and the result was what ??? after 5 years
ZERO
Comment by shani — 7 October, 2009 @ 11:36 pm
#57
“if there’s no mechanism for influence then HOW can you bring about change? Those that defend the Labour Party should explain this to us. ”
The changes to the rule book are a serious problem, but constitutions shouod not be mistaken for the real social relations that they are built upon.
UNISON, UNITE, GMB, and the other affiliated unions still potentially hold the power, it is just that they have chosen not to exercise it.
That is the obstacle to overcome, to get the trade unions to play a more independent political role is the key - and that applies whether they exercise their influence through the labour party, or potentially through some other route.
Comment by Andy Newman — 7 October, 2009 @ 11:42 pm
Unisons own polling has shown that Unison members in the Public Services are as likely to vote Conservative as Labour
Ipsos MORI conducted a poll for the trade union UNISON between 12-14 June 2009. The headline voting intention figures from this poll, conducted among 1,252 British adults age 18 and over, show the Conservatives on 39%, Labour on 25% and the Liberal Democrats on 19% among those absolutely certain to vote in a General Election.
The poll contained a ‘booster’ sample of 251 public sector workers, meaning that 494 public sector workers were interviewed in total. The voting intention figures among public sector workers show the Conservatives on 32%, Labour on 29% and the Liberal Democrats on 19% among those absolutely certain to vote.
Ipsos MORI’s headline voting figures are based on those ‘certain to vote’ in an upcoming election. However, we also publish our ‘unfiltered’ voting intention figures, amongst all giving a voting intention. These scores traditionally show a higher Labour share and a lower Conservative share, due to the fact that Conservative voters are more likely to say they are ‘certain to vote’ at an election. For this poll, 37% of the public who give a voting intention would vote Conservative, 26% Labour and 20% Liberal Democrat.
Because our regular political polls do not contain ‘boosters’ for public sector workers, it is normally impossible to apply the ‘certainty of voting’ filter to this group, as it reduces the sample of public sector workers too far. Therefore we have constructed a trend chart based on public sector workers’ voting intentions, but without the turnout filter. For this survey, 30% of public sector workers giving a voting intention indicate they would vote Labour, 28% indicate they would vote Conservative and 19% Liberal Democrat.
SEE CHART 2005-2009 Public Sector
http://www.ipsos-mori.com/Assets/Docs/Polls/poll-ipsos-mori-poll-for-unison-chart.
Comment by Red Bandits — 7 October, 2009 @ 11:56 pm
John Gray I think its the mindless posturing inside the conference hall, repeated by various self important folk that really pisses most people off. Have you seen the polls lately? Dare I say it a bit of modesty from delegates to that idiotic conference might be in order. I mean its not as if anyone was doing anything constructive or worthwhile inside the conference other then polishing their own egos.
Comment by johng — 8 October, 2009 @ 2:13 am
“were gutted by the pay freeze by the Tories - and it wont be just one year”
They laid their cards on the table which is more than can be said about New Labour. Brown is holding back until after the election but you’d have to be a spin doctor on cocaine to believe that New Labour won’t continue their descent into neoliberalism and try to make workers pay for the crisis.
The worst thing about telling workers to vote New Labour instead of Left candidates outside NL is that it plays right into the hands of the Tories. It demonstrates a lack of regard for the suffering inflicted upon workers by NL and offers no alternative to Browns neoliberal politics. If the left aren’t listening to the grievances of workers and responding to them then it leaves a gap for the Tories and more frighteningly, the BNP.
Comment by Ray — 8 October, 2009 @ 2:29 am
THE TWO POSTS #49 and #50 say it all really …
We are currently rereading Alan Bennett’s quite brilliant ‘Untold Stories’ [2005] - including these gems:
DIARY for 16 March 2003
One of the lowest moments this year was Tony Blair and Jack Straw misrepresenting the French and German position on Iraq in order to encourage xenophobia and get more support from the Murdoch papers.
DIARY for 21 March 2003
The first soldiers killed. If our army had been made up of conscripts, no one would have tolerated this war for a moment. However much these are ‘our boys’, the war can only be waged because the US and the UK have armies of mercenaries.
