ABORIGINAL ACTING LEGEND JACK CHARLES DENIED ENTRY TO UK

Via Gary Foley:

PRESS RELEASE

23rd OCTOBER 2009

LEGENDARY ABORIGINAL ACTOR AND CULTURAL LEADER DENIED ACCESS THE UK

Photos taken 20 years apart. From an exhibition by Fitzroy artist Rod McNicoll.

Aboriginal elder and film, television and theatre icon, Jack Charles is a national treasure.

Since founding the first Aboriginal theatre company in the 1970’s, Jack has performed with Australia’s most renowned actors (Geoffrey Rush, David Gulpilil, Bill Hunter) and directors in feature films (The Chant of Jimmie Blacksmith, Bedevil and Blackfellas) TV series and hundreds of plays.

The feature documentary Bastardy charts Jack Charles’ amazing life story as he has also overcome the adversity of heroin addiction and a life in and out of jail. At age 66, Jack is now a Koori community leader and a tireless believer in grass roots reconciliation.

Jack was recently invited to speak before a series of screenings of Bastardy at the Sheffield International Documentary Festival - one of the most prestigious documentary festivals in the world.

On the 22nd of October Jack was denied entry to the United Kingdom because of his previous criminal record.

Jack was meant to depart for the UK on the 1st of November and friends and supporters of Jack are now desperately seeking anyone who can leverage intervention on a federal government level (The Hon Peter Garrett AM MP Minister for the Environment, Heritage and the Arts) to give Jack this incredibly important cultural opportunity to speak at this international forum.

CONTACT:

Amiel Courtin-Wilson (the director of of Bastardy) at
amiel@amielcourtin-wilson.com

Winning hearts and minds...

Via BoRev, a painful and distressing example of WTF?!! I can't even laugh...

In Afghanistan today a young girl was killed when the British government literally dropped a box of propaganda on her head.

"According to the BBC, the leaflet box was supposed to open in mid-air, spreading pro-coalition propaganda over rural Helmand province. But the container failed to break apart, landing on top of the girl, who died later in the hospital."

So off-topic and yet so...not.

Scotland & England agree to repatriate Aboriginal dead!

NOTE TO EDITORS: It is offensive to Aboriginal cultural and religious beliefs that any images of skulls or other body parts be shown. According to Aboriginal beliefs an image of a dead Aboriginal, whether skeletal or otherwise, can capture the spirit of the dead and cause trauma to the spirit and the Aboriginal people generally. Please do not use images of the dead to accompany media stories.

PRESS RELEASE: SCOTLAND and ENGLAND AGREE TO REPATRIATE ABORIGINAL DEAD

Aborigines are ecstatic to be finally bringing home a skull and jawbone of Aboriginals taken more than 150 years ago.

“We are so happy to be finally collecting the remains,” one of the delegates Sara Maynard said today. “Caroline Spotswood and I leave Hobart on flight QF1012 at 4.50pm Saturday 12^th. We arrive in Scotland on Tuesday to collect one of our dead. On Wednesday we will collect the other from the Royal College of Surgeons in London.

“The National Museums Scotland does not have any information about how our dead finished up in Scotland. That usually means the remains were grave-robbed. In such cases the grave robber rarely provided detailed documentation about where the remains were dug up from, or were found on sand blown burial sites. We do know that some of our people were murdered just so the prized skulls of what settlers hypocritically called savages could be donated to scientists.

The jawbone coming back from the Royal College of Surgeons was taken in the 1830s from sick and dying Aborigines by George Augustus Robinson, self styled “Protector of Aborigines”. These bones, usually of close relatives, were wrapped with sinew and were worn as amulets to ward off pain and sickness. Five others were returned by the Royal College in 2002; this one was only recently located.

There was a massive trade in Tasmanian Aboriginal remains in the mid 1880’s. Many of the dead were donated to “old mother England” (and Scotland) by settlers wanting to ingratiate themselves back home.

While this is a victory of over 20 years effort, other institutions in Britain are playing games to hold onto their collections of Aboriginal dead. The laws in Britain now allow institutions to hand over Aboriginal dead, but they are not compelled to. Many refuse to cooperate directly with Aborigines, hiding behind long and complicated processes that delay repatriations and exhaust the limited resources of Aboriginal groups. The Wellcome Trust told us this week that we could not collect our dead from them because we have not even begun their process - although both we and the Australian Government were first in touch with them back in 2007!

Oxford and Cambridge are the hard heads who refuse to talk to us. Unless the Australian Prime Minister gets involved we will never get the remains back that those institutions hold. Oxford has the skulls of five people, and hair from five other people. Cambridge will not yet even confirm what they do have; it could be four skulls and two jawbones.

Prime Minister Rudd must ask the British Prime Minister to change the law so that all Aboriginal dead are returned to Australia. While his predecessor Mr Howard had been active in getting laws changed in Britain to help with repatriation, Mr Rudd has not been at all interested.

Sara Maynard

Mobile: 0437 259 357

Email: saramaynard2002@yahoo.com.au (Please use this email address from the 11^th-21^st of September 2009)

11 September 2009

Cricket & Class Struggle?

The wombats, having grown up in the thick of rural Australian cricket, have long been considering a foray into the question of cricket and class struggle. However, having neither the time nor total dedication (nor, perhaps, the skill) of C.L.R. James, we have failed to produce such a piece.

The game is afoot, however. John Passant has written a small piece post-Ashes, declaring England's defeat of Australia victory for the class struggle, and a defeat of "cricket's imperialist masters" (ie Australia), and the right-wing troglodyte Andrew Bolt has picked up on John Passant's piece, applying the usual finesse (equvialent to passing a nuclear weapon through a key-hole) that passes for "analysis" in his work. So, perhaps now is the time...

Firstly, the wombats disagree with John Passant's proposition, and we believe it to be a fundamentally flawed approach to the question of class and cricket (although we assume John's eye was primarily on the ball of racism in cricket, and there are valuable points to be made there).

In fact, however, cricket and class struggle, cricket and national liberation (sometimes called "liberation cricket"), cricket and racism, and cricket and the development of capitalism, its grave-diggers and its silly-mid-off have a far more interesting connectivity.

While we are no James, the wombats have decided that - after the disaster of the recent Ashes tour - we'll have a go, over a number of posts, at sketching a brief "People's History of Cricket".

Resistance statement of solidarity with Vestas workers

Resistance, an Australia-wide socialist youth organisation, sends greetings and solidarity to the workers occupying the Vestas plant on the Isle of Wight and join the calls of protest against Vestas’ decision to close down the wind turbine factory.

This decision is clearly a case of corporate greed being placed ahead of the needs of workers, the community, and the environment on which we all depend. As companies and governments around the world state that action on climate change can only come at the expense of the economy, this decision highlights that what is meant by the economy is profits for the corporate elite. This green industry has provided hundreds of jobs for the people of the Isle of Wight and supported thousands more indirectly and we need to open more factories like it, not close them down, to make a safe climate future possible.

