04.04.1996

New Labour, old Labour

Communist press

Somewhat belatedly I want to draw readers’ attention to the February/March edition of Fight Racism, Fight Imperialism. Although nominally a communist paper, it is invariably devoid of any communist polemic and has nothing at all to say on the Party question. But FRFI can certainly claim to be one of the most consistent anti-imperialist newspapers in Britain.

The reader is never left in doubt that Britain is still a major imperialist nation, plundering the developing world and buying off sections of the working class with some crumbs from its imperialist booty, while poisoning the minds of the working class with national chauvinism and outright racist ideologies.

In particular, FRFI’s relentless exposure of the Labour Party as a pro-imperialist party cannot be faulted. And it is this particular point that brings me to its editorial statement concerning the Socialist Labour Party. Neither falling into the euphoria that some organisations have adopted, nor condemning the SLP as simply the Labour Party Mark II, the FRFI editorial seeks to locate the SLP within the context of world imperialism. FRFI opens:

“In our view any political development which weakens the Labour Party is a very welcome and wonderful thing. If the SLP mounts an electoral challenge to the Labour Party in defence of the welfare state and in defence of the working class and the poor we can only applaud and support it. Socialists can have no time for and no interest in the Labour Party’s electoral fortunes. The Labour Party is an instrument for the ruling class and will be used to attack a large section of the working class.”

The editorial continues:

“If the SLP relates to the concerns of the poorest sections and if it supports and includes those already fighting and taking direct action against injustice ... then it will take a healthy direction. This will, however, require an ideological and organisational break with the past of enormous magnitude. And the first SLP-published documents show it has not yet discarded the Labour Party’s reactionary ideological and organisational legacy.”

The FRFI Statement dismisses any notion of a socialist-orientated Labour Party existing prior to Blair and the ditching of clause four. Any such illusions are “an apologia for a Labour Party which throughout its whole history has been pro-capitalist, racist, imperialist and anti-working class”.

FRFI concludes, “Our view on the SLP is determined by the practical needs of the working class.”

Julian Jake