Letters

YP stitch-up

An overruled, outmanoeuvred and stage-managed left. That’s my takeaway from last weekend’s Your Party founding conference. I’m not surprised: the signs were there from its ‘first stutterings’, and then it seemed every few weeks we had to shrug off exasperation at the spats between Jeremy Corbyn, Zarah Sultana and the organising committee.

It seemed like members were being drip-fed deliberate chaos by the nameless and faceless bureaucrats - from the original radio silence over local organisation (so we just got up and did it ourselves), to the stillborn first membership portal, the freezing out of Zarah Sultana and the delayed release of founding documents and amendments. I had the same impression, looking back on Your Party’s first months, as I did when I was a kid, looking back to the mud track, after we’d brought the cows in for milking on my grandparents’ small farm: what a lot of shit they’ve dropped on the way here.

Yet there was hope that, given a collective boot in the right direction, we were potentially seeing a glimpse of a vanguard for a mass socialist party. And, once the sortition results were out, it felt like there could be no turning back now. Of course, if you had been sortitioned and wanted to attend in Liverpool, you first had to cross the profiteers’ palms with a lot of silver - the going rate for a hotel room was £250 a night, I heard from many delegates.

But the shenanigans didn’t end there. On the eve of the conference, as thousands travelled to Liverpool, expulsion emails were wending their way into members’ inboxes for the crime of holding dual membership, including Lewis Nielsen, national secretary of the Socialist Workers Party. At a Socialist Unity Platform meeting I’d attended the night before, we were warned that a witch-hunt would ensue if the current organising committee weren’t challenged. There was little support for the idea that evening, but what a difference 12 hours make.

On the morning of day one, a comrade had only just settled in his seat next to me when he said something like: “The left feel they can be as combative and argumentative as they like, because we’re so far from power we’ve nothing to lose; let’s hope that outlook doesn’t ruin things today.” Hang on, I said, surely there’s no behaviour more hostile than the current committee expelling members already.

At first there was little regret on his part. He’d heard the SWP was out to take over Your Party through bloc voting, so it was probably best they were out, he said. It didn’t take long to talk him round that this was not how a left-unifying mass party should be behaving, particularly without endorsement by its members, and that this was likely the thin end of the proverbial wedge.

He turned to tell the comrade next to him about it, then the members behind us joined in the conversation. The bureaucrats’ behaviour wasn’t impressing them and, when the dual membership vote came round, my impression was the floor was for it, and it was voted in by a 69% majority.

It wasn’t exactly the win I’d hoped for, having tried to endorse a motion allowing acceptance of all left groups, not the cop-out, “with aligned allied parties”, but it remained permanently in draft - a tactic used many times over by the committee.

The camaraderie and open discussion I experienced among members that morning was in stark contrast to the atmosphere from ‘our leaders’. As the chair and officials came on the stage, the welcoming atmosphere was sucked out of the room. The dementors had arrived. Yes, they gave plenty of impassioned speeches about ending austerity and whatnot to rabble-rouse the room, but I had the distinct impression we were being carefully herded in a certain direction.

First we were told that there would be “no points of order from the floor”; that all suggestions were to be made to the standing orders committee during proceedings - oh, and they would also close promptly during the lunch break, so if there’s a queue, never mind, you just won’t be seen. I imagined a black-bereted, blank-faced version of Little Britain’s Carol Beer sitting at the computer telling delegates, ‘The committee says no’.

Also, any shouting, heckling, or attempts to interfere with proceedings were explicitly banned and anyone caught doing it would be thrown out. If you had any doubts about their sincerity, you only had to look around the room, peppered every few metres with a ‘bouncer’.

I was now beginning to feel like I was in a cross between a prison camp, surrounded by guards, and a very strict school assembly, with the head and senior teachers glaring down at us from the dais, alert for any signs of misbehaviour.

These weren’t empty threats either. When a group of delegates stood up from the floor to speak, they were brusquely marched out, despite the room shouting, “Let them speak!” Just as fast, the live feed to delegates watching from home was shut off. I read on a social post that viewers were fed images of smiling-faced Jeremy Corbyn and Zarah Sultana, à la BBC test card.