Resistance supports calls for Gordon Brown’s Labour government to step in and nationalise the Vestas factory. The twin crises the world now faces – the economic crisis and the ecological crisis – both have their roots in the greedy exploitation and profiteering of the free market. What is clearly needed is massive government investment in renewable energy, supporting green jobs and beginning the transition to a low-carbon economy.

Resistance support the demands of the workers and calls for immediate trade union recognition, nationalisation of the factory under the control of the workers, and making the plant a building block for a green energy revolution. We add our support to the trade unions, fellow workers and general public who have rallied to save the workers and save the planet.

Vestas Workers Beseiged By Riot Police!

From "FACTORY UNDER OCCUPATION: Save 600 jobs at Vestas!", a blog covering the occupation of Vestas wind turbine factory in the UK:

(Updated Press Release)

Workers staging a sit-in at the soon-to-close Vestas wind turbine plant on the Isle of Wight are being starved out by police.

The police, many inside the factory and dressed in riot gear, have denied food to the workers who took over the factory offices last night, to protest about the closure of their factory. The police, operating with highly questionable legal authority, have surrounded the offices, preventing supporters from joining the sit-in, and preventing food from being brought to the protestors.

Around 20 workers at the Vestas Plant in Newport, on the Isle of Wight, occupied the top floor of offices in their factory to protest against its closure which will result in over 500 job losses.

Acting without an injunction, on private property, the police have repeatedly tried to break into the office where the protesting workers have barricaded themselves, and have threatened the workers with arrest for aggravated trespass, despite the fact that no damage has been done to the property where the protest is taking place. Police have also forcibly removed people from private property, another action that is of very questionable legality in the absence of a formal injunction.

The officer involved in the latter action was number 3606. The officer who appears to be in charge is 3115. It may help to let the local police authorities know that we are unhappy with their handling of the situation – in this case the email address to bombard is professional.standards@hampshire.pnn.police.uk

This heavy handed response is the latest in a long line of over-reactions to protest by various UK police forces.

Wales: Time For A Rainbow Coalition

Via the Socialist Unity blog:

by Adam Price MP
Er gwaetha’r cynnydd yng nghefnogaeth y Blaid a’n llwyddiant yn ein cadarnleoedd, mae’r anfadwaith bod pleidiau cenedlaetholaidd Prydeining wedi gwneud bron cystal a’r Blaid Genedlaethol Gymreig yn yr Etholiadau Ewropeaidd yng Nghymru dal yn fy mhoeni. Gobiethio bod hyn yn pigo cydwybod pob gwladgarwr wnaeth aros gatre, ond mae’n gyfrifoldeb arna i ofyn beth a ellir gwneud yn well neu’n wahanol. Yn hen draddodiad y trioedd, dyma dair, taer awgrym.

Rhaid i ni beidio ymddiheuro am ein cenedlaetholdeb. Yn oes globaleiddio mae gwleidyddiaeth hunaniaeth a’r amgen am ail-wreiddio grym gwleidyddol mewn cymunedau lleol a chenedlaethol yn ganolog i’n cyfnod. Dyna yn rhannol sydd wrth wraidd twf y Dde Brydeinig; consyrn gwirioneddol am bwer anatebol, boed yn sefydliadau Ewropeaidd annemocrataidd neu gorfforaethau’n ecsploetio llafur rhad.

Ein cyfrifoldeb a’n cyfle fel cenedlatholwyr Cymreig yw dangos bod yna ddewis amgen i hunaniaeth Brydeinig, hiliol y BNP (fyddai yn hala Colin Jackson ‘adre’, ond nid y mewnfudwr i Faldwyn, Gauleiter Griffin) a gwrth-Gymreig UKIP (sydd am ddileu’r Cynulliad ynghyd ag unrhyw fesur o ddwyieithrwydd). Mae hyn yn golygu gwella’n gallu i gynhyrchu negeseuon syml, gafaelgar: mi oedd neges UKIP, a’r BNP, dim ots pa mor wyrdroedig, yn hawdd i’w cofio ac yn uniongyrchol. Rhaid i ni greu neges o genedligrwydd cynhwysol Gymreig sydd yr un mor rymus emosiynol.

Yn ail, mae rhaid i ni dargedu’r dosbarth gweithiol sydd wedi eu bradychu gan Lafur newydd ac sydd nawr yn chwilio am gartref gwleidyddol newydd. Ar wahan i’r Cymoedd, mae’r Blaid wedi bod yn blaid y dosbarth canol Cymraeg am gyfran helaeth o’i bodolaaeth. Pan ymunodd fy nheulu i a’r Blaid yn ystod Streic y Glowyr, roedd e’n dipyn o sioc ddiwylliant i’r Blaid yn lleol. O fewn rhai misoedd, mi holltodd y gangen yn ddau: un yn cwrdd yn Neuadd Les y Glowyr a’r llall yn hen dy rheolwr yr Ammanford Colliery Company a oedd bellach yn ‘country club’ y Wernoleu. Mae’r Blaid a Rhydaman wedi mynd ar siwrnai gwleidyddol ers y ddyddiau hynny – ond os ydym am wireddu ein potensial fel yr ydym yn Sir Gar ac yn hen ardaloedd y chwareli, rhaid i ni droi nid yn unig yn Blaid Cymru, ond plaid pobl cyffredin trwy Gymru gyfan.

Yn olaf, mae rhaid i ni ffurfio cynghreiriau. Hen alwad gen i erbyn hyn, ond mae’r canlyniadau diwedderaraf a llwyddiant y Dde yn arbennig yn profi’r angen am gydweithio ar y Chwith. Pe bae’r Gwyrddion yng Nghymru wedi cytuno i’n galwad ni am restr ar y cyd i’r Etholiadau yma mae’n siwr gen i y byddwn wedi dod yn gyntaf a, gyda phum mil ychwanegol o bleidleisiau, wedi llwyddo i guro UKIP gan roi i’r Gwyrddion Cymreig eu Haelod cyntaf yn Ewrop. Mae’r un peth yn wir am Mebyon Kernow a’r Gwyrddion yn Ne-Orllewin Lloegr fyddai wedi ennill sedd oddi wrth y Toriaid wrth sefyll ar y cyd. A’r Dde ar garlam, nawr yw’r amser i greu clymblaid enfys go iawn i ennill nid yn unig yn Ewrop ym 2014, ond yn bwysicach fyth, yng Nghymru 2011.

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IN ENGLISH

Despite the rise in Plaid’s support and our success in our strongholds, the villainy that British nationalist parties have done nearly as well as the Welsh National Party in the European elections still worries me. Hopefully this will prick the conscience every lover of our nation who stayed at home, but I have the responsibility of asking what can be done better or differently. In the old traditions of threes, here are three suggestions.

We must stop apologising for our nationalism. In a world of globalisation, identity politics and the alternative of re-rooting political power in local and national communities is central to our era. This, in part, is the root of the British Right’s growth: genuine concern about unaccountable power, in undemocratic European institutions or bodies exploiting cheap labour.

