09.03.2006

McCombes strategy provokes reaction

Sandy McBurney, a member of the SSP's Workers Unity platform, gives his assessment of the weekend

The conference was better than I thought it would be in terms of numbers -including numbers of young people. The attendance was not down on last year, so it was positive in that respect.

However, the dynamic of the leadership towards becoming simply a left nationalist party is very much in evidence. But it is provoking some resistance on the left and amongst rank and file comrades - this was shown by the vote on the independence convention, where the executive's position went through by something like a 60%-40% margin. Quite a few speeches from the floor were opposed to what is effectively the leadership's central position - an independent capitalist Scotland.

Rank and file resistance is not coherent, but there is a mood against the argument that independence, of itself, would be a step forward. Members are suspicious of that.

Both the Committee for a Workers' International and the Socialist Worker platform voted against the leadership on the independence convention, but the SWP did not speak in the debate! As for the CWI, its position is utterly incoherent. On the one hand, it criticises the leadership for downplaying socialism in favour of independence, but, on the other, it goes along with its nationalist trajectory. The CWI motion stated: "While supporting independence and a campaign for a referendum as a democratic advance, we have a responsibility to explain that the achievement of national independence of Scotland, without a mass movement to break with capitalism, would not be a solution "¦"

A mass movement does not have to be a mass movement for socialism. The SSP leadership also wants a mass movement - for independence - and that mass movement would obviously be dominated by the SNP. Alan McCombes admitted that this was the purpose of the convention: first we have to get independence, which will then allow us to implement measures in the interest of the working class. The CWI says it is against prettifying capitalism but, when it comes down to it, it too thinks an independent capitalist Scotland would be a step forward.

The SW platform's Neil Davidson spoke against the entrenchment of independence in the SSP constitution, which was moved by Donald Anderson of the Scottish Republican Socialist Movement, but the SW platform did not speak against independence per se. The Scottish Republicans were definitely weaker this year, by the way - some of the people around Don Anderson and Gerry Cairns have dropped out. They were almost an irrelevance.

Workers Unity was the only tendency that argued we should withdraw from the convention and work with socialists in the rest of Britain to build a new socialist party - as opposed to working with the Scottish National Party and Scottish Greens to build an independent capitalist Scotland. Interestingly, one of the younger SW platform members spoke for the WU motion - I think he has only just joined! We were by no means isolated and the speeches we made drew some applause. There was certainly much less hostility than previously towards the idea of a British socialist party.

Incredibly, Mary MacGregor of the Republican Communist Network said that, while the Scottish Republicans have a Scottish nationalist position, Workers Unity has a British nationalist position. Actually, Mary, we defend the unity of the British working class, not the unity of the British state. (The one positive contribution from the RCN was its motion calling for the SSP to encourage all organisations to which it affiliates to be organised on an open and democratic basis. This was really aimed against the SW platform, which has proposed affiliation to unaccountable organisations like Unite Against Fascism.)

The EC motion in favour of the McCombes strategy was voted on first, and the chair ruled that if it passed the other motions would fall. The CWI, SW platform, RCN and WU all voted against, but, because the EC motion was carried, support for the alternative positions was not tested.

On a related matter, the EC was defeated on its proposal not to stand in first-past-the-post seats in next year's Scottish parliament elections. Most members are very much against adopting a policy that carries any hint of voting for the SNP - that is a position held by Scottish Socialist Voice columnist Kevin Williamson and former Labour MEP Hugh Kerr, who are very much out on a limb. However, I do think that the leadership actually wants to get to a position where the SSP contests the PR lists and a vote for the 'independence parties' is recommended in first-past-the-post seats. The EC is unable to openly put that to conference - it would get slaughtered if it did. But it did believe that by arguing financial constraints it would get its position through.

It failed, but the reality is that the EC will still be arguing that we should not stand in certain places and I am sure it will do everything it can to keep down the number of SSP candidates in first-past-the-post seats.

