leadership's attacks
THIs YEAR's Labour Party conference debated a series of resolutions affecting women's organisation in the party. Some - like those calling for at least one woman to be included on every parliamentary shortlist, and for a Ministry for Women (with, against the NEC's wishes, cabinet status accorded to the women's minister) — were passed. They represent great progress for women in the party,
Labour's policies affecting women.
Predictably though, the proposal that the national Conference of Labour Women should elect the five women representatives on the NEC WaS rejected. Predictably, because this proposal has come to conference year after year — and year after year it has been rejected, largely due to the overwhelming opposition of the trade unions.
Two points are really at issue here. First, there are those (including many trade unions, like APEX) who argue that all NEC members must be elected by annual party conference in order to be properly accountable. They therefore oppose any moves to allow the women's conference, like the Young Socialists' annual conference, the right to elect their own representative on the NEC. Secondly, there are those who support women's right in principle to elect their own representatives, but argue that women's conINTERVATIONAL No7 November/December 1986
Confronting the police at Wapping WAC backtracks The women's debate at this year's Labour Party conference witnessed an unholy alliance between members of the WAC executive and the NEC on the question of reorganising women's conference. JANE WELLS argues that — whatever the intention, and whatever the flaws in the existing structure - giving the task of reorganising the conference to the NEC was seriously mistaken. ference, as presently constituted, is not sufficiently authoritative or representative, and is theretore not ready to bear this responsibility.
There has been discussion for some time among many in the party - including women in the trade unions and in the constituencies — about the problems with the system of voting and representation at Labour Women's conference. Whilst each wo-
ALLOST TIMEN Moore/Reflex men's section, women's council and so on may have two delegates to women's conference, a maximum of twenty delegates per trade union are allowed. So a delegate from a constituency might represent, say, 50 or 100 women, whereas a trade union delegate could be representing tens of thousands of women with her single vote.
Women throughout the party have been concerned to see proposals developed which would give a fair weight to the trade union votes at Labour Women's conference, reserved seats on the National Labour Women's Committee and so forth, so that the strength and authority of the women's organisations in the party might be increased, and the full participation of women in all sections of the party ensured. But what emerged at this year's Labour Party conference was a new consensus of concerns, which came together to effectively turn over he women's organisations in the party to he NEC — propelled by the hope of finding new responsibilities, granted in return for handing over old and long-fought-for, rights, and with the constant threat and fear that if they didn't, the trade union women would simply walk out.
Women's conterence - and its policies (way to the left of Labour Party policy anc of annual conference decisions), its National Labour Women's Committee and its sha-
dow NEC elections, are an embarassment to the Labour Party leadership with its softlysoftly policies and soft focus images - — Insofar as it notices the women's conference at all, that is.
So the women's conference is one of the few remaining policy tor , or power bases, which remain outside of the control of the rightward- moving Labour leadership. While the conference itself has no power (it cannot implement its own decisions and it has no budget), this is not a major problem. But as the clear and irresistable demand that women should have the right to elect their own representatives from the conference gathers steam and the support of more and more sections of the party, the problem of control over the women's conference becomes crucial for the party leadership. This, Andrew Moore/Reflex
CTORY O THEof course, is felt all the more acutely in the run up to a general election as policies and presentation are trimmed to fit political marketing profiles drawn up by the smart young men at Walworth Road.
useful and instructive might be made with the youth section in the Labour Party. This organisation is, in some ways (partly because it does have access to its own budget, and is able to elect its own representative onto the NEC), more embarassing to the Labour leadership fluence of the politics of the Militant has meant that the activities of the Lpys have attracted a great deal of attention from the media, and very little support from the progressive currents in the party — making it an obvious, and more immediate target for the leadership's attempts to pull the member-
ship smartly into line.
This year the vEc brought proposals to conference to 'democratise' and increase the
authority of the party's youth organisation, and to popularise' its politics. Shadowing
the ideas published recently in the Fabian 1 12 Society pamphlet Labour and Youth by John
Mann (ex-Nots Chair) and Phil Woolas (ex-Nus President), a resolution from Glasgow Hillhead cur outlined the main elements expressed in the NEC proposals: to reduce a ys already undermined by substantial cuts in its budget and attacks on its politics and mem-
'consultative' rather than decision-making body. It was overwhelmingly.
Glasgow Hillhead cLP, so successful in setting the ys onto this safe course towards its transformation into regional networks of cultural/ discussion/campaigning/Kinnock upport groups, cropped up again at conte.
This time it was in the debate or women's organisation.
A resolution by APEX (not known for its
policies on substantially amended by the Labour Co-
'the decision of the WAC
executive was a major retreat from their principles ordinating Committee (LCC)-dominated constituency, Glasgow Hillhead.
The resolution was carried with a large majority, and won the support of the National Labour Women's Committee, the executive of the Women's Action Committee (WAC), and some of the hard left working through Labour Left Liaison, including Socialist Action.
Conference agreed that the NEC, in conunction with the National Labour Women's Committee, should 'consult' throughout the movement, and look into producing a tairer, more representative system of voting at women's conference, and should 'review the system of electing the five reserved women's seats on the National Executive Committee. The Nec is then asked to report with proposals for change to next year's Labour Party conference.
