What should the British left do next?

What next?

Introduction
1.a
A significant and growing part of the European working class do not accept austerity but their rulers cannot go on in the old way. Between America and Asia, the European continent is being squeezed into new shapes. On the one hand its labour is too expensive – especially now in the in the south. On the other welfare is too expensive – especially in the north – including Britain. Between the dollar and the linked renminbi the euro still staggers after eight years of crisis. Europe has not been able to fight its own wars for decades. Now it cannot maintain its post war concessions to its own populations on welfare. And despite the loud words of Christian Democrats after the last European elections, it cannot guarantee its own political stability. Only Germany seems solid. But breaches with France have undermined even that keystone of the European Union.

Britain’s rulers have had their typical reaction. Cut a new deal or run. But this time they can’t. First they face exactly the same economic dilemmas as their European counterparts and second everybody knows that their traditional route march out of Europe is directionless. The UK cannot ‘go home to Mamma.’ The US platform of stability in the world, the policeman that defended vast international investments, many organised and centered in the City of London, is no longer as available as previously. It is making its own  ‘turn to Asia.’

In China and India and Brazil and South Africa, huge social struggles are underway. The Middle East, reacting to the weakness of the west and its client regimes, experienced a first wave of revolution aimed at social and political development that stalled, then reversed and has now started new wars. There is a deep political crisis In the US itself, underpinned by the most cavernous political polarisation since the period just before the Civil War. Revolutionary mass mobilisation in Thailand, Cambodia; political/military crisis in Ukraine, in Iraq and now Afghanistan; the disintegration of the ‘Pax Americana’ and its western hangers on is obvious.

The one consistent reaction of the European rulers, including the British, has been to ratchet up the offensive against their own working classes and further shield and safeguard the rich.

1.b
This new picture, characterised by profound economic and political crisis of capitalism – especially in Western Europe - emerges from, and reorganises all of the existing class relations that we have been familiar with. Already transformed by the 20th century, the worlds’ two leading classes are now shaping up for the next stage of their historic confrontation in new formations and in new ways. Europe will be a major battlefield as it is forced further into relative global decline.

Britain is a weak link in the western Imperialist camp. It destabilises Europe’s ‘chain of command’. It is utterly unbalanced in its domestic economy and now starting a period of its own serious political crisis; (the prospect of continued coalition governments based on a smaller and smaller vote, uncertainty over Scotland – whichever way the vote on independence turns and turmoil over the EU.)

2.a
The progress of the British working class movement
In the late 1960s and early 1970s the British working class movement had 12 million organised in unions (out of 20 to 24 million economically active in the overall population during that period.)  In launched major strikes, defeated industrial relations bills and acts, massively contributed to the raising of working class living standards and social welfare but in the end, was incapable of leading the whole nation. When an industrially defeated Heath put the question ‘who rules?’ to the country in the 1974 General Election, he nearly won it. The voters were uncertain what the industrial power of the unions represented.

At the time (and after) many radicals claimed that the weakness in the working class movement and its eventual defeat (with the isolation of the Miners in 84/5) was the result of its bureaucratic leadership. According to this view the energy of the working class was being stifled or misdirected by the labour bureaucracy both in the Labour Party and the unions. And truly, the bureaucracy was separated off from the shop floor and often concentrated the most backward and reactionary moods that did sweep through society from time to time. But it was also true that in popular consciousness, even in the most radical sectors of the unions, revolts never really breeched union walls (with a couple of honourable exceptions.) The far left often reinterpreted the trade union militancy they witnessed among the rank and file as something else. Without much experience they translated the day-to-day diet of trade union struggles into revolutionary fantasies. This weakness was of course linked to the role of the trade union and Labour Party leaders, and again some left organizations had a greater grasp on reality than others, but there was more at stake in getting to grips with what was going on in the union movement than simply the perfidious (and eternal) role of the bureaucracy.

