The half-a-million plus demonstration (see BBC October 20) for another 'Peoples' Vote' on Britain's Brexit deal was symbolically led by young people. But behind the symbols, and seeking a pivotal position, is the rapidly evolving creation of a new political leadership. This has spread from major capitalist enterprises, via various ex Prime Ministers, via the Labour London Mayor, via the would-be 'new-party' Labour MPs, via the Scottish National Party and is now propped up by various left trends and liberal strands that imagine they can reform the EU.
Another campaign force is also organising. The Peoples' Assembly is mounting an 'End Broken Britain' campaign around the country. It aims to attach their anti-austerity message wherever possible to the growing number of strikes, other industrial actions and the needful anti-racist and anti-fascist activity. The Peoples' Assembly, in alliance with allies in the unions, among youth and with the base of the Labour Party, might also offer a different path, a united means of breaking out of the crisis.
What crisis?
We are witnessing the accelerating crash of the once, historically revered, stable, British Parliament. Steering the sinking ship is a Tory Party and a Tory leader that are carrying forward more cuts and which are factionally incapable of delivering any sort of pro-people Brexit. The only consistent theme in their mess and muddle is the desperate hope of Tory Prime Minister May that she can somehow hang on. But what she cannot do is win a majority vote in Parliament. In other words, it is the forces within British society at large that have to move now to resolve both of these crises. Any solutions to Britain's deepening poverty (except for the rich) and winning a Brexit that defends the majority, are currently unavailable from Britain's benighted Parliament.
Technically Parliamentary governments are now tied to a 4 year cycle. In reality, Britain's Parliament and its Tory Government are vulnerable on all fronts and could be toppled in an hour. Remember the set-in-stone Thatcher premiership was dumped following the main Poll Tax riots. Pressure from Northern Ireland's (utterly reactionary) Democratic Unionist Party, to vote against the coming budget - or any of its key measures, would be enough to stop the right of government to raise taxes or to use them. May's Tory Party is weakened by its detachment from Britain's ruling class support for the EU (with the partial exception of some key elements in the City of London financial district.) It is weakened by its constant battle for party leadership. And it is desperately weakened by the rise of the Corbyn (and the end of what May called her 'shared values' with the old Labour Party.)
The Tory/Parliament paralysis means that the different classes in society are now having to find the means to resolve the crisis. As the British (not to mention the Western) crisis is profound and deep, albeit coming to very important point of change, such changes open new prospects rather than find instant solutions. The overturn of the current government will be just a start. But it is an essential step to a different type of future in Britain.
What to do?
The Poll Tax rebellion of 1988 - 1991 came out of villages and cities. Old political certainties were dumped as Tory voters right down to self-defined Leninists decided to act to stop a Tory government's 'step too far.' The key here is the broadest possible unity in society of all those who need to fight against the government. And that means bringing together all those who hate austerity AND all those who believe that the Tory's approach to Brexit is against the interest of the people. The current government is producing a tragedy on both of these fronts.
The right-wing Labour MPs who want to re-run the EU referendum, will demand the October 20 demonstration as their property, insisting that a new, opposite referendum to 2017, is the critical issue. In reality they seek a 'new' (old) Labour Party, designed to tune into ruling class interests, sharing May's 'values'. But many of the thousands who marched (and the millions who sympathised) are still to be won - still open to a new type of internationalism, not one defined by the corrupt, corporate creatures that run the EU, AND they still also seek a real and abiding end to austerity.
This is the chance for the Peoples' Assembly. Can it bring this decisive moment together? Can it appeal to the youth who want, overwhelmingly, to vote for Corbyn's Labour and who also seek a deep defence of internationalism, poisoned so far by the Tory Brexit? Can it speak to people across Britain whose lives have been poisoned by poverty, a constant reduction of services and politics that have relentlessly failed them?
