Benn:c of Labour's Betrayals

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against such policies within the Labour Party.

challenge to Denis Healey in left, the candidate for demothe election for the deputy cracy within the Labour leadership has opened up an Party.

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UNOR

TONY BENN served as a minister throughout both of Labour's last two periods of office. In Wilson's 1964-70 governments, Benn held office as Postmaster General, then as Minister of Technology and Minister of Power.

During this period Benn put forward no open criticism of Wilson's right wing policies, and was a keen supporter of Barbara Castle's anti-union White Paper In Place of Strife, which was eventually abandoned after heavy opposition from the trade union movement.

His loyalty to i Wilson continued in the 1974 government, when Benn took office as Industry Secretary, acting as front man for Wilson's strategy of handing huge cash subşidies to private industry through the National Enterprise Board.

His Industry Bill included attempts to draw shop stewards into organised class collaboration through various forms of "workers' participation" • A model of this approach was Lord Ryder's plan for the reorganisation of British Leyland which successfully undermined the independence of the shop stewards movement ecoy though the strident nationalism contained within his anti-EEC stance has been a consistent feature of his politics as Minister of Agriculture and since Labour's 1979 defeat.

He is at present a trusted member of Foot's leadership, serving as Shadow Leader of the House of Commons.

Silkin's candidacy would seem little other than a sick joke if it were not for the desperate search of certain union leaders and Labour MPs for a means of ensuring the defeat of Tony Benn while avoiding the embarrassment and aggro of casting votes for Healey. - creating ideal conditions for Edwardes' subsequent attacks.

Removed from the Industry post, Benn was then allocated to the Department of Energy, where he helped oversee the exploitation of North Sea oil and gas by private oil monopolies.

As à cabinet minister, Benn shared responsibility for the imposition of wage controls and the other reactionary policies carried through by the Wilson/ Callaghan government up to the electoral defeat of 1979.

But since that point Dama'a maltinal sunamina hansa benn s polttical energies Have been directed towards the fight for democratic reforms and accountability within the leadership of the Labour Openly criticising the record of the governments he was a part of, Benn has begun consistently to argue that the class collaborationist strategies of Wilson and the right wing cannot succeed in reforming capitalism.

He has emerged as the clear leader of the leftward movement within the LaboUr Party and hic unprecedented debate on policies and the accountability of leaders to the rank and file throughout the labour movement.

His political stance remains that of left wing reformism: the Alternative Economic Strategy is little more than a package of measures to modify the pace of the capitalist crisis. And the nationalism implicit in Benn's calls for import controls has now been extended and rationalised into the theory that imperialist Britain has now become a "colony" deprived of •national inaependence • 1 ....: danceli Left Nevertheless as the standard-bearer of the left, and leading advocate of much needed democratic reforms and accountability within the Labour Party, Benn, with his inadequate and belated criticisms of previous Labour policy is plainly preferable as a candidate to Healey — a dogged opponent of such reforms and supporter of the old policies.

It is for this reason that we call for critical support to Renn a the candidate of the Benn movement 200. because of the JAKE ECCLESTONE, newly elected Deputy General Secretary of the National Union of Journalists was among those who gaye Benn a standing ovation after last week's debate in Blackpool. Ss e told SOCIALIST "I only joined the Labour Party this summer, though I had held my own views for some time. Until now the Party always seemed so corrupt - not interested in socialism at all.

"What Benn - and others as well - have done is to try to get accountability. The nub of it is that leaders should not be in it for themselves, they are there to represent other people. They must be called to account ior how they vote, speak and behave.

"The NUJ is democratic compared with other unions, but it's not perfect. I'd like to see the regular election of all officials -only a few are elected at the moment.

"What impresses me most about Benn and what struck me at the TUC last week was the feeling of apprehension among union leaders that what has been started in the Labour Party will spill over irretrievably into the. trade union movement.

"People will say that what's good enough for MPs is good enough for General Secretaries. I'd like to see that.

"After all why does the General Secretary of the TUC emerge unelected from Congress House?

"I think Benn has an appealing personality, and a genuine concern for people. I don't know whether he's ambitious - it seems that he's not.

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