The Glorious Twelfth

The second weekend in July was busy. Friday night offered the opportunity of watching Newcastle United’s first pre-season friendly away to Gateshead. £15 entry put me off that one though. The Mouth of the Tyne Festival started and the appalling Paul Heaton headlined and if the entry fee had been 15p I wouldn’t have wasted it on him. However I did go down  on the bike to check out support act I Am Kloot, who were fun, or at least as much fun as you can have standing at the top of King Eddy’s Bay steps looking at a giant screen half a mile away.  What I’d really hoped to be doing on Friday was attending a public meeting at Blakelaw Club, where Dennis Skinner was scheduled to be the keynote speaker. Sadly, Dennis was indisposed, which I hope isn’t code for a serious health problem, and had to cancel this and his proposed appearance at the Big Meeting on the Saturday.

I used to go to the Big Meeting as a kid, but hadn’t been for decades until two years ago, when I carried my union’s banner from the market place to the race course in a journey that took nigh on 3 hours; it was a privilege and an honour. Sadly, last year and this I’ve had to pass on attending the greatest annual gathering of working class culture in the north, in order to play in a pre-season friendly for Winstons, ironically against Blakelaw Club. Good game yesterday morning, and then a superb one in the afternoon as Benfield walloped Frickley Athletic 4-1. I even took in a bit of cricket at Jesmond as County Club went down by 2 wickets to Durham Academy, before Laura and I stepped out to listen to The Specials at Mouth of the Tyne. They weren’t bad, a bit safe and predictable, but we met some friends we’ve not seen in a while and had a decent drink. The subsequent late night meant I decided against getting up for the Labour leadership hustings; anyway, I’d only have been thrown out for heckling Liz Kendall (she carried the RMT banner at the Big Meeting you realise; sometimes the truth is beyond parody). Instead, Laura and I went along to the Irish Centre, on Orangeman’s Day, for a public meeting where the speaker was leadership candidate Jeremy Corbyn (and to see Tipp beat the Deise in the Munster final as well).

Jeremy Corbyn was brilliant; inspirational, logical, reasoned and humble. There were 350 people in a packed room; young old, long time activists and those new to the party, who were all drawn to attend by a shared belief in social justice, equality and the reanimation of the Labour Party, based on the ideas held as normal during the post war social democratic consensus. Jeremy Corbyn is a fine man and he believes passionately in Socialism; hell, he even recited Clause 4.  I will feel energised to vote for him and would rejoice if he were elected. You see, in the wake of the election disaster, I have belatedly come to realise that the Labour Party are our only hope and that we must rescue the party to correct the terrible evils being visited upon ordinary working people, young and old, by the wicked policies of the Tories.

Consequently, one of the first things I did on the morning of May 8^th when I woke late, hungover and in despair at the prospect of 5 more years of Cameron and his cronies was to re-join the Labour Party. It would be inaccurate to say my membership had simply lapsed, as the last year I had paid my annual subs would have been 1984. Why did I leave? Well, partly it was absolute disgust with Kinnock’s point blank refusal to back the NUM during the strike; partly it was because I’d grown up and moved away from the Militant dominated Felling ward in the Gateshead East constituency that I was unfortunate enough to have been born in, but mainly it was because I read Socialist Standard and realised that the nonsensical, reformist Leninist belief in vanguardism that brainwashed, social inadequate Militant zealots endlessly parroted (when they weren’t trying to bleed people dry for the “fighting fund”) was plain wrong. If I realised this aged 19, how come others as intelligent as me have wasted their lives in blind, obsequious devotion to Peter Taaffe’s Leninist vanity project? It’s tragic to see the waste of talent poured down the drain in unblinking devotion to “the organisation” that perpetuates gross distortions of Marxist thought, while simultaneously controlling every thought, every action and even the personal lives of weak, foolish adherents.

Immediately I understood the full meaning of the declaration of principles of the Socialist Party of Great Britain, I realised I had found an explanation for how the world could be transformed. The SPGB vision didn’t involve autocratic, absolutist leaders requiring disciples to fund the lavish lifestyles of the vanguard’s dynastic super elite. It didn’t involve violence. It didn’t involve venerating workerism to the extent that adopting anti-sexist, anti-homophobic anti-racist attitudes was seen as evidence of being “sectarian” and “middle-class” or, worst of all, “undialectical” by “comrades” (yes, they still call themselves that, without a scintilla of irony).  Since that day in summer 1984, I have described myself as a supporter of the SPGB, rather than a member. Sadly, I’ve come to accept that my party political activity over the past 30 years has been an abject failure. Not just my activity, every single one of us who stood outside the Labour Party since the late 60s onwards. Instead of uniting in the only organisation capable of harnessing and mobilising mass working class support and activism, we’ve wasted decades on snide ad hominem abuse, internecine warfare and irrelevant recondite theorising. It is still happening; Owen Jones suffers the vilest slander from Militants, simply because he turned away from the grotesque parody of a “revolutionary party” he was born into. The fact is this, despite venal claims that “somebody has to be right,” which I still believe is the SPGB, we are no closer to changing society than we were the day my Labour Party membership expired.