Nevertheless it was a show of anti-nationalist feeling that caused the EC defeat. That was the encouraging thing - I had thought that perhaps some of the new recruits might have been more nationalist-inclined, but it does not look as though that is necessarily true. When Tommy Sheridan was to the fore, we were winning people from the SNP. But today those kind of people may be feeling that the SSP is something of a fringe party and are no longer joining. That leaves a larger proportion of members who are more interested in the 'socialist' part of the 'independent socialist Scotland' slogan. There was a certain presence from student societies from Glasgow, Edinburgh and Aberdeen - this seems to be one area where new people are coming in and it could be that these comrades are more radical.

One other development arises from the fact that the International Socialist Movement - the old Scottish Militant Labour majority that split from the CWI - is shortly to vote on a motion calling for its own disbandment (although its journal, Frontline, will still be published, it seems). Where does that leave the good ISM people who say that the SSP needs a Marxist current (the ISM is loosely linked to the United Secretariat of the Fourth International)? There is some disquiet amongst some of them and a number have argued the need for some kind of non-sectarian Marxist current in the SSP.

Of course, the ISM leadership around McCombes has, it seems, given up on the idea of building a Marxist current, but some of its rank and file, including recruits to the ISM, are against the disbandment. Hopefully some of them will become involved in a new Marxist forum being set up in Glasgow.

To conclude, while the overall trajectory of the SSP remains firmly nationalist, this is now producing something of a reaction amongst those who identify primarily with socialism. It is true that most of them still hold to the old position of an 'independent socialist Scotland' rather than the 'independence first, socialism later' position of the executive committee majority. But it is very easy to demolish this position - how is it possible to have a socialist revolution in Scotland and not in England and Wales? 'Independent socialist Scotland' is just a slogan. I myself am for a socialist Scotland, but it can only be achieved by a united struggle of the British working class.

Yes, the word 'independent' shows that such comrades are still infected with left nationalism, but they are starting to see where McCombes is leading them and are becoming more open to argument.

The problem is twofold: not just the fact that the policy has inevitably led to the de facto position of an independent capitalist Scotland, but that is fails to fight for a Britain-wide socialist party. A socialist revolution in Scotland that is not simultaneously a socialist revolution in the rest of Britain is just a pipe dream.

I am not talking about people like McCombes, who referred approvingly to Keir Hardie in his keynote speech. Obviously he no longer upholds socialist revolution. I am talking about a section of the ISM, CWI and SW supporters and rank and file individuals who are not happy about the prospect of the SSP becoming a kind of tail of the SNP - in reality a left face for the anti-working class project of capitalist independence.

There is a section of the membership - Hugh Kerr and one or two others - that wants a social democratic Scotland. But that is marginal. At the moment the major campaign the leadership is fighting is in support of the SNP's project for independence.

But the interesting thing is, it does not matter how rightwing that project gets in terms of trying to win the endorsement of finance capital - they are now locked into it. Independence in itself is a step forward for the working class, according to them, because it breaks up the British state. So an independent, neoliberal Scotland would be a step forward! They will find it hard to sell this to the working class.

Yet much of the conference was concerned with what are British-wide struggles - the fightback against the attack on pensions or the AUT strike, for example. Similarly the anti-war movement, the fight to stop attacks on muslims - these were often referred to as "national campaigns", meaning British-wide. Or comrades would talk about them taking place "across the country", again meaning Britain. So the case for an all-Britain socialist party is not a difficult one to put.

Apart from amongst the SNP and the SSP leadership, the nationalist movement for independence is not a big thing in Scotland at the moment. The war is far more significant. Here again organisations like Families Against the War are set up on an all-Britain basis.

Tommy Sheridan spoke in a few debates. He arrived late and left early, so there was little opportunity for people to speak to him personally. Whenever he intervened, he was right behind McCombes - he spoke very strongly, not to say demagogically, in favour of the independence convention. However, it seems there is a certain section of the leadership that has completely broken off all relations with him. Some do not speak to him any more. But amongst the rank and file there is a feeling that he is a better performer than Colin Fox. They just wish the whole affair with the News of the World allegations and the impending libel case had not happened.