22.08.1996

General election strategy

SL Kenning looks at latest developments in the Socialist Labour Party

Socialist Labour’s August 3 National Executive Committee in London was billed as an attempt at “finalising our election policy” (Socialist Labour information August 1 1996). The meetings of June and July were deadlocked. Essentially, there was a split centring on the number of candidates. Most NEC members, including general secretary Patrick Sikorski, favoured a minimal approach. But president Scargill is a committed maximalist.

The August NEC was long and often very heated. However, when the key vote was finally taken, comrade Scargill managed to get himself a slim majority for his line. Unfortunately this is a tribute to our president’s ability to operate bureaucratically, not SLP democracy. There has been no open debate, no attempt to involve the rank and file. Comrade Scargill knows, perhaps better than anyone, the way to fix a meeting. Years of training in the NUM taught him all about behind-the-scenes deals, none-too-subtle arm twisting and manipulating procedure.

So we are now officially committed to standing 100 candidates. The NEC will select key ‘strategic’ seats. Branches - none of which are yet organised on a constituency basis - will then nominate their own candidates.

Challenging Blair from the left is an altogether good thing. SLP candidates deserve the support of all working class partisans. Nevertheless, before the general election one big internal question must be answered. Where will the money come from?

Running 100 candidates will mean spending a small fortune. Take the Hemsworth by-election. It cost something like £8,000. Brenda Nixon got 1,193 votes or 5.4% of the poll, thus saving the £500 deposit - just. Comrade Scargill says 5-10% of the poll in a general election would be an SLP victory. It would certainly be an impressive beginning. But a general election is not a by-election. By-elections favour protest votes and Hemsworth is very favourable territory for the SLP. A solid working class area in the heart of the militant South Yorkshire coalfield, it has been devastated by Tory vandalism. We also had an excellent candidate. Comrade Nixon was in the forefront of Women Against Pit Closures in 1992-3 and personified the spirit of the 1984-5 Great Strike. To top it all Walworth Road removed the local NUM-backed candidate. Its own New Labour man was imposed by dictat.

Saving a deposit is an important political bench-mark. It is though only a marginal item of expenditure. Even if costs could be halved in a general election with economies of scale, the SLP will still have to raise £400,000 by April 1997 at the latest. Our NEC’s fundraising subcommittee - comrades Anne Scargill, Dave Proctor, Graham Till and Bob Crow - must come up with more than £1 badges, £4.50 T-shirts and £3.50 baseball hats.

The impact of our 100 candidates will certainly be diminished by the NEC decision to shun all proposals for left unity and cooperation. Instead of joining with the Scottish Socialist Alliance, the CPGB, Militant Labour, etc, and fighting for a united workers’ front against Blairism, the NEC has decided upon a sectarian course.

Thankfully the NEC is not to seek out a contest with well-known leftwingers. The SLP will not stand against Tommy Sheridan or Dave Nellist. But this is the result of empirical calculation, not principle. The NEC does not rate our chances.

The same narrow spirit informs its attitude towards Labourites. Where there is no SLP candidate, voters are urged to opt for those closest to our policies. Hence, though they will be standing on New Labour’s pro-capitalist manifesto, the likes of Tony Benn will not find themselves opposed by SLP candidates.

Dark forces

The NEC is reported to have unanimously agreed to back the McCarthyite purge of suspected communists in the SLP. Nine SLP members are to receive letters. They will be told either that their membership is null and void or is up for question. There is, of course, no right of appeal. The NEC has set itself up as prosecution, jury and judge.

The NEC has been told that 70 CPGB members are in the SLP. I for one welcome them. All leftwing organisations should join the SLP and build it as the mass working class party. Socialist Labour must be open to all Marxists, communists and socialists.

As to our NEC - shame on you, comrades. Especially those, including comrade Scargill, who have gone on record opposing the witch hunt of communists and other leftwingers in the Labour Party. Shame on you all for turning a blind eye to the overwhelming evidence that comrades Patrick Sikorski, Carolyn Sikorski and Brian Heron - who sit next to you on the NEC and were appointed by you to our general purposes committee - are factionally organised in the secret Fourth International Supporters Caucus. Shame on Fisc, our dark forces. On the one hand these people kow-tow to Arthur Scargill. On the other they operate as the witch hunter generals in the SLP. What an historical irony that they do so in the name of Leon Trotsky.

News of the news

Socialist News should now be ready for its launch on Monday September 9 - and TUC week. What sort of paper will it be? And will it sell?

The NEC agreed to comrade Scargill’s proposal that Socialist News would not be for the education and enlightenment of SLP members or those already involved in left politics. It will be aimed at those “new” to socialism. In other words we will have on our hands yet another attempt at a ‘socialist’ Daily Mirror. Articles will tend to be localist, economistic and very short - “generally” no longer than 500 words.

Frankly the prospects do not look good. Putting forward socialist ideas that go against the grain of so-called common sense in a period of reaction such as this is no easy matter. Putting them forward in 500 words or less is to court banality.

That will not make interesting reading ... for anyone. Organising the NUM round the trade union politics of The Yorkshire Miner is quite feasible. Organising the SLP is another matter entirely. We must develop the programme that can comprehensively equip our class so it can become the ruling class. That means the highest theory and extensive polemic with others.

Comrade Scargill does not possess sophisticated theory. His politics are a combination of NUMism and reconstructed ‘official communism’. No doubt that is why he has instructed members not to engage in sterile correspondence or debate with organisations that claim to be ‘on the left’ but whose objective is to undermine all the positive work of Socialist Labour” (A Scargill Socialist Labour information August 1 1996). Does that apply to the letters from London SLP comrades Stuart Goodman, Ian Dudley and Geoff Palmer, recently submitted to Socialist Review and Results and prospects?

There is also an immediate problem with the finances and potential sales of Socialist News. Its projected size has already gone down from 12 to eight pages. That does not surprise me. Our branches, which typically meet only monthly or even once every two months, are not well placed to meet the 3,000 monthly break-even target.

On the other hand a monthly paper might serve to galvanise Socialist Labour. Meetings have to become more frequent if vast losses and disaster are to be avoided for Socialist News. Nor should members be put off by the 500-word stipulation. Articles not printed in Socialist News can always be sent elsewhere.