Our responsibility and our opportunity as Welsh nationalists is to show that there is alternative option to the British identifying, racist BNP (who would send Colin Jackson ‘home’, but not the Mongomeryshire immigrant, Gauleiter Griffin) and the anti-Welsh UKIP (who would abolish the Assembly as well as any level of bilingualism). This means improving our ability to produce simple, gripping messages: UKIP’s message, and the BNP’s, no matter how perverted, is easy to remember and direct. We have to create an inclusive Welsh nationalist message that has the same emotional force.

Secondly, we have to target the working classes who have been betrayed by New Labour and who are now looking for a new political home. Except for the Valleys, Plaid has been the party of middle-class Welsh speakers for a large part of its existence. When my family joined Plaid during the Miners’ Strike, it was a bit of a shock to the party’s local culture. Within a few months, the branch split in two: one meeting in the Miners’ Welfare Hall and the other in the old Ammanford Colliery Company manager’s house that was now the Wernoleu’s country club. Plaid and Ammanford have been on a political journey since those days – but if we are to achieve our potential as we are in Carmarthenshire and in the old quarry areas, we have to become not only a Party of Wales, but a party for all ordinary people across Wales.

Finally, we must form alliances. It’s an old call of mine by now, but recent results and the success of the Right especially prove the need for co-operation on the Left. If the Greens in Wales had agreed to our call for a joint list for these elections I’m sure we’d have come first and, with five thousand extra votes, succeeded in beating UKIP and given the Welsh Greens their first member in Europe. The same is true of Mebyon Kernow and the Greens in South-West England who would have won a seat from the Tories by standing together. With the Right on the rise, now is the time to create a real rainbow coalition to win not only in Europe in 2014, but more importantly, in Wales 2011.

BNP wins 2 seats in Europe

Via Socialist Unity and Hope Not Hate:

Who is Andrew Brons?

Yorkshire and Humber constituency will return Andrew Brons (at the left of the picture) to the European Parliament if the BNP gets 11.5% across the constituency. So far the results coming in show it to be on a knife edge.

The BNP have 10% in Sheffield, much more in Barnsley.

If they do win a seat there, we will have to deal with that situation as we come to it.

But I imagine there will be some fun and games inside the BNP is Griffin fails to be elected in the North West, which would give Andrew Brons a higher profile than the leader, and his own significant budget.

So who is Andrew Brons. Certainly if he is elected the press should give this Hitler lover some serious scrutiny.

Brons, 61, started his nazi career in the National Socialist Movement, an organisation that was deliberately founded on Hitler’s birthday by Colin Jordan, the British nazi leader who died in April aged 85. NSM members were responsible for an arson campaign against Jewish property and synagogues in the 1960s.

Brons appears to have approved. In a letter to Jordan’s wife, Brons reported meeting an NSM member who “mentioned such activities as bombing synagogues”. He declared: “On This subject I have a dual view, in that I realise that he is well intentioned, I feel that our public image may suffer considerable damage as a result of these activities. I am however open to correction on this point.”

He also sent Mrs Jordan money to buy a swastika badge and other Nazi material, explaining he was about the undertake a “crash programme” of publicity for the NSM in Yorkshire by deluging areas with Nazi stickers, posters and slogans.

Brons was a prominent member of the National Front, notorious for its extreme racism and violence, from its early days and was voted onto its national directorate in 1974. Later as the NF’s education officer he hosted seminars on racial nationalism and tried to give its racism a more “scientific” basis.

After the departure of John Tyndall from the NF in March 1980 Brons was promoted to NF chairman. One of his allies during this period was Richard Verrall, the author of Did Six Million Really Die?, with whom he edited the NF journal New Nation. In 1982 Brons led an NF march through Northfield on which marchers chanted: “we’ve got to get rid of the blacks”.

In June 1984 Brons was convicted of behaviour likely to cause a breach of the peace following his arrest in Leeds while selling papers in a shopping centre.

He and another NF member were heard shouting slogans such as “Death to Jews”, “White Power” and “National Front”. When approached by PC John Raj, Brons stated: “inferior beings like yourself probably do not understand the principle of free speech”.

Brons resigned as NF chairman in 1984 and later faded from public view. He has been a BNP member for around four years.

Ireland: Colin Duffy to refuse food

Below is a statement from the family of Colin Duffy, one of the Irish republicans arrested after the recent attacks in the six counties, stating that he is refusing to take food in protest over the injustice of his case.

**UPDATE: Since posting this, the news has come out of prisoners in Maghaberry prison going on hunger strike in solidarity with the Antrim Interrogation centre prisoners (including Duffy), currently being held under UK terror laws that allow 28 day internment without trial.
It also appears that the killings that sparked this whole fiasco have had at least one positive effect.**

**UPDATE 2: After a Belfast court overturned the police order allowing the ongoing detention of Duffy and five others, forcing their release, Colin Duffy has been re-arrested. See the comments section below for his family's response.

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Colin Duffy to refuse food: Statement from Duffy Family

COLIN DUFFY - A CASE OF TRIAL BY MEDIA
OPPOSE THE NEW FORM OF INTERNMENT

In the immediate aftermath of the fatal shootings in Antrim and Craigavon, the media and some local politicians hysterically engaged in what can only be described as frenzy of finger pointing and ‘felon setting’.

As each politician and reporter attempted to outdo the comments of each other regarding who may have been responsible, a deliberate picture was painted that resulted in the media and politicians identifying who ought to be arrested. Our family member Colin was one of those and, in due course, the PSNI obliged.

Colin’s arrest came as no surprise to us, his family. Due to the unsubstantiated comments made by sections of the media and by Stormont politicians, it was our great fear and worry that he would be ‘set up’ as a scapegoat. Our family’s concerns and worries have been reinforced by two very important facts that both the media and politicians have failed to report or comment upon.

Firstly, Colin was visited at his home four days home before his arrest by the PSNI to inform him that a threat had been made on his life. The PSNI photographed Colin at his front door.

Why did the PSNI not arrest him then?

Secondly, following his arrest, Colin’s legal representative was astounded to be informed that the arrest was “not based on evidence”. In the absence of any evidential basis for his arrest, it is clear that the PSNI had other sinister motivations for detaining him.

It is the view of his family that the PSNI’s motivations are based upon sheer vindictiveness and also as a reaction to the media frenzy.

It was similar vindictiveness, spurred on by a hostile media, which led to the wrongful arrest and lengthy imprisonment of innocent people in the past such the Birmingham Six, the Maguire Family and the Guildford Four. More recently, we have witnessed, in the cases of Sean Hoey and Chris Ward exactly what the PSNI are capable of.

How many more people will be wrongfully detained for prolonged periods of time under the new form of internment before someone says “Stop, not in my name’?

While the Duffy family are calling for Colin's release, we are also fully aware that there are others detained under the current British legislation which can hold them for 28 days. We would like to take this opportunity to call for their immediate release also.

