17.11.2005

Decision time for SWP

The Socialist Workers Party is still refusing to take responsibility for two of their members who voted for the scandalous pension deal in the PCSU: Martin John has resigned from the party and no action has been taken against Sue Bond. Lee Rock, national secretary of the PCSU Socialist Caucus, reports

On Saturday November 12 the Socialist Workers Party held a meeting of its Public and Commercial Services Union members. The purpose of the meeting, which took place in London and was attended by just over 20 comrades from around the country, was to attempt to deal with the crisis in the fraction whereby leading members on the union's national executive had once again failed to adhere to the SWP's agreed position on clear matters of principle. The situation had become so embarrassing that the SWP leadership was forced at last to act. The issues concern the union climb-down over pensions and the decision of Martin John and Sue Bond to vote with the Socialist Party/Scottish Socialist Party to accept this retreat without a fight (see Weekly Worker November 3). The seriousness of the matter was shown by the fact that the meeting was also attended by several prominent SWPers not in the PCSU. Leading the central committee delegation was Chris Harman. The central committee distributed its statement which correctly outlines the position to be taken as regards the proposed pensions deal and the need for party discipline in such matters. But it accepts no responsibility for the CC's own role in this debacle - the comrades were fully aware of the positions taken by Martin John over the last few years and they failed to take action. So what did they expect to happen? It was only a matter of time before he let them down publicly again. And this time the effect was felt much wider than just within the PCSU. The PCSU comrades present who had come not only to show their loyalty to the SWP but have a go at Martin John were to be disappointed. Comrade John had sent his letter of resignation to SWP national secretary Martin Smith the day before the meeting. General secretary Mark Serwotka can do no wrong for John. He writes: "Nobody could have done more than Mark" and "Mark will play a crucial role", and explains his refusal to accept SWP discipline in this way: "I have also, for the last five years, acted as a close adviser to Mark and publicly arguing a position I obviously did not fully share would make this very difficult." More importantly, disagreeing with Mark and the SP would ruin John's chances of a full-time post. So, after 27 years of SWP membership, he has finally jumped ship. He will now be supported as an 'independent' by the Socialist Party. This will be the preferred position of both Martin John and the SP comrades - though if the latter really wished to rub the noses of the SWP in it, they would insist he joins their organisation. If John had to do this to save his position in the union, then I am sure he would. For anyone who may feel I am being too harsh on Martin John and the CC's inability to deal with him, I have had a quick look though the Weekly Worker archives to see what has previously been written. And I find the CC has been given plenty of warnings regarding his political positions and lack of party discipline. The fact that they and the PCSU fraction ignored them is to their shame. In June 2004 (yes, one and a half years ago) I wrote of "the ever rightward-moving Martin John", who argued at the PCSU conference against a motion calling for the rejection of any pay offer below the European decency threshold of £16,780, since this was "not an achievable demand". Hardly the position of the SWP. I wrote at the time: "For Martin John it is no doubt more important to get elected than fight for the policies he claims to stand for. Needless to say, not all the SWP comrades at the conference were prepared to support Martin John on these issues, but they seem unable to replace him as their leading representative and therefore the whole SWP gets tarnished with the bureaucratic nonsense that he espouses." In March 2005 I wrote an article concerning the calling off of a strike over pensions in the run-up to the general election. I reported that Socialist Party executive members were "supported in their decision to suspend the action by Sue Bond and Martin John". In relation to the SWP I wrote: "On the one hand it argues that strike action can win, and yet its NEC members readily go along with the Socialist Party in suspending the action. They must have known that calling off the strike was hardly likely to be the position of the SWP leadership (in fact within two days Socialist Worker published an article criticising the union for doing just that). "Recently Martin John voted to accept a poor pay deal (tying the hands of 100,000 department for works and pensions members for three years), and then voted against a motion trying to commit Left Unity, the PCSU broad left, to at least campaign for a 'no' vote in the subsequent ballot. The position of comrade John in continually ignoring the discipline of the SWP can only be put down to personal ambition. There