That turned out to be true, because I experienced the same thing on day two, watching from home. It happened several times, when there were disputes between members and those up on high. Such as when comrades used their stage debate time to call out the organising committee for refusing to allow the “workers’ wage for elected representatives” point of order. It was kept off the agenda despite being one of the most popular amendments, and was eventually thrown out - first for being a duplicate and then for a typo. Even Orwell couldn’t make this up.

Again and again, members on the floor voiced their impatience, as the proceedings plodded along, leaving no time to debate amendments. We faced either the rictus grins of authority, as they suppressed the resistance, or admonishment: one chair said some of us “were being very naughty”, another that she’d “need a glass of wine after this - no, two”, and another that she “wasn’t scared of us”. A comrade leaned over to me and said, “I was regretting coming, but it’s worth it for the entertainment!”

Such was the iron fist over the agenda that when we had extra time at the end of Saturday, we were told to debate the new name of the party (most had already voted on that in the morning) instead of the many, many points of order that had been put forward by members.

Despite the weekend of debate between Your Party members, the sharing of ideas, of solidarity across group lines, the shameful stitch-up of thousands hopeful for something better has left a sour taste in my mouth. If the bureaucrats’ behaviour is anything to go by, the fervour I saw and the chance of an opportunity to build something really socialist and democratic will likely be pissed up the wall. We’ll have to wait for the elections in a few months to see exactly how.

After that? Well, as my mother would say, “If you want owt doing right, do it yer sen”. That might be our only option.

Pat Taylor
email

YP gains

Despite the completely undemocratic nature of the founding conference of Your Party, there have been significant gains for the socialist wing of the party, even if they are confined to what the leadership considered acceptable.

We must focus on the central executive committee elections and elect a CEC that can defend socialists from purges and also ensure that another conference is hosted during the party’s first year, before the ‘two thirds majority’ amendment makes improving the constitution particularly difficult. We also need to educate people on why online voting is so atomising - how it turns democratic debate into ‘who can build the most email lists’.

Perhaps the most important and most controversial vote, other than the dual membership amendment, was the decision of the conference to establish a collective leadership. The social democratic wing of the party was seemingly angered and confused: how could people vote for ordinary members to run the party instead of having a celebrity politician leader? Surely for a party to be electorally successful there needs to be a person who can inform the people of Britain that they intend to run the state, and who can convince millions of people that they as a person are able to improve their lives if granted power? Someone for the media to obsessively discuss - one individual who can utilise their own personal platform to promote the party.

There is some truth to that (although also it should be mentioned that politicians still have a platform even if they are not the leader of a party - for example, New York mayor Zohran Mamdani). However, the fact is that we cannot rely on the traditional media at all: if they can build popularity around a celebrity leader, they can also annihilate that popularity. After all, they managed to convince millions of people, even would-be supporters, that Corbyn and the Labour Party were at the very least unable to deal with a supposed rampant anti-Semitism crisis. Much of the social democratic media were completely unable to refute these claims, and often did not properly stand up for anti-Zionists or even actively perpetuated those claims. Some of those that today talk about the need for a great leader to ‘play the media’ have previously failed, when such a leader was subject to the ability of the mainstream media to gradually associate them with so much negativity that their popularity eventually collapsed.

What we need is socialist media - genuinely unapologetically socialist media that advocates a socialist worldview and promotes a socialist understanding of news events. That includes social media, YouTube channels, etc, as well as traditional-style newspapers (of course, these days such newspapers should also have a website at the very least), because quite often the socialist online community does not have the kind of following that would be necessary for a genuine alternative form of news media for the vast majority of people. To some extent we need to have some method for distributing news IRL.

When Your Party is properly set up, not only should there be at least one national YP newspaper, but branches need to join together to set up local newspapers (eg, all the London branches joining together to produce a London newspaper, or all the Oxfordshire branches for here in Oxfordshire), which should discuss not just local news, but also national and international news, as well as the internal politics and events within YP, so that readers can know about their party.

