13.11.1997

Soberly assess the CGSD

The Scottish Committee of the CPGB put forward a minority position in opposition to the agreed theses

In the aftermath of the September 11 referendum we believe the Party’s decision to launch a campaign for an active boycott of Blair’s rigged referendum was the correct position. After any action, such as the Campaign for Genuine Self-Determination, it is imperative that the organisation makes an objective, honest and sober assessment. A balance sheet should be drawn up, which sets out the positives and negatives, the lessons learnt and points to where now. The theses on the Scottish referendum, proposed by the Provisional Central Committee, fails to do this. It was for this reason that at the recent Party aggregate we submitted 11 amendments. The leadership decided that not one of these amendments was worthy of support. Despite its attempt to caricature our analysis and assessment of the boycott campaign as “rightwing liquidationism” our argument attracted support from other comrades. At the end some of those who voted for the unamended theses expressed dissatisfaction with the final document.

Our first amendment was for the deletion of the last sentence in thesis two. We do not believe that there is “a tendency towards pessimism and confusion”. Far from this being the case, comrades in Scotland are proud of the campaign we ran during the referendum. Much of the left simply disappeared as they became submerged into Scotland Forward. Our differences with the PCC resolution centre around how we evaluate our success, not whether the campaign was a success or a failure.

Our second amendment, the deletion of thesis three, was because it elaborated on this so-called “pessimism and confusion”. The examples cited by the PCC show disagreement and reality, nothing else.

On thesis four, we moved to delete “the truth is clear”, as this is obviously not the case. There are a number of ways to analyse our intervention all of which reveal a “truth”. Our amendments were an attempt to continue the search for clarity and the truth. Also we asked for the removal of the sentence, “Fight for what is possible and necessary is our slogan.” This has never been our slogan. Our slogan is and should remain, “Fight for what is necessary”. This change seemed to be the only rightwing liquidationist trend at the meeting - and it was moved by the PCC.

Our amendment to thesis 15 only sought to make the sentence accurate: delete the first two sentences and replace with “Once Blair’s rigged two-question referendum was fixed, independent working class politics could not thereby be directly expressed at the ballot box”. It was not impossible to get other questions on the ballot paper - unlikely maybe, but not impossible if a mass movement had demanded it.

Unfortunately by this point in the meeting it seemed that the PCC had decided to stick by their thesis in its entirety, even though it was clarified that PCC members were not bound to vote for the thesis.

Our remaining amendments sought to measure the success of our campaign in an objective fashion. The removal of sentences two and three in thesis 16 was because they are unnecessary. Our argument for deleting the last sentence of thesis 17 was because it is a partial quotation, the rest of it going on to elaborate the nature of the spoilt ballot papers. Using the quotation in this partial way is dishonest.

In thesis 18 we wanted to add, “However, it is impossible to assess the extent of our impact in terms of non-voters and spoilt ballot papers.” This does not mean that we had no impact. We believe that we did, but it was a peripheral impact on the masses. We cannot tell at this time how many of those who did not vote or spoilt their ballot papers did so as a result of our intervention. Undoubtedly some did, but that number cannot be quantified. What we can say is that almost 50% of the population in Glasgow did not vote.

There are several factors that contribute to this figure, as well as our campaign. These include an old electoral register; disillusion and cynicism to all politics, exacerbated by the Glasgow and Paisley sleaze scandals; the temporary and partial resolution of the democratic deficit following the May 1 general election result, which meant the overall political character of the House of Commons reflected the way people in Scotland voted; and the universities were still on holiday.

Because our campaign did not achieve an active boycott it is not possible to quantify our impact on the masses who passively boycotted by abstaining. It should also be remembered that at the general election almost 40% of those entitled to vote in Glasgow failed to use it, despite the fact that there was a Scottish Socialist Alliance candidate in all 10 seats in the city.

The Campaign for Genuine Self-Determination articulated the sentiments of those who stayed away because they were insulted by Labour’s sop and wanted genuine self-determination for Scotland. It is wrong and foolish for anyone to quantify this number. Therefore we called for thesis 19 to be deleted and replaced with:

“The most successful aspect of our campaign was our impact on the left. We exposed the nationalism and opportunism of both the SSA majority and SML. Amongst the left we stood out as principled fighters for Scottish self-determination and posed the method necessary for the working class to forge itself as a political class and win hegemony.”

In thesis 20 we moved to replace “resounding” with “qualified”, and “hundreds of thousands” with “those”. Our campaign was a success, but it was qualified because we did not achieve an “active” boycott which had been our intention. Surely if we had the masses on the streets then it would have been resounding. We articulated a mood. We had a peripheral effect on the masses and we had a major impact on the left. That is a success but we must measure our achievements against our objectives. The mood of militancy in Scotland in March around the council cuts had ebbed. There was not a movement on the streets.

However, we were extremely well placed if a spark had ignited and demanded more than Blair’s sop parliament. And - who knows? - had others taken up our slogans and campaign, then much more could have been possible. Let us not damn ourselves and not use fantasy numbers when we have no need to. Let us make a sober assessment of our intervention.

Let us be politicians in the real world, not in the world of our fantasies.