Keir Starmer supports "the fullest internal democracy" to avoid domination by "vertical hierarchies". (Well, he did...)

A little more than thirty years ago a small group on (and outside) the Labour Left, one of whom would go on to become Director of Public Prosecutions, produced a few issues of a magazine which called for a better response to the defeats and setbacks suffered by our movement in the mid 1980s than political witch hunting within the Labour Party and business unionism in the trade unions.

Some of us took some inspiration from some of what we read in that magazine and still remember it.

My own UNISON Branch Labour Link group has today agreed to call for the restoration of the whip to Jeremy Corbyn, MP, reflecting the rather easier climate for debate and discussion of Labour Party matters in the trade unions, as opposed to within the Party itself. UNISON nationally may not yet have spoken out quite so clearly but most of Labour’s affiliated trade unions have now done so.

Labourlist are reporting that eight of the twelve national trade unions affiliated to the Labour Party have expressed concern about internal disputes and divisions arising from the removal of the whip from Jeremy Corbyn. These eight unions comprise more than a third of the total affiliated membership of all affiliated trade unions and - as Labourlist point out - include Community (certainly not seen as on the “left” of the Party).

Keir Starmer might well be expected to welcome a positive contribution from trade unions to the debate - after all he is on record as a strong supporter of trade unions which “reject the integration of the unions into the management of capitalist enterprises” (see p3 of Socialist Alternatives, vol 2 no 2 August/September 1987).

Whilst UNISON at a national level has not (yet?) joined in public lobbying of the leadership to resolve the current dispute, it is also to be expected that Keir Starmer will welcome positive grassroots initiatives, such as the motion agreed by Lambeth UNISON Labour Link members, bearing in mind his past support for “the fullest internal democracy to avoid vertical hierarchies dominating the unions” (see p27 of Socialist Alternatives, vol 1 no 3 December 1983/January 1987).

With a reactionary, corrupt and incompetent Government mishandling the pandemic and with the country teetering on the brink of a “no deal” Brexit, now is the time for the unity which we were promised by the Party leadership. If Comrade Starmer rediscovered his earlier enthusiasm for internal democracy to provide a check on vertical hierarchies that might also be a good thing.