This branch cooperation could also be utilised to gather funds to set up socialist newsagents, where obviously YP publications could be purchased, ideally alongside various other socialist publications (yes, even indeed the newspapers of the various socialist groups of Britain). Of course, these socialists newsagents should also have journals and books and various socialist media. Having a presence ‘IRL’, and a ‘third space’ would help build the socialist news media ecosystem that is required for the ideas of socialism to gain an influence within the minds of more people.

Dovah
Oxfordshire

For YP exclusions

I have to admit that, despite being far from ignorant of the atrocious history, behaviours and lack of basic political (as well as personal) morality of much of the Trotskyoid groups, grouplets and sects in this country, I was staggered by the brazenness and sheer brass necks of the vast majority flocking to join Your Party, as if their own sect membership, political history, commitments and loyalties were of no consequence whatsoever.

Have they all suddenly had Saul of Tarsus conversions on the road to the Liverpool conference, having realised the complete futility and pointlessness of their sectarian and sect histories to date, and suddenly become converts to the notion of a genuinely mass-membership, broad socialist party? Have they resigned their membership of the sects, leaving their ‘cadre’ cards at the door? Are the sects committing to winding up and dissolving, in favour of YP? Will their primary loyalty be to YP rather than their individual sect? Of course, as we all know, none of that will be true.

We all know what they are up to. They are flocking to Your Party because they see opportunities to recruit to their own sects. To basically try and establish slightly larger versions of their current selves. Then they will either clear off or be thrown out anyway for their conduct - no doubt complaining and whinging, as they are thrown into the gutters. Classic Trotskyism. Complete opportunism and parasitism. Disgusting, disgraceful and shameful behaviour.

Social media outlets of some of the sects have been ‘outraged’ that members of the Socialist Workers Party have been expelled from Your Party, and maybe also from the Socialist Party in England and Wales and some others. Instead of faux outrage and whining about ‘witch-hunts’, surely the basic question should be, what the hell are members of the SWP, SPEW and others, doing in another socialist party in the first place?

Should anyone really be surprised that Your Party have (eventually) woken up to the problem that they have attracted: alongside the tens and possibly hundreds of thousands genuinely committed to a mass socialist party, there are people who are absolutely not committed to the YP project, but only to furthering the advance of their own individual sects? Is it really so shocking that Your Party should want to establish some boundaries for basic membership: eg, that the person should be genuinely committed to Your Party, as opposed to one of the sects?

It is, of course, possible that some of the groups and sects might genuinely see the need for a mass socialist party, in which they might seek to further their politics, programme and strategy; that the aims and objectives of their group might be complementary, rather than antagonistic, to Your Party. So, what would be the principled, open and democratic response?

Surely, it would be along the lines of openly approaching YP and its leadership and openly seeking opportunities for close working and cooperation, and maybe even open affiliation as an option? I know YP doesn’t currently have a provision for affiliation of other organisations, but surely that could be worked up as an option, especially if it was persuaded through example and practice that open affiliation of genuinely supportive socialist and revolutionary groups would be beneficial?

I would hope that Your Party does at some point allow for the formal, open and democratic affiliation of genuine working class organisations and formations, progressive democratic campaigns (including for international peace and solidarity, struggles for justice, equality and non-discrimination for oppressed groups, etc), and socialist and revolutionary groups which have a real basis in the working class and are genuinely committed to the politics and strategy of a mass, socialist, working class party.

Zarah Sultana’s notion of a party of the whole left (quoted by Carla Roberts in at least one of her reports in the Weekly Worker) is no doubt exceedingly attractive, and might, possibly, over time, provide the political and organisational basis, or at least a framework, for a very significant unity of the left - of socialists, communists and other genuine revolutionaries. That members of the various socialist, communist and Trotskyoid groups, might possibly be able to work together in a cooperative, beneficial and mutually enhancing manner - as opposed to knocking verbal lumps out of each other, pursuing nefarious infiltration and membership poaching drives, and overall punching far less than our apparent collective numerical weight.