The left unions did not join the students in the Viet Nam protests. With few exceptions they supported British state policy over Ireland. What did even the radical trade unionists sing to the crowds, the women, the immigrants; the small shopkeepers that watched their marches and demonstrations pass by?
‘You can’t get me, I’m part of the union.’
Later this bowdlerization of an old union song by a pop group (that were actually making an ironic attack on the self serving attitudes of the 1970s unions) was replaced by a chant, now normally led by the far left, that still emerges from time to time, and that puts things more defensively;
‘The workers united – will never be defeated.’
This slogan is an old anti-fascist chant used when barricades were raised against Mosley in London’s East End – where all were workers (on both sides.) It made some sense to the whole community. It is less obvious what it means today.

2.b
The whole union movement is barely half the numerical size of its 1970’s ancestor with a tenth of its political significance. In 1970 unions represented nearly half the total of those who were economically active. Today, in a population with 32.7 million economically active in Britain, they represent 12%. And the left unions are an even smaller part of this already shriveled national trades union movement.

Yet today unions like the RMT, the FBU, the NUT, CPS and even UNITE are part of a majority female trade union movement, discussing whether to move to independence from the Labour Party, acting and organising in defense of all who suffer austerity, and which have a far greater chance of offering a lead to the whole nation by unions than at anytime since WW2. They have broken in part, and unevenly, from the paralyzing spell of trade union consciousness. They have started to map out a way towards a socialist future.  But there is still a real struggle to be had.

First unions start off from a position of some isolation in society and there is a danger that they are seen as, or worse, act as, special interest groups that stand only for the relative privileges of their particular sector of the workforce. We can already see some union leaders who already describe their function as a unique and special interest. The feminisation of unions is one crucial, material block to this danger and initiatives like those of the RMT and UNITE to try to organise unemployed, semi-employed and very low wage, illegal economy workers, are crucial bridges into the much wider but unorganized working class.

Second, the widespread understanding in the left unions that they cannot win by themselves and also that their defensive actions must be linked to a wider political perspective, is not resolved by those thoughts alone. Indeed these ideas become more and more vulnerable to the extent that they are not carried out in practice. Huge efforts have been made on this score by unions like the RMT. But those efforts have so far not been met by a similar response on the political left. The grotesque implosion of the Scottish Socialist Party, despite the affiliation of the Scottish RMT, was signal in this regard.

On the other hand the emergence of the Peoples Assembly as a national anti-austerity movement is the most significant advance in the battle with austerity so far and it has huge potential in the effort to connect the left unions to a much wider working class community on that front. The coordination now happening between striking unions and a mass anti-austerity campaign brought together by the Peoples Assembly, and its effect on the TUC, and even on some in the Labour Party, is unique since the Miners strike. This is the biggest step taken so far, with left trade unionists at its core, to rebuild a general working class movement.

3.a
What can be done now?
The government and the state
1. As the General Election approaches (and May 2015 may well produce the conditions for another election relatively rapidly) the priority is to get at least one, well-known, independent socialist elected to Parliament. The left unions and left trade unionists in other unions, could select genuinely representative and well known people to be candidates, given the need to focus on breaking the monopoly consensus that the Tories, Labour and the LibDems have created; on austerity; on immigration; on union rights; on privatization; on war. Supporting far left nation wide junkets, with hundreds of unknown candidates attracting few votes, representing no one, has proved to be a costly waste of time and effort at this stage. Equally, fighting for identikit, follow my leader Labour candidates in key marginals (which will be the command issuing from what remains of the leadership of the TUC etc) is worse than futile. We will need to win Labour supporters to action against austerity but the huge majority of Labour MPs, let alone a Labour Government, will give us more. The key now is to get some real representation for anti-austerity. Carolyn Lucas and, in the past, Bernadette Mckaliskey, have made a huge difference as single MPs who stood for a cause. The anti-austerity movement has a much larger potential constituency than they had. We must start with a pole of attraction for the country, a symbol of what might be done. We need one, better a handful, of brave MPs who are not identified with the mainstream political sewer and who genuinely speak for us. They will be an extension, into Parliament, of the independent unions and the national anti-austerity movement. They will be tribunes of the people.

