23.07.2015

Sectarian anti-sectarianism

The fallout from Greece and an attempt to boot out Workers Power have aroused passions in Yorkshire Left Unity. Mickey Coulter and Tina Becker report

Left Unity in South Yorkshire saw effectively three meetings in Leeds on Sunday July 18. The first was a political educational; the second was the region’s business meeting; and the third saw a special Leeds members’ aggregate seeking to find a way to heal the deep rift between its two branches. This final meeting was mediated by Kate Hudson and Simon Hardy, two of the party’s national officers, who both also provided lead-offs for the educational.

The topic under discussion here was simply ‘Where is Left Unity going?’, which, as the chair of the meeting and Leeds Left Unity member Matthew Caygill observed, would no doubt also extend to discussion of the actions of Syriza in Greece, which he thought was seen by so many as the defining political model for Left Unity.

“It’s been a tough five years,” began national secretary Kate Hudson. The last parliament was dominated by the cuts programme, by the cruel and arbitrary imposition of the work programme and so on. But the next five years would see, with a Conservative majority government, not only a continuation, but an acceleration of Tory attacks - most apparent in the proposed anti-union legislation, which would effectively make most strike action unlawful. The Labour leadership, she said, had already capitulated. In spite of this she stressed that, in terms of the votes which went to the government as a percentage, it received only around 25% support. One wonders if this is the new way of calling it a “weak government” without using that particular bit of phrasing so popular - and so incorrect - on the left about the 2010 coalition. Perhaps it will become weak in the course of events, but at present one cannot call it so, statistics or no.

Though the phrasing may have changed, it seems that the struggle remains the same in the coming period. That is, in comrade Hudson’s words, to find a way to convert the initial dismay over the election results into a “fightback”. Last month’s People’s Assembly march, high in spirits and numbers (although rather lower than the official line has it), was hopefully an indication of this.

Defeat for all

Moving onto Greece, comrade Hudson spoke angrily about the intensification of the “neoliberal” model of capitalism: “The defeat of Syriza is a defeat for all of us,” was her sombre assessment. More than ever it was now important to seek to build a European left, able to enter into a serious discussion of the defeat and its lessons, which was why Left Unity has applied for observer status in the European Left Party. Interestingly, in her second contribution, comrade Hudson openly stated that the events in Greece had made her question whether there was a parliamentary road to socialism any more - interesting because of her political background in the Morning Star’s Communist Party of Britain, which still today espouses a national-parliamentary road to socialism.

As for Left Unity, we have “a good media profile”, for which she praised Tom Walker. A lot of Left Unity banners and placards had been caught in press photographs of the anti-austerity protests, and there was “good take-up” of press releases and so on. As for the Corbyn campaign within Labour, the comrade welcomed it, and so should Left Unity as a whole. Of course, she continued, there are problems in how we can support him, as we cannot join Labour and vote for him without providing ammunition for the concerted effort of the party right to discredit him. Even so, a successful campaign would be a boost for the entire left.

More briefly, Simon Hardy, the national officer for membership and branch development, gave his take on what the present and future is for the party. In the present, we have had good local campaigns and interventions, he said, giving his own general election campaign as an example, and noted the presence of London LU members in the capital’s various struggles. Comrade Hardy also welcomed Jeremy Corbyn’s campaign - how we work with the Labour left in the future would, he added, depend on the final showing made by Corbyn. Comrade Hudson herself was anticipating either a strong showing or a victory for Corbyn.

The subsequent debate was very wide-ranging in terms of the future of the party - from the lessons of Syriza, to building local campaigns and branches. Chris, a comrade from York, thought that greater cooperation with the Scottish National Party and the Green Party would be necessary in the coming period, as they were both anti-austerity. This line was opposed by the two Sheffield delegates and authors of this article, although Terry from York sounded a sympathetic note, stating that the Greek people had educated themselves in anti-austerity politics through Syriza - just like the Scots have educated themselves through the SNP (on the Greens and Syriza, however, comrade Hudson called their support a form of “deflected anti-austerity” sentiment). Nick from Leeds spoke with pride of the branch’s accomplishments, including delivering 18,000 leaflets in a constituency of 19,000. For Garth Franklin (Socialist Resistance), the problem with what we say about Corbyn was similar to our approach to Syriza - how to criticise them without coming across as sectarian.