DIARY for 31 March 2004
We place a different value on the lives of Iraqi combatants, with the dead not even numbered or named. Our view of the Iraqis is not far off Falstaff’s view of his company:
‘They’ll fill a pit as well as better.
Tush, man, mortal men, mortal men.’
But POSTS #49 and #50 say all that need be said, although the text was written in such rage and fury that a firm editorial hand is called for in future!
Comment by snitch and snatch — 8 October, 2009 @ 5:38 am
And in #16 FLEABITE mentions the all-too-easily-forgotten Kinnock.
How well the Famille Kinnock have done out of the UK and EU taxpayer over the years!
[Although one somehow doubts that Kinnock would display a 21,000-quid Patek Philippe watch at a Labour Party Conference with unabashedly flamboyant Madelsonian flair!]
Comment by snitch and snatch — 8 October, 2009 @ 5:41 am
In POST #20 FLEABITE mentions the ‘ethical foreign policy’ and refers in passing to Saudi Arabia
One may not necessarily yearn for Lord Palmerston to be in command of British foreign policy, but it was disgraceful and appalling that a Labour foreign minister was all-but-silent when British citizens were quite obviously tortured into making woodenly false confessions on television.
Remember?
Comment by snitch and snatch — 8 October, 2009 @ 5:50 am
Keep on SHOUTING red bandit - after all it will change the World.
Public sector workers will vote Labour. Especially after this weeks Tory conference. Turkeys do not vote for Christmas unlike the Ultra Left.
If people genuinely do not want to support the Labour Party during the next few months then I can understand and while I think they are wrong that is their choice. But those who profess to hate the Tories but won’t do anything for Labour “because they are just as bad” I have nothing but scorn. There is no alternative to Labour at this time (and I hope never) so if you support anyone else but Labour or do not vote then really you should go the whole hog and just vote Tory.
Hi Johng - actually I thought that a lot of good stuff came out in the conference. Onwards and forwards to victory next year.
Comment by John Gray — 8 October, 2009 @ 7:38 am
JOhnG
“mindless posturing inside the conference hall, repeated by various self important folk that really pisses most people off. Have you seen the polls lately? Dare I say it a bit of modesty from delegates to that idiotic conference might be in order. I mean its not as if anyone was doing anything constructive or worthwhile inside the conference other then polishing their own egos.”
JOhn
- would you care to shine this same spotlight on the SWP’s conference?
Comment by Andy Newman — 8 October, 2009 @ 9:28 am
All this lesser of two evils bollocks infects a number of posts here which says more about political bankrupcy than anything else.Evil is evil and should be seen as such.
If people are braindead enough to vote for shit in voting for New labour then they must accept the consequences and similarly those gullable and stupid enough to vote tory equally must accept the consequences.
Personally,I feel that the still fighting left(as against the chameleon left which poses as all things to all people) needs to fully expose all and both neo liberal capitalist imperialist parties and urgently needs to provide a sound politcal and electoral alternative.This is work in process and should be the main focus for our interest and energy.
It’s no good sitting bemoaning the failure of past Left unity projects or simply waiting for the various bit players of the Left to necessarily come together.Where there are opennings and possiblities for left unity and working together whether within unions,community campaigns and movements these strands can form the basis for electoral alliances as has been shown by the Wigan people’s alliance.
Urging milions of former Labour voters,who are deeply alienated and disillusioned with New Labour to vote New Labour to keep out the tories is tantamount to asking them to eat their own shit and choke on their own vomit.It’s not going to happen except with a few sad highly masochistic individuals who have lost all sound political judgement, political courage and imagination.
There is a fighting socialist alternative and there will continue to be a fighting socialist alternative irrespective of whoever wins at the next general elections.
Comment by FLEABITE — 8 October, 2009 @ 9:37 am
#70 Andy, with your insinuating question you give away, again, your motive for publishing this article.
Comment by Jef — 8 October, 2009 @ 10:33 am
http://www.socialistworker.co.uk/issue.php?issue_id=453
SWP Conference 2009: debating the fightback in an age of slumps and war.