Colin has now been detained since Saturday March 14th. In an attempt to bring this ‘farce’ to an end, he is now refusing to take food in order to highlight the injustice he is suffering.

We have all been down this road before and know where it can end unless true leadership is shown.

Justice is a right. It is not a gift to be given or removed from citizens by a police force acting at the behest of local politicians and the media.

Please do whatever you can to ensure that Colin receives justice NOW!

STAND UP FOR JUSTICE! FREE COLIN DUFFY!

Responses to the events in Ireland's north

There have been a number of different responses to the recent attacks in the Six Counties in northern Ireland, most of them stridenty critical, and for good reason.

The responses and some analyses are listed below , followed by an important and relevant piece from James Connolly, the heroic socialist revolutionary who fell in the Easter 1916 Uprising, and whose work remains some of the best for understanding the Irish struggle, and what the best solutions might be.

Sinn Fein
Éirigí
Eamonn McCann
SWP
Lenin's Tomb
Socialist Party
Brian Freeney
Socialist Democracy (and this)
A musical response

James Connolly - Physical Force in Irish Politics (1899)

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From Workers’ Republic, July 22, 1899.
Transcribed by The James Connolly Society in 1997.

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Ireland occupies a position among the nations of the earth unique in a great variety of its aspects, but in no one particular is this singularity more marked than in the possession of what is known as a ‘physical force party’ – a party, that is to say, whose members are united upon no one point, and agree upon no single principle, except upon the use of physical force as the sole means of settling the dispute between the people of this country and the governing power of Great Britain.

Other countries and other peoples have, from time to time, appealed to what the first French Revolutionists picturesquely described as the “sacred right of insurrection,” but in so appealing they acted under the inspiration of, and combated for, some great governing principle of political or social life upon which they, to a man, were in absolute agreement. The latter-day high falutin ‘hillside’ man, on the other hand, exalts into a principle that which the revolutionsists of other countries have looked upon as a weapon, and in his gatherings prohibits all discussion of those principles which formed the main strength of his prototypes elsewhere and made the successful use of that weapon possible. Our people have glided at different periods of the past century from moral force agitation, so-called, into physical force rebellion, from constitutionalism into insurrectionism, meeting in each the same failure and the same disaster and yet seem as far as ever from learning the great truth that neither method is ever likely to be successful until they first insist that a perfect agreement upon the end to be attained should be arrived at as a starting-point of all our efforts.

To the reader unfamiliar with Irish political history such a remark seems to savour almost of foolishness, its truth is so apparent; but to the reader acquainted with the inner workings of the political movements of this country the remark is pregnant with the deepest meaning. Every revolutionary effort in Ireland has drawn the bulk of its adherents from the ranks of the disappointed followers of defeated constitutional movements. After having exhausted their constitutional efforts in striving to secure such a modicum of political power as would justify them to their own consciences in taking a place as loyal subjects of the British Empire, they, in despair, turned to thoughts of physical force as a means of attaining their ends. Their conception of what constitutes freedom was in no sense changed or revolutionised; they still believed in the political form of freedom which had been their ideal in their constitutional days; but no longer hoping for it from the acts of the British Parliament, they swung over into the ranks of the ‘physical force’ men as the only means of attaining it.

The so-called physical force movement of today in like manner bases its hopes upon the disgust of the people over the failure of the Home Rule movement; it seeks to enlist the people under its banners, not so much by pointing out the base ideals of the constitutionalists or the total inadequacy of their pet measures to remedy the evils under which the people suffer, as by emphasising the greater efficacy of physical force as a national weapon. Thus, the one test of an advanced Nationalist is, in their opinion, one who believes in physical force. It may be the persons so professing to believe are Republicans; it may be they are believers in monarchy; it may be that Home Rule would satisfy them; it may be that they despise Home Rule. No matter what their political faith may be, if only they are prepared to express belief in the saving grace of physical force, they are acclaimed as advanced Nationalists - worthy descendants of ‘the men of ’98.’ The ’98 Executive, organised in the commencement by professed believers in the physical force doctrine, started by proclaiming its adherence to the principle of national independence “as understood by Wolfe Tone and the United Irishmen,” and in less than twelve months from doing so, deliberately rejected a similar resolution and elected on its governing body men notorious for their Royalist proclivities. As the ’98 Executive represents the advanced Nationalists of Ireland, this repudiation of the Republican faith of the United Irishmen is an interesting corroboration of the truth of our statement that the advanced Nationalists of our day are utterly regardless of principle and only attach importance to methods – an instance of putting the cart before the horse, absolutely unique in its imbecility and unparalleled in the history of the world.

It may be interesting, then, to place before our readers the Socialist Republican conception of the functions and uses of physical force in a popular movement. We neither exalt it into a principle nor repudiate it as something not to be thought of. Our position towards it is that the use or non-use of force for the realisation of the ideas of progress always has been and always will be determined by the attitude, not of the party of progress, but of the governing class opposed to that party. If the time should arrive when the party of progress finds its way to freedom barred by the stubborn greed of a possessing class entrenched behind the barriers of law and order; if the party of progress has indoctrinated the people at large with the new revolutionary conception of society and is therefore representative of the will of a majority of the nation, if it has exhausted all the peaceful means at its disposal for the purpose of demonstrating to the people and their enemies that the new revolutionary ideas do possess the suffrage of the majority; then, but not till then, the party which represents the revolutionary idea is justified in taking steps to assume the powers of government, and in using the weapons of force to dislodge the usurping class or government in possession, and treating its members and supporters as usurpers and rebels against the constituted authorities always have been created. In other words, Socialists believe that the question of force is of very minor importance; the really important question is of the principles upon which is based the movement that may or may not need the use of force to realise its object.

Here, then, is the immense difference between the Socialist Republicans and our friends the physical force men. The latter, by stifling all discussions of principles, earn the passive and fleeting commendation of the unthinking multitude; the former, by insisting upon a thorough understanding of their basic principles, do not so readily attract the multitude, but do attract and hold the more thoughtful amongst them. It is the difference betwixt a mob in revolt and an army in preparation. The mob who cheer a speaker referring to the hopes of a physical force movement would, in the very hour of apparent success, be utterly disorganised and divided by the passage through the British Legislature of any trumpery Home Rule Bill. The army of class-conscious workers organising under the banner of the Socialist Republican Party, strong in their knowledge of economic truth and firmly grounded in their revolutionary principles, would remain entirely unaffected by any such manoeuvre and, knowing it would not change their position as a subject class, would still press forward, resolute and undivided, with their faces set towards their only hope of emancipation – the complete control by the working-class democracy of all the powers of National Government.

Thus the policy of the Socialist Republicans is seen to be the only wise one. “Educate that you may be free”; principles first, methods afterwards. If the advocacy of physical force failed to achieve success or even to effect an uprising when the majority were unenfranchised and the secret ballot unknown, how can it be expected to succeed now that the majority are in possession of voting power and the secret ballot safeguards the voter?

