The fact is that at the present time there is no realistic alternative to the Labour Party. There is no shortage of small groups on the fringes of the Labour movement who have attempted to put themselves forward as such an alternative, but they are not even noticed by the mass of workers. The working class can never express itself through small organisations, even if they have correct ideas. It is a law that when the working class moves into action it always expresses itself in the first instance through the traditional mass organisations of the class. In Britain that means the trade unions and the Labour Party.
Given the deep historical roots of the Labour Party, there is no possibility of creating a new alternative workers’ Party under present conditions. The workers will test their organisations time and time again before they finally draw the conclusion that a new party is necessary. This has been shown in practice many times. Labour voters, even when they are disgusted with the government, generally choose to abstain in protest rather than go anywhere else. In all elections since 1997, there has been a fall in turnout, particularly in Labour strongholds. But there has been no movement in the direction of any new political formation outside the Labour Party. The workers’ discontent with Blairism has been expressed in a growth of abstentionism. This will only change when they see the development of opposition within the Labour Party. At the moment, this opposition is developing within the unions and is expressed in the replacement of the old right-wing leaders by more left-wing elements. That is how the movement always begins.
It is necessary to draw certain lessons from history. When the Independent Labour Party (ILP) split from the Labour Party in 1932 it had some 100,000 supporters. But with an unclear policy it eventually collapsed and was reduced to dust. The British Communist Party, with the authority of the Russian Revolution behind it, never succeeded in creating a mass base in Britain. Lenin, who understood the question of the mass organisations very well, insisted that the CP should orient to the Labour Party and even affiliate to it. Initially, the CP accepted Lenin’s advice and obtained important results. But when it abandoned the Leninist policy and adopted the ultra-left “third period” line, it was rapidly reduced to a sect. More recently, none of the “57 Heinz varieties” of sectarian groups on the fringes of the Labour movement have made the slightest impact.
The Socialist Labour Party, set up by Arthur Scargill after he split from the Labour Party, has sunk without a trace. Though Scargill was a well-known leader with a reputation as a leading class fighter, in the end, it meant nothing to the broad mass. The Socialist Alliance has done little better.
The overwhelming majority of the working class in Britain, despite profound disappointment with Blair, see no alternative to the Labour Party. According to a recent opinion poll, a big majority of Labour voters expressed their opposition to breaking the Labour-union links. Sixty-four percent of Labour voters were opposed to breaking these historic links. On the other hand, fifty-three percent of Conservative voters wanted the links broken. These results are sufficient to show the class basis of this important question.
The fate of the Labour Party is in the hands of trade unions and their members. And the situation is changing rapidly. Whereas in the past the unions were the bastions of Labour’s right wing, today they stand increasingly on the left. It is no accident that the new left trade union leaders, practically without exception, have raised the idea of reclaiming the Labour Party from the Blairites. Bob Crow, the general secretary of the RMT and Mick Rix, the then general secretary of ASLEF, issued a joint statement calling for the unions to reclaim the Party:
We believe that it is time the Labour Party was reclaimed for labour, that it learned once more to listen to the voice of the class it enfranchised…
In Britain, solidarity action is unlawful, and even the right to strike is hedged about with hurdles and qualifications. The effect of such restrictions is to make tackling inequality and injustice even harder. The general public does not gain from legally enfeebled trade unions, but bad employers do. And it has now been proved beyond doubt that if trade unions are driven out of politics – New Labour’s maximum programme – there is no alternative means of representing working-class concerns to hand.
Trade unions are still potentially decisive in shaping Labour policy. The Party is still our representation committee – if we choose to make it so. OK, we don’t write cheques for £125,000 and expect the PM to write a letter on our behalf by return. That deluxe service is reserved for business leaders. But our representatives are there when policy is debated, have votes when votes are counted and are embedded in the life of the Party at every level…
Likewise, at the Party’s annual conference, we can make policy if we want to, the more so since our opposition to privatisation and our support for a better deal for trade unions and employees in the workplace are shared by many and probably most Party members, who prefer Labour’s traditions to the embrace of suspect business leaders. If we have a government that is more Berlusconi than Bevin, it is only because we tolerate it.
Now that New Labour has found out the hard way the corrupting consequences of inviting the right into their political parlour, there could be no better time for the unions to play a more open, and proud, part in Labour’s policy debates…
Derek Simpson, the general secretary of Amicus, also urged union members to fight to take back the Labour Party. “I would urge members to go into the branches, to step up their work within Labour and take this Party back…” he said. He encouraged union members to flood local Parties, and ensure more union-backed candidates win election nominations and constituency positions. They should seek “to reclaim our Party”, he said. “We want to be engaging more, not less. If we are there in much greater numbers we can take back Labour.”
Billy Hayes, general secretary of the CWU, has also called on members to join the Party and reclaim it for the rank and file: “The weakness of Blairism today shows there is the chance for change if trade unionists play their part in shaping the sort of Labour Party we need”, he said. The attempt to get the CWU to disaffiliate from the Labour Party at their 2003 national conference was overwhelmingly defeated. Other union leaders are taking up this call for a revolt against Blairism within the Labour Party in an increasingly organised fashion.
John Edmonds, who was initially on the right wing of the Party, revealed he had been offered a peerage by Blair, but had refused. “There is more nobility in representing working people than you will ever find under the ermine in the House of Lords”, he said. He has also added his voice to those urging the unions to reclaim the Labour Party.
This is the time to stand by our principles and fight to reclaim the Party for those socialist values that we believe in… I am not leaving this Party in the hands of people like the Hinduja brothers or Bernie Ecclestone.
His successor as general secretary of the GMB, Kevin Curran, dismissed New Labour as a product of a handful of people and said that they would ignore the trade unions “at their peril”. He said there was no intention of breaking the link: the aim was to ensure that Labour lived up to the values of the union. He also rejected the view that Labour had to change to get elected. “Any Labour Party would have been elected in 1997. I don’t think it was a trick of new Labour; it was the death throes of the Tory Party.”
The victory of Tony Woodley as general secretary of the powerful Transport and General Union, Britain’s third biggest union is a further step in the direction of reclaiming the Party. He has given notice that he intends to hold a summit with other left-wing union leaders hostile to New Labour to “put the Labour in the Party”.
“I’ll fulfil my promise to call a summit of affiliated unions to discuss how to get Labour back representing working-class people”, said Woodley.
The T&G knows better than most that the Labour Party is a broad coalition whose destiny has been guided since its beginning by the trade unions. If the progressive ideas of the unions appear now to be ignored, the solution is not to withdraw and sulk in our tents.
It means representing members rather than ministers as we take the arguments for progressive policies into every area of the Labour Party to which we are affiliated.