The Socialist Workers Party (SWP) held its annual conference last weekend in London.
The discussions were framed and focused by the global crisis of capitalism that erupted last year.
Saturday’s daytime agenda was postponed to allow delegates to attend the massive demonstration called by the Stop the War Coalition and others against Israel’s attack on the Palestinians in Gaza.
This was just one example of the fast changing nature of political events in the current period – and of the party’s determination to engage with them.
Conference nevertheless found time for over 500 delegates to engage in a robust debate about how the party intervenes in the world and how its internal structures should operate.
The conference also elected the SWP’s leading bodies, together with a special commission to examine party democracy.
http://www.socialistworker.co.uk/art.php?id=16840 for picture of delegates
There were rarely any empty seats and around another 40/50 were standing at the back of the hall.
Comment by Anonymous — 8 October, 2009 @ 11:02 am
Yes I would Andy. I don’t understand your point. I’d always thought this was a socialist site dedicated to building an alternative to the Labour Party. Perhaps I and many others were mistaken.
Comment by johng — 8 October, 2009 @ 12:14 pm
O/T, but I really enjoyed reading about this tribute to Andy Abel - just down the road from my brother’s house, if I’m not mistaken. A fittingly Bristolian send-off.
Comment by chjh — 8 October, 2009 @ 1:25 pm
URL here http://lastingtribute.thisisbristol.co.uk/tribute/abel/3162599
Comment by chjh — 8 October, 2009 @ 1:26 pm
First apologies for not linking to the original post re the COL.
I’ve spent the last 18 months on the COL working with Green Party, LRC, Respect, CPB and SP supporters in a comradely way. We organised a successful five-day conference in Manchester last year and have continued to be active with local groups being set up working in a non-sectarian way so therefore the level of abuse directed at me personally is pretty unconstructive as well as being ageist,sexist and pretty disgusting.
My union, the NUJ, along with others, convened the demo on the theme of “Jobs, Education and Peace”. The SWP decided to mobilise separately and re-brand it Rage Against New Labour.
I am NOT, and never have been, an apologist for New Labour. But I have been a Labour Party member for 30 years and don’t plan to leave unless they kick me out.Apologies for being 52 but it does at least mean I know what a Tory Government is like.
Earlier this year I stood as a Parliamentary candidate on an LRC platform and gut utterly shafted by the leadership for my pains. My constituency had its candidate de-selected because she was left so I don’t need any lectures thanks about the corription of the New Labour machine. But my position has always been to stay and fight rather than walk away. Others disagree as is their right and i quite understnd why many can’t stomach the notion of being in the LP.I know enough socialists in the LP , who bravely cary on in very difficult circumstances, to take a different view
It’s also absolutely right that New Labour’s policy programme is in many ways indistinguishable from the Tories but our task as socialists in the Labour Party has always been to pose an alternative. We also have, still, a body of MPs, maybe no more than 20, who will join us in opposition to everything from privatisation to the Welfare Reform Bill, Royal Mail privatisation, etc etc etc. They don’t deserve to be tarred with the same brush and they also deserve to be re-elected. Beacuse they DON’T sign up to the status quo. As anyone who attended the LRC rally Monday night will testify
With six months to go to a General Election, the idea of the demo was to tell New Labour what must be done to stop the Tories and express solidarity with trade union struggle. I think it was also meant to win support from a broad swathe of the left - yes including people at the LP Conference. They are not all the Anti-Christ
And let’s get this in persepctive. It was a small demonstration. Maybe about 5,000. And the loudest, and most visible, component was the SWP.Well done to them for mobiloising but the result was unfortunate
My take on the demo was utterly personal .
But I was not alone in finding the abuse-hurling counter-productive. Yes it lets off steam but frankly, it only gives our opponents ammunition and achieves bugger all.
And, if Labour is “out” then who is in? The Tories. And if, when we get a Tory Government then the left will be even more decimated and weak than it is now. Is that really a better option?
If we are trying to build the left then I don’t think this is the way to do it. I would point out I also attended the CWU demo on the Tuesday lunchtime and a PSC demo Tuesday night. Both were positive events.