A start
This new unity will not be a product of propaganda. The start is action to pull down the Tory government. That is what will immediately focuses the collective attention of leavers, remainers, the youth and the pensioners. That is the alliance that has to be created in Britain. An alliance that denies the ex Prime Ministers, the billionaires and the reconditioned Blairites their moment in the setting sun. Instead bringing the forces together in society that have the resolution to build a socially supportive and hopeful country based on an entirely different internationalism.
Sunday 21 October 2018
Sunday 14 October 2018
A critical moment for Britain
The British Prime Minister, Teresa May, shuffles towards her Brexit deal with the EU (see Blog 28 September. 'The British Prime Minister May will probably agree some half-baked plan from Brussels that supposedly will continue to be discussed after next March.')
Among a series of concessions, May will accept the EU Customs Union - which allows the EU control of all of Britain's trade matters - on a 'temporary basis.' Tory cabinet members are turning themselves in knots trying to define 'temporary' without suggesting a definite ending. But, in the end, everything is temporary. A predictable upheaval in the Tory Party both inside and outside Parliament is now underway (again.) We have apparently reached 44 letters against May, handed over to the ridiculous Tory 1922 Committee, and only 4 more are required for her to have to face election for the leadership of the Party. But May's future is not the key question.
The critical issue for British politics, now, is what is going to happen to the Labour Party.
The British newspaper 'The Independent' published a story on the internet (Sunday 14 October) that, if true, will begin the real destruction of the Labour Party. Here is a selection of quotes from its news.
'Multiple Labour MPs have told the Independent they are prepared to support the Brexit agreement Teresa May hopes to bring back from Brussels, boosting the PM's chances of forcing it through parliament.' ... 'even if, as expected, Jeremy Corbyn orders his party to oppose it.' ... 'at least 15 could rebel against Mr Corbyn ... enough to tip the balance on the Commons in favour of the deal.'
Gareth Snell, MP for Stoke Central, Ruth Smeeth MP, from Stoke North and Carolyn Flint, MP for Don Valley are all mentioned in the article as holding these views. Other Labour MPs, the Independent continues, are considering abstention.
The Labour Party as a whole, together with its membership, its union affiliates and its MPs, has taken a position at its September conference. Conference voted to reject any Brexit deal without the 6 conditions the Party sees as essential for the well being and rights of the majority of people in Britain. In the (up to now likely) event of the defeat of May's dismal plan in Parliament, Labour would force a General Election against austerity. If the Tories decided to hang on to prevent a General Election, Labour would then call for a new Peoples' vote, with 'all options on the table'.
If a group of Labour MPs vote for May's EU deal they are breaking from their Party's decision, they are supporting an anti-working class 'deal' with the EU and they are ensuring the continuation of a vicious, pro-austerity government. Why? Because they put their continued presence in Parliament before the desperate need to put an end to the destruction of millions of peoples lives and future. But that goes without saying. More accurately, they will be definitively attacking the working class base of the Labour Party at the precise moment when its potential in society is opening out.
The Labour leadership across Parliament and the unions have systematically sought to bring any working class rebellion back into the system's fold, across the entire history of the Labour Party. What is different today is that the new, working-class base of Labour have broken into Labour's traditional leadership and begun a new movement that potentially challenges capitalism. This is a major political advance in British society. If/when Labour MPs vote for the May's poisonous mess with the EU, they will reverse that process, maintain an austerity government, further dividing the working class on Brexit, sewing nationalist seeds of disorientation as a result - and likely usher in a new radical right wing under Boris Johnston.
The fundamental class division between the the historical base of Labour support and its traditional leadership will then explode. The upheaval will take the form of the Parliamentary disassociation of Labour MPs from the Party's leadership and its new base - create the inherent inability of establishing a Labour government in that context - and thereby dissolve Labour's current formation.
What, as some socialists in the past have asked, is to be done?