The lack of proper channels for horizontal communication in the party was acknowledged by comrades Hardy and Hudson, who shared the frustration of Tina Becker that members of Left Unity could only communicate on unofficial Facebook pages, often run in a high-handed manner by unaccountable persons. Simon agreed that an official page or forum, which allowed members only to comment, should be set up soon, promising that this would be discussed at the next LU national council.

Finally, the regional committee supported our motion in relation to Jeremy Corbyn’s campaign for the Labour leadership, which was unanimously endorsed (see http://communistplatform.org.uk). It was great to see the universal support of those present for the campaign.

Branch split

Unfortunately, the whole day was somewhat overshadowed by the subsequent Leeds members’ aggregate and the rather clumsy attempt of Matthew Caygill and a few local allies to expel Workers Power from Leeds Left Unity. Or, to be more precise (and more bizarre), to get Workers Power comrades to expel themselves.

To remind readers of the background: in September 2013, comrade Caygill (himself a member of the Podemos Tendency in LU), together with a few assorted rightwingers, had split from the official Leeds LU branch and set up a branch they called Leeds North and East. Not because he and his allies were based in the north-east of the city, but because he found the half a dozen local members of Workers Power in the branch “intolerable” to work with (ie: he could not always get a majority to support what he proposed).

Although this split along political lines was clearly unconstitutional, the new branch was unfortunately recognised by the national council in 2014. Still, the LU leadership continues quite rightly to attempt to overcome the division and has set up a “mediation” process. An insight into the current untenable situation: the contact details of new members are being forwarded to both existing branches, who then scramble to recruit the newcomer.

A mediation report, drafted by comrade Hudson and Felicity Dowling in September 2014, was rejected by Caygill and co, because it recommended that the original branch should be renamed ‘Leeds Central’ (in other words, that would grant the WP-dominated branch, as well as North and East, the right to exist). Instead, the Leeds rightwingers suggested that the original branch should be dissolved, and that new geographically based branches should be established, with WP comrades “distributed” amongst those (you know how scary they can get when there are more than two of them). You would think that Leeds has hundreds of members. But, no, there is a grand total of 45 - 17 of whom showed up to this Leeds aggregate - and only a minority regularly attend branch meetings. At the current stage of LU’s development, this is clearly a one-branch territory.

Comrades Hudson and Hardy had travelled to Leeds to “assist” comrades in finding a way forward. Before the aggregate, comrade Caygill had circulated three motions. Clearly, having orchestrated the split, he now feels he has to defend it tooth and nail and has attempted to go on the offensive.

We “want everyone to see that we have simply had enough”, he writes rather dramatically in his email introduction. Reading through the motions, however, it becomes clear that he has nothing concrete to accuse WP of, because, well, they haven’t actually done anything wrong.

It is “intolerable”, says the first motion, that “the smaller branch, which is dominated by a tiny and sectarian far-left group which might be called ‘Workers Power’, or might be the ‘League for a Fifth International’, is called ‘Leeds’.” The motion demands “an immediate change” of name. Remember, this is the actual, original Leeds branch that he and his comrades split away from.

The second motion deals with ‘dual membership’ and quotes from the mediation report, which recommended that “when engaging in Left Unity branch activity, members must not promote the policies of any other political party or organisation or seek to represent their policies as the policies of Left Unity; nor must they use Left Unity meetings or stalls as vehicles for the promotion of the politics or materials of other political parties or organisations.”

