Conference or farce?
* Britain The British Labour Party conference at the end of September was a strange affair. The leadership did not allow discussion and vote on any key policy issue. But they could not prevent lett-wingers winning seats on the National Executive Committee. Neil Murray The Left/centre-left Grassroots Alliance won four of the six National Executive Committee seats elected by a ballot of members. And left MP Dennis Skinner almost won one of the three places elec-
"Partnership in Power" rules adopted last year, the party's conference is no longer primarily a discussion of resolutions on particular policy.
Instead, resolutions are forwarded to the National Policy Forum, which produces lengthy reports differing very little from government policy statements, except that they are less concrete. These reports, covering vast areas such as Welfare Reform and Europe, eventually come to conference for endorsement, but
Partnership in Power "allows for the possibility" of minority reports from the National Policy Forum. But no-one knows if this will actually happen, or who will be allowed to write them.
Most reports at this conference were "interim" ones. In other words, whatever conference decided, the documents would be discussed further, before coming back to a future conference for final approval. This produced long periods of discussion where some important points were made, but no votes taken. Party leaders listened politely, but did not respond to those trade union leaders who criticised Labour's "Fairness At Work" proposals.
The General Secretary of the Communication Workers' Union, Derek Hodgson, got a standing ovation for his attack on the threatened privatisation of the Post Office. Again, there was no response from the party leadership.
Constituency Labour Parties, trade unions and socialist societies were allowed to submit narrowly defined "contemporary resolutions" not covered by the Policy Forum reports. These included the loss of manufacturing jobs, the new "anti-terrorist" law, the Asylum White Paper and the U.S. 8 International Viewpoint #305 November 1998 bombing of Sudan and Afghanistan. Curiously, party leaders allowed the resolutions which fell outside these narrow regulations.
Conference delegates were allowed to vote for just four priority contemporary issues to be discussed by conference. But the list of resolutions had been leaked to the major trade unions, who used their large votes to prioritise exactly those resolutions which the leadership
Only six speakers were called on each of the "contemporary resolutions" Debates on Europe, Transport and Local provided no threat to the Government party leadership. In the fourth debate, the leadership's lukewarm support for electoral reform was almost overruled by a vote commiting the Party to defence of the current "First Past the Post" electoral
The transport discussion had two resolutions, one bland one in support of government policy from the Transport and General Workers' Union and one from the Rail Maritime Transport (RMT) union which called for the renationalisation of the railways and opposition to the privatisation of the London Underground (metro) No supporters of the RMT motion were able to speak in the debate, and the motion was heavily defeated.
The local government resolution, presented by UNISON, the largest public sector union, even argued support for "Best Value", a form of privatisation of local government services.
The only other important votes taken at conference were in endorsing the leadership's proposals on the selection of parliamentary candidates, downgrading the Party's women's organisations to the point of ineffectiveness, and endorsing the leadership's centraly decided candidate lists for the European elections.
Blair used his speech at conference to insist that there would be no backing down from the government's policies. He promised a new initiative on "Welfare reform", which will mean reducing the eligibility of many people, particularly the disabled, to state benefits.
The attack on public sector workers continues with restrictions on their pay and the privatisation of services. Trade union rights removed by the Tories will not be restored by this government, and it has just published proposals to speed up how it deals with asylum seekers - by getting them out of the country quicker. Blair fully supported the U.S. bombing of Afghanistan and Sudan, and passed a new 'anti-terrorism' law condemned by Amnesty International and other human rights organisations as repressive.
His response to the election of the Grassroots candidates to the NEC was to say that people could either have the current Labour government or a Conservative government, but not "the Labour government of their dreams."
Against this backdrop of preventing disagreement, the election of left-wingers to the National Executive Committee was an incredible achievement. The leadership-loyal "Members First" group went to incredible lengths to defeat the popular "dissidents"
This year, MPs were no longer eligible to stand for election to the constituency section of the NEC, elected by all the membership. The leadership introduced this change in order to prevent oppositional MPs like Dennis Skinner, Ken Livingstone and Diane Abbott being elected.
They hoped that limiting candidates to "ordinary" members would mean that only those promoted by the leadership got elected. However several organisations on the left of the party, together with Labour Reform, part of the old (pre-Blair) right wing disenchanted with increasing centralisation, agreed on a common platform for the election, presenting six candidates under the name of the Grassroots Alliance.
A previously unknown organisation, Members First, emerged as the vehicle for the six pro-leadership candidates. The group had at least £100,000 to spend (much of it comming from the engineering union), and a telephone canvassing company was hired to ring up members encouraging them to vote for these candidates. Ballot papers were even sent to members who had left the Party.
The General Secretary of the Labour Party, supposedly neutral under the rules of internal elections, attacked the Grassroots Alliance candidates, as did exParty leader Neil Kinnock. The most widely read liberal newspaper, The Guardian, gave Kinnock front page and editorial space to denounce Mark Seddon, Cathy Jamieson, Liz Davies and Pete Willsman as trotskyists.
The Grassroots Alliance candidates spoke at many meetings around the country, including at trade union conferences. Many activists circulated material and rang members in support of the campaign. Unlike Members First, this was all done by party members and on a voluntary basis.
Mark Seddon, editor of the left reformist Tribune newspaper, came top of the poll with 56% of all the votes cast. All Grassroots Alliance candidates for the Conference Arrangements Committee were successfully elected. The Grassroots Alliance now has about a quarter of the places on the National Policy Forum.