The current base and the current leadership of the Labour Party must not be sucked back into the Parliamentary melee that will boil and bluster away in Parliament following the May deal and its Labour defenders. On the contrary; the new and critical Labour forces must sharpen their political edge by rallying the working class - in and across society. Whatever happens, the austerity government must fall. And that means it must be torn down by any and by all means necessary. Leavers and remainers, trade unionists and 'casual' workers, north and south have to be brought together, to regroup, bring down the government and stop the right wing chaos created by the new Tories. Success (or otherwise) will now have to come from society, not from Parliament.
Among a series of concessions, May will accept the EU Customs Union - which allows the EU control of all of Britain's trade matters - on a 'temporary basis.' Tory cabinet members are turning themselves in knots trying to define 'temporary' without suggesting a definite ending. But, in the end, everything is temporary. A predictable upheaval in the Tory Party both inside and outside Parliament is now underway (again.) We have apparently reached 44 letters against May, handed over to the ridiculous Tory 1922 Committee, and only 4 more are required for her to have to face election for the leadership of the Party. But May's future is not the key question.
The critical issue for British politics, now, is what is going to happen to the Labour Party.
The British newspaper 'The Independent' published a story on the internet (Sunday 14 October) that, if true, will begin the real destruction of the Labour Party. Here is a selection of quotes from its news.
'Multiple Labour MPs have told the Independent they are prepared to support the Brexit agreement Teresa May hopes to bring back from Brussels, boosting the PM's chances of forcing it through parliament.' ... 'even if, as expected, Jeremy Corbyn orders his party to oppose it.' ... 'at least 15 could rebel against Mr Corbyn ... enough to tip the balance on the Commons in favour of the deal.'
Gareth Snell, MP for Stoke Central, Ruth Smeeth MP, from Stoke North and Carolyn Flint, MP for Don Valley are all mentioned in the article as holding these views. Other Labour MPs, the Independent continues, are considering abstention.
The Labour Party as a whole, together with its membership, its union affiliates and its MPs, has taken a position at its September conference. Conference voted to reject any Brexit deal without the 6 conditions the Party sees as essential for the well being and rights of the majority of people in Britain. In the (up to now likely) event of the defeat of May's dismal plan in Parliament, Labour would force a General Election against austerity. If the Tories decided to hang on to prevent a General Election, Labour would then call for a new Peoples' vote, with 'all options on the table'.
If a group of Labour MPs vote for May's EU deal they are breaking from their Party's decision, they are supporting an anti-working class 'deal' with the EU and they are ensuring the continuation of a vicious, pro-austerity government. Why? Because they put their continued presence in Parliament before the desperate need to put an end to the destruction of millions of peoples lives and future. But that goes without saying. More accurately, they will be definitively attacking the working class base of the Labour Party at the precise moment when its potential in society is opening out.
The Labour leadership across Parliament and the unions have systematically sought to bring any working class rebellion back into the system's fold, across the entire history of the Labour Party. What is different today is that the new, working-class base of Labour have broken into Labour's traditional leadership and begun a new movement that potentially challenges capitalism. This is a major political advance in British society. If/when Labour MPs vote for the May's poisonous mess with the EU, they will reverse that process, maintain an austerity government, further dividing the working class on Brexit, sewing nationalist seeds of disorientation as a result - and likely usher in a new radical right wing under Boris Johnston.
The fundamental class division between the the historical base of Labour support and its traditional leadership will then explode. The upheaval will take the form of the Parliamentary disassociation of Labour MPs from the Party's leadership and its new base - create the inherent inability of establishing a Labour government in that context - and thereby dissolve Labour's current formation.
What, as some socialists in the past have asked, is to be done?
The current base and the current leadership of the Labour Party must not be sucked back into the Parliamentary melee that will boil and bluster away in Parliament following the May deal and its Labour defenders. On the contrary; the new and critical Labour forces must sharpen their political edge by rallying the working class - in and across society. Whatever happens, the austerity government must fall. And that means it must be torn down by any and by all means necessary. Leavers and remainers, trade unionists and 'casual' workers, north and south have to be brought together, to regroup, bring down the government and stop the right wing chaos created by the new Tories. Success (or otherwise) will now have to come from society, not from Parliament.
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