Letters

Extreme modesty

The CPGB has got itself into something of a tangle over the post-Scottish referendum analysis. Fortunately the CPGB’s method of open debate seems most likely to sort this out with the maximum of clarity and the minimum of damage. The rest of the left should take note of real democratic centralism in practice.

The confusion stems ultimately from a lack of clarity as to the objectives of our work. If the prime objective is to win votes for abstention, then this is the main thing we want to measure in evaluating “success”. The key issue is our political objectives. This vital question is not being addressed.

The Revolutionary Democratic Group had two objectives: a positive and a negative. The positive was to win support for our central programmatic demand of a federal republic. The negative side was to openly oppose the bourgeois plan for a reformed monarchy, whilst not allying ourselves with the reactionary anti-democratic ‘no’ campaign. The call for a republican boycott campaign captured the idea of combining the positive and negative. Of these two objectives, the programmatic objective of winning support for a federal republic is more important than the tactical question of boycott.

To make boycott the sole or even the main question is to descend into programmatic liquidationism and to end up with a negative campaign. This could easily be confused with anarchist ideas of boycotting every kind of parliament on principle. If the CPGB did not go to this extreme, they tended in this direction.

Ideally the RDG and CPGB should have been totally united against SML. In fact the CPGB downplayed the federal republic. Their Campaign for Genuine Self-Determination didn’t call for a federal republic, but for “a parliament with full powers”. We had not only to attack SML, but also criticise the programmatic ‘liquidationism’ of CPGB. To their own credit, and hopefully to the benefit of the political development of their readers, the CPGB printed this criticism of their own line in the Weekly Worker.

Whilst the question of interpretation of votes is an important part of any assessment, the CPGB has become obsessed with this aspect alone. This reflects the tendency for the CPGB to run a ‘pure’ boycott, not a republican boycott. If it is true that the Scottish comrades are suffering from post-referendum blues, it must be because they have been in the front line of negativism.

The RDG has no base of support in Scotland. How many abstention votes we ‘won’ is a non-issue. Of course we totally applaud those comrades in Scotland who did carry the boycott argument to the masses. But for the RDG the argument for boycott was to place us on the right side of the class divide, with those who went ‘on strike’ against Blair’s referendum, and against the bourgeois plan for a reformed monarchy.

A few weeks ago, following a letter from Linda Addison, myself and Jack Conrad spontaneously formed a united front against those who seemed to think that although we called for boycott, we could wash our hands of the mass abstention. This wasn’t just negative, it was doubly negative. It ultimately implied the call for a boycott was a mistake. The differences between myself and Jack were described as minor or those of nuance. We didn’t hide them. Jack (mistakenly) identified his difference with me as my tendency to claim all the abstention votes.

Now the false arguments of our opponents have been defeated, the debate has moved on. It is time to examine the nuances of interpretation, which nevertheless could have important political consequences for future work.

I am claiming that 49% of Glaswegians and 1.5 million nationally abstained. I am not claiming that this 49% was due to agitation by myself, or the RDG or CPGB. Indeed I am not in a position to make a scientific estimate of how many are due to our combined efforts. Hence I claimed it could be 3 or 33 or 33,333 or some other number.

Leaving aside the science of statistics, let’s turn to the art of politics. The CPGB would be making a political error - possibly a serious one - in claiming tens of thousands of abstentions were due to the Campaign for Genuine Self-Determination. What we need is extreme modesty about how many abstentions were down to us. Thirty-three for example would be very modest, but it would not damage our basic political case. On the other hand anything that appears to the Scottish left as bragging or boasting about “success” could open up the CPGB to a lack of credibility or even ridicule.

In the post-referendum period, we need to deal in facts, not speculation. The fact is that 49% of Glaswegians abstained. The fact is that we, and especially the Scottish comrades, did everything we could to maximise that abstention, given our very limited resources. The fact is that Blair’s triumph was less than total and not as great as his spin doctors would have us believe. We should certainly congratulate the working class of Glasgow for rejecting the ‘no’ campaign and not supporting Blair’s proposals, based on lies and deception.

I’m sure that SML will want the CPGB to claim tens of thousands of abstentions. They could debate this total red herring night and day. But we will not hear them dispute the fact that 49% abstained. I am sure they will not want to draw attention to this crown of thorns. Clearly we should concentrate our fire on the fact of 49% and not the guestimate of tens of thousands.