The ballot-box was given us by our masters for their purpose; let us use it for our own. Let us demonstrate at that ballot-box the strength and intelligence of the revolutionary idea; let us make the hustings a rostrum from which to promulgate our principles; let us grasp the public powers in the interest of the disinherited class; let us emulate our fathers and, like the ‘true men of ’98,’ place ourselves in line with the most advanced thought of our age and drawing inspiration and hope from the spectacle presented by the world-wide revolt of the workers, prepare for the coming of the day when the Socialist working-class of Ireland will, through its elected representatives, present its demand for freedom from the yoke of a governing master class or nation – the day on which the question of moral or physical force shall be finally decided.

Colin Fox: Too poor to stay warm

by the Scottish Socialist Party's Colin Fox, first published in the Morning Star

Scottish government figures released this month showed 569,000 Scots households living in fuel poverty. The number has doubled since 2002.

Fuel poverty campaigners have reacted angrily to the news and attacked the failure of repeated government "initiatives."
They point to the fact that hese latest figures are for the year 2006-7 and do not take account of the gas and electricity price rises of the last 12 months.

In 2002, 13 per cent of Scots households endured fuel poverty, which is defined as those spending 10 per cent of their income on keeping warm. By 2007, this had leapt to 24.6 per cent.
Households now paying more than 20 per cent of their income on gas and electricity, a category that housing charity Shelter defines as people living in "extreme fuel poverty," now number 163,000.

Across Britain, the picture is much the same. Energy Watch estimates that 5.5 million households in Britain are living in fuel poverty.
With average combined gas and electricity bills now more than £1,300, it concludes: "There are millions of families who do not have that kind of money."

The question is, will the power companies try to disconnect those families unable to pay such sums this winter?

These are the circumstances behind the Scottish Socialist Party's decision to organise a day of action across Scotland on Saturday to draw attention to this intolerable situation. We will be campaigning on the streets of Glasgow, Edinburgh, Dundee and elsewhere to channel the widespread anger that exists towards the big six power companies and force a reduction in these exorbitant bills.

Public anger has been bubbling up for months.
Campaigning on Edinburgh's Princes Street each Saturday afternoon, I have seen it for myself. People are livid at what they see as energy companies "profiteering" and acting as an illegal industry cartel.

"Son, my gas and electric bill has never been so high," well-known local pensioner activist Phyllis Herriot told me. And this was a remark made in reference to her summer bill.
Margaret Holmes is another senior citizen who is angry. "These gas and electric firms are at it. My power card doesn't last half as long as it used tae."

And all the energy companies now admit that their power cards and pre-payment meter charges mean that the highest rates are levied against those in the lowest income groups.
So, the poor are penalised while the better off on their direct debits receive significant discounts. The government admits that more than 1,000 meters are now being installed every day in households across Britain.

The North Edinburgh Fuel Poverty group has also been campaigning for many months. It believes that people are extremely fearful that they will not have the money to pay these exorbitant bills when they arrive.

All the power companies were quick to put up their bills this summer citing the cost of oil and gas at $145 per barrel as the reason. They have shown no comparable speed in reducing their charges now that oil is trading at below $40 a barrel. No wonder the charge of profiteering and acting as an illegal cartel has stuck.

This seething sense of inequity and frustration provides the left with a significant opportunity to mobilise opposition. We have a golden chance to increase our influence acting together on a shared programme.

The SSP campaign is based on the following key demands:

* A £250 winter fuel allowance for all pensioners, unemployed and low-paid, paid for by a windfall tax on the power utilities
* The return of our gas and electricity industries to public ownership as this is the only way that we can guarantee everyone in the country will receive the energy that they need
* Tariffs on prepayment meters should be the reduced to become the cheapest and not the highest rates available
* A programme of investment in fuel efficiency and insulation to bring all homes up to the National Home Energy rating in five years
* An end to our dependence on burning fossil fuels by developing renewable forms of electricity generation

The North Edinburgh Fuel Poverty group has organised a forum in the city which will meet in January to focus on the anger and organise the broadest possible coalition around our shared and coherent programme. The Scottish Socialist Party has been invited to join as equal partners, as have MPs, MSPs and other interested parties.
Let this message ring out across Britain.

The left combined together 20 years ago to stop sheriff officers throwing people out on the street because they didn't have the money to pay the hated poll tax. We can combine again now, notwithstanding our divisions, to stop these hated multinational power companies disconnecting those who don't have the money to pay these exorbitant fuel charges.

In the process, we can show people that only the left will stand up to the profiteering of multinational corporations which seek to plunge millions into the misery of fuel poverty.

Socialism's comeback

At the beginning of the century, the chances of socialism making a return looked close to zero. Yet now, all around Europe, the red flag is flying again, writes Neil Clark in The New Statesman

"If socialism signifies a political and economic system in which the government controls a large part of the economy and redistributes wealth to produce social equality, then I think it is safe to say the likelihood of its making a comeback any time in the next generation is close to zero," wrote Francis Fukuyama, author of The End of History, in Time magazine in 2000.

He should take a trip around Europe today.

Make no mistake, socialism - pure, unadulterated socialism, an ideology that was taken for dead by liberal capitalists - is making a strong comeback. Across the continent, there is a definite trend in which long-established parties of the centre left that bought in to globalisation and neoliberalism are seeing their electoral dominance challenged by unequivocally socialist parties which have not.

The parties in question offer policies which mark a clean break from the Thatcherist agenda that many of Europe's centre-left parties have embraced over the past 20 years. They advocate renationalisation of privatised state enterprises and a halt to further liberalisation of the public sector. They call for new wealth taxes to be imposed and for a radical redistribution of wealth. They defend the welfare state and the rights of all citizens to a decent pension and free health care. They strongly oppose war - and any further expansion of Nato.

Most fundamentally of all, they challenge an economic system in which the interests of ordinary working people are subordinated to those of capital.

Nowhere is this new leftward trend more apparent than in Germany, home to the meteoric rise of Die Linke ("The Left"), a political grouping formed only 18 months ago - and co-led by the veteran socialist "Red" Oskar Lafontaine, a long-standing scourge of big business. The party, already the main opposition to the Christian Democrats in eastern Germany, has made significant inroads into the vote for the Social Democratic Party (SPD) in elections to western parliaments this year, gaining representation in Lower Saxony, Hamburg and Hesse. Die Linke's unapologetically socialist policies, which include the renationalisation of electricity and gas, the banning of hedge funds and the introduction of a maximum wage, chime with a population concerned at the dismantling of Germany's mixed economic model and the adoption of Anglo-Saxon capitalism - a shift that occurred while the SPD was in government.

An opinion poll last year showed that 45 per cent of west Germans (and 57 per cent of east Germans) consider socialism "a good idea"; in October, another poll showed that Germans overwhelmingly favour nationalisation of large segments of the economy. Two-thirds of all Germans say they agree with all or some of Die Linke's programme.