Looking further ahead, it is clear that the conditions at the end of the 19th century when the leaders of mass unions set up the new Labour Party are reversed. Today, although our political left unions are a crucial advance for the whole working class, they cannot organise the new working class in the mass unions of the past. Instead it will be political initiatives and not the economic and social structures of the working class that will call together the new working class in Britain, with the left unions at the core of those initiatives. This is not speculation. The first signs of the British working class gathering itself together again since the mid 1980s was the great anti-Iraq war march and campaign. Like the Charter of the 1830s, which brought millions of toilers into action, so it will be political action that initiates a new class unity under the new conditions. A great anti-austerity movement is, currently, the biggest stepping-stone available towards any future mass political organisation of the new working class.

3.b We must begin the political offensive on our rank, corrupt, unrepresentative, timeserving democracy. Britain needs a new democracy  - based on principles. All MPs on average wages. All MPs helpers (up to 2) on average wages. All candidates for election, whether put forward by parties or other community based organisations, have to be in twos (one female and one male). All costs of elections to have a low ceiling for all candidates. Once an election is called the privately owned media is barred from any comment. All MPs not allowed more than three terms. All governments and all ministers, including the Prime Minister, to be voted on by all MPs as a whole.  Proportional representation in all elections.  No non elected law makers (including the monarchy and the House of Lords.) As for the old and proposed new anti trade union laws – they have to be broken. Let’s have the fight for solidarity, for the common cause for all and show that ordinary people, if they organise, can win.

3.c We are the defenders of state education, state welfare, state pensions and state healthcare. That part of the state belongs to the people and we are its guardians. Stafford and two other Hospital Trusts are selling off their cancer services – to people who want to profit from misery, fear and pain. The NHS cancer services are the jewel in its crown. Already private contracts in health have risen to £9 billion a year. We will support all non-cooperation with the privateers. We will organise community conferences to attack the profit mongers, to defend our NHS and to discuss our local health priorities and needs. We call for an expansion of the health budget year on year for ten years, funded from reductions in defense, to bring all its parts up to the best modern standards.

3.d The economy
British Banks and companies are being fined $billions for their crimes by US authorities. We call for a National Commission to investigate tax crime by the rich and then fine them and/or seize their assets. The National Commission should then make recommendations on how to close the growing gap between rich and poor, including sweeping away rich privileges like the public school system. Banks already in part state ownership should be made the core of state banks, designed to fund development and green technology. All other banks should have their investment arms brought under state control. This would be the first step to regulation of the finance industry and the City of London.

3.e Minimum wages and benefits in Britain have become a national disgrace. (More people who work have to receive top-up benefit than those who are unemployed.) The minimum wage should become the Living Wage and tied like all benefits to the cost of living. Each workplace employing over 200, both public and private should publish top and bottom wages annually. A legal restriction for the gap in incomes should be established defining a limit of 5 times in the first instance.

3.f Public polling shows overwhelming support for the nationalisation of transport and public utilities – including the Post Office. This should be the first step in a root and branch survey of what parts of our economic life need to be owned and governed exclusively by the people as a whole. Our principle is that our economic life should serve the needs of the population and not the other way around.

3.g War
The British people are finished with foreign wars. Building western empires has damaged so much of the world. Millions have paid the price. Enough is enough. Even when we are told the war is to defend democracy it turns out to be a failure as well as a lie and the real reasons based on power and wealth that are consistently hidden from us by our leaders. First, the whole population needs to vote on any new proposal to use armed forces. Second we can get rid of Trident and much of the rest of the useless paraphernalia the admirals and generals so love. Then we can use the resources released to build up agencies of peace and development of which we might be proud. (After its astonishing revolution, Cuba subsequently gained more international credit by sending doctors round the under-developed world than virtually anything else it did.)

These and other measures (see for example the Peoples Charter, now part of the Peoples Assembly) attempt to summarise in practice, for the British situation, some of the implications of the crisis our civilisation faces, but undoubtedly the best is yet to come and will emerge from the imagination of the people released in the battles ahead.

NOTE: This blog will be resumed in August.