23.03.2000

LSA rotation?

The coordinating committee of the London Socialist Alliance met on Tuesday March 21. The agenda proved too packed to properly discuss every item, especially as one debate dominated the meeting.

Despite the disruptive tactics of the sectarian Scargill and the Communist Party of Britain, a real potential exists for the LSA to win seats in the Greater London Assembly. This gives some urgency to our discussions about the future of the LSA after May 4: who will head the list and our attitude to the tenure of any assembly member we win. Thus the meeting debated at length a proposal from Alliance for Workers' Liberty that we commit ourselves to a system of rotation - any members we won would automatically resign after a set period, the AWL proposed, to be replaced by a comrade from another constituent organisation of the LSA, further down the list.

While this ostensibly gives the impression of 'fairness' to the component elements of the alliance, it reneges on our wider responsibilities to the workers' movement as a whole. A number of comrades argued against this proposal, pointing out that ideally we would want our GLA member to use the position to become a tribune, someone the working class in London and beyond could look to for support and leadership. It would be simply foolish to commit ourselves now to perhaps yanking such a comrade out of the assembly, regardless of the political situation they were operating in and what they were achieving. The example of Tommy Sheridan was used to illustrate the potential of developing a mass workers' leader over an extended period.

The meeting was evenly split over this issue. For rotation as "a principle" - the AWL, the International Socialist Group and the Independent Labour Network. Against - the Communist Party, the Socialist Workers Party and Workers Power. (It was mutually agreed with the Socialist Party rep, comrade Jim Horton, that, as it is not participating in the LSA slate, he would not have a vote on its composition or arrangements.)

Comrade Horton did make the effective point that the real issue was one of accountability. His compromise proposal was accepted by the meeting as a means of moving forward. Essentially, we will return to discuss the mechanisms through which any elected LSA member will be made continuously accountable to, and replaceable by, the alliance. In the meantime, the meeting provisionally committed our assumed GLA members to present an annual (at least) report to a conference of the LSA, to be questioned and criticised on their record.

Of course, we will need to discuss how this would operate in practice. However, the SWP was at pains to emphasise its growing long-term commitment to the unity project. Thus, its reps assured us, it would have no interest in "cutting our throats in public" - that is, in swamping such a conference to effectively declare UDI from the bloc.

Mistrust remains, but there do seem to be encouraging signs of the SWP warming to the idea of continuing with the LSA project after May 4, an orientation which will mean it must keep the other groups 'on board'.

The meeting also took encouraging reports of potential candidates for our London list. (The ILN has now put forward comrade Toby Abse as its nominee). However the financial position of the alliance remains precarious, despite some substantial donations from individuals. Comrades are encouraged to make the special showing of 'Land and freedom' introduced by director Ken Loach on March 27 a success - an opportunity to boost our coffers.