Letters

Read all about it

As a subscriber to the UK Left Network internet discussion list, I find my inbox regularly overflowing with messages relating to Scotland in general and the Scottish Socialist Party in particular. Most of them consist of a more or less (usually less) coherent exchange of insults between a small coterie of individuals, but they do have a certain fascination - and not necessarily just for the trained psychiatrist.

Stimulated by these 'debates', I thought I would take a look at the SSP's website (http://www.scottishsocialistparty.org/) and catch up with what's going on. "SSP news" seemed like the obvious link to follow, so I did just that, and discovered a single item entitled "Latest poll: good news for SSP", according to which, "The latest System Three poll for the Herald today shows that 'others', which includes the Scottish Socialist Party, have increased their share of voting intentions in both the first and second votes for the Scottish parliament since the election. The figures now stand at six percent in the first vote (up three percent) and 14% in the second (up three percent). The SSP's share of this is three percent and six percent, which would give us four MSPs."

Excellent. But then I noticed that the dateline for this piece of "latest" news was August 8 2000. Come on, comrades, even in the glorious days of William Wallace, you could have got on a horse and brought us benighted Sassenachs the latest gossip in the space of maybe three or four days at a comfortable trot (no pun intended).

Fair enough, issue 45 of Scottish Socialist Voice (March 16) is available, and it contains some interesting stuff on the recent furore over Tommy Sheridan and drugs, but at a pinch I could get the paper from my newsagent. Surely the whole point of the website is to let us know electronically what is going on in the SSP now? Can it really be that nothing newsworthy has happened in the last eight months?

Read all about it
Read all about it

Welsh essentials

Mike Davies's letter, whilst raising some valid points, was, I felt, a little cynical and despondent about the potential that exists for the Welsh Socialist Alliance to build itself into a credible political alternative (Weekly Worker March 22).

Mike asks, "Who is doing the whispering" about the creation of a Welsh Socialist Party? He makes a valid point because, as far as I am aware, everyone I have spoken to in the WSA is open and honest about such a position. As Mike points out, the proposal to form a Welsh Socialist Party was debated and heavily defeated at the WSA conference. This suggests that 'whispers' about a Welsh Socialist Party are incorrect and misleading.

Where I disagree with Mike is over his conclusion that currently the WSA is now merely a flag of electoral convenience. Whilst he is correct in suggesting that sectarianism is rife in certain areas of the WSA, he is incorrect in stating that non-aligned members have left and attempts to build a deep broad alliance have been abandoned.

Within the Gwent branch of the WSA, which is one of the largest and most active in Wales, about one third of the members are non-aligned. Most of these members have been attracted for three reasons. Firstly, because they see the creation of a true socialist alliance/party as a political necessity. Secondly, they have the opportunity to openly campaign for socialist policies within our communities. Thirdly, they are presented with the opportunity to participate in genuine political discussion - which in our case has incorporated topics as diverse as socialists and the environment, the national question and Cuba. It is on this basis that the alliance will continue to grow in our area.

It is clear that, where we present ourselves in public and campaign on issues affecting our communities, the WSA will grow. As a result of taking our organisation and campaigns to the streets we have now raised over £500 from the public towards our election campaign. Such activity and discussion amongst the Gwent branch of the WSA has in my opinion helped overcome initial mistrust among comrades and has led to a positive and vibrant atmosphere between members from the SWP, CPGB, the Labour Party and non-party members.

This is the way forward for the WSA and this is happening at the moment. Where the WSA does not campaign and where sectarianism still prevails, it will stagnate, as no forward-looking individual socialist is going to want to get involved in a paranoid, sect-dominated grouping. It is the latter viewpoint of the WSA which I feel that Mike is referring to. In my opinion those individuals/sects currently within the WSA, but who are not serious about building it, will fall by the wayside and will be overtaken by events.

There are thousands of people in Wales who have been disenfranchised from the political process due to years of being ignored, neglected and on the receiving end of cuts in public services and living standards, more often than not by Labour authorities. History teaches us that many of these areas have been among the most receptive to communist and revolutionary ideas. It is our task to re-inherit this legacy and build the WSA in a positive and constructive manner. This can and will be done, providing we attract youth and new layers of non-aligned comrades.

This task will made easier when we become a party. In my opinion this should be a Welsh Socialist Party modelled on the Scottish Socialist Party, but whatever such development occurs will be determined by events in our base within the working class, as well as discussion and debate.

