01.11.2001

Hackney SA

Hard road to unity

Although the experience of many is that Socialist Alliance branches are being marginalisd by the Socialist Workers Party in favour of the anti-war movement, Hackney appears to have fared better than most.

After an initial wobble with SWP members not wanting to discuss the war at all, we now have two SA delegates to the Hackney Stop the War Coalition. More to the point, we have also discussed the issue at all members meetings and produced our own leaflets on the war. A new leaflet, currently under discussion, will hopefully go much further than the current anti-war coalition and take a strong stance both against the Taliban and for militant action against the war.

There have also been interesting developments with the Morning Star?s Communist Party of Britain. Discussions were held between representatives of Hackney SA and CPB last week in order to map out future cooperation. Monty Goldman and Ivan Beavis of the CPB met Liz Davies, Anne Mc Shane and Will McMahon of the SA.

The comrades from the CPB made clear at the beginning that they were not talking about joining the SA but wanted to open up the possibility of mutual support in the 2002 local elections. They want to stand two candidates and do not want to stand against the SA. Our side floated the idea of SA sponsored CPB candidates. This appeared agreeable to the CPB comrades and they said they would report back to their organisation. They were invited to attend members meetings and the manifesto and candidate selection meeting on December 2. Members of the CPB have already in fact begun to attend as observers.

Other avenues of work agreed were anti-war work, campaigning around the council cuts and also public political discussions. It has been rumoured that the London aggregate of the CPB has discussed joining the SA and agreed to defer the debate until after our December conference. When asked about the CPB moving closer to the SA in other parts of the country, one comrade replied that a process of left realignment is now possible that, when the Soviet Union existed, could not have been contemplated. Also that the Blairisation of Labour has opened up a debate within the CPB on whether to continue supporting the Labour Party.  The acknowledgement of the need for the left to come together is welcome and the CPB should be encouraged to join the SA.

A pre-conference debate was held on Thursday. Unfortunately the turnout for this meeting ? especially from the SWP ? was very low. Leading SWP members gave a variety of unconvincing reasons ? ranging from a lack of interest among their membership, to not wanting to dominate numerically, to a lot of people having a flu virus. The result was about ten SWP members in attendance (out of over 200 SWP members signed up to the Hackney SA). The average being between 40-100.

This shows something of a lack of commitment to a vital debate on the way forward for the SA. Undoubtedly it reflects the sterile internal life of the SWP ? where members are rarely involved in serious discussion and are pushed instead to be foot soldiers rather than self-activating cadre.

Showing the importance that is attached to Hackney SA, all the movers of constitutional proposals at the December 1 conference attended, with the exception of Pete McLaren. The discussion was useful albeit rather flat. Clive Heemskirk for the SP put forward his federal proposals and defended them essentially on the basis that the SWP are the majority and they do not trust them to respect the SP?s democratic rights. However, it was pointed out that, when the SP were the majority of the London Socialist Alliance, they played a very undemocratic role.

Rob Hoveman for the SWP argued that the SA must go forward on a one-member one-vote basis, and although reluctant to call the SA a party, said that if it walks like a party and talks like a party, then possibly it is one. He was against the proposal of a SA paper - everyone had the right to publish their own views. But as was made clear by both Dave Church and Mark Fischer for the CPGB, nobody is talking about closing down anybody?s publications but instead of taking a vital step forward to build on the gains of the SA. It is not enough to have local bulletins ? an effective national oganisation needs a regular political paper.

Comrade Fischer also criticised those like Workers Power who want a party ?sometime in the future?. Also the SP, who argue for a mass working class party but refuse to build the SA as the nucleus for such a party.

The discussion mainly focused on the reluctance of the SP to commit itself to the SA. However, much as the SWP has been in advance of the SP to date on this question, its rush to downplay the SA as simply one of a number of ?united fronts? since the advent of war is worrying. Clearly, independents and others in Hackney and elsewhere are frustrated at the SWP?s failure to put the SA at the forefront of the anti-war movement and the subsequent neglect of the SA as SWP members rush off to do their own anti-war activities. There should be no contradiction between building the SA and building the anti-war movement.

Anne Mc Shane