12.04.2000

A parliament for England?

Dave Craig of the Revolutionary Democratic Group calls for the left to lead a campaign for consistent democracy

In a keynote speech on March 28 Blair signalled that the current period of constitutional reforms was coming to a close.

The Independent noted Blair's "cooling towards further constitutional upheaval". Rather than promise further change he played the patriotic card. He stressed his belief in the union. He was at pains to show that devolution in Scotland and Wales had helped to cement the unity of the United Kingdom. Now was the time to call a halt. No feast of democracy. We should dine on the thin gruel of British values.

Shortly afterwards an estimated 100,000 workers and their families marched through Birmingham to protest at the sell-off of Rover cars. The Weekly Worker reported this demonstration as one of the largest in Britain since World War II. The Economist estimated that if Longbridge loses 6,000 jobs, this will result in a further 30,000 to 50,000 losses down the supply chain (April 1). The high value of the pound is also threatening the profits of other manufacturers in the west Midlands. The Goodyear tyre factory in Wolverhampton, for example, has puts its workers on short-time working. The trade unions believe that closure is likely.

Some political fallout from this is inevitable. Naturally the Tories are ready to exploit the situation. A shift by 10% of voters in the area would give them an extra nine seats. On the other hand the mobilisation of the working class begs a political response from the left. In London, Livingstone has raised the banner of a left alternative. The London Socialist Alliance has marched into the vacuum left by the absence of a 'Livingstone Party'. One hundred thousand workers protesting on the streets of Birmingham surely points to a West Midlands Socialist Alliance.

It is no surprise that the 'trendy, youthful and modernising' image that Blair tried to conjure up with 'Cool Britannia' has now been dropped. This is not simply out of embarrassment or because of the cat-calls of disgust from the youth. It is also because he now feels the need to stress a more conservative approach. Blair proclaims he is proud to be British and uphold 'British values', as represented in the union of England, Scotland Wales and Northern Ireland. No new constitutional change. He intends to face down the Tories on the basis that devolution has strengthened the union.

But of course it has not. The British union state was not formed by democratic means. It is not a voluntary democratic union. There is real danger that national disputes can produce a violent confrontation. Such a confrontation is built into the genes of Blair's semi-federal constitutional monarchy, especially when fuelled by capitalist economic crisis and a chauvinist political culture.

A civil war between England and Scotland cannot be prevented by preaching anti-nationalist morality to the working class. It certainly will not be prevented by the Scottish Socialist Party hoping to gain some warmth from nationalism by pouring petrol on the flames. And Blair's reforms will no more halt the threat of nationalist civil war than reformists can prevent an outbreak of revolution by preaching about the dangers of violence. We must win the working class to a democratic republican programme based on voluntary reunification.

Having avoided constitutional change for decades, the ruling class understands the danger from Scottish and, to a lesser extent, Welsh nationalism only too well. The Tory policy of 'no change' had wiped them off the political map. So change was necessary. The method is to concede as little as possible, delayed for a long as possible. Then when this does not deliver very much and the people are disillusioned, the press barons can get over the message - constitutional change is a waste of time. We were better off before. Blair is the establishment politician with the necessary programme. This is why there was no run on the pound to stop constitutional change in its tracks.

Classic British pragmatism was in play. Scotland, the most rebellious countrym, got a parliament with law-making powers. Wales was less so and got an assembly with no powers - a talking shop. England was passive and Tory. Why give them anything? The ruling class are impervious to democracy. They cough up democratic teeth only after we have extracted them one by one. Whether it is votes for women or ridding society of monarchism, it is struggle that decides.

Blair's reforms have not stabilised the situation. He has unlocked the different politics within each nation, on for example student tuition fees or clause 28. He has tried to get the Labour Party machine to do the job formerly done by the British constitution. Without the constitution to hide behind, poor old Blair has been caught out. Our priestly prime minister, a man with such high moral principles, is a dirty old anti-democratic manipulator after all. The whole country has seen it for themselves.

Under the old constitutional arrangements Ken Livingstone, Rhodri Morgan and Dennis Canavan had been locked up and the keys thrown away. It has never occurred to our economist numskulls of the British left - such as the SWP, etc - that constitutional change is our 'get out of jail free' card. And if the hole in the prison walls is not wide enough we should smash open a much bigger hole. British constitution? - hand out the sledgehammers. The LSA is not just the product of the SWP waking up and changing its attitude. It is also the first result of the most timid constitutional change.

The democratic deficit is now in England. Devolution has unhinged the constitution. In a certain sense the constitution is unreformable. It is so antiquated that in tinkering with it the whole charade threatens to crumble to dust. Blair's solution has only opened up further contradictions. The so-called English question now comes into play. What is called the West Lothian question - Scottish MPs voting on English affairs - is a contradiction at the heart of the constitution. Putting the genie of constitutional change back in the bottle will prove very difficult, if not impossible.

"Blair must take blame for the break-up of Britain". This was the headline on the letters page of The Sun on April 4. A number of letters on this subject were published from readers. The following, from S Lambert, was one, not untypical, example:

"So Tony Blair has said he is proud to be British. I wonder if this is because Labour fears the growing tide of nationalism, which is the direct result of the government's introduction of devolution in Scotland and Wales. We are told it is acceptable for people to be proud of their Scottish or Welsh nationality, but there are cries of racism and suspicion that they belong to some fascist organisation if anyone says they are proud to be English. Why should we be ashamed of who and what we are? This great nation lost many of her finest liberating Europe with our close cousins from Scotland, Wales and Ireland, not once, but three times. If our cousins can be patriotic, why can't we? Tony Blair started the ball rolling with devolution. Now, when it is politically inconvenient, he wishes to do a U-turn. It's time he put up or shut up and gave the English people a parliament of their own."

