27.06.2001

FBU political fund

The report below is intended to clarify what was decided by the Fire Brigades Union conference in May, discuss how it was achieved and make some suggestions for the future. It has been written rather quickly and probably doesn?t cover all the arguments. Despite that I hope it can contribute to a serious debate on the issue

Resolution 101 - Political Fund

Conference notes with concern the continuing attacks on the fire service by Labour-controlled authorities. Therefore, conference agrees that the Fire Brigades Union political fund will in future be used to support candidates and organisations whose policies are supportive of the policies and principles of this union. This may include candidates and organisations who stand in opposition to New Labour so long as they uphold policies and principles in line with those of the Fire Brigades Union.

When considering any request for assistance the Fire Brigades Union and regional committees should carefully examine the policies and record of all such individuals and organisations.

Conference instructs the executive council to prepare any necessary subsequent rule changes for annual conference 2002.

Motion 101 carried on a card vote by 27,498 to 23,924.

What it means - and what it doesn?t

Various reports in the left papers and at meetings have stated that the motion is for disaffiliation from the Labour Party. Quite clearly it is not. It allows union committees to support non-Labour organisations in elections.

The motion instructs the executive to prepare ?any necessary? rule changes by next year. This point was included to try to prevent the motion being ruled out of order by standing orders. My own interpretation is that there are no necessary rule changes. In any case the conference decision is clear and should be implemented now.

The executive, however, is arguing that it cannot be implemented until next year, by which time they presumably hope to overturn the decision. Either way, we face a battle to implement the policy and to defend it at next year?s conference.

How was Resolution 101 won?

There were two resolutions on the political fund: resolution 101 from London, and resolution 102 from Bedfordshire. The Bedfordshire resolution called for disaffiliation from Labour and specifically raised the issue of support for Socialist Alliances. The differences between the two and the unfolding of the debate obviously have implications for the debate in other unions.

I had always felt that the London resolution could go through but that the Bedfordshire resolution was highly unlikely to. In those circumstances I felt it better to argue that Bedfordshire should be asked to withdraw. During the course of the debate a number of significant delegations approached us and Bedfordshire arguing that they should withdraw. To their great credit the Bedfordshire delegates agreed to do. This cut away a lot of the argument of the general secretary and simplified the debate around resolution 101.

I believe there are three main reasons why the resolution was carried:

1. Discontent with Labour at local and national level.
2. The four FBU Socialist Alliance candidates and particularly the disgust at events in St Helens.
3. The argument for resolution 101 was posed in terms of democratising the political fund rather than in terms of disaffiliation.

Democratise the political funds!

I believe that posing the question in terms of democratising the political funds can greatly strengthen a campaign on this issue.

Democratising the funds means firstly that the union should no longer give unconditional support to Labour. This is an argument we can win with the rank and file. It is based on allowing the fullest debate within the union on the politics of the various organisations asking for support without pre-judging that debate. If Labour supporters want to argue for support for their candidates then so be it, as long as the same rights are granted equally to other working class organisations. In this way we can argue that politics within the union should become a real area of debate and discussion rather than simply a process of handing cheques over to Labour without any discussion with the members.

How democratised funds would actually work in practice would vary from union to union according to the union?s rules and normal practices. In the FBU I would argue now that regional committees have the freedom to consider applications within their regions without further debate at national level. Bringing these decisions down to local level will also encourage real political debate among members.

The process of unions breaking from Labour is likely to be complicated and drawn out. It will not be a straightforward process of disillusion with Labour leading to disaffiliation and automatic support for the Socialist Alliance. In such a process I believe the Socialist Alliance will fare best if it argues generally for democratisation of the funds while at the same time arguing within the unions to build support for the alliance.

The Socialist Alliance is a new organisation in terms of national intervention and work in the unions. As such trade unionists will rightly seek to test us and see how we perform before committing themselves to such a project. However, what we can argue for is that we and other working class political organisations be given an equal chance to argue for support.

By posing the issue in this way we were able to win a number of Labour Party members to support us in the FBU, both within London and at conference. I believe without that support we could not have won the vote, indeed might not even have got the motion on the agenda.

On the other hand, to simply call for disaffiliation will definitely not win such support. I am certainly not against discussing the issue of the trade union link as a whole. However, to argue now at union conferences for immediate disaffiliation seems to simply hand the argument to the leadership. Firstly we lose the support of Labour Party members as mentioned above. Secondly, we appear to cut ourselves off from those union activists in the Labour Party who still believe that changes can be made there. Thirdly, the question immediately arises of what will replace Labour. At this stage the alliance, unproved as it is, will not be seen generally as an alternative. Rather, it is a question of building that support by our work.

The real issue then is breaking the unions from Labourism. The question of union affiliation is obviously important here. However, are we concerned with making real progress to breaking the unions from Blair or is it more important to make the ?correct? speech at a conference? What is correct is surely that which takes us forward a real step. I therefore believe that what is needed is a united campaign to raise the call for democratising the political funds.

Matt Wrack