What basis for unity of Labour's Left!

Scan page 6

- a member of the Benn Campaign Committee [writing in a personal capacity ] -opens a discussion on organising the Left.

CAN LEFT unity ever genuinely be more than romantic notions, good intentions, and constant bickering and division?

The precedents may not be encouraging, but there are several signs which can legitimately give rise to optimism.

Firstly, ' 'broad left' and similar groupings, stretching across a far wider political spectrum than the Labour Left, have operated very successfully in a large number of unions.

Secondly, the Rank and File Mobilising Committee has united up to ten different groups on the left of the Party in a common aim over the last eighteen months:

Blocks Both of these examples must be qualified, bowever. In many unions, such Broad Left groups often operate solely to get resolutions onto agendas and build up electoral blocks in support of those resolutions and left candidates.

This is a legitimate exer cise in itself, but it is also a source of equally legitimate criticism levelled at the Labour left by the ultraleft - that it is merely interested in building up electoral blocks, controlling the bureaucratic superstructure, while ignoring grass-roots activity.

In addition, the Rank and File Mobilising Committee may have created a certain unity on the left (although that was not without its traumas), but it must be conceded that such unity was on a very limited basis - namely the need for democratic reform of the Party constitution.

Activity

Nevertheless, it should certainly be possible in the light of these experiences to avoid in future some of the shortcomings of these two approaches.

A broad left grouping in the Labour Party would certainly have a role in building electoral blocks in support of resolutions. But it shquld not be an organisNation which swings into operation only at the time of conferences and Party elections. It would need to involve itself in rank and Se campaigning building • IDA IT = iDe Fast =20c Is should also be possible to build upon a wider basis of unity than solely constitutional reform. Whatever differences the left may have over import controls and other specific elements of the alternative strategy, there is more that fundamentally unites us than divides us.

Rhetoric For instance, our commitment to Clause IV Part 4 of the Labour Party constitution, and to that 'fundamental and irreversible shift in the balance of wealth and power in favour of working people and their families" unites us. Our belief that our society is still divided by class and privilege, and that the Labour Party must seek to overthrow capitalism rather than merely seek to man- age it better than the Tories, unites us and fundamentally differentiates left and right when all the rhetoric has been stripped away. There is a fundamental basis for unity.

Roy Hattersley has recently criticised the Left of the Party for indulging in 'street politics' '. The Left would, of course, consider this to be one of the most encouraging developments, epitomised at a national level by the People's March and the huge unemployment demonstrations officially organised by the Party, but mirrored a bousand times in local Ne.

Hattersley's comments are clearly typical of the "leave it all to the Parliamentarians" approach.

This is shared not a few of the Tribune Group, who believe that socialism can be legislated into existence by three hundred Labour MPs.

We would obviously reject that, and one of the essential tasks of any tentative new basis of left unity would be to coordinate the left forces in Parliament (those on the left of the Tribune Group) and the whole spectrum of left activity outside Parliament.

The Labour Party's role has always been to represent the interests of working people. The origins of the Party itself lie in the campaign for Labour Representation in the Commons.

To secure this, the Labour Representation Committee was founded in 1900, and launched with these words, "It is the workers' reply to the aggressive action of Federated Masters and Trusts"

Today workers are still suffering from the "aggressive action" of the same market and from a Balle reactionary Tory government which is seeking to turn the clock back eighty years on basic trade union rights.

The difference now, is that the working class has boch the strength and the prices democratically emmet a bs ibe TIC and tbe Labour Pars! Annual Conference to combat successfully the joint attack upon workers' living standards and their basic rights.

What remains the same is the need for Labour Representation in the Commons; that is to say, elected representatives of the Party who will represent the cause of Labour in Parliament.

The recent letter signed by Labour's five-strong front bench defence team repudiating Party policy on disarmament illustrates just how far away we remain from this simple and fundamental requirement.

One of the fundamental aims of any new basis for left unity must be, then, to coordinate the activities of left Labour MPs and activists, and to secure the representation of the cause of the labour movement in Parliament, in a way that it clearly is not represented at present. The following could form the basis for discussion towards establishing principles on which to ground the Labour Representation Committee. Methods of effecting such basic principles would, of course, be far more controversial, but point 10 would go some way towards covering this.

1. To consolidate the gains already made for democracy in the Party and to extend the principle of accountability to other areas of the Party's oper..

ation. 2.To ensure that Labour's manifesto at the next election contains clear commitments to carry out those policies which will have been decided by conference. 3. To secure the election to offices in the Party of people committed to the carrying out of conference policies.

4. To defend the federal structure of the Labour Party and the central role of the trade unions within it, while not necessarily accepting existing levels of democracy within trade blacks and other minorities.

10. To promote discuse-. ion of the most effective methods of bringing about an irreversible shift in balance of power and wealth in favour of working people and their families, in a frank but tolerant fashion.

11. To coordinate the activities of left-wing Labour MPs and left activists in the unions, constituencies, and other Labour Party groups.

Impetus It should be stressed again that sucn a list is far from comprehensive (it was the product of half an hour one rainy afternoon); it is merely meant to serve as a basis for discussion and an example of the sort of platform around which the left ought to be able to Tony Benn's candidature has electrified British politics and generated unprecedented interest in left alternative policies; the momentum and impetus it has given the whole of the Left cannot afford to be wasted. The potential is most certainly there. What is necessary now is the most wide-ranging discussion on the precise basis upon which left unity should proceed.