02.06.2004

More than an electoral front

The Weekly Worker's Peter Manson interviews Greg Tucker, an RMT militant and Respect candidate for the Greater London Authority on June 10

How has the campaign been going?
Quite well. It was slow at the beginning, but now it's picking up. As the name 'Respect' has become better known and entered into the consciousness, it's begun to pick up steam. I have not addressed many meetings myself - I'm low enough down the list to escape that. I've been doing street activity and leafleting in the main. At first it was difficult because people didn't know who we were, but things have progressed slowly.

What sort of reaction have you been getting?
It's difficult to say, because still the biggest thing is that people don't know what Respect is, although people have generally been positive about what we're saying. Yesterday we were leafleting on my estate and we were chased down the block by someone who had just had a leaflet through their door. They wanted to grab hold of us and try and find out more and make sure they could vote. So that's been one of the reactions we've had - once people know we exist and have found out who we are, then they've been responding positively to our message.

That's the indication one gets from the material going out and also from the response to the party political broadcasts. I don't know whether it's ever happened before, but I presume that this is the first time that a clearly left party has been able to get material distributed to every household in the country. So people who live outside the metropolitan heartlands and haven't got a strong left in their own small town or whatever, and who very rarely come across this sort of political stance, are responding very positively. I get the impression that Respect branches are being set up in towns where you wouldn't normally expect the far left to have reached.

Without wanting to tempt fate, what sort of vote are you expecting?
I'm an eternal pessimist when it comes to elections - I know I'm not going to be elected at eighth on the London-wide list! I do think it is possible for people to get elected though. I don't know whether that's true across the whole country, because the EU elections are such that each region has a different effective threshold. But clearly the reception we're getting, the size of the meetings, the reaction in the street are such that there are whole layers of people preparing to vote for us who wouldn't have dreamt of voting for the left in the past.

However, Respect is not registering at all in most opinion polls. I think the Evening Standard had us at around 0.5%.
My view of opinion polls is that you get the result you pay for. You get it by asking them questions you think will deliver that result. Whereas sometimes it might suit the Evening Standard to predict a good left result, I'm sure this time they're seriously underestimating what we are likely to get. As I understand it, the question the paper asked didn't really explain who was up for election, which makes it very easy for people not to realise who is standing and that there is a serious vote available for Respect.

But, as people get their European Union election address, as they get their mayoral booklet in London, that is changing. People are actually looking at what's on offer and saying, 'That makes sense'. The bourgeois media carry a certain balance of opinion, but when you see a page for each party in the mayoral booklet, you start to draw a different conclusion.

So what sort of percentage would you be reasonably satisfied with?
Well, I'd be satisfied if we had some people elected. I'm not expecting us to storm the barricades, but this is a vote where there is a serious possibility that we can get people elected. The figure varies across the country, but for the Greater London Assembly the threshold will be around five percent. I think that's possible, although it's going to require some hard work in the week we have remaining. As people see the broadcasts, as they read the material being delivered by Royal Mail, the message we're getting from the national office is that the hotline is in constant use. People are phoning up asking for more information, asking to join, asking how they can vote - it's a very positive situation we're in.

Have you had any hostile reaction?
Occasionally, but that's to be expected. What worries me more than anything else is people's apathy. Sometimes - at tube stations, for example - people have been reluctant even to take a leaflet. There is a certain difficulty in that people aren't going to notice this election is going on. Even in this election, where you've got a good chance of getting elected under proportional representation, it's very hard for people to break out of the mindset of what they're fed in terms of the British electoral system. They don't think there could be an alternative to the main parties with their sterile debates.

That's why it's so important that we get someone elected. It's been shown with the Scottish Socialist Party that, once you get someone up there in the media spotlight, you can actually show you're different and can start to deal with some of that apathy - even though we're not the biggest, the strongest party, we can make a difference, we can affect things and can express opinions that people can relate to.

What is the situation regarding support for Respect within the RMT?
I've lost track of the number of branches supporting us. Probably a minority are underground - there are two railway branches in my region and two or three in the North West, for example.

Turning to something controversial, Respect as a whole neither distanced itself from nor disowned George Galloway's recent statement against abortion. Do you think this might have given the wrong impression - that Respect itself shares those views?
I don't think that people seriously think that's the position of Respect. I might find it difficult on a personal level what individuals say, but I think people realise that's an individual position - Respect is more than what George Galloway happens to say on a particular day. People aren't stupid.
But George Galloway is the main figurehead, not just an individual member.
There are people who are looking for a reason not to support Respect and this has been handy for people who want to take that view.