By all means Rage Against New Labour. But blind rage, without a strategy which can win people over, is pretty pointless.
Comment by susan press — 8 October, 2009 @ 1:36 pm
well said susan
Comment by Wild Bob — 8 October, 2009 @ 2:07 pm
Reading between the lines of Susan’s response, it seems pretty obvious that those who initially called the demo mobilised hardly anyone. So the complaint about “hijacking” makes little sense here. And the whole dismissive tone (and having read other reports of the demo from many who are in the Labour Party, I’d have to say that dismissive tone is replete with simple miisrepresentation as well) sounds like sour grapes to me. More then that it raises questions about how well placed those in the Labour Party really are to mobilise resistance which will surely be needed in the coming years.
Comment by johng — 8 October, 2009 @ 2:38 pm
Perhaps Cllr Susan can enlighten us how to ‘rage against New Labour’ with a strategy that is effective? Or is the answer just the ‘reclaim Labour’ mantra?
Comment by Jef — 8 October, 2009 @ 3:07 pm
“It’s also absolutely right that New Labour’s policy programme is in many ways indistinguishable from the Tories but our task as socialists in the Labour Party has always been to pose an alternative. We also have, still, a body of MPs, maybe no more than 20, who will join us in opposition to everything from privatisation to the Welfare Reform Bill, Royal Mail privatisation, etc etc etc. They don’t deserve to be tarred with the same brush and they also deserve to be re-elected. Beacuse they DON’T sign up to the status quo. As anyone who attended the LRC rally Monday night will testify”
The question is why are you and they staying in New Labour when as you rightly claim it is as neo-liberal as the Tories? The history of the Labour Party is evidence that when in government the left is marginalised and the party manages capitalism. In this case there isn’t even marginalised left. Atomised would be more of an appropriate word.
Regardless of whether or not you stay in New Labour, a neoliberal project of Blair and Mandelson, what is unforgivable is your attack on those outside of NL who are actually trying to rebuild the left. You claim we have no strategy even though you obviously need to disregard what the left outside of New Labour is organising to justify why you remain in it. If you want to run around New Labour conference like a headless chicken imagining you are rebuilding the left then that’s your own personal delusion. Don’t tar everyone else with the same brush.
Comment by Ray — 8 October, 2009 @ 3:34 pm
Andy Abel was a memorable comrade.
Can I just ask whether if the Tories win the next election it will all be the SWP’s fault?
Comment by tyresome points — 8 October, 2009 @ 4:38 pm
“And, if Labour is “out” then who is in? The Tories. And if, when we get a Tory Government then the left will be even more decimated and weak than it is now. Is that really a better option?”
Yes, Left unity electoral fronts are developing around the country as are community and cuts campaigns.There is the Green party and Respect.May as well vote for some thing you believe in however imperfect that maybe rather than something you hate and despise which is how many people fell about both New labour and tories.
Whether you like it or not the rest of the Labour party is tainted by New Labour and the concret evidence of 12 further years of bloody neo liberal capitalism and imperialist wars following on from 17 years of the same under the tories.Yes there are differences but does it or has it really made a biggest enough difference for the better to many people’s lives?
I dont think it folloes in the least that the Left will be decimated following a tory electoal victory, on the contrary it could act as the straw which finally breaks the camels back of the NEW lABOUR ILLUSION and serves as a final impulse for the masochistic Left and it’s supporters and maong trasde unions and trasde unions to make a cleran break with and jump the sinking ship and help usher in the process of political realignment on the Left and advance Left unity in the creation of a new fighting and genuinely popular socialist party to funally camel which breaks the straws back (Jack Straw),
The fact that over Two hundred thousand people have left the Labour party speaks volumes. I think 15 MP’s voted against the imperialist wars in Iraq and ASfghanistan if they really had a vote at all.So much for political and democratic representation !
The problem with the REMAINING ‘ body’ of so called Left MP’s is that they are pretty much a mish mash and certainly not a power to be reckonned with of any sorts.
At best they are completely over shadowed and at wose serve as a fig leaf to New Labour as New Labour likes it’s authortarian mercurial nature as it can try to switch on and talk left when it suits it while doing the complete opposite.Who do they think they are kidding?
