Keep calm and carry on campaigning for socialism

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At a time when our trade unions appear to be incapable of leading national fights to improve our living standards, any hope which we may have for an improvement in our lives as working class people is necessarily focused upon our political party, the Labour Party.

Under socialist leadership, the Labour Party has bucked the trend of decline which is afflicting centre-left parties across Europe. We have reversed the the slide into irrelevance which commenced under the leadership of those in the Party who ceaselessly seek to undermine that socialist leadership.

The 2017 General Election manifesto signposts the possibility that Labour will be rescued from its historic role as a Party which could be relied upon to put responsibility to “the nation” (meaning to the ruling class) ahead of loyalty to its working-class base. This possibility has unleased the dogs of war against our Party and its leadership.

In recent weeks, Jeremy Corbyn, one of the most principled and politically consistent Parliamentarians of our lifetime, has variously been denounced as a cold war Czechoslovak spy, as “soft” on Putin in a confected episode of inter-imperialist rivalry and, most recently, as the cause of anti-semitism within our movement.

No one should deny that anti-semitism, as a particular form of racism with an ancient and grotesque lineage in European history, is a reactionary manifestation of prejudice which all socialists should oppose (and which no one should excuse) – and no one needs to do that in order to see that the sudden outrage at a six year old comment on Facebook is – as the majority of Labour Party members see – an episode in intra-Party conflict.

This intra-Party conflict is simply the latest desperate throw of the dice by those who want to return Labour to its role as a “safe” alternative to the increasingly divided Tories (who are tearing themselves apart over Brexit). The attacks upon Labour’s socialist leadership which we have seen in recent weeks and days are simply a foretaste of what is to come as we approach the possibility of a General Election victory.

Without doubt Jeremy Corbyn (being a human being) will have made comments (or “liked” other comments) on social media over the years which can be presented in a bad light by those who wish to do so. There can be even less doubt that some supporters of the Party leadership will have done discreditable things over many years – and each and every indiscretion will be publicised and condemned.

There are sufficient members of the Parliamentary Labour Party whose loyalties lie outside our ranks that they will be prepared to be lachrymose in response to whatever is said by our enemies (just as there have been Labour local government leaders who have been so obviously prepared to put their own individual interests before those of our Party).

There is a fifth column within our Party and our movement, consisting largely of career politicians, and its membership will become clearer as the fear which we rightly instil in our political adversaries (rightly) grows.

So what should socialists do?

Keep calm and carry on.

There are local elections in many areas in May – and we need to elect as many Labour Councillors as possible.

In Brighton and Hove we need members to put themselves forward to stand in next year’s Council elections.

Don’t let yourselves be distracted comrades.

How shall we write Labour's manifesto in local elections?

One area of the current Labour Party Democracy Review which won’t necessarily attract the attention of the media (which may be a good thing) concerns the arrangements for relationships between the Party locally and Labour Groups on local authorities.

During the decades of decline, in which Party membership fell away and the democratic structures of the Party were hollowed out, Labour Groups were increasingly reorganised (often around the undemocratic model of Cabinet Governance or the even more undemocratic model of an elected Mayor) in order to ensure the discipline of Labour Groups in delivering the so-called “New” Labour agenda.

Labour Councillors were taught that they were part of a small “elite” who had to circle their wagons against political opposition (including that from those within their own Party who believed that our purpose was to represent working class people rather more than to administer the local state against the interests of those people).

That time is over and is not coming back. Those lessons – where they were learned – need now to be unlearned.

We can easily write change into our Rule Book by borrowing locally from arrangements which we have long had nationally.

Our Rule Book provides for the manifesto in a Parliamentary election to be approved by the various parts of our federal Party structure (at what is known as a Clause Five meeting) as follows (from Parts Three and Four of Clause Five of Chapter One of the Rule Book);

“When in Government the NEC, the seven backbench members of the Parliamentary Committee of the Parliamentary Labour Party (‘PLP’) plus the Chair of the PLP, the Cabinet, the Leaders of the Scottish and Welsh Labour Parties, the Chair and three vice Chairs of the NPF, two CLP members of the NPF to be elected by CLP delegates to the NPF, and eight Trade Union members of the TULO Contact Group, shall decide which items from the Party programme shall be included in the manifesto which shall be issued by the NEC prior to every general election. The joint meeting shall also define the attitude of the Party to the principal issues raised by the election which are not covered by the manifesto.

When not in Government the NEC, the Shadow Cabinet, the Parliamentary Committee of the Parliamentary Labour Party (‘PLP’), the Leaders of the Scottish and Welsh Labour Parties, and the Chair and three vice Chairs of the NPF and eight Trade Union members of the TULO Contact Group shall decide which items from the Party programme shall be included in the manifesto that shall be issued by the NEC prior to every general election. The joint meeting shall also define the attitude of the Party to the principal issues raised by the election which are not covered by the manifesto.”

However, when it comes to local elections, our Rule Book currently writes in a division of labour whereby the Party membership does the heavy lifting of campaigning whilst the Labour Group determines the manifesto (as if we allowed the PLP to determine the manifesto in a General Election!)

