14.03.1996

Why I joined the SLP

Realism comes with time. The Labour Party will not advance the working class. It will appease the working class and the establishment and support capitalism. The LP is no longer the home of disenfranchised leftwing activists who want to pursue policies and socialist principles.

The ‘new’ LP bears more resemblance to the American Democratic Party than to a radical party of socialist change.

As an LP member for 10 years I considered the party both at local level and nationally to be lacklustre. But I turned out at elections along with thousands of other activists to do our bit, to try and gain power so that our socialism could be obtained.

I can’t exactly say when the rot set in, or whether it had always been there, but the LP stopped fighting and started nodding. The party shunned the miners in 1984 and I can’t actually tell which shift in policy actually changed my mind - the shift over grant maintained schools, the failure locally to fight budget cuts or the ultimate betrayal of principle in accepting the capitalist system by dropping clause four.

All of these played an important part in my decision to leave. As a Labour member I had been viewed like others as rightwing - committed to a party which had no record of radical change and no hope for it in the future. I at that time did not see it in that way. I saw the LP as the only realistic chance for the working class.

From within the party I had seen the victories and defeats of the left over the poll tax, local government, anti-road and anti-racist struggles. But I had always viewed these as single-issue battles without any clear course - they couldn’t be advanced to make wholesale political change.

The question then as now for Labour activists is not ‘Are you left or right?’, but ‘What do you consider the road to socialism to be?’ I always believed in many of the ideals of the SWP, ML and CPGB, but I doubted their ability to gain mass support for socialism. Not because of their policies or ideals, but because of Labour’s entrenchment as the mainstream party of the ‘left’, coupled with the possibility of revolution at this time being nil.

Reluctantly and dispassionately I stayed with Labour, not active as I would have liked to have been, but waiting - waiting for power.

The formation of the SLP has changed the political landscape on the left. Many leftwing activists within the LP found their position in it impossible after the dropping of clause four. They still paid their dues but became less active and more disillusioned.

The SLP represents a party which - although disenfranchised - the left can actually join and participate in. The SLP is committed to agitation and demonstrations on the streets, as well as using elections. It provides an opportunity to join forces to defeat capitalism.

The problems of the left in the past have been caused by useless fighting. All class activists must unite to fight. Debate must not be stifled and all sections of the left must be allowed to project their own policies. But behind this there must be a sense of unity within the class.

The SLP has an advantage over other groups in having a familiar face. Hated or loved, Scargill has played an important part in launching the party and this, along with the result by Brenda Nixon in Hemsworth, has projected the party into the minds of millions of people in Britain. The fledgling SLP is now seen as a radical left wing alternative to ‘new’ Labour. Only time will tell if it will fail or succeed, but its membership will decide. It is a membership forged out of betrayal, but with a commitment to socialist change.

Nigel Ball