Farewell to the working class?
Jane Wells looks at Kinnock's 'final solution' for party members after the next election. Despite some disappointments in last month's local elections, Labour is still far enough ahead in the polls to warrant serious attention by the powers that be. City businessmen take Shadow Chancellor John Smith to lunch; and a television documentary examining Kinnock's suitablity as a resident at Number 10 concludes that he's not a total write-off. Praise indeed.
That's the context for the next stages in restructuring the Labour Party. As the next general election approaches, the leadership's plans to rein in members' involvement - and more importantly deny them any control over policy - come sharply into focus.
This, make no mistake about it, is Labour preparing for govemment. To get elected, reckon the party managers, you have to get the approval of those who count in opinionforming: journalists, industry and the city. This you do by achieving 'respectability and by responding (by giving in) to any criticisms they may have of your policies or party. Naturally, left-wing policies are out (unilateralism, economic planning and public ownership, trade union and minority rights). And, crucially, party structures have to be changed, to transform Labour from its working class roots into a full bourgeois, social democratic party.
In many respects Kinnock is well on the way to achieving his aims.
Since he took over as leader he has overseen the reversal of many key policies through the mechanism of the policy review. The creation of the National Constitutional Committee has ensured the snag-free prosecution and expulsion of scores of socialists from the party; and the previously independent womens' and youth organisations have simply been abolished and replaced with entirely leadership-friendly structures. Control is increasingSOCIALIST OUTLOOK no 25, June 1990
FEATURES Kinnock: on the way to a final solution
ly centralised: the national membership drive
now means new members come through head
office first; party officers and publications are
loyal to the leadership or dispensed with;
regional conferences stick to regional discus-
sions only.
Party democracy has come under attack
too. Kinnock has so far managed to get his
way on replacing the selection of prospective
parliamentary candidates by General Commit-
tees with a local "electoral college'; and he has
ensured that challenges to his leadership
within the Parliamentary Party will be less ef-
fective, with more MPs now required to re"The NEC has assumed an unprecedented political and organisational weight in the party, allowing the leadership to initiate policy, and giving the NEC a wider range of executive powers"
quest a challenge, and with the introduction of
"One Member One Vote' for the CLPs in any
election.
The NEC has also gradually assumed an
unprecedented political and organisational
weight in the party, allowing the leadership to
initiate policy, with the membership forced to
respond, and giving the NEC a much wider
range of executive powers - including the now
routine practice of choosing or even imposing
candidates in by-elections.
There is much more of the same - and
worse - to come, though.
Next on the list and most dangerous are the
fundamental - and perhaps irreversible -
refors planned for discussion at this year's
conference, with implementation to stretch
over the next few years into the next parlia-
ment. All are subject, in theory, to consult-
ation - but Labour's leaders, through Wal-
worth Road press briefings, have signalled
their priority 'hidden agenda'.
Andrew Wiard/Report
Tame Fleet Street reporters duly regurgitate publicity supremo Peter Mandleson's double-speak under headlines like 'Labour members to have more say on policy-making - when of course the changes will result in just the opposite. A membership pacified by Thatcherism and New Realism, and increasingly excluded from any real say in policy making is expected to toe the line as it has done to a large extent over the last five years.
Kinnock can only get away with it as long as the membership let him. But whilst factors out there in the real world - the balance of class forces - have allowed Kinnock to put
the party into reverse on policy, he has also used the opportunity to introduce fundamental structural changes which will protect his policy shifts when members become more confident and organised again. That is why the current priority for Kinnock is organisational changes - self protection - and why the fight for the left at this, and probably next year's conference, will centre on protecting party democracy
Farewell to the working class
The working class has got to go, is the admen's main message. Even though the pollsters are now telling us that Labour is winning the C2 (skilled working class) vote, it looks better in the papers if Labour isn't too closely linked with the unions.
This means that moves are afoot to exclude unions from choosing parliamentary candidates, through the introduction of selection by 'One Member One Vote' to replace the electoral college (similarly for the election of party leader); and to reduce their blockvote share at conference. More votes for constituency delegates at conference has long been a demand of the left: Kinnock's sudden conversion is more a sign of his willingness to move to a social democratic model than any
Page 23
Labour Andrew Wiard/Report
Pleased to have ditched the working class concem to take note of the members.
Reducing the weight of the block vote has to be accompanied by an increase in a passive party membership, and a restriction members' say over policy, if Kinnock is to continue to get his way. Press reports indicate that Walworth Road is looking to cut the trade union share of the vote at conference to, initially, 70 percent, with further reductions as individual membership increases. Easier said than done; a miserable recruitment drive complete, with targetted mail shots and credit card incentives, has met with limited success. Nevertheless, changes to policy making procedures are coming in thick and fast.
Consensus not class politics
Speaking at a recent meeting of Tribune Group MPs, Kinnock loyalist Tom Sawyer was reported as claiming that the policy review had been by far the most successful format for policy-making to date. He went on to argue for a revised structure which would involve a more "sifted' gathering of delegates (from regions, unions, PLP, shadow cabinet etc) who would develop policy in commissions, reporting to conference on a two-year cycle. I see this as particularly important when Labour is in office' he said, in a rare moment of straight-talking.
