24.10.1996
Important advance for SSA
At this month’s national council meeting of the Scottish Socialist Alliance, Allan Green reported back from the national liaison meeting hosted by the Coventry Alliance.
He told the national council that on the way to the conference he and the other delegates took the decision that the SSA would not participate in any all-Britain structure of Alliances, although this has never been discussed by either a national council or by an SSA conference.
The council, however, agreed that while accepting the reasoning behind the delegates’ decision (the uneven development of the Alliances, etc) this must not rule out the SSA discussing this matter in some depth in the future. We may in fact decide to be part of or even lead such an all-Britain body. We also agreed to participate fully in the follow-up meeting on January 11 in Manchester.
Although no firm commitments were made, this is a decisive step forward for working class unity against the diversionary nature of nationalism that permeates the left as well as the right in Scotland.
The fight for self-determination must be waged by the working class leading the struggle for democracy throughout the UK and internationally.
The struggle for one Party to smash the UK state must be waged in Socialist Alliances throughout Britain.
The meeting continued the discussions on the proposed Charter for socialist change around the areas of education, welfare and culture.
Two months ago the Communist Party’s proposals on the level of the minimum wage and benefits resulted in a lively debate between the CPGB’s Mary Ward and Nick Clarke on one side and Tommy Sheridan and Richie Venton of Scottish Militant Labour on the other.
Ward and Clarke’s position (a minimum wage of £275 per week) was defeated in favour of the minimum wage being set at the level of the European ‘decency’ threshold (£6 per hour, or £210 per week) with the meeting clearly backing the Sheridan position that benefits, etc must be less than the level of the minimum wage in order to give incentives for people to work. Our proposals for a minimum income at the level of the minimum wage were characterised as utopian and ahead of the consciousness of the working class.
This month a number of leading Glasgow SML members unfortunately did not make the meeting. However, several other comrades had given at least some thought to the previous arguments.
Particularly Les Robertson, former leader of Dumbarton District Council, who said that he had felt extremely unhappy with the position he had taken during the previous debate and now was convinced that the level of the minimum wage should be seen as the minimum level of income required to live a decent life in Britain today.
Consequently the national council, despite Allan Green’s attempts to argue the previous positions, accepted the document on education, including the amendment that grants be set at the level of the minimum wage.
On the welfare document the amendment that “No individual should have a benefit level below that of the minimum wage” was defeated in favour of the amendment that we include in the preamble the sentence, “We are for a society where unemployment is eliminated and everyone is guaranteed an income at that of the European decency threshold”.
These amendments, even the watered down one on welfare, mark a small but important step forward within the Alliance. They establish the logical principle that if you set a minimum level of income required to live in this country then to suggest that some groups - such as pensioners, students, single parents or 16 to 18-year olds - should live on an income below that level means effectively condemning them to poverty. Comrades voted for what was necessary, rejecting the opportunism of advocating either what was easier to argue or popular.
The papers on education, welfare and culture were accepted and are good minimum demands for the Alliance to take forward.
Mary Ward