Another Sun letter from I Davidson says: "Despite Tony Blair's speech on patriotism, the Labour Party say that Scottish and Welsh MPs will continue to be allowed to vote on English issues. How can this be fair? In effect it gives them two houses in which to vote, which is hardly democratic. When are we going to get an English parliament - or would that be too racist? Somebody please start sticking up for this country before it's too late."

These two letters are obviously not from advanced, class conscious workers. We can only guess at their politics. But it is not unreasonable to suggest that these attitudes might be typical of broader public opinion. If they are workers at all, they might be the sort of people that went on the Longbridge demo carrying union jacks. But we should listen to what they are telling us.

They are resentful against Scotland and Wales. They want to be English nationalists and resent any implication that this would be labelled racist. They want greater democracy, as represented by an English parliament. What we have here is a mixture of democratic aspirations and English chauvinism. In so far as this is typical it is a mood that can go in two quite opposite directions. It is the voice of what Hague has called "the sleeping English dragon".

The politicians will use public opinion. Hague wants to exploit the English chauvinist card, not the democratic card. No English parliament for him, at least if it can be avoided. He has come up with the idea of stopping Scottish MPs voting on 'English' laws. Obviously this will not increase democracy, but it is a good means of tapping into resentment against the Scots. Blair has ridiculed this idea.

The Economist notes that Hague and the Tories have "shrunk from the boldest logical remedy [to the unbalanced constitution], the creation of an English parliament, on the ground that doing so could stir some of these horrible tribal emotions" (April 1). See how 'principled' the Tories are. They don't want to stir up our democratic aspirations, but are quite ready to stir up English chauvinist emotions instead! Will the dragon wake up as a democrat or a chauvinist? The interests of the Tories are quite clear.

Blair may also have a problem with his own party. His constitutional 'revolution' is incomplete. Labour's 1997 election manifesto pledged the new government to set up elected regional assemblies in areas where there was "popular consent". The Independent tells us something of the differences within the Labour Party over this (March 29). When Blair's speech laid claim to be the patriotic party of Britain, he also rebuffed John Prescott's demands for the creation of regional assemblies in England. In addition the Liberal Democrats are also pressing forward with democratic reforms for England.

At last England is waking up. We can see it in the Birmingham demonstration. We can see it in the Livingstone campaign and the LSA. We can see it in the manoeuvring of the Tory, Labour and Lib Dem politicians. We can sense it in the letters to the papers. But what should the left do?

As revolutionary democratic communists, we follow Lenin's famous dictum in What is to be done? when he says that, "He is no social democrat [ie, Marxist] who forgets in practice his obligation to be ahead of all in raising, accentuating, and solving every general democratic question" (VI Lenin SW Vol 1 Moscow 1977, p156). It is not a question of ignoring this issue or hoping it will go away or burying our heads in the sand. On the contrary we should boldly go where Blair and Hague fear to tread.

Unfortunately British Marxism is largely economistic and tailist. It has turned Lenin upside down. Instead of raising up and accentuating the democratic question, our economists either have nothing to say or relegate it to a footnote. If you ask them what they think about a parliament for England, they won't know what to say. They are the last even to consider it.

Consider the three levels of bourgeois politics - trade union politics (wages and conditions), normal bourgeois politics (anti-union laws, health and education, racism) and high bourgeois politics (matters of the constitution and political power). Fundamentally the British economists like the SWP do not have a clue on the level of high bourgeois politics. They are like a car that is driven only in the first two gears. When questioned the driver declares that he has no idea what the third gear is for and certainly does not want to find out. Although he does wonder why everybody keeps overtaking him.

The SWP has shown its colours already. It ignored the question of a Scottish parliament for years. It would only consider a workers' republic. That was used to cover the absence of a serious policy. Then it turns round and votes 'yes' in the Scottish referendum. This is the worst kind of tailism, following the constitutional proposals of the bourgeois Labour Party.

We revolutionary democratic communists have already had a dress rehearsal in the 1997 Scottish referendum. Were we in favour of a Scottish parliament? In general yes, because it was a democratic reform. But, when faced with the specific offering of the Blair parliament and a rigged referendum, our answer was hostile. We demanded a republican parliament for Scotland. Consequently the RDG called for a republican boycott in the Scottish referendum.

The republican boycott meant we were not lining up with the anti-democrats in the 'no' campaign. Neither were we lining up with the pseudo-democrats in the Blair 'yes' campaign. We were urging the Scottish people to abstain or spoil their ballot papers on republican grounds. I should say that good comrades like Sandy McBurney, of the Glasgow Marxist Forum and now the SSP, were absolutely wrong to line up with the anti-democrat 'no' campaign. If he had been right, he would be now fighting for the immediate abolition of the Scottish parliament and opposing a parliament for England.

Now, on the basis of Marxist theory and that experience in Scotland, we should be for an English parliament, but only as a republican parliament. We must 'accentuate', as Lenin said, our democratic and republican ideas. A parliament in England is a republic - nothing less. I leave aside here the issue of whether the parliament in England should be thought of as one parliament or a series of regional republican assemblies.

The left has to be at the forefront of campaigning for this. The political vacuum in England is waiting to be filled. It might be filled by a democratic movement or a reactionary movement. We must act now. We cannot wait. If we wait for the economist left to lead us, we will be left miles behind. So the RDG, CPGB, CT, RCN and AWL must get their act together on the question of a parliament for England. We are already miles behind. We have a lot of catching up to do.