This proposal is at the heart of the NEC's 'Future of Labour Party Conference' consultation document, and success on this is key for Kinnock. What party managers want is consensus policy developed at the top, and delivered ready-packaged to the members and the media: no more rows, or embarrassing incidents when the members propose policy or try to make up their own minds.
The replacement of conference as we know it by a highly centralised, stage-managed talking shop would effectively cut out members completely from policy making.
Short of such a complete overhaul though, Page 24
FEATURES there is a 'Plan B'. This involves a series of measures, all of which will restrict democracy and carve members out.
Resolutions and even subjects to be debated will be sifted through regional conferences or specially created bureaucratic committees. CLPs will no longer be able to submit amendments to resolutions; this would cut their participation by half (whilst at the same time, the NEC could be given new powers to amend CLP resolutions!). Rule change resolutions will not be allowed except at rules revision conferences every three or four years. And changes to NEC elections to prevent MPs standing in the constituency section will ensure that left candidates have little chance of
Many if not all of these changes, described by Party General Secretary Larry Whitty as mere "tinkering' amendments, will be put before this year's conference. As with the policy review, conference will have no right to amend the NECs proposals. Once passed, rule changes would then be put to the first conference after the general election. Only two NEC members voted against the package: Dennis Skinner and Tony Benn. All this means that a Labour Party in Govemment will have a free rein on policy (most importantly to impose an incomes policy): members and the unions will be powerless to object.
"Members Only': An end to
accountability
It is in this context that the move to make reselection of sitting MPs more difficult, and to reduce accountability of MPs by the introduction of 'One Member One Vote', comes sharply into focus.
Yet another "consultation' document from the NEC proposes that in future, sitting Labour MPs will be subject to reselection only if a majority of members agree to a contest in a postal ballot. On past experience, from the
notorious pre-1981 days when a GC vote of no confidence was the required trigger-mechanism for reselections, there hardly were any. When a vote did go through, as in the case of Newham North West MP Reg Prentice (later to become a Tory Minister), it took years of intemal battles before he could be ousted. If the NEC gets its way on this there will be no more reselections, meaning no new women or black MPs and the domination of the PLP by white middle class men will be guaranted well into the next century. Most importantly, Labour MPs in a Labour Govemment would be at liberty to make things up as they go along: conference (whatever may be left of it) policy commitments can be torn up. No reselections, no party accountability. Members will be powerless to insist that party policy is observed.
It is an almost inevitable consequence of Kinnock's "electioneering by proxy', with only opinion-formers (and not the working class) in his sights, that top-down reforms, introducing top-down democracy with little say for the rank and file, must follow.
Insofar as there is such a rationale, or grand plan behind Labour's lurch to the right, it is misguided - even if vote-catching is the only immediate and ultimate aim.
Protest voting
Labour's current lead in the polls is evidence surely of common sense (and Marxist) psephology: voting behaviour (and political belief) is determined more by experience than ideas. Interest rates and high poll tax bills have much more to do with current protest voting than any positive approval of the vague package of policies that constitute Kinnock's new realism (although tragically, he will undoubtedly make political capital from the coincidence).
That evidence leads some on the left in the party to conclude that oppositions don't win elections, but govemments lose them. True enough, to a point. But it is a serious mistake to go on and argue (as some do) that the argument over policy and democracy can be kept 'in the family' of Labour loyalists, and that you lay the groundwork for left-wing policies not by campaigning now for socialist politics, but by refining party procedures to make sure the structures for accountability are there ready for when the left is on the up again.
It's a tall order, but we need an approach that embraces and builds on the experiences of the struggles that working people face every day, and brings them into the party to join the fight for working class democracy. Labour Party Socialists, as part of the Socialist Movement, is an attempt to build such a campaigning approach.
SOCIALIST OUTLOOK no 25, June 1990
Peruvian miners fight back Caught between the army and Recent elections in Peru have been marked by a shift to the right, with the strengthening of the FREDEMO coalition behind presidential can- didate Mario Vargas Llosa. But FREDEMO's support was eclipsed at the last minute by previously unknown bourgeois independent Alberto Fujimori, who got 30 per cent of the vote. This suggests that support for FREDEMO was more a reaction to the hyper inflation, unemployment, terror and corruption of the previous APRA regime of Alan Garcia than over twice that in the mid-1980s - partly due to a split in the main coali- Despite these setbacks and the increasing repression faced by workers and peasants, the Peruvian trade unions and peasants' organisations remain organised and combative. JORGE QUEZADA LINAN of the Mineworkers Federation has recently been on a European tour to high- light the repression faced by the workers' movement, and campaign for the release of miners' president Victor Taipe. Before the elections he gave Socialist Outlook this account of the situation facing miners and the
There are about 60,000 permanent mineworkers in Peru, plus about 30,000 on short term contracts and 25,000 involved in gold prospecting work. Mining represents about 50 percent of foreign earnings, so we are a very key economic group. Despite this, issues of concern to miners are ignored by the government and the companies.
