06.07.1995

Inching towards the Party

REPRESENTATIVES of the Provisional Central Committee of the Communist Party attended a meeting convened by Red Action on Saturday, July 1.

The event was organised to discuss a united response from groups identified as anti-Labour Party to the huge political vacuum in British society.

However, the diffuse nature of the groups present, plus the fact that the meeting had no agenda and lacked a clear sense of purpose, meant discussion was confused and unproductive. While we welcomed the initiative, RA as the convening organisation is to be criticised for this. Also present were the Anarchist Communist Federation, the Revolutionary Communist Group, the Communist Action Group, Class War, individuals in Anti-Fascist Action, Analysis (long thought defunct) and Open Polemic - organisations with massive political differences, impossible to reconcile in a single unstructured gathering.

Comrades from the CPGB brought greetings from the Revolutionary Democratic Group and reported on our work for revolutionary rapprochement. We put forward our minimum platform of working class defence as a basis for revolutionary work in the field of bourgeois elections.

This sparked debate with some, who predictably raised objections to electoral work in principle and counterposed ‘direct action’.

Others - paradoxically - spoke of revolution in Britain as a more or less imminent prospect, while in the same breath they suggested that elections required “too many resources” and warned against “falling flat on our faces”. No other practical suggestions for united work were raised.

The meeting ended with an agreement for RA to formulate their proposals more precisely and for a delegate meeting in a month. We believe that comrades in RA and Afa have recognised that their current political form had reached a dead end. They are inching towards the solution of the Party, but in an intuitive and unconscious way. Thus, they are quite wrong to assert that all organisations “have failed”.

A working class party - a Communist Party - with room for organised factions and free discussion, but with unity in revolutionary action is the solution - not simply for the comrades of RA, but for all working class partisans and revolutionaries.

Mark Fischer