That doesn't apply to me.
No, but we have to develop the policies of Respect in a process after this election. We're going to have to go away and clarify a whole range of questions over a period of time. But I don't think abortion has been a central issue for this campaign, so the fact that one person's view might be contrary to what I suspect will be the majority view is a problem at this stage.
If he had come out and said he was pro-war, that might have been a problem, but abortion hasn't been a fundamental dividing line in this election, however important that question might be.
I'm against the imperialist war, but I'm also passionately for a woman's right to choose.
I'm not saying you shouldn't be. But what I'm saying is I don't think the fact that George Galloway may have some mistaken views around abortion is an issue that's been setting this campaign alight. We can't hang around to sort those things out, but there's got to be a process for doing so.

If we come to a general election and we haven't made some progress on some of these other issues, then that might be a problem, but in this particular campaign it's not been an issue - no-one's mentioned it to me seriously as to whether it would affect their vote for Respect. The only people who raise the issue are those who have been looking for a reason not to vote Respect in the first place.

So in a general election we have to have our policies sorted out on the whole range of issues, but not in a European election?
At this stage of development of Respect, the question of abortion has not been a key issue. Whether it's a general election or just the next election, over time we're going to have to sort things out. But they don't have to be sorted out from day one.

In the meantime isn't it possible that some people will vote for Respect believing it to be an anti-abortion party?
I don't think that's the case. But the possibility could have been avoided altogether by putting out a statement …

I think we'd have been chasing our tails if we'd tried to do that. We have to fight on our own positive agenda, not try and double-guess if people have got the wrong impression. If there'd been some Respect leaflet which had misled people, that would be one thing. But if individuals make statements that aren't necessarily of the best, then that can be dealt with, but I don't think this has caused any real problems.

On the question of migration and asylum-seekers, the International Socialist Group and Resistance have mentioned the possibility of forming a platform within Respect, calling for open borders. How are you treating this issue during your campaigning?
Well, we're the party with the clearest position of support for asylum-seekers and I don't think people have seen us as being half-hearted for civil rights and civil liberties. Sometimes we can examine these things too closely. It's right to have politics but I don't think in terms of the election campaign itself the issue has presented itself in that sort of way. People haven't been quibbling, saying we only go so far.

In fact the reverse is true. People have been saying, 'We've read the leaflets and we agree with everything you say except the question of asylum-seekers and we've had to argue the toss. I think actually, once you have the argument, you normally convince people and that's the way it's been going: you sit down and go through the arguments and people will recognise what you're saying is right and support you after all.

But do you think you can really win the argument without saying plainly that all people should have the right to live and work in any country? Otherwise there is a danger of 'special caseism'.
Well, I would tend to have the argument going beyond Respect policies in any case. I would defend people's rights to be where they can and explain the difference between the movement of people and the movement of capital.

How do you see things developing for Respect in the future? I suppose it depends on the election results.
I hope it doesn't depend on the election results. There is a future for Respect in any case. What's been a problem is that we're very young and people don't know who we are. This is just the first test.

Whether in two or three years time there'll still be quite the same kind of coalition I don't know. I hope things can grow, but I don't think the basis for Respect is going to disappear. What's been impressive for me is the commitment from all sides in this election campaign, seeing this as a long-term project, not some quick-fix electoral front to get yourself through.

That's been an issue in the RMT - the biggest attack we've had of any credibility has not been from the Labour supporters. It's been from other parts of the left who say, 'We're not sure about how serious you are. Is this just a front for these elections? Are you going to disappear?' People have to be convinced that we're serious and we have a long-term strategy.

I'm certainly confident within the RMT of winning that argument and that the RMT can be part of the process of building a new left party, whatever it's called. We can work together if we show ourselves as being serious.

People might be sceptical in view of what happened to the Socialist Alliance. The same sort of thing was said in the SA's early days.
I think that Respect naturally flowed out of the Socialist Alliance. It wouldn't exist if it hadn't been for the SA. The move in the direction of building Respect came out of the experience of the alliance and I would hope we could build on that experience. I don't see the two as being counterposed at all.

So what do you hope will emerge at the end of the day?
Clearly there are broader range of forces on the left that we want to be able to incorporate in a new political formation. Respect isn't a finished product. It would be difficult to get the RMT, for instance, to affiliate to Respect - it won't work that way. But I can see a process developing where we can win the RMT to be part of a broader organisation, for which Respect is a firm base to start from. In the same way the SA provided a firm base to start building Respect.

If we can show we are serious about such a long-term project, I would want to embrace parts of the left currently standing outside, looking to see if we've got a future or not. So there's a lot to play for.

Certainly there's no indication whatsoever that there's any basis for building a broad current inside the Labour Party, for all of the so-called rebellions over the last year. Labour is clearly a dead end, as far as that's concerned. Therefore the future lies in building a bigger and better Respect.

For me Respect has a logic pointing to a party already. There will be some big decisions that constituent parts of the coalition will have to take, but if Respect is to be successful it will have to develop a party perspective. People will have to believe that it's not just a temporary vehicle, but a political organisation with its own life. Unions like the RMT aren't going to support something they believe is just for short-term electoral purposes - they want to be part of a real party formation. That's the key to RMT support for the SSP and it's the solution that Respect has to develop.