Every year about 100 miners die in accidents in the mines. 25 per cent suffer from lung disease as a result of their work. The mining camps are very isolated from the cities and 40 per cent of miners in Peru have no housing. Many of the 60 per cent who do have somewhere to live, live in 4 foot by 4 foot rooms without basic amenities like water and electricity. The health service which is provided by the government and the mining companies is awful.
In the majority of mining camps there is no education provided for the children of miners, except maybe at the most basic level or primary school. So the youth in the mining communities have very limited opportunities for obtaining an education. The situation has become even worse with the general economic crisis in Peru. In the last year inflation has Peruvian peasants are a key part of the left SOCIALIST OUTLOOK no 25, June 1990
FEATURES Sendero tion, the United Left. left in Peru. power of miners.
a positive vote. The left vote was squeezed to 11 per cent from being been running at something like 2,700 per cent - which really brings down the spending So we are fighting for collective bargaining at a national level, in order to deal with these important problems of basic wages and condi- away
tions of work and life.
The way in which the unions are structured in Peru is very different from union structures in Europe. In Peru there are individual trade unions and worker's organisations because of the isolation and distance between the dif-
ferent zones. They relate to different economic groups, power bases and businesses in each area. It is to bring together all those workplace unions that we founded the federation. We hoped that by having national collective bargaining we would do with unnecessary sectoral workplace negotiation and divisions. The businessmen are afraid of this because it would mean that instead of little unions in isolated parts of the country going through their own discussions we would have some national power. In the past two years we have organised three strikes. The first was in July of 1988. We managed to win a Supreme decree - a law recognising the right to national collective bargaining But the businessmen went to the courts to block its implementation. In October 1988 we undertook a second strike lasting 59 days, but we didn't manage to force them to negotiate. It is a reflection of the corruption within the judiciary that, after being bribed by the mining businessmen, they Page 25
declared the decree, relating to the national platform, unconstitutional. While we were on strike, the goverment declared a state of emergency in the mining sector. This was intended to break the strike. So we went to a judge and also bribed him to declare the supreme decree, declaring the state of emergency, unconstitutional.
The third strike was called in August last year. The response was a united front of government, businessmen and army in the central area of the country, where many of the mining camps are. The army militarised the whole area. They arrested the main leaders and took them to the barracks. People were prohibited from holding meetings. The army in the militarised zones presented the miners with two choices. To get into an army lorry taking them to the barracks, or get into one of the mining companies lorries and be taken
Peruvian election campagn rally back to work.
It was impossible for an important sector of the mining area to take part in the strike. So we stopped the strike in order to prepare a confrontation over this situation through a general strike.
These strikes have been very combative and have mobilised thousands in marches to the cities to protest. Our brothers have been killed in the course of these marches. They have been assassinated by the security forces. We have had to confront a very evil campaign by the mining companies which has tried to link us with subversive actions. They have spent a fortune in the media and the mining camps in a propaganda campaign trying to isolate the miners from other workers and from the communities in those camps.
The mining companies have been arrogant and intransigent. Settling the dispute could have cost 25 million dollars, but they preferred to spend 50 million dollars to avoid giving in. They know how awful our living conditions are, but they are afraid of agreeing to collective bargaining because they know that it would give the miners a very important Page 26
FEATURES strategic role in the popular movement in Peru.
In the course of our struggles we've made some gains. For instance a law has been passed giving pensions to miners, which means that we are able to retire earlier. The 5th December has been recognised as 'the day of the mine' - it is the anniversary of the foundation of the federation and has been recognised as a day for the miners of Peru.
Those who are employed on contracts are now guaranteed a minimum salary which they didn't previously have. It is now recognised that miners contract industrial diseases previously recognised by the International Labour Organisation but not by the Peruvian authorities. We have also won a kind of subsidy for miners who are ill or who have had accidents.
But so far we have not been able to solve the fundamental problems of living and working conditions in the mines. And so we still insist that our platform should be discussed and we should have national bargaining with the companies. We are preparing our forces so that the miners will become involved in the next strike with greater awareness in order to impose this collective bargaining platform.
We have produced our own newspaper, as a way of communicating with the base of the union. We are carrying out quite an extensive campaign to train grass roots trade unionists and we have working groups who are drawing up alternative proposals for solving the problems that miners suffer.
We are also building self defence committees to protect miners from violence in the area. These brigades have to carry arms in order to protect themselves against people who attack them, because the enemies who attack us no longer understand words, they attack us first - they don't talk.
There is a group called Sendero Luminoso. According to them they are carrying out a revolution. But this isn't true. They have killed our brother workers and they believe
that anyone who doesn't become involved in their guerrilla warfare is a traitor. They have called 'armed strikes' in some mining areas. But their political platform doesn't raise a single union issue relating to workers. The way in which they have called strikes hasn't been democratic. The workers have not been consulted. When workers have not agreed to participate in that form of strike, Sendero have assassinated union leaders.
So the miners of Peru are