The last remaining HANDFUL of Left MP’s are but a handful, who would have much greater credibility if they left and broke with the rotten and rotting caracas of New Labour taking a significant layer of Labour activists and last remaining socialist and Labour activists with them.
For the Labour Left to encourage people to go back into the party or vote once again for this neo liberal imperialist party which is so despised by many is madness.The tories are equally despised by many.
Such futile and deluded appeals serve only to further discedit the Labour Left and their socialist ideas and further disillusion many.It divert vital energy away from where it should be directed which is against the capitalist system, the class system and it’s murderous and very bloody and costly imperialist wars and against all the neo liberal parties which collude in this.
Believe it or not there is life outside the New Labour hell hole!
There is no evidence or indication whatsoever that following an electoral defeat New Labour would in any shape or form move to the Left if it even knew what that actually meany anymore.The only trajectory will be to move New labour further to the right with the able assistence of the majority of the deluded TUC and attempt to out tories as the tories have out new laboured New slay bells labour.
Ding dong !
At the end of the day people wont vote for what they dont believe in or trust
Comment by FLEABITE — 8 October, 2009 @ 5:25 pm
Ray, if people want to march up and down Brighton promenande shouting “Gordon Brown , you are scum” and imagining THAT is trying to re-build the left it is up to them.
I don’t stay with New Labour. I stay with the Labour Party which maybe you see as indistinguishable but as I said not all MPs are New labour, neither are thousands of constituency activists, councillors and trade unionists who choose to stay in the Party.Which is not to dispute that the Labour Party is in a dire state and thousands have understandably walked away
FYI, I spent no time whatsoever in the conference hall as the event is a stage-managed sham but i did attend lots of very useful fringe meetings including the Justice For Shrewsbury 24, Labour Friends Of palestine, the LRC Rally and of course the Convention Of The Left on the Saturday which was by no means perfect but at least free from sectarianism and respectful of different points of view. If the Tories win the next election then, yes, a lot of that blame lies at the door of New Labour.But the fact remains, that the Tories will be worse.
Rage, on its own, will re-build nothing. Initiatives like the People’s Charter, now officially backed by TUC, are far more positive for all of us, whichever group we belong to on the left. The pressure can only come below. But those who shout the loudest are not necessarily right.
And as i said, the whole point of the demo wasto bring people together in a united call for change in policy. Which I think we would all agree is desperately needed.
Comment by susan press — 8 October, 2009 @ 5:40 pm
Except Susan that your report was a heavily jaundiced attack on a demo which was reported quite differently by other people in the Labour Party (Daves Part, Stroppy amongst others) and some of the comments here were just unconstructive ranting about anyone who is not in the Labour Party. If we lift our eyes to the experiance of other European countries what we see is defeat for the social-liberal social democrats and a polarisation on the margins between those to the left and those to the right. Its our likely future. Except without the left if we are not very careful. Attacking everyone who does not fall in line with the Labour Party is not likely to avert the worst of those possible options.
Comment by johng — 8 October, 2009 @ 5:50 pm
John makes a very good point about the polarisation of the left and right in Europe. The European Left are organising outside the traditional social democratic parties because they realise that neo-liberal policies they have co-opted have destroyed the credibility of the left.
It’s about time the few remaining left in New Labour woke up to this reality. It’s no help Susan claiming that you are contributing to rebuilding the left when you disparage those outside New Labour. FYI you are doing New Labours dirty work every time you attack those of us on the left organising outside of New Labour. What difference is there if either you or Mandelson does it?
Comment by Ray — 8 October, 2009 @ 6:30 pm
Susan’s voice does sound like a cry for help from the wilderness of New Labour. But, for me, time is too valuable to be wasted supporting Brown and risking eventual disappointment.
Certainly, the childish nonsense of the sloganeers serves only to obscure serious campaigns and a constructive approach.
Those with energy to spare would probably find a more worthwhile cause in supporting a coherent alternative - in my view: Respect and the Greens.