It would seem appropriate that affiliated organisations should have some formal collective input into the decision-making of Your Party, as well as presumably making financial contributions for the privilege and encouraging their supporters to take out individual membership of YP. But there should be no automatic or logical reason why the collective ‘vote’ of affiliated organisations should automatically ‘drown out’ or otherwise marginalise the role of individual members.

(The sniping at trade union ‘bloc votes’ is very revealing. A ‘bloc vote’ is simply the trade union (or other organisation) deciding democratically how its total membership vote should be cast in line with its collectively agreed policy. We should be in favour of collective and disciplined decision-making in the working class movement.

It would be perfectly possible to establish ringfenced percentage shares of (say) decision-making conferences to individual members, affiliated trade unions, trades councils, community groups, national progressive democratic campaigns, affiliated socialist and communist parties and groups, etc. So the various voices from the various constituencies making up the overall membership basis of Your Party could input in a balanced, open and democratic manner. Of course, affiliated memberships should have appropriate weight. But so should those who do sign up on an individual basis, in their communities and localities or workplaces.

YP provides a fundamental challenge to the entire history, sectarianism, behaviour and bad morality of the great majority of the Trotskyoid groups. Of course, to date, they have been collectively wetting themselves with excitement over the prospect of being able to fish for recruits in a much larger pool (and in a typically underhand and surreptitious manner). If they continue like this, frankly, they deserve to be exposed and kicked out like dogs in the night.

But they also have a big opportunity to change. If they have genuine confidence in their own politics, programme (or equivalent), in their own comrades, in their own groups, etc, then approach YP openly, democratically and respectfully, and formally explore opportunities for closer working or even affiliation. If they are rebuffed, then work through daily practice and example to persuade Your Party they were wrong and should change their approach.

If they keep to their sect memberships and prime loyalties, and stick to decades of ingrained sectarian and parasitical behaviour, then, frankly, they get what they deserve.

Andrew Northall
Kettering

Remember Fidel

On November 25, the world commemorated the ninth anniversary of the death of Cuban leader Fidel Castro - the remarkable revolutionary communist, who died peacefully in Havana at the age of 90 after surviving more than 600 CIA-orchestrated assassination attempts.

Fidel Castro never compromised in his anti-imperialism nor renounced his commitment to socialism. He was, and will continue to be, a revolutionary inspiration for the poor and oppressed around the world, those fighting against imperialist exploitation and plunder, against racism and prejudice in all its forms, those fighting for social and economic justice and a working class democracy.

In early 1989, shortly before the fall of the Berlin Wall, I wrote an article, ‘In defence of socialism’, which counterposed the transitions underway in the socialist bloc countries: that is, the “dangerous trend to embrace capitalist economic mechanisms and political values” with the process of socialist reinvigoration underway in Cuba, where “Castro has raised the banner of resistance, the true banner of socialism and Marxism-Leninism”.

The bourgeois press had declared capitalism to be victorious. The New Yorker proclaimed: “Less than 75 years after it officially began, the contest between capitalism and socialism is over: capitalism has won” (January 23 1989). And yet, 36 years later, New Yorkers voted in a self-proclaimed socialist as the city’s new mayor. Whatever his political limitations, it has upset the ruling class in the United States. On November 21 this year, the House of Representatives passed a resolution to denounce “the horrors of socialism”. What exactly do they fear? The resolution was sponsored by rightwing Cuban American politician Maria Elvira Salazar, who has built her political career on opposition to Cuban socialism. The spectre of Fidel Castro and socialism is haunting imperialism.

For more analysis of imperialism and crisis, please go to https://davidyaffe.org.uk. Please take time to explore the website - it represents a lifetime’s political and theoretical work - and feel free to get in touch, with any thoughts or questions via the contact form.

David Yaffe
Email

Censorship fight

A film featuring spectacular new evidence of state censorship of the Palestine genocide premiered in Bristol on Saturday November 20. New material in the film, Censoring Palestine, includes previously unseen footage of police arrests and eye-witness accounts of alleged police brutality during demonstrations against the ban on the protest group, Palestine Action.