are a number of leftwing officials that have recently taken up residence as PCSU full-timers and only by keeping in with the Socialist Party can you guarantee positions on slates for NEC and officer posts." It is of interest that there is to be no action taken against Sue Bond. The view of the SWP appears to be that this is her "first offence". But as the quote above shows, Sue Bond was with Martin John in voting to call off the proposed strike action in March 2005 despite it being obvious what the position of the SWP was. So, on two key issues Sue Bond has now broken the discipline of the SWP. The letter of apology that Sue Bond has written is embarrassing for a comrade of such long standing. She now accepts that she and John, "whatever the tactical considerations, should not have voted in favour of the pensions deal because this was a clear matter of principle". Comrade Bond continues: "I do regret the position our vote left comrades in, and the significant implications for the left in other public sector unions. I can certainly assure comrades that I have no intention of breaking party discipline in the future." Neither comrade Bond nor the CC make any mention of the previous occasion where party discipline was broken. Comrade Bond instead attempts to shift some of the blame onto the other comrades in the PCSU fraction for their lack of support. The real problem with the PCSU fraction is that they have consistently failed to stand up to Martin John as he continued his ambition-fuelled rightward orientation. Very few members of the fraction committee will feel they have genuinely acted as revolutionary socialists in the union over the last few years. The PCSU fraction and the central committee have consistently allowed Martin John (and also, but to a lesser extent, Sue Bond) to tail the SP/SSP/Serwotka leadership despite its obvious failings. Nowhere can we find any criticism of Serwotka. They fear that to criticise Serwotka will mean any influence they have, plus the occasional appearance on Respect platforms, will be lost. Of course, neither SWP members outside the PCSU nor the readership of Socialist Worker initially had any idea that there were serious problems with their own comrades in the PCSU. Firstly they read a good article by Chris Bambery which lays down the line on pensions. Unfortunately this article only criticises the TUC, deliberately failing to mention the leading role played in the sell-out negotiations by Serwotka. The following week they read an article from one of their PCSU activists, which is silent on the role of their own leading comrades. It is only now, nearly four weeks later and under pressure following my last article (Weekly Worker November 3), that the SWP puts out a statement regarding the pensions deal and the conduct of their two comrades on the national executive. In this statement there is no attempt at explaining how this situation has come about. To do so, the central committee would have to explain why it allowed the comrades to ignore party policies and discipline for over three years. This fudging of the problem is in direct contradiction with the final sentence of the statement, which declares: "Honest debate over issues is not a barrier to this - it is essential." Well, we live in hope. It now remains to be seen what the SWP PCSU fraction intends to do in forthcoming elections. Despite the resignation of Martin John, under the threat of expulsion, SWP members remain unsure as to whether they intend voting for him in the internal Left Unity elections. Some of the comrades fail to see the contradiction that if they cannot support him when he was a party comrade, then it must be impossible to do so when he breaks from them to the right. How can the SWP vote for the SP and Stalinists in the Left Unity elections when they accuse them of voting for "a deal which lets down future generations of workers"? It is time the SWP members in the union voted for Socialist Caucus candidates in the Left Unity elections. A Socialist Caucus/SWP bloc would have a real chance of being in the majority on key department executives (notably the 100,000-member department for work and pensions). Such an alliance would not split the left, as there will still be a united Left Unity slate come the actual union elections several months later. If the SWP comrades continue to bloc with those they frequently vote against, and refuse to align with those they usually vote with, then they will be seen to have changed nothing apart from the personnel at the top. Their politics of opportunism in this union, as demonstrated by Martin John, will continue in the desperate hope of getting elected and gaining 'influence'. It is now up to the SWP comrades to decide whether they wish to organise a real fightback against job cuts and pension attacks, or continue to tail the cowardly Socialist Party, acting as the SP's left cover, and take no responsibility for their lack of fight. If the SWP want to stop the pensions sell-out there is still time - but to simply re-elect the Socialist Party onto the Left Unity slate will kill any chance of a fight on the issue. www.socialistcaucus.org.uk