Comment by Dave — 8 October, 2009 @ 7:09 pm
Every tory goverment has attacked the workers. so has every labour goverment. the point about the demo in brighton was to galvanise workers into action over pay, jobs and conditions. not to go begging cap in hand to the bastards who’ve attacked us at every turn for the last 12 years, in the hopes they might punch us in the stomach rather than the face. and yes, i’m a public sector worker, and no, most of my colleagues will not be voting labour. who could blame them?
Comment by Keith Watermelon — 8 October, 2009 @ 7:28 pm
“But the fact remains, that the Tories will be worse”"
Susan Press
This would be funny if it was not so fatuous.
Susan Press pretends to some sort of high moral Labour Party ground, from which she can predict the future and wag her finger at the ultra left. The Ultra Left includes all those terrible people who dont agree with her that Labour is always better even when killing and torturing.That we should all keep quiet about Labours crimes and creep around Brighton singing hymns of praise to the Labour Party and its progressive, enlightened and compassionate leaders.
From her ivory tower, Susan can see that Labour is doing things that have made a lot of people angry but the Tories will be worse..the old refrain of Labours scoundrels,careerists and those who cannot stand to look at the reality of what Labour actually does.
“But the fact remains, that the Tories will be worse”
Go and tell that to the relatives of the Million Iraqi Civilian Dead, the million mentally traumatised children of Iraq or the millions of Iraqi refugees and displaced. Tell them that Labour phosphourous doesnot burn as hot as Tory.
“But the fact remains, that the Tories will be worse”
Tell the 90,000 Prisoners locked up by Labour in the Labour Privatised Prisons, mostly young, working class, ill educated, mentally ill,But the Tories will be worse. Tell it to the them that a Labour Privatised Prison system is better than a Tory Privatised Prison system
“But the fact remains, that the Tories will be worse”
Tell the Post office Workers, that Labour inspired management Privatisation, bullying and victimisation is kinder and gentler than the Tory
“But the fact remains, that the Tories will be worse”
As if the Labour and Conservative Tories can be seperated of course they cannot and they learn, inspire and support each other.
“But the fact remains, that the Tories will be worse”
The Conservative Tories seeing how the Labour Tories have chopped up the NHS will proceed to dismember it and the tools they will use will bear the makers mark, Made by the Labour Party.
Labours a Neo Liberal Party, the armed wing of the Tory Party,
Labour is dead as a progressive, working class orientaited Party and those who want to continue to inhabit its carcass are living in denial.
They are propping up a bunch of corrupt,venal, warmongering,blood spattered, torturing, Neo Liberal, Privatisers.
Comment by Red Bandits — 10 October, 2009 @ 2:16 am
I am not Labour Party member- I left over Clause 4-, and I believe in building a new socialist party, but I would find some of the criticisms made here a bit more impressive if those of us on the Left outside of the Labour Party were able to show that we had convinced enough people to support a credible left alternative so that the alternative for most people in the elections was not to abstain and let the Tories in. In most places in England and Wales, not voting Labour will have the same effect as voting Tory.
Now you can say as much as you like that there’s no difference between Labour and Tory, but if you haven’t got a credible alternative it’s hardly very impressive, and none of the understandable bile spat out at Brown et al does anything to address that problem.
Comment by Armchair — 10 October, 2009 @ 11:17 am
In most places in England and Wales, not voting Labour will have the same effect as voting Tory.
The problem is Armchair that voting Labour in most parts of England and Wales will have the same effect as voting Tory.
Pretending that Labour is in any way going to be better, kinder, gentler, so It is not just a Tory Cut its a Labour Tory Cut,is dishonest.
This Labour Government have done things, to the NHS for eample that the Conservatives would not have dared and now the Conservatives will use the tools Labour has given them to dismember the NHS and Labour did this.
Yesterday on BBC Radio 4s Any Questions, Labour MP and Brown ally Nick Brown was telling the Post office workers that they should not strike and that Privatisation was a good plan and that it was wrong to oppose managements changes. The usual Tory response, in fact Browns response was almost indistinguisahable from William Hagues,on the same programme.
Herpes or Diptheria both nasty but its your choice which symptoms do you prefer?
Comment by Red Bandits — 10 October, 2009 @ 12:47 pm