It's a similar story of left-wing revival in neighbouring Holland. There the Socialist Party of the Netherlands (SP), which almost trebled its parliamentary representation in the most recent general election (2006), and which made huge gains in last year's provincial elections, continues to make headway.

Led by a charismatic 41-year-old epidemiologist, Agnes Kant, the SP is on course to surpass the Dutch Labour Party, a member of the ruling conservative-led coalition, as the Netherlands' main left-of centre grouping.

The SP has gained popularity by being the only left-wing Dutch parliamentary party to campaign for a "No" vote during the 2005 referendum on the EU constitutional treaty and for its opposition to large-scale immigration, which it regards as being part of a neoliberal package that encourages flexible labour markets.

The party calls for a society where the values of "human dignity, equality and solidarity" are most prominent, and has been scathing in its attacks on what it describes as "the culture of greed", brought about by "a capitalism based on inflated bonuses and easy money". Like Die Linke, the SP campaigns on a staunchly anti-war platform - demanding an end to Holland's role as "the US's lapdog".

In Greece, the party on the up is the Coalition of the Radical Left (SYRIZA), the surprise package in last year's general election. As public opposition to the neoliberal economic policies of the ruling New Democracy government builds, SYRIZA's opinion-poll ratings have risen to almost 20 per cent - putting it within touching distance of PASOK, the historical left-of-centre opposition, which has lurched sharply to the right in recent years. SYRIZA is particularly popular with young voters: its support among those aged 35 and under stands at roughly 30 per cent in the polls, ahead of PASOK.

In Norway, socialists are already in power; the ruling "red-green" coalition consists of the Socialist Left Party, the Labour Party and the Centre Party. Since coming to power three years ago, the coalition - which has been labelled the most left-wing government in Europe, has halted the privatisation of state-owned companies and made further development of the welfare state, public health care and improving care for the elderly its priorities.

The success of such forces shows that there can be an electoral dividend for left-wing parties if voters see them responding to the crisis of modern capitalism by offering boldly socialist solutions. Their success also demonstrates the benefits to electoral support for socialist groupings as they put aside their differences to unite behind a commonly agreed programme.

For example, Die Linke consists of a number of internal caucuses - or forums - including the "Anti-Capitalist Left", "Communist Platform" and "Democratic Socialist Forum". SYRIZA is a coalition of more than ten Greek political groups. And the Dutch Socialist Party - which was originally called the Communist Party of the Netherlands, has successfully brought socialists and communists together to support its collectivist programme.

It is worth noting that those European parties of the centre left which have not fully embraced the neoliberal agenda are retaining their dominant position. In Spain, the governing Socialist Workers' Party has managed to maintain its broad left base and was re-elected for another four-year term in March, with Prime Minister José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero promising a "socialist economic policy" that would focus on the needs of workers and the poor.

There are exceptions to the European continent's shift towards socialism. Despite the recent election of leftist Martine Aubry as leader of the French Socialist Party, the French left has been torn apart by divisions, at the very moment when it could be exploiting the growing unpopularity of the Sarkozy administration.

And, in Britain, despite opinion being arguably more to the left on economic issues than at any time since 1945, few are calling for a return to socialism.

The British left, despite promising initiatives such as September's Convention of the Left in Manchester, which gathered representatives from several socialist groups, still remains fragmented and divided. The left's espousal of unrestricted or loosely controlled immigration is also, arguably, a major vote loser among working-class voters who should provide its core support. No socialist group in Britain has as yet articulated a critique of mass immigration from an anti-capitalist and anti-racist viewpoint in the way the Socialist Party of the Netherlands has.

And even if a Die Linke-style coalition of progressive forces could be built and put on a formal footing in time for the next general election, Britain's first-past-the-post system provides a formidable obstacle to change.

Nevertheless, the prognosis for socialism in Britain and the rest of Europe is good. As the recession bites, and neoliberalism is discredited, the phenomenon of unequivocally socialist parties with clear, anti-capitalist, anti-globalist messages gaining ground, and even replacing "Third Way" parties in Europe, is likely to continue.

Even in Britain, where the electoral system grants huge advantage to the established parties, pressure on Labour to jettison its commitment to neoliberal policies and to adopt a more socialist agenda is sure to intensify.

Wales after Britain?

Over at the Socialist Unity blog, they've reproduced Leanne Woods' piece from the latest Scottish Left Review, entitled Wales after Britain? In light of the ongoing process of devolution, it posits the important question of whether the UK can survive, and for how long? Discussion is already going on at Socialist Unity.

Wales After Britain?

Politics in Wales has changed dramatically in the last decade. From winning the yes vote in the referendum to set up the Assembly in 1997 by just 6,721 votes, it’s difficult to imagine now how devolution could be rolled back.

Tom Nairn has been arguing for more than 30 years that the break-up of Britain is inevitable. More recently he points to the devolution referendums in the two and a half of the four countries which make up the British Isles to show that he was right. He argues that devolution will gather its own momentum, and that the future of Britain is over. The unanswerable question is how long has it got left?

In response, Gordon Brown and his New Labour mates are playing the “Rule Brittania” card in a desperate attempt to shore up a British identity which is on its way out. “British Jobs for British People”, wrapping himself up in the Union Jack, suggestions of a British day and a British motto runs alongside anti-immigrant and asylum rhetoric and demands that everyone speaks English. In a country where more than 20 per cent and growing of the people speak Welsh, and our citizens who were born or who have relatives in other countries speak a wide variety of languages form all over the world, this sort of talk doesn’t go down too well. I’d guess it’s irrelevant, if not offensive to many people in all four countries.

Meanwhile, there are a group of “progressive English patriots” who agree with Nairn’s break-up theory. They see Scotland and Wales wanting to free themselves form Westminster rule, perhaps also eventually a free and united Ireland. They want to make sure that England is not confused with Britain, and that their nation isn’t left behind. At the same time they are acutely aware of the need to couple their patriotism/nationalism with an anti racist stance and they are keen to distance themselves from the New Labour response to devolution as well as the fascist parties. It’s an interesting development which deserves attention and support from Welsh, Scots and Irish left nationalists. If the call for an English Parliament grows, the progress towards independence for the nations of Britain will accelerate.

So what are we doing in Wales? A year ago, Plaid Cymru entered into government for the first time in our history as part of a centre-left coalition with Labour. A key plank of that agreement was a commitment from Labour to deliver and campaign for a successful outcome in a referendum for a law making parliament within this Assembly term. If we get that yes vote, we’ll still have only a fraction of the powers currently enjoyed by the Scottish Parliament. We will be able to legislate freely on matters currently devolved, which would be an improvement on the current situation where Westminster can veto Welsh laws. But we’d still have no powers over criminal justice or any real macro-economic muscle. We’ll also still have no means to raise our own revenue.

