10.02.2000

Eleventh hour conversion at CPB Star

It took the self-styled "daily paper of the left" and its Communist Party of Britain right up to the end of January before pressure from below forced it to overcome sectarian instinct and take the side of its bête noire, Ken Livingstone, in his David and Goliath struggle against Blair's New Labour regime. In the end, a reluctant political committee had to swallow its pride.

During the Morning Star journalists' strike of February-March 1998, Weekly Worker readers will remember, Livingstone successfully neutralised support which sacked editor John Haylett was getting from members of the Campaign Group of MPs by tabling an early day motion in the Commons condemning the strike - a motion which he then withdrew in exchange for others withdrawing their "previously expressed individual views" in support of the strikers (Weekly Worker March 19 1998).

Livingstone, together with his Socialist Action allies, evidently took the losing side in the 'Star wars', backing the unimaginative Hicks-Rosser family dynasty which had long ruled over the CPB and the Morning Star with a bureaucratic heavy hand. The Haylett-Griffiths faction now runs both CPB and paper. Apart from taking sides against them, Livingstone is also regarded by the new dynasty - John Haylett and Robert Griffiths are related by marriage - as a kind of Euro-devil, for his failure to oppose the integration of their beloved Britain into the European Union.

As is usual in this tradition, the lead came from the paper, with the CPB falling meekly into line. Good for Andrew Murray - once a leading member of Fergus Nicholson's Straight Left faction of the 'official' CPGB - and then Communist Liaison - that he came out in his 'Eyes left' column on Friday January 28 calling on London Labour Party members and affiliated trade unionists to vote for Livingstone as candidate. The CPB political committee met at the weekend and went along with this, affirming "that success for Ken Livingstone as Labour mayoral candidate would be a significant victory for the left and labour movement" (Morning Star January 31).

Murray points to "reasons enough for people on the left to be wary of Livingstone . his support for Nato imperialism, his preference for the City of London over public ownership", and, last but not least, "his preposterous attacks two years back on the editor of this paper". Although Frank Dobson "in his heart . may be more 'old Labour' than Livingstone", he has been made "an instrument of those forces in the labour movement most hostile to socialism". On the other hand, "a vote for Ken Livingstone is a declaration of opposition to the state of the world as it is."

Morning Star readers are, of course, totally unprepared for the very real possibility of Livingstone standing for mayor independently of, and against, Labour. Since the CPB is programmatically tied to achieving socialism through a series of imaginary leftward-moving Labour Party governments, a Livingstone-led split should, logically, be condemned, as it would weaken the fight for socialist policies within Labour.

Murray sees Livingstone's struggle as a fight for the Labour Party, against "the architects of the New Labour project". Nor does the CPB political committee hint at the possibility of a Livingstone split. To mention such a thing would, for them, be tantamount to encouraging it. Hear no evil, see no evil, speak no evil. That is how the Morning Star educates its readers to face the trials and tribulations which life will certainly impose.

The main task of communists must be to break the working class away from its allegiance to Labour by reforging the Communist Party. For the sad British-roaders of the CPB, life without Labour is unthinkable. At all costs the Labour Party must be rescued to sustain the illusory revolutionary-reformist road to British national socialism.

In the columns of the Daily Worker (1930-1967), "the Party" meant the Communist Party of Great Britain. It used to mean the same in the Morning Star. Today, however, it means the Labour Party. So we find the announcement that a special commemorative issue of the Star on February 28 will celebrate the centenary of the Labour Party. Not critically, you understand:
"Advertise your support for the founding principles of Labour" (Morning Star February 8). Why, then, was the CPGB founded in 1920? The very existence of the CPB is illogical, given its programme. If Labour is the vehicle for socialism, why not wind up the CPB now, comrades?