There is a second question. The slogan of a “parliament with full powers” (PWFP) is inferior to the slogan of a federal republic. This inferiority is twofold. First PWFP is ambiguous concerning the republic. John Stone proved this at the recent seminar when he opposed a republic and supported PFWP. He is well supported in this by SML, the SWP and Workers Power. In reply comrade Jack Conrad put the opposite interpretation. Second the federal republic forces us to make an argument for the unity of the English, Scottish and Welsh working class. PWFP is open to nationalistic interpretation as a purely Scottish slogan. John Stone is dabbling in nationalism and not paying sufficient attention to English, Scottish and Welsh working class unity.

The PCC (not Jack Conrad) needs to state openly in its theses that it accepts that PWFP is inferior. It needs to say that it adopted this slogan purely for tactical reasons. What was that tactic and did it work? It is possible to claim that the liquidator slogan of PWFP was permissible, despite its drawback, had it been possible to draw SML into an anti-Blair boycott united front. The CPGB would have been able to put forward the federal republic as minority agitation. However, once it became clear that the SML would not bite on the CPGB bait, the federal republic slogan should have been instantly reinstated to a central official demand of the campaign.

Failure to do so was a mistake. But the mistake was a minor error, compared with the SML’s own failure to call for a federal republic. It is not something SML can exploit without admitting they made the same error, but 10,000 times worse. In their dash for nationalism they have totally neglected the unity of the English, Scottish and Welsh working class.

The choice is this. Either we made no mistakes and tens of thousands followed our (infallible) leadership. Alternatively we made at least one mistake in what was basically a correct line. Suffice to say that 49% abstained and we did all we could to maximise that number and infuse it with idea of a federal republic.

If I was a Scottish worker, I know which line I would believe and which ‘party’ I could begin to trust. In my opinion Jack Conrad in his necessary fight against what would have been a wrong analysis has bent the stick too far.

Dave Craig
RDG, faction of the SWP

Grotesque SLP

Scargill’s SLP has become grotesque. It is dangerously close to the point where it can be described as a missed opportunity. There could well be a mass exodus of the remaining healthy elements in the organisation after the December congress. In its present condition, its value is really only in its use a ‘foil’, as a comparator to what is needed; as a tool for building an understanding of working class political tasks. The left and democratic forces within the SLP have signally failed in the task of creating a forum for discussion of how to construct a party with an organic relationship with all sections of the working class. The project of the CDSLP conference, the creation of an open publication to fight has collapsed. The Swindon group, with its different approach of ‘internal’ campaigning has also failed, being told by Scargill to keep quite - or get out of the SLP. It has deliberately perpetuated a split by excluding all voided SLP members from its meetings, its circulation lists and even its petition - an act of unprincipled cowardice in my view. The Marxist Bulletin group has gone further and scabbed by branding the CDSLP as an “anti-SLP lash up”; and inviting Scargill to regard the comrades involved in it as outside of the party.

The fight to build the struggle for democracy in the SLP must continue.

Bill Keene
Manchester

Boycott wrong

I have some sympathy for your organisation and paper. The stuff on Scargill and the SLP is great. But the CPGB was very wrong to boycott the September 11 referendum in Scotland. You put communism on the same side as the Tories. There was no revolutionary situation. There was never a chance of action on the streets. You would-be Lenins in London can dream on, but we up here know different.

What real people wanted was more democracy. Whatever the shortcomings of what you call Blair’s ‘parish council’ parliament, it was the only thing on offer. We all know that the Edinburgh parliament does not have ‘full’ powers. You don’t need tell us that. Legally it is debarred from voting for an independent Scotland. But for all that it is a real gain. The appetite grows with the eating. Every journey begins with a single step. Et cetera.

That is why socialists, greens, republicans and left nationalists in Scotland were right to critically vote ‘yes’ on September 11. We did not vote for a ‘monarchist’ parliament, but to get key class fighters into a position where they can best fight for socialism. Now we’ve got it, we can ready ourselves for the March 1999 elections. I am not a member of SML, but wouldn’t it be fantastic to get Tommy Sheridan elected as a MSP?

Blair fears the independence scenario more than the Tories. Despite the limitations of his parliament it is a weapon which Scottish working people will sharpen. That done, we will use it against Blair and against this stinking rotten capitalist ‘Great’ Britain. That will do more for socialism than any ‘active boycott’.

Robbie Sakwa
Glasgow