Wales is at the bottom of the UK’s economic performance table. While the city of London continues to skew its economic policy to benefit the areas its immediate vicinity, the periphery loses out. With a history of significant industrial production, Wales should now be rich. But the areas which produced the wealth for Britain are today among some of the most economically disadvantaged in the whole of the European Union. These are the areas which were targeted by Thatcher in her obsession to crush union power, then forgotten. And these are the areas that now face further decline from New Labour’s regional pay plans and sickness benefits purge. It doesn’t have to be this way. An autonomous government responsible for two and a quarter million people could do a much better job of gearing macro -economic policy to meet the needs of people in the former industrial areas of Wales. It’s clear those needs have not been considered by successive Westminster governments.

If scientists are right about peak oil, and we can now be confident of a united scientific position on climate change, then the way economies work will have to change. Energy, food and water will become increasingly important and the economy is bound to reflect that. If oil prices continue to rise as they have of late, we’ll be forced to rethink how we use and obtain our energy. When Cuba’s energy supply was cut off at the end of the USSR, Cuban’s lost 30 per cent of their body weight in a year. Can we afford not to plan for a dramatic reduction in the availability of energy and potential implications?

Wales is in a fantastic position to become energy self sufficient. We have a large coastline with opportunities to harness the tides. We have lots of wind, rain, peat bogs and open countryside. A long-term plan to expand research and development, invest in new skills and training and government support for small Welsh businesses to produce microgenerators could put the infrastructure in place. This could be coupled with a national awareness raising programme, incentives for reducing consumption and growing and buying local food. Food and energy self-sufficiency could provide the key to self-government. According to the WWF, Cuba is the only sustainable country in the world. We could learn a lot from the Cubans.

While there may not be a consensus among political parties for Welsh self-government, there is for more devolution. There is also a growing awareness and consensus around climate change. Oil prices are forcing people to think about alternatives, while there is a strong anti-nuclear tendency in the Welsh government. To put the building blocks in place for food and energy self-sufficiency, there has to be more devolution. These challenges have reminded some of us in Plaid that we need to argue the case for self-government more clearly than ever before. Support for the idea won’t build until the debate takes place.

Left-wing Plaid MP Adam Price has recently called for a new “movement within a movement” to reaffirm the party’s long-term goals. He correctly claims that the younger members, those under 45, are strong believers in independence. It’s encouraging to note that we have a healthy-sized and growing youth membership and activist base. For a quarter of a century our opponents in the unionist parties have been allowed to define what Welsh independence means, which has resulted in smaller levels of support than we would like.

Vision is what is missing in politics today. A vision of a Wales without fossil fuels and nuclear is one which shouldn’t be difficult to sell. Armed with the arguments for self-government, Plaid Cymru offers a vision of a different, more equal, sustainable Wales, one that can inspire a younger generation. With the independence debate raging ahead in Scotland, Plaid cannot allow Wales to be left behind. The thinking and the campaigning for a better Wales after Britain has to start now.

Leanne Wood was elected to the National Assembly in 2003 to represent the South Wales Central region. She is now Plaid Cymru’s spokesperson for Sustainability and the Environment.

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George Galloway letter to Respect National Council

Via Mac Uaid's blog, the Wombats have come upon an interesting item from England, republished below. It is the text of a letter from George Galloway to the Respect coalition's National Council outlining what he regards to be some of the problems and criticisms. A fair bit of discussion is already beginning to circulate around the arguments made.

It was the best of times, it was the worst of times

The Shadwell by-election victory has stunned the New Labour establishment, turned the tide in Tower Hamlets and opened up the real possibility of winning two parliamentary seats in East London which, together with the potential gain in Birmingham, would make us the most successful left-wing party in British history.
New Labour’s decision to try to rehabilitate Michael Keith – the former leader of Tower Hamlets council who we first defeated last year – raised the stakes in this election enormously. A victory for him in a ward where we had all three councillors would have thrown us into a grave crisis. Instead, it is Labour that is suffering shattering demoralisation and we are enjoying a post-Shadwell bounce.
Ealing Southall, on the other hand, just a few weeks before, marked the lowest point in Respect’s three-year history. The failure to harvest even the vote we had secured in just one ward of the constituency in the local elections 12 months earlier was a sharp reminder that what goes up can come down and should shatter any complacency about the London elections next May.
It is clear to everyone, if we are honest, that Respect is not punching its weight in British politics and has not fulfilled its potential either in terms of votes consistently gained, members recruited or fighting funds raised.
The primary reasons for this are not objective circumstances, but internal problems of our own making.
The conditions for Respect to grow strongly obtain in just the same way as they did when we first launched the organisation and had our historic breakthrough in 2005.
Anyone who was at the 1000-strong street celebration after the victory in Shadwell will attest that the idea of Respect remains very much alive and, as Jim Fitzpatrick MP said in Tribune, it’s clear that ‘the Iraq war hasn’t gone away’.
Michael Lavalette’s advancing position in Preston shows what can be done with imaginative and dedicated work. In Bristol, around Jerry Hicks, and in Sheffield around Maxine Bowler, we have placed ourselves in pole position to enter the council chamber. But to achieve that we must recognise our serious internal weaknesses which are becoming more apparent and which threaten to derail the whole project.

Membership
Despite being a rather well known political brand our membership has not grown. And in some areas it has gone into a steep decline. Whole areas of the country are effectively moribund as far as Respect activity is concerned. In some weeks there is not a single Respect activity anywhere in the country advertised in our media. No systematic effort has been able to be mounted - in fact, a major effort had to be launched to get back to the levels of membership we had, despite electoral successes, widespread publicity and the continuing absence of any serious rival on the left. This has left a small core of activists to shoulder burden after burden without much in the way of support from the centre, leading to exhaustion and enervation.

Fundraising
This is all but non-existent. We have stumbled from one financial crisis to another. And with the prospect of an early general election we are simply unable to challenge the major parties in our key constituencies. None of the Respect staff appears to have been tasked with either membership or fundraising responsibilities. Or if they have it isn’t working. There is a deep-seated culture of amateurism and irresponsibility on the question of money. Activities are not properly budgeted and even where budgets are set they are not adhered to. Take, for example, the Fighting Unions Conference which was full to the rafters but still managed to lose £5000. The intervention at Pride, where we gave away merchandise rather than sold it, lost £2000.
It is a moot point whether the turn to building Fighting Unions which occupied the National Office for four months was the correct prioritisation of slender resources, following our breakthroughs at the local elections last year. What is not moot is that mismanagement turned an event which ought to have been a money-spinner into a money-loser.
Equally the Pride intervention, which occupied a great deal of the organisation’s time (I personally was telephoned three times to be asked if I would make it, and others report similar pressure) can be compared to the total lack of a presence at the Barking Mela last weekend - the biggest in Europe - or the minimal campaigning presence at the recent London Latin American festival. Again, while it is arguable that Pride was the priority, what is not arguable is that fundraising at it should have been included in the plan.
Further, what ought to have been the unalloyed success of the Pride intervention was seriously marred. Instead of a simple encouragement for members to attend – with a logical emphasis on LGBT members and young people – several members in elected office were subjected to a high-handed “instruction” from the national office to take part. It appeared to them to be some kind of misplaced test of their commitment to the equality programme of the organisation. This is frankly absurd. There are LGBT people who don’t feel comfortable being on a float on a parade. It would be a serious mistake to read off someone’s commitment to equality from their willingness to be dancing on the back of a truck on the Pride parade.
Having done that and spent £2,000 there was no effort to publicise our intervention externally by ensuring that all the relevant media and organisations were made aware that we were the only political party to have a float on the parade.