Finally, can I congratulate you on your coverage of the Socialist Alliances and the SSP. The Weekly Worker, as is the case with other leftwing papers, has proved itself essential reading in the Gwent branch of the WSA.

Welsh essentials
Welsh essentials

Economistic CPGB

I guess I must have touched a nerve with my contribution to the Socialist Alliance conference in Birmingham, because Phil Watson seems most agitated in his article ('Calculated insult' Weekly Worker March 15). Obviously, I apologise for my sullenness, but head-banging with inveterate sectarians over the level of minimum wage we should call for does not lift my spirits.

The hard politics of the question are that the level should be defined by what is most likely to grab the attention and imagination of the class at large and allow the more advanced sections of it to mobilise and fight for this among other demands. In this fight they will supersede the demand for a £7 per hour minimum wage or indeed an £8.57 rate and recognise that wage-slavery at whatever wage rate is exploitative.

The CPGB argues that the Socialist Alliance's demand for the minimum wage to be raised to the 'European threshold' of £7 per hour should be rejected - because it is less than subsistence. They argue we should instead demand £8.57 an hour, the level the CPGB themselves have calculated as allowing an adequate living standard.

Firstly, this is a moralistic approach. Were the CPGB organising workers on £4 an hour would they refuse to raise a wage demand less than a 114% rise to £8.57 an hour? A good wage demand is one that leads to an effective struggle, which raise workers' self-confidence, combativity and class-consciousness.

Of course, I have no faith in the European Union or TUC leaders' ability to set the rate of minimum wage, but since the TUC leaders are the TUC leaders, in the current situation more of the class give credence to their views than to the CPGB's. We might use the European decency threshold to mobilise the movement. However, it would be harder to use a number dreamt up by a small leftwing group, even had it been endorsed by the organised hard left representing a couple of thousand activists.

The CPGB's approach flouts basic Marxist economics. Suppose the CPGB is right and £8.57 an hour is an accurate measure of the value of average labour-power in Britain today. According to Marx, workers can extract wages equivalent to the full value of their labour-power only by organising and struggle, and capitalist production inevitably involves many less organised workers receiving wages less than full value. A minimum wage of £8.57 an hour is impossible unless the value of labour-power has meanwhile been raised above that level - which is desirable, but not to be achieved just by "demanding" it, and anyway would presumably lead the CPGB to spurn the £8.57 figure!

To demand all wages equal or exceed the value of labour-power, on the basis of capitalist production, is as unMarxist as demanding equality of all wages, or fairness in all exchanges. It is what Marx called "false radicalism".

Finally I am surprised that the CPGB is so concerned with this 'economistic' issue. Surely, it is of little concern what crumbs the workers fight for from the bosses' table when they could be fighting for a democratic federal republic.

Yours in "mealy-mouthed and sullen" comradeship.

Economistic CPGB
Economistic CPGB

National Front

The recent demonstration of over 1,000 anti-fascists to oppose a mobilisation by the rump National Front (NF), may have seemed a credible event. However, it also poses a number of questions for the left.

The NF is by far the junior player of British fascism, dwarfed by the BNP. It specialises in organising frequent demonstrations, usually on the issues of asylum or paedophiles, which never attract more than a few dozen of their frenzied membership.

The question therefore is, are such large-scale mobilisations appropriate for such a pathetic rump grouplet? I would argue it to be possibly counterproductive. The NF can crow to any individuals sad enough to be on their periphery of taking on the commies, having been outnumbered 100-1, and certainly they will have little worries for their safety, protected as they habitually are by the police. The demos, like the seemingly weekly ones in Dover against the NF, would seem to do little other than make any dodgy, racist-inclined individuals more aware of who and how to get in contact.

How therefore should we react? There are no easy solutions. Demo organisers should certainly consider how best to actually get to the fascists and physically deter them from similar outings again. However, the 'carry on' nature of baying at a few nutters protected by Plod, is highly questionable. This may have made the demonstrators feel they had done a good day's work, but what if the demos go on week in, week out, and diminish in size?

The composition of the platform was also one which caused me some concern: the high billing of Lib-Dem MP Simon Hughes and assorted middle class worthies of various religious denominations is not serious anti-fascism. With the Socialist Alliance, the CPGB is thankfully in the same orbit and should have at least made its feelings known on this issue. This popular frontism, combined with the recent refusal to contest an East London by-election, fearing splitting the Labour vote, sends out all the wrong signals.

