21.04.2004

Towards a party of the left

Socialist filmmaker Ken Loach is a Respect candidate for the European Union list in London. Peter Manson spoke to him about the coalition's prospects

How would you assess the campaign so far?

The work on the ground has been very good, including in the unions. I spoke at the London regional RMT meeting, which was very well attended, and had a warm response. There is a good rapport building amongst many active trade unionists.

The difficulty, as always, is in establishing a public presence. Obviously, everybody in Respect is working as a volunteer because they care about the issues. That gives us a huge advantage - everybody is doing it out of commitment. But that can sometimes leave gaps in what you can achieve. Our biggest problem is to become absorbed into the mainstream debate - in the press, in broadcasting. That’s our biggest hurdle, because without that it’s difficult to attract a large number of people to vote for us.

A lot of press releases have been issued, of course, but they haven’t been taken up. The mainstream editors want to put us into a left ghetto - their instinctive response is to squeeze us out. To break that down is very difficult, but it’s something we can’t give up on, and there’s no way around it.

At the moment I’m working on a film in Italy and I’ve been dividing my time between here and there, so it’s been difficult to fulfil as many engagements as I’d like, but I’ve spoken at quite a few meetings, and there are more coming up.

What do think are Respect’s prospects, compared to the Socialist Alliance?

Well, the circumstances are more favourable. The war has drawn a whole lot of people into a position to the left of Labour and made New Labour very unpopular, so the possibilities are much stronger for a movement of the left. In fact the vacuum is massive and obvious to everybody. The question is, though, can we be the movement that steps into the open space?

The Greens are pushing, but of course they are an anti-socialist party. They seem to have no grasp of the mechanisms of capital and the direction it will always drive in the interests of the multinationals. So they will never fill that vacuum, but the trouble is, they might do more damage in the short term - I have been surprised at how sectarian they are in refusing any electoral agreement.

Nevertheless, the circumstances are much more positive for a broad movement of the left than when the Socialist Alliance was formed.

You said that the Greens are an anti-socialist party, but there are non-socialists in Respect as well, aren’t there?

Yes, but I don’t think they have the kind of virulent hatred of socialism that the Greens have. Clearly this is a coalition where socialists are playing a major role. But you’re right - in Respect there are socialists, social democrats, environmentalists and just people who oppose the war. It’s an essential step that we started as a coalition and, as the discussion develops, I would argue for socialist leadership. But we have to be more tolerant than maybe left groups have been in the past in relation to people who share our objectives, but not necessarily the means of getting there.

We have to present the arguments in an inclusive and open way. For example, the motive for the war came from the demands of the American multinationals for resources, cheap labour, economic dominance and the rest. The whole Project for a New American Century doesn’t come out of nowhere - it comes out of the needs of US capital. We have to keep making that connection. If you opposed the war, you must therefore oppose the interests behind it.

Do you think that lessons also arose out of the anti-war movement about how British society is run?

There are probably a generation of people who joined the Labour Party thinking they might change the way society is organised. This has been the event that educated them. Many will have been shocked just by the extent to which the Labour leadership has adopted the interests of capital - and done it so nakedly. The weakness and shallowness of the vast majority of the parliamentary Labour Party has been exposed.

Every decade we seem to learn that lesson. My age group went through it with Harold Wilson and then the next generation had the experience of Kinnock. And now another is learning that same lesson with Blair - they are left astounded by the betrayals of the Labour leadership. It’s one of those constants of history since Ramsay MacDonald, but this time the betrayal has been so stunning in its totality that it’s difficult to imagine anybody who wants to change society staying in the party.

I was thinking more of the democratic deficit mentioned in Respect’s founding declaration - the possibility of using the royal prerogative to go to war, the blocking powers of the second chamber, and the complete lack of accountability for elected representatives.

That’s part of the way the state has subverted universal suffrage. We may have the vote, but we have a system of government that works against the vast majority of people - a confidence trick that’s been pulled really for the whole of the last century. We know of course that the rightwing parties like the Conservatives and Liberal Democrats will act on behalf of the ruling class. But part of the trick has been that the Labour Party has claimed to act on behalf of working people and yet has consistently done the opposite. So the basic democratic deficit lies in the fact that the working class doesn’t have a political organisation to understand it or act on its behalf.

I agree that that is a considerable deficit. But shouldn’t Respect also highlight the failings of the constitutional monarchy and campaign for a democratic republic?

I don’t suppose anybody in Respect would oppose the idea of the abolition of the monarchy. However, given that this is an election campaign and we don’t have a 300-page treatise on the state of the nation, I don’t see it as a key issue at this time. There are more pressing issues, but in the long term I can’t imagine a democratic state while there is still inherited wealth and privilege, with the monarchy at the head of the constitution. If we made the abolition of the monarchy the centre of our election broadcast, rather than the war and Blair’s role in it, I don’t think it would be particularly successful in getting people to vote for us.

You pointed to the broadness and brevity of our declaration. How then do you expand upon the points it contains? As a candidate do you respond to questions put to you as a socialist?

Yes. We have a European manifesto now, but if there’s an issue I’m not familiar with, I ask other members of the Respect executive what their point of view is and assimilate the different things people say. I tend not to shoot from the hip as an individual - that’s not the way we should work. But on the principal issues, I think we’re all fairly clear - such as on our attitude towards the European Union and other European peoples.

But you have to remember, we’re not a party: we are a coalition. And it is a coalition for this election in the hope that something more specific may emerge.

I suppose that the very act of standing in a national election - the need for answers on all issues and so on - makes us appear as a party.

But it’s a process - you have to take a broad view. Respect came from the million and a half on the streets and the different elements within that. We have to get to know how different people operate so we can actually continue to work together.

What do you hope will be at the end of that process?

I would hope there would be a party of the left, which from my point of view would be firmly rooted in a class analysis of society. However, we have to recognise that we should work with people who won’t go that far, but who are nevertheless principled and determined to shift the political debate to the left.

In the Socialist Alliance all candidates committed themselves to only accepting the equivalent of an average worker’s wage if they were elected, say, to the European parliament. But that is something Respect as a whole has failed to do. What is your position?

It is very difficult for someone in my position who works in films, where wages tend to be quite good …

I’m not referring to income from a candidate’s job, but solely their remuneration as an elected representative.

It’s a principle that is sound and one I would support. I would, though, find it difficult to be very prominent in that argument, given the industry I work in. It is not a good idea for someone in my position to wag an admonishing finger at other people.