The revised film exposes a major escalation in the British government’s attempts to clamp down on protest about the genocide in Gaza. It is one thing to accuse protestors like Palestine Action of criminal damage, if they enter an arms factory and spray paint there. But to prosecute them as terrorists is outrageous, unjust and utterly unjustified.

The updated feature-length documentary from Platform Films includes contributions from award-winning filmmaker Ken Loach, comedian activist Alexei Sayle, journalist Sarah Wilkinson, who was raided by anti-terrorist police, and relatives of the Filton 24 protestors, imprisoned for their actions against the Israel-owned drone-maker, Elbit Systems.

The terrorism law is being used on an industrial scale against peaceful protest. Well over 2,000 people have now been arrested for simply holding up a sign saying that they oppose genocide and support Palestine Action. People whose only ‘crime’ was to protest against war crimes are being put in jail for years of their lives. This has to stop.

The government is trying to outrageously censor the public debate on Gaza and if they get away with this they will, we believe, take even more draconian measures. The aim of our film is to alert people to this danger - we must fight for our freedoms or risk losing them.

The premiere of the updated film took place at the Bristol Palestine Film Festival. The screening was followed by a panel discussion, with human rights barrister Ousman Noor and Sue Parfitt, an 83-year old priest arrested for supporting Palestine Action.

Check it out.

Norman Thomas
Platform Films

RIP Phil

I believe I first met Phil Kent (Phil Railston), who died on October 17, and his dog, Cookie, at the same time - back at a comrade’s old pad in London. Cookie, still a puppy then, greeted someone else with a firm bite to the nose and then proceeded to mess up the entire flat - a task successfully accomplished within a quarter of an hour. Phil made no attempt whatsoever to stop her, instead regaling us with tales of his travels to India, as he watched on.

Phil was a real character - funny, sharp, self-deprecating, one of a kind. He was never chauvinistic, but he wasn’t particularly politically correct either. Perhaps because of his age and generation, or perhaps because he had politically come of age with the Workers Revolutionary Party’s pre-war brand of Trotskyist orthodoxy, he had successfully dodged any New Left influences, which may have been partly why he always remained human and relatable. The other reason was that, unlike many communists, he never went around with the posture of an all-knowing sage. He’d often offer a sharp observation on some political subject or other, but then added the phrase, “I’m saying this from a position of considerable ignorance” - something that is ultimately true of everybody, but few in our circles have the guts to admit. I loved that turn of phrase from Phil.

I also loved drinking with Phil and Jack Conrad when the London Communist Forum was still at the Calthorpe Arms pub. We’d often stay in the pub downstairs long after everyone else had left, and Phil would proceed from pints to spirits. One of my last memories from that period is when I told him I was going to Italy to visit a girl (the one I live with now). Phil replied that I was very lucky, because, in his words, “Italian girls are famous for wearing nothing all day”.

Phil was far from being a well-adjusted member of society, but he still somehow managed not only to survive, but also to contribute something valuable to this world. In his case, this was his sheer presence in the CPGB, and his indispensable role as layout artist for the Weekly Worker. I always found people like him - in fact, especially him - deeply reassuring. They show that the important thing is to deliver in some field, preferably of your own choosing. It’s fine not to be exactly ‘normal’ otherwise.

I’m glad that the one time I visited London after I had moved to Italy, I made sure to go for a pint with Phil at one of his preferred haunts, and took Cookie for a walk in Chestnuts Park. In the past, they had always rushed ahead of me and I’d struggle to keep up. I always wondered how a man in his 70s and about half my size could walk so much faster than me. But it wasn’t the same this time. They had both lost quite a bit of life force, and it felt as if it could be the last time I’d see them, so I cherished every moment. Sadly, that’s exactly what came to pass.

Phil is a big loss for everybody who knew him. I’m in a different country and couldn’t attend his funeral ceremony, but I was there in spirit, and I’ll commemorate him the way he’d want me to - by raising a glass or two to him. I wish I could do so at one of his favourite pubs.

Rest in peace, my friend, Phil. Meet you at the long bar in the sky!

Maciej Zurowski
Italy