Clause Eight Part One of Chapter Thirteen of the Rule Book currently provides that; “The local government election campaign strategy shall be determined by the local Party, normally the Local Campaign Forum in consultation with the Labour Group. The Labour Group shall formulate election manifestos in consultation with the local Party and relevant CLPs.”

What we need is to write in a formal role for the Party, alongside the Group, in writing the local manifesto – not because we want such a formal meeting to have to take place and face the need to vote on differences, but because by writing the Rules this way we will aim to ensure a consensual approach to the writing of our manifesto in a local area which respects the role of the local Party (and ultimately – if agreement is not arrived at by consensus – we need a democratic process that doesn’t simply raise elected representatives above local Party members).

What I have suggested to the Democracy Review is what follows; 

Chapter 13 Clause VIII Part One should be amended to read as follows;

“The local government election campaign strategy shall be determined by the local Party, normally the Local Campaign Forum in consultation with the Labour Group. Election Manifestos shall be agreed, as far in advance of each election as is practicable and appropriate, at a joint meeting of the Local Campaign Forum (or equivalent) and the Labour Group, also including two additional representatives of each Constituency Labour Party within the relevant local authority area (to be nominated by the Executive of the CLP) and six additional representatives of affiliates (elected by and from delegates from affiliates to CLPs within the relevant local authority area). The joint meeting shall also define the attitude of the Party to the principal issues raised by the election which are not covered by the manifesto.”

This amendment – and you might be able to think of something better which you could submit online – would open up the process of writing local election manifestos to the wider Party. In a slow process of change Labour Councillors are accepting that the new, mass membership, socialist led, Labour Party is not the Party it was a few years ago and that professional politicians are not in charge (and never again will be).

Forward looking Labour Councillors are already preparing themselves for the collaborative future in which the Party and our elected representatives work together to advance socialist politics – and there is room in this future for all those who want to work together to achieve the socialist objectives of the Party.

Ahead of any rule changes which may or may not emerge from the Democracy Review, we can – and will – work together to develop local Labour manifestos which command the enthusiastic support of the Party’s mass membership – and in Brighton and Hove I am confident that we will now find a positive way forward. I wish luck to comrades elsewhere in the country seeking the same end.

Time to think again about unity on the left

In a week in which a leading figure on the Labour left bizarrely called for disaffiliation of trade unions from our Party it may seem idiosyncratic to continue to be interested in the fate of another minor Party.

But – having advanced the argument here some time ago – I was pleased to see Owen Jones take to a wide audience the plausible case for Green Party affiliation to Labour.

It was not too much of a shock to see that argument comprehensively rebuffed by the Green Party’s two leaders – albeit their arguments are fairly slender.

Caroline Lucas and Jonathan Bartley justify their continued electoral project on the grounds that they have some better policies than our Party (they already oppose Trident and we haven’t quite got there yet), they exist to challenge an economic orthodoxy based upon a belief in endless economic growth – and they are committed to activism (sometimes including civil disobedience).

Anyone who wants to win the political arguments which the Green Party could still have with a left-led Labour Party must know that what winning will look like will be influencing a left-led Labour Government. Those of us who want to see unilateral nuclear disarmament (for example) would welcome new allies to help us win that argument in the Party and trade unions.

Equally, a real challenge to economic orthodoxy must encompass a renewed attempt to empower democracy against finance – and the only prospect of doing that in the next ten years (or, for that matter in my adult lifetime) is through the election of a Labour Government committed to socialist policies.

If the political and ideological justifications for the continuing Green electoral project (on a national scale) are so slender as to disappear when you turn them sideways, the argument that Greens are activists and that this differentiates them from Labour’s left simply fails to stand up to examination. Since the 2015 General Election and leadership election, tens of thousands of committed activists have been among the multitude who have joined or rejoined Labour.

Lucas and Bartley are looking away from the reality of national politics in Britain in order to justify an electoral project the only material consequence of which (under a First Past the Post electoral system) can only be – outside Brighton Pavilion perhaps – to win enough votes in a few Labour/Tory marginals to provide evidence for those who want to accuse the Greens of “splitting the vote” and letting the Tories in.

This is not a negligible consideration given that the two main Parties are close in the polls, the Tory Government are trying to introduce identity checks to discourage voting by those least likely to support them, the next General Election may be fought on new boundaries of benefit to the political right, and the establishment and their allies (including those within the labour movement) will pull out all the stops to scupper the prospect of a socialist Government.

In these circumstances it may be a hopeful sign that a Labour movement campaign has been launched which – among its objectives – supports the electoral reform which the Green Party leaders suggest is a sine qua non of any future cooperation with Labour. Although our first priorities in Government must be the social and economic policies needed to repair the damage done to working class communities by austerity, we do need to address the need for constitutional change.

This isn’t just about the electoral system for Westminster – which requires the sort of informed debate we did not have in 2012 – but about abolishing an unelected House of Parliament and addressing the absurd and archaic monarchy.

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With a once in a lifetime chance of socialist victory in a General Election we all need to be prepared to re-examine long held views – and bring together all those who want to see the transformation of society.