Staffing

This is a mystery to me and others. People pop up as staff members in jobs which have not been advertised, for which there have been no interviews and whose job descriptions are unclear and certainly unpublished. One staff member was appointed at a meeting at which that same staff member was present, making it obviously embarrassing for anyone to query whether they were the right person for the job, whether they could be afforded or why the job should go to them rather than someone else. This unnecessarily poor management leads to tensions, even animosity and the suspicion that staff are recruited for their political opinions on internal matters rather than on a proper basis. Sometimes the conduct of some staff buttresses this suspicion. For example, at the selection meeting for our Shadwell candidate two members of staff were openly proselytising for one candidate and against another - including heckling - and even after the decision had been taken. This undoubtedly contributed to the exceedingly poor involvement of the wider membership in the subsequent election. No paid member of staff attended the Shadwell victory celebrations and when I asked one of them if they would be attending I was told ‘no, I will be watching the football’. This was noticed widely by the activists who were present at the celebration and commented upon. It is again bad management to allow such culture and practices to proliferate.

Internal relations

There is a custom of anathematisation in the organisation which is deeply unhealthy and has been the ruin of many a left-wing group before us. This began with Salma Yaqoob, once one of our star turns, promoted on virtually every platform, and who is responsible for some of the greatest election victories (and near misses) during our era.
Now she has been airbrushed from our history at just the time when she is becoming a regular feature on the national media and her impact on the politics of Britain’s second city has never been higher.
There appears to be no plan to rescue her from this perdition, indeed every sign that her internal exile is a fixture. This is intolerable and must end now. Whatever personal differences may exist between leading members the rest of us cannot allow Respect to be hobbled in this way. We are not over-endowed with national figures.

Decision making and implementation

There is a marked tendency for decisions made at the national council or avenues signposted for exploration to be left to wither on the vine if they are not deemed to meet priorities (which themselves are not agreed). For example, there was a very useful discussion at the last national council on what initiatives we should explore following Brown’s succession and the then anticipated failure of the McDonnell campaign to get out of the starting gate. Among the varied suggestions were seeking to cohere wider progressive opinion around a minimal five point programme; approaching McDonnell to organise an open meeting in Parliament; seeking a joint conference with the RMT, CPB, Labour left and others; and organising a people’s march to London as an agitational vehicle for rallying forces and struggles against the Brown government. None of these have been seriously followed up. The overall emphasis – that the departure of Blair and the failure of the Labour left’s strategy opened up possibilities for us both to build Respect directly and to place it at the centre of a progressive realignment – was allowed to run into the ground.

Building the organisation

We must be much more systematic in building Respect’s profile in the wider arenas our members are active in. There is no question that struggles such as Stop the War, Defend Council Housing, anti-racist campaigns, activity around trade union disputes and so on are the lifeblood of a progressive political force such as ourselves. But the great lesson of the Stop the War movement in 2003 was that these movements do not automatically give rise to a force that can punch through on the political scene. That requires – as it did when we founded Respect – patient, detailed work and single-mindedness about ensuring that Respect grows out of the wider radical milieu.
Two of our outstanding members are at the helm of Defend Council Housing; many of our members are active in it in their localities. Yet as an organisation we have done far too little to raise the Respect banner inside the campaign and, to put it bluntly, cash in on the work our activists have put in and the turmoil the campaign has caused among disaffected Labour councillors and Labour-supporting tenants and trade unionists.
At the successful Stop the War demonstration outside the Labour Party conference in Manchester in September last year the nationally produced propaganda was for the Fighting Unions conference. It was thanks only to the Manchester comrades that we had a tabloid promoting Respect as a political formation. It was again thanks to the Manchester comrades that we had such a publication for the protest outside Brown’s coronation.
In every area of activity we need to encourage in our members a focus on recruitment, fundraising, establishing the profile of our candidates and unashamedly promoting Respect as the critical force in the wider reconstitution of the progressive and socialist movement.

Internal selections

Then there is the practice of the creation of false dichotomies between candidates for internal elections. Neither Oliur Rahman nor Abjul Miah nor Haroon Miah is Karl Liebknecht. And Sultana Begum is not Rosa Luxemburg. Yet in internal election contests these four contested in Tower Hamlets the divisions between them were deliberately and artificially exaggerated and members mobilised about “principles” which never were. This has led to deep and lasting divisions which show no signs of healing in the current atmosphere. So we must make a new atmosphere. If we are to rally to win the prize of a seat on the GLA, and three members of parliament, we must start right now.
Relations between leading figures in Respect are at an all-time low and this must be addressed. I have proposals to make which are not aimed at a change of political line, still less an attack on any organisation or section within Respect. They are aimed at placing us on an election war-footing, closing the chasm which has been caused to develop between leading members, together with an emergency fundraising and membership drive to facilitate our forthcoming electoral challenges. Business as usual will not do and everyone in their heart knows this.
The crossroads at which we now stand can take us either down the Shadwell route or the road to Southall.
Instead of three MPs and a presence on the GLA we could have no MPs and no one on the GLA by this time next year. A few honest moments thoughts should suffice to calibrate where that would leave us. Oblivion.
I cannot imagine that any member of the National Council wants to see us arrive at the destination where now lies the wreck of left-wing politics in Scotland and so I hope that these proposals will be considered with the best interests of the Respect project uppermost in our minds.

A way forward

It is abundantly clear for a variety of reasons that the leadership team must be strengthened and all talents mustered. I therefore propose the creation of a new high-powered elections committee whose task would be to rapidly evaluate our election strengths and weaknesses, proposed target seats, supervise the selection of candidates - national and local - and to spearhead a national membership and fundraising drive. This committee must comprise the leading members of Respect, including Salma, Linda Smith, Yvonne Ridley, Abjol Miah (as the leader of our 11 councillors in the central election battleground of Tower Hamlets), me, Lindsey German, Alan Thornett, Nick Wrack as well as the National Secretary.
I also propose a crucial new post of National Organiser, preferably full-time, whose task would be the aforementioned re-organisation and re-energising of the key clusters of Respect support and the encouragement of members everywhere. This position would sit alongside the position of National Secretary. It must be advertised and subject to competitive interview overseen by the elections committee.
While this document may seem stark in black and white it reflects a widespread feeling which has surfaced in various ways - including at the National Council - and it is clear that the status quo, or minor tinkering, are not options. Time is short, renovation is urgently required and we must start the process now.
George Galloway MP