Most effective in combating fascists, alongside the use of physical force when necessary, is offering communities targeted by the fascists - more usually the BNP than the NF - a credible alternative from the left. The need for the Socialist Alliance to organise into a party structure and integrate itself into addressing the needs of such communities could not be more relevant.

Attack fascism with ideas as well as fists.

National Front
National Front

Lessons of Newham

The concerns raised by Anti-Fascist Action (Afa) about the way the Socialist Alliance reacted to the Newham by-election should have initiated a serious discussion within the left and anti-fascist movement as to what is needed to beat the threat from the far right. Apart from a few lines agreeing with Afa in the Weekly Worker and some comments on the UK Left Network discussion site, the targets of Afa's criticisms have remained completely silent. The Newham election may appear to have only limited significance, but in fact perfectly illustrates many of the key issues.

The local paper described the area in the south of the borough as "being in the top two percent of the most deprived areas in the country, and long-term unemployment has become an accepted feature of life there. Poor housing stock, a lack of social amenities and a decline in essential services have all conspired to create an atmosphere of isolation and despair. The community regard themselves as the forgotten people of Newham and that feeling runs deep among the 16,000 living there" (Newham Recorder March 29). Perfect territory for the left to attack the Labour-run council, you would think. But no, instead the East London Socialist Alliance called for a Labour vote.

As a member of the Communist Party of Great Britain said on the UK Left Network discussion site, "Given that the only reason that the BNP ever gets any halfway decent votes is because working class people feel they are being disenfranchised by Labour (old and new), it is therefore bizarre to then call for a vote for Labour to defeat the BNP!"

And why did the Socialist Alliance back Labour? Because they placed race above class. Fearing their intervention might split the Labour vote and allow the BNP to win the seat, rather than out-radicalise the far right and win over working class voters from the BNP, they instead backed the class enemy. In a community where some resources are already allocated along racial lines, a failure to be seen to be standing up for all sections of the community only helps those who seek to divide the working class into competing racial groups.

Having backed Labour in the election, it is hard to stomach the prospective Socialist Alliance candidate in the forthcoming general election claiming in a letter to the Newham Recorder that, "Newham New Labour council's plan for Canning Town is nothing other than 'social cleansing' - push out working class people and bring in the rich and those for whom a flat or house is a 'property investment', not a place to live and bring up your family. The Socialist Alliance will stand with those fighting this 'social cleansing', and opposing Jim [Fitzpatrick MP] and his New Labour friends on Newham and Tower Hamlets councils at the general election" (April 4).

The question is, will the "working class people" referred to by the Socialist Alliance have any faith in an organisation that was launched with a fanfare to fight Labour, then decides to back Labour, and now announces it will stand against Labour in a few months time? This is hardly principled opposition, designed to show the community you have their interests at heart.

Recent results in Austria should give encouragement to the left. Although the Freedom Party still got over 20% of the vote in the Vienna elections, the seven percent drop they did suffer was on account of their support for cuts in welfare spending which were unpopular with their working class supporters. The potential for a genuine progressive working class movement remains immense.

Unlike the Socialist Alliance, the Christian People's Alliance were keen to stand against Labour, their candidate speaking out against Labour's "gentrification" before the election, and afterwards said: "On the streets I heard a lot of hurt and anger. No one is upset about the need to do things for Canning Town, but the housing programme will destroy communities" (Newham Recorder April 4). And what were the Socialist Alliance doing while this was going on? Backing the forces of "social cleansing"!

The need for a consistent working class opposition to Labour becomes a priority when you look at the big picture. The latest Commission for Racial Equality survey found that "three quarters of white respondents thought that ethnic minority communities receive too much advice and assistance from the government" and 20% of those surveyed were hostile to asylum-seekers. These are the issues that the BNP will look to exploit and at the same time these are issues that the left can challenge the fascists on. The BNP only appear radical in the absence of any alternative, a point Afa is totally confident on. Whether it is consistent support for local working class concerns or addressing the refugee situation with a working class-friendly 'For the community - against racism' approach, the left could isolate the fascists from working class communities.

If, on the other hand, none of these lessons are learned and it remains 'business as usual', then projects like the Socialist Alliance will have no value for the anti-fascist movement. To make it a serious three-cornered fight in working class communities between Labour, the BNP and the left (because this is the issue), then the Socialist Alliance will have to do a lot more than just turn up with a few slogans.

Lessons of Newham