Agenda for Socialist Alliance: Manchester Socialist Alliance hosts the conference launching the 'Socialist Charter for a socialist ruture on saturday 15 july. A spokesperson said: "The Charter will provide a framework for all socialists to unite benina. It can be used to promote positive socialist campaigns in the workplace and communities as a whole." Cattle cull coup: the EU veterinary committee looks set to call for the cull of cows in BSE-infected herds to be extended to include those born since 1989. This means around 100,000 cattle being Killed. £225,000 to dine with Blair!: Ruth Rendell and Sir Richard Attenborough are amongