Socialist MPs defend the NHS

Back in August 2018 I blogged here about my prostate cancer diagnosis. In April 2020 I noted that my cancer had progressed and was no longer curable. Since then excellent treatment by our National Health Service (NHS) has kept me alive and, until recently, largely free of pain. 

This has allowed me not only to enjoy the happiest time of my life but also to add to the jollity by continuing in my role as Chair of Brighton Pavilion Constituency Labour Party. I have been particularly pleased to see developments in UNISON, the trade union to which I devoted my working life, since last year's elections to the National Executive Council (NEC).

Unfortunately, a secondary tumour in my shoulder and lymphoedema in my right arm has now created new challenges for myself and those caring for me, which includes not only my partner and family but of course many workers in our NHS.

I'm therefore particularly pleased to see that the Socialist Campaign Group of MPs are organising an event on Monday evening as part of the continuing campaign against the privatisation of our NHS.

Unfortunately, I do not think that we can rely upon the leadership of our Party for a robust defence of the NHS in the public sector. Keir Starmer is eagerly bringing onto his front bench the sort of politicians who have no problem with private provision of public services, and who wrongly think that as long as the NHS provides care that is free at the point of use it doesn't matter who actually provides that care.

The pernicious spread of the private sector within our health service over the past generation and more is quite as damaging as a cancer and needs to be cut out. As you might imagine, I feel particularly strongly about this.

There will be those who, looking at what the labour leadership say the Labour Party would do in government, will abandon all hope for socialist politics in our party and go off in search of a more convivial, if irrelevant, environment for political activity.

The Socialist Campaign Group of MPs are not abandoning our Party and they are right not to. The struggle between the socialist left wing and the social democratic (or not even social democratic) right-wing of the workers movement is central to the stability of an advanced capitalist society.

The Labour left are always fighting with both hands tied behind our backs and nine times out of 10 we lose. Most recently we have seen the tragic outcome of the defeat in 2019 and the evolution of the party under the disingenuous victor of the 2020 leadership election. 

"Corbynism" has perhaps gone the way of "Bennism" and "Bevanism" before it. This is hardly surprising. If the establishment could not generally, and with relative ease, restore control over the commanding heights of our movement then our capitalist system would be continuously unstable. 

The Labour Party, as I said recently, has always been a battleground between socialists and those who are not really socialist. In this repeated struggle the left generally faces defeat. 

However, we only need one real victory to achieve the permanent transformation not only of our Party but of our society.

The struggle takes place within the Labour Party and the wider labour movement and it doesn't take place elsewhere.

This is the struggle that I have been a small part of all my life and in which I hope to continue to play a role for a while yet.