These Left victories are important, but must be seen in perspective. There is a danger that the Left will lose sight of
what the conference really meant. In the euphoria of election victory, labour party members have surrendered their ability to influence policy. While the election results may make the Left feel stronger, conference clearly showed that the leadership call all the shots. The 32member NEC is no longer responsible for policy, only organisational questions.
Policy is now reserved for the National Policy Forum, which has no clear democratic functioning. The ultimate policy decisions will be made by the Joint Policy Committee, chaired by party leader Tony Blair, and consisting of 50% Cabinet appointees and 50% NEC appointees. In other words, a body on which Blair will face no opposition. What now for the Labour left?
The four successful NEC candidates have promised to fight for democracy on the NEC, and report back regularly to those who elected them. Left members of the National Policy Forum say they will fight for the right to take minority other left candidates.
There is nothing wrong with an election platform which focuses primarily around defence of party democracy against the centralising Blairites. But for this to continue to be relevant to wider layers of Party members, let alone workers outside, it also has to make key policy issues central.
The biggest problem facing the Left in Britain, inside and outside the Labour Party, is the low level of industrial struggle. The latest figures for strikes are again the lowest on record. Although this will not continue indefinitely, it is an indication of the scale of the recovery necessary after the defeats of the Thatcher years.
For the moment, the Blair government is able to get away with building on Thatcher's policies because of this lack of opposition. The leadership of most trade unions express only mild criticism of Blair's policies. They lobby the government for improvements, but cannot immagine actually mobilising trade unionists to put real pressure on for change. Or taking strike action over such issues as the continued clamp down on pay in the public sector. The recent Trade Union Congress showed the majority of unions to be prostrate in front of the government, making similar noises about partnership with the employers as the Labour leadership. The left-led unions are too small to have much impact in this situation.
The main task for the Left is to build opposition to these policies, particularly in the trade unions, to encourage struggle against the government's polices and to support and build on those struggles which do break out. * The author is a supporter of Socialist Outlook <outlook@gn.apc.org>
New Labour's structures reports to conference so there can be real debates and votes. They should be supported in this, but it falls far short of what is needed.
If the Left is to make these things happen, let alone change or defeat the government's right wing policies, it needs to both make itself an effective force in the Party and be part of wider campaigns and struggles against the government's policies. Activities which reach beyond the Party membership. In order to do so, the labour left needs to involve its supporters in discussion and decisions about how to go forward.
This is necessary even to maintain this years election result, given that the Blairites will learn the lesson from this year and organise far earlier and more effectively next time. The best way of organising such discussion would be for all the organisations supporting the alliance to jointly call a conference.
Such a concept of organising its base democratically is a long way from how the Grassroots Alliance has organised so far. In theory, the candidates and the platform on which they stood were decided by meetings of those organisations which backed the alliance. In practice they were dictated by the desire of the Campaign for Labour Party Democracy to keep out the "ultra left" and keep Labour Reform on board at all costs. In fact, the candidates were elected despite being denounced as trotskyists.
The election campaign and results showed that Labour Reform was in fact the weakest part of the alliance, with very little on the ground. Many on the left were wary of voting for the Labour Reform candidate, Andy Howell, because of his record of voting for cuts on Birmingham City Council. (Labour Reform supporters elsewhere have been equally prominent in pushing through cuts). Howell got half the votes of the
National Conference - delegates are elected by trade unions, Constituency-level Party bodies, and a small number of socialist societies. Trade union delegates hold about half the votes at conference, with almost all the rest held by constituency party delegates. National Executive Committee - 32 members, six elected by all members of the Party, three elected by the MPs and MEPs, rest from trade unions, local government councillors, Leader and deputy Leader of
The NEC used to be the highest body of the party between conferences, dealing with both policy and organisation. Policy has been taken away from the NEC to the new Joint Policy Committee, which consists of 50% NEC members, 50% Cabinet (government) members and the leader of the Party (i.e. Blair). The Parliamentary Labour Party is the organisation of the Party in parliament. It consists of all Labour MPs. The National Policy Forum is a relatively new body. This is the main place where Party policy is discussed. Consists of delegates from the PLP, trade unions, socialist societies, NEC, and delegates elected by CLP delegates to national confeThe Forum has no formal method of functioning, i.e. no votes are taken, and its reports are essentially drawn up by the leadership. Partnership in Power is the name of the changes introduced by Blair at the 1997 conference. Severely restricts the opportunity for the Party, through conference, to criticise the government and hold it The Conference Arrangement Committee oversees the running of conference, the legitimacy of resolutions etc. Often ignored by the leadership. Elected from CLPs and unions. Campaign for Labour Party Democracy -an organisation committed to fighting for reform of the structures of the party and its democratisation. Won some important victories in the past, but is now considerably weaker. Does not concern itself much with policy issues. Labour Reform - an organisation which has emerged in the last two years consisting of disenchanted right-wingers. Committed to maintaining the link between the party and the unions and opposed to the Partnership in Power changes. On policy issues it is often right wing. Often seen as the Hattersleyites' after Roy Hattersley, former deputy leader of the party who is a vocal critic of the current leadership, although not actually a member of Labour Reform. First Past the Post - the current system of election to the British House of Commons, whereby the country is split into 650 constituencies and the candidate getting the most votes in the constituency is elected, regardless of what proportion of the votes European elections, and elections to the new Scottish Parliament and Welsh Assembly will be under proportional representation. A commission is investigating the introduction of a proportional system in all future national elections. *
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* The Basque country and Spain