Labour care
Two, three, many Guildford Fours? The Winchester Three - three young Irish people sentenced to 25 years for conspiracy to murder Tom King and persons unknown two years ago - were released in April following their successful appeal.
Within weeks, for the first time since their incarceration, the
Broadwater Farm Three (Winston Silcott, Mark Braith-
waite and Engin Raghip - gaoled for the murder of PC Blakelock
during the Tottenham riots of
Autumn 1985) have seen their campaign for freedom move centre stage with support from the BBC's Inside Story
documentary and the Reverend Jesse Jackson.
What is the significance of this? Has the state lost control of the situation? Are we likely to
witness more framed up Irish and black people walking free from the prison gates?
Seven months ago, when the
Guildford Four were released some on the left were so stunned they could hardly believe it was a victory. For the first time in twenty years of struggle the frame-up of Irish political the challenge to Labour
Pre-election fears about the 'Islamic threat' to Labour failed to produce any critical look at Labour's policies or record. Far from it: defending the lack of black councillors in Bolton (only one out of 60 after years of Labour control of the council, council leader Bob Howarth told a radio interviewer that you have to be in the Labour Party 15 years before you can become a councillor (patently not true of course, except for women, black people, and anybody too left wing).
And when leaflets distributed by an Islamic Party supporter in Bolton accused another sitting SOCIALIST OUTLOOK no 25, June 1990
UPDATE prisoners was being officially recognised. It was tempting to regard this as some clever trick, a manocuvre to strengthen the British hand.
The freeing of the Four may have given the Accord a vital blood transfusion at a time when it appeared to be on its death bed. But that was comparatively far less significant than the major setback it represented for the state and the historic breakthrough for the struggle against British rule in Ireland.
The govemment and the judiciary faced a dilemma. They could carry on holding the prisoners as, effectively, hostages to terrorise Irish nationalists (in Britain and Ireland) into silence. But they thereby risked the continued discrediting of the system that kept the prisoners in gaol. Or they could release the prisoners, but risk opening the floodgates -having recognised that criminalisation and *antiterrorism' had failed.
In a no-win situation they opted for a release and hoped that continued terror combined with damage limitation would responded by saying This is a complete joke. And it demonstrates the cultural chasm between Islamic fundamentalism in which bribery is normal practice and our own democratic society where it is not.
There is no doubt that the Islamic Party's platform and campaign was reactionary. It has called for the suspension of the death threat to Rushdie - on the grounds that he was mentally unstable whilst writing Satanic Verses, but has called for the book to be banned. One of their main campaigning demands was for state funding for Muslim schools. Leaflets handed out in
hold the line. But given the defeat they were forced to concede that was never really on the cards. It helped prise open already ex- isting divisions within the es- tablishment about the efficacy of criminalisation, draconian "emergency' legislation, dirty tricks and assas- sination squads as a method of deal- When will the Broadwater Three be set free? ing with the Irish 'problem' In freeing the Winchester Three, the judiciary may feel it has saved its bacon (albeit at fur- ther cost to the government's Irish criminalisation policy) but in reality it can only unleash a further hornets nest of problems. Foremost these is a among deepening of the crisis of con- fidence in the criminal justice system - whatever the liberal media pundits might claim. The Tories are committed to more for homosexuals than they do for Muslims. But that's not the point, nor the end of the story for Labour. The Islamic Party will disap pear from the media spotlight, at least in the near future; but Britain's black voters will not go away - and without any serious attempts to rid the party of its racism, build its black member- ship and black representation at all levels of the party, and to develop policies that meet the needs of Britain's black com- munities - they may desert Labour. Jane Wells
FRANED PRISONERS
ITE-LIFE INNOCENT SET HIM FREE/ Chris Post ЭL. abolishing the right to silence -as they have already done in the North of Ireland. Not only will this be more difficult, but so will the unofficial smear campaigns when Irish and black political prisoners choose to exercise that right. Thatcher campaigned against trial by television' when the media belatedly began to debate issues like the Birmingham Six: but it has now been recognised that such defendants themselves can be prejudiced by media coverage and public comments by government ministers.
Similarly the debate opened up by the Guildford release on the unreliability of uncorroborated confessions and the effects of police terror tactics and corruption has been a major boost to the campaigns for other framed-up prisoners.
This process cannot now be reversed. The release of the Broadwater Farm Three and the Birmingham Six must surely be attainable goals in the foreseeable future. The labour movement must therefore put these campaigns high on its agenda -defending the rights of Irish and black people.
Piers Mostyn Page 5