The effect of carrying these proposals is to hand over the re-organisation of women's conference to the NEC. The NEC has an open mandate from conference: to look at the women's organisation in the party right
cross the board, how they elect their repre
entatives, how their decisions should b
made, how they should be put into ettect, and how they fit into the overall structures of the party.
A realistic appraisal of the forces at work
lobbying and organising to push these proposals through conterence gives us a broad idea of the kind of 'consulting' and proposals we can expect from the NEC.
First, on the constituency level, as the LCC
stated in Labour Activist, their daily bulletın at conference, under the title 'Reshaping the
Party':
The LCC believe that just as equality,
democracy and participation are tunda-
mental socialist principles, so they must be
integral to a mass, campaigning and pro-
gressive Party. That is the underlying reason
why it was LCC supporters who played the
crucial role in putting forward the key motions and amendments in the women and
youth organisation debates. (their emphasis) They were joined by key Kinnock sup porters on the NEC and in positions of influence in the labour movement (Morrell et al) — and by most of the trade unions.
Some of the trade union delegations at conference were openly talking about introducing the block vote into the women's confernce, although it is clear that many women trade unionists would prefer to see a weighted vote' representative and accountable to women members in the trade unions.
In fact this question of exactly how the trade union vote will operate at women's conference and how it will reflect the interests of women in the trade unions is crucial. Clearly, it will not be the main concern of the NEC, nor of the trade union leadership: (male of course) to see that rank and fil women members, or their interests, are genuinely represented. It is, of course, in the interests of the people who presently control the labour movement to keep it that way. So the introduction of whatever form of block vote into the women's conference is far more likely to mean that the effective political control of that body will be passed into • the hands of the bureaucrats in the trade unions and Labour Party than where it belongs with women in the movement.
The problem now facing women activists in the party and trade unions (which is in fact the same one facing socialists throughout the movement - and which has been consistently neglected) is how to fight for socialist policies and accountability in the trade unions. Only by doing this, can the block vote in any labour movement body be used in the fight for socialist policies to represent working class interests, and not used as a weapon against them.
So it came as no surprise that the LCC effectively the constituency organiser for Kinnock's policies and strategy — rallied its
'the effect of these proposals
Tis to turn over the reorganisation to the NEC' support to these proposals. What was more difficult to understand for the many ordinary wac members present at conterence wa why the executive ot the Women's Actior Committee (for so long the sole body cam paigning for women's rights in the party) should be going along with them.
Putting their case at conference, the repre sentatives of the wac executive argued tha women were being offered a great oppor tunity - to campaign for our right to elec our own representatives on the NEC, and to involve trade union women more centrall in the women's conference.
Briefing Women, who alongside Socialis
Organiser and CLPD opposed these proposal
argued against the resolution and amenc
ment at conference, and organised through a wide caucus of constituency de legates — an effective intervention on th
conference floor to speak against it. Th
INTERNATIONAL No 7 November/December 19
central point argued by Breting supporters was that the principle of the right of women to organise autonomously inside the Labour Party was threatened by the resolution.
Standing up for the right of women to decide how they want to run their own organisation is about principles because these principles have an immediate and real ettect on the practice and participation ot women in movement. Only when women can see that the Labour Party offers a real forum for women to organise themselves, to discuss and campaign on the issues that concern them — and to be responsible for exercising and developing democracy in their own organisations, will women sup port, join and build the Labour Party in anything like the numbers needed to ettect Labour's recovery.
Only when women - like other oppressed sections of society — have real control over their own organisations within the movement, will that movement be able to take on their demands, and fight for genuine socialist polices.
The decision of the wac executive to join the Icc and the trade union delegations in supporting these proposals was a major retreat from their previously firmly held principles about the right of women to organise themselves - and contributed to a major defeat for women in the party.
They effectively joined with those bureaucrats who, like Margaret Prosser (women's officer for the ToWl), would rather trust the men in the movement to look after their organisations and interests, than the women at the women's conference
which is, she says 'dominated by women who want change yesterday, jam today and women, women trade unionists, don't get much look in..? and where discussion is 'hogged by those who shout the loudest'.
The power in the labour movement rests with the people who occupy the top positions in it and not with its rank and file: and clearly that power will be used now to attack the autonomy, and the policies of the women's conference. We can and will, as the Women's Action Committee advise, campaign for our demands about the reorganisation of the women's conference. But it's not defeatism — just realism — to recognise that we won't win them against the present Labour leadership.
The questions posed at conterence tor women and for the left as a whole were about principles, about tactics and about alliances. It was always the case that there was another — more principled, practical and ultimately more effective strategy to win what we wanted for women's conference. And that was for the women in the movement, through the National Labour Women's Committee and the women's conference to decide — possibly through a specially convened rules revision conference. Of course, any proposals would have eventually to go to the NEc for ratification they could then have gone from a position of strength rather than weakness — and they could, with real consultation, have represented what the women in the movement wanted. We could also have won. INTERNATIONAL No 7 November/December 1986
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