Ultimately, while I know the SPGB and other companion parties in the World Socialist Movement are correct in their analysis of capitalism and the failings of the so-called revolutionary left in Britain, especially the Trot factions, my sense of reality, honed through many years of trade union activism, does not allow me to sacrifice pragmatism for impossibilist theory, however alluring. I cannot  fully accept the SPGB position, which states that Socialists need to be equally hostile to all other parties or to remain indifferent as to the need to strive for the best possible conditions for our members, as piecemeal reforms apparently do nothing other than perpetuate the wage system within capitalism. As regards the first of these positions, I’ve taken every single opportunity to cast my vote to the left of Labour over the past 30 years, believing that  impossibilism needs to be tempered with gestures of opposition, however small or even futile. This means I’ve voted variously for: SPGB, Respect, Communist, Green and once, to my utter shame and regret, for TUSC; though in defence I was voting for myself. Not one of them has won; they’ve almost invariably finished bottom of the poll and the lot of the working classes under capitalism has not been improved one iota.

Despite such voting history, I’ve never been entirely comfortable with the idea that everyone in the Labour Party was inherently evil. Up here, most of our MPs, bar the repugnant Nick Brown, are pretty good. In October 2011 I went to London on union business to meet Mary Glindon in the House of Commons. As it was half term, I took Ben down with me. He’s a Socialist by breeding and instinct, so when Mary took us out onto the terrace and we met Dennis Skinner, it made Ben’s day. When we were introduced I said to Dennis he’d always been a hero of mine. He expressed thanks but also announced “we must avoid the cult of personality. Ideas are what matters.” The power with which he delivered these words mesmerised Ben, who says that was the moment his political die was cast. I’m proud to say my son became part of the Labour Party a few days after the election as well; like 50,000 others. I doubt all the other left wing parties in the country combined will have 10% of that total. To me, this is incontrovertible proof that our movement must be a synoym for the Labour Party; to be outside of it is a futile gesture destined to result in the political and social wilderness.  Socialists openly laugh at the antics of the Militant cult; it’s the brainwashed zealots who’ve wasted their lives in unquestioning devotion that I feel sympathy for.

When I first heard of TUSC, I was naively enthused by the idea of a left of Labour coalition, probably because Bob Crow had just died and I’d found his speech at the Big Meeting in 2013 utterly inspirational, as I still saw some merit in the idea of a “new” party for workers. Of course if Bob, whose union RMT had a policy of forming a new workers’ party to replace Labour, were around today, he’d be appalled by the behaviour of Militant. I’m sure he would not want any dealings with the bizarre Leninist cult under the dictatorial rule of Kim-il Taaffe who have hijacked TUSC. Militant are still in the business of being the Trot equivalent of the Moonies or Jim Jones and the People’s Temple; ruining people’s lives by destroying their ability to think or act independently. It’s tragic and terrifying and incredibly dangerous for the kinds of weak and inadequate people, who are preyed on by the Trots with mendacious promises of jam yesterday. Before I realised a Militant leopard never changes its spots, I stood as a TUSC candidate in the Dene ward for Newcastle City Council in 2014 and polled 180 votes, which was 6% of the total vote; it wasn’t an earthquake, but it was a respectable showing I thought. Contrast it with the fact TUSC got 170 (0.2%) votes in Newcastle East at the general election, when fielding the Liverpudlian Leninist’s second most unquestioning devotee.  That was not just a disappointing result; it was pathetic. It was humiliating for those who continue to pretend, or even believe (if they’ve been controlled sufficiently by the Walton Wehrmacht) that Militant are revolutionary. Or even relevant.

The general election result, with particular focus on TUSC’s farcical flatlining, made me rethink my whole political approach. Did I support the ideas and philosophy of the SPGB? Definitely yes. Could I see myself spending another 30 years outside of the Labour Party arguing the SPGB’s case considering how little had been achieved over the previous decades? Definitely no. The simple and unavoidable truth is this; even now, the Labour Party is our only realistic hope. It is our party. It is the party of the working class, the party of trade unions and trade unionists, the only party ever to have granted us concessions to make life under capitalism bearable. Universal free healthcare. A cradle to grave welfare state that protects the weak. A party that seeks to make society fair. To make citizens healthy, educated, securely housed, suitably and gainfully employed, regardless of ethnicity, nationality, class, creed or sexuality.  The Labour Party did all these things in the past and it still exists; the structure is in place to reform the party from within. If enough of us get active, we can transform the party and make it a crusading mass, Socialist party that includes all manner of left wing opinion. The terrible mistakes of the failed New Labour experiment need to be learned from. 

This country needs massive investment in social housing, education, health care and welfare benefits. It does not need Trident or to reward devious, rapacious banking criminals. The only way we can possibly hope to turn the country round again is to involve ourselves in reforming the Labour Party, wresting it back from idiots like Liz Kendall (blaming the Greek situation on the people for electing “extremists” for fuck’s sake!!) and ensuring Labour stands on a socially inclusive, socially just and broadly Socialist platform in 2020. That will be so much easier if Jeremy Corbyn is our leader. Join the Labour Party if you support him and lead the fightback for our class against the evils of society.