Labour prepares for office
After 16 years, Britain's Conservative control of just 13 of Britain's 402 local councils.
government could fall at any time. It seems The response of the opposition Labour Party has irreparably divided by the question of European been to move further to the right. Duncan integration, implicated in a growing number ot Chapple explains why corruption cases, and was recently reduced to
International Viewpoint #266 May1995
Great Britain
Labour is now the preferred party of government for a large section of the capitalist class. Unlike the ruling Conservative Party, Labour's leadership wholeheartedly backs the project of European integration. At its April 29 special conference, the Labour Party dropped its constitutional commitment to common ownership of the means of production! This reflects the pressure of capital on the party's leadership.
It marks the first step of a three phase plan of the new rightist leadership team around party leader Tony Blair. Phase one was the elimination of Clause 4, in a trial of strength with the left in the party and the trade unions, backed to the hilt by the right wing mass media. Phase two will be further moves to cut the unions' voice in policy making and dampen down their demands. Phase three is likely to include proposals for the state funding of political parties that would end Labour's financial dependency, and enable Blair to sever the remaining links between the party and the trade union movement that founded it.
While Labour remains clearly a party of the worker's movement, Blair's goal is to break trade union control over the party. His model is the U.S. Democrats, leaving the trade unions only as an uncritical force delivering votes to Labour.
Blair knows that, unlike previous Labour governments, once in power his administration will run into conflict with the rank and file of the trade union movement if he sticks to a programme of minimal change. The campaign to remove Clause 4 aimed to destroy the ability of Labour's trade union base to control the leadership, leaving Labour free to meet the needs of big business.
While a third of the vote at the special conference went tin defence of Clause 4, Labour's 'soft left' collapsed to the right and the hard left' caucus in Parliament was quiet. From their narrow parliamentary framework, they were unable to challenge the pro-capitalist programme of Blair and resist the logic of "party unity'.
While the defeatist ideas of new 34 realism' remain dominant in the unions, support for Clause 4 was strongest in the trades unions — gaining the block vote of two of the largest unions. Its most vocal partisan was Arthur Scargill, the left-wing leader of the miners' union.
The defeat of Clause 4 has made many people see Labour as less of a force for change. Now the Labour right will move onto the offensive. Already they are opposing the re-election of Bill Morris, the leader of the massive Transport and General Workers' Union (T&GWU) and turning increasingly against Rodney Bickerstaffe, the 'soft left' leader of the public sector union UNISON.
At the same time, millions of workers who are at present indifferent to the explicitly pro-capitalist wording of Blair's new clause will vote Labour not to uphold the rigours of competition and the market, but in the expectation that new policies will implemented, and that they themselves will benefit.
They want an end to the Tory (Conservative) war on the public sector, to low wages and cut-throat market mechanisms introduced into the management of local state services and the National Health Service. They want extra funds for health, education and pensions, and schemes to create real jobs, new houses, and restore a viable public transport system. They may not realise yet that none of these are on offer from Blair's 'New Labour'.
Workers will vote Labour because it remains the traditional party of the working class, and the only serious alternative government to the Tories. This is not France, where you can safely vote for a far-left candidate in the first round of the presidential election, and still vote for the Socialist Party candidate in the decisive second round.
Blair's policies can only be tested, fought and defeated in practice. And as long as the dominant factor in workers' minds is getting rid of the Tories, debate on the finer points of policy for the future appears abstract and irrelevant to many.
The Clause 4 debate placed a great pressure on those far left currents which abstain from work in the Labour Party. The Socialist Workers' Party (in some countries known as the International Socialists) supported the Campaign to Defend Clause Four, and at the same time called on those people in the campaign to resign from the Labour Party. Militant Labour stepped up its anti-Labour profile - aiming to stand 40 candidates against Labour in May's local election. Their only 'victory' was in Scotland, where one popular local councillor retained his seat The Militant Labour vote fell from 8% to under 6% in Scotland, their strongest area.
The growing isolation of the left outside the Labour Party reflects the massive increase in support for Labour. Fourtyeight percent of voters in this month's local elections chose Labour, with the ruling Conservatives wining a mere 25%.
The central task of the left is now to hold together, and rebuild itself, starting from the campaign to defend Clause 4. Blair has only accomplished Phase One of his master-plan to reshape the Labour Party. The left must fight tooth and nail to stop the completion of his plan. It must fight for specific policy commitments that would be demanded of a Labour government, and for opposition to any attempt to weaken the trade union control over the Labour Party.
Working people will take on Blair only once the main enemy has been swept away, and the timid role of Labour in office runs into conflict with the mood and aspirations of ordinary working people. That is why the fight in the unions and in the Labour Party remains crucial in setting out the ground for the fight to come. *
The author is deputy editor of Socialist Outlook, the fortnightly newspaper which reflects the views of British supporters of the Fourth International
1 Ssee Roland Wood's article in the December 1994 issue of International Viewpoint).