Obviously this is far too restrictive. The Communist Platform makes no apology for circulating its materials at Left Unity meetings. Not that we present our politics as the politics of Left Unity. We presume that comrades in Workers Power do the exact same thing. Hence, comrade Caygill’s next line of argument: “… further experience has demonstrated these principles need to be applied to social media and deal with ‘different hats’ question - it isn’t good enough for a member to say, ‘Today I’m Workers Power; tomorrow I might be Left Unity’. We are not talking to goldfish - we want continuity.”

Comrade Caygill and his friends may or may not be “talking to goldfish”, but he implies that working class people are about as smart as them. Because they clearly could not possibly grasp the possibility that somebody can be a member of two organisations at once. So, instead of being honest about their political affiliation and their critique of some of LU’s policies, WP (and other groups too, needless to say) should pretend they simply happen to share the same viewpoints as some other random members in LU. In other words, Caygill advocates lying to the working class. Not that this has never been tried before in our movement, but we know it does not tend to end well.

The third motion quotes rather laboriously from the Manifesto for a Fifth International and WP’s statement on Syriza’s capitulation, in which the comrades argue against “making concession to centrism”. Caygill’s motion states frothily:

We have little interest in the correct revolutionary programme. We aren’t even ‘centrists’ in the minds of Workers Power. But we do want a build a broad party and feel like we are the subjects of a relentless struggle against our reformist errors. Consequently we think Workers Power’s participation in Left Unity is a matter of bad faith and dishonesty. We ask them to leave and take their struggle for a Fifth International elsewhere before they cause more damage.

Here we get to the rub of it. Caygill and his co-thinkers probably know very well that their sub-reformist politics cannot provide a viable answer to the crisis of capitalism and how to get to socialism. But they damn well don’t want to be told so - or be showed up by a bunch of mouthy revolutionaries in the process.

Communist Platform supporters have been accused of exactly the same when we act as a disciplined group at LU conferences, or in branches where we happen to have a majority of active members. We might disagree with a lot of what WP comrades are saying, but like them we have collectively discussed various political issues over many decades and have come to joint, collective conclusions that we are advancing in Left Unity and elsewhere. People without a coherent political framework can find our presence extremely annoying.

We are in the middle of the biggest attacks on workers’ rights and the welfare state for many decades and yet Left Unity is still hovering at just under 2,000 members. Syriza and Podemos have attracted mass support, yet in Britain the left continues to get dismal votes. Surely, somebody - anybody - must be to blame for the left’s sorry state. It must be those nutters on the revolutionary left.

In this, Matthew Caygill is not alone in displaying a worrying level of impatience. Clearly, it is not enough to ‘plant a flag’ and watch the millions flock to the latest left project. You need to work hard on, yes, the “correct programme” and on convincing the working class that we have a viable way out of capitalism’s further descent into hell.

Defeated

Communist Platform supporters on the regional committee had prepared a motion opposing these sectarian moves by Caygill and his branch. As it transpired in discussions with comrades Hardy and Hudson during the day, however, the LU leadership does not support such sectarian madness. After all, if you allow Workers Power to be censured like this, you surely ought to go next for Socialist Resistance, Socialist Action, the CPGB, the Independent Socialist Network, etc. Before long, there would be nobody left.

We were happy to withdraw our motion and, true enough, none of the three bizarre motions were even taken by comrade Hudson (who chaired the meeting). Instead, she and comrade Hardy reiterated that Workers Power comrades of course have a right to be members of LU. Comrade Hardy further stated that it was “intolerable that branches are split along political lines”.

However, as it seems unlikely that the rightwingers will dissolve their breakaway branch, in reality this means that, over time, the leadership hopes that geographically defined branches will evolve, with the ‘old’ Leeds branch being renamed ‘Leeds Central and West’. A ‘city committee’ is supposed to meet regularly to build bridges. Astonishingly, there is now talk of some of the rightwingers setting up a third Leeds branch to cover the south of the city.

So, while one sectarian manoeuvre was roundly defeated, the situation in Leeds still remains rather precarious. A bad example for the whole of Left Unity. The leadership really should take a clear view on the matter and close down the sectarian breakaway branch.