23.07.2003
Socialist Alliance: minority meets
Non-SWP members of the SA national council et after the meeting and issued a statement
After the national council meeting, supporters of the motion moved by Lesley Mahmood and Steve Godward met to discuss the next steps. I was pleased to see 24 comrades (almost all of the national council minority) attend. Five members of Workers Power also sat in as observers.
We agreed that members of the executive should draft a statement (right) and seek endorsements. We will hold a conference in September with the aim of achieving a common Socialist Alliance platform based on democracy and inclusivity.
The consensus was that people should stay in the alliance and fight for unity around such politics. It was important to prevent the fragmentation of the democratic and pro-party elements. We agreed that links with socialists outside the SA should be made, including with the Socialist Party.
This is the way that comrades should be working: let us unite the supporters of the Mahmood-Godward motion, the May 3 committee (proposers of the Merseyside composite) and the comrades proposing another ‘indie’ conference into one force. Unity is strength. Support the statement.
Motion
Preamble
Following the narrow defeat of resolutions opposing the actions of the SWP in Birmingham at the national council on July 19, we are asking for your support for:
- the statement below;
- a conference to be held in September organising for democracy within the SA.
Statement
There remains an objective need for the unity of socialists in Blairite Britain. The Socialist Alliance has been the best attempt at achieving that unity in the immediate period in England and Wales. At the national council of the Socialist Alliance on July 19, the actions of the Socialist Workers Party has put a question mark over the future of the alliance. By voting en bloc, with the support of only a handful of others, to scupper motions in opposition to its political coup against critical voices in the Birmingham Socialist Alliance, the SWP is in danger of overturning the founding principles of the Socialist Alliance: democracy, inclusiveness, transparency, unity and accountability.
The idea of socialist unity is not the property of any one trend in the workers’ movement. The overwhelming majority of non-SWP members at the national council - and throughout the alliance - oppose the heavy-handed, anti-democratic approach of the SWP.
We call for the increased unity of all those in the alliance who support its original aims and methods based on People before profit. Those of us who aspire to the successes of the Scottish Socialist Party and Rifondazione Comunista in Italy wish to build a Socialist Alliance based on the founding principles of inclusivity, the rights of minorities, openness and democracy rather than through packing meetings and bulldozing votes.
To this end we are calling a conference in September (avoiding the Stop the War demo on September 27) for anyone who wishes to support these aims and who wishes to effectively organise around them (from 11am in Birmingham; date to be confirmed).
Please circulate through your own networks and contact the executive members who have put their names to this for further details.
Lesley Mahmood, vice-chair
Steve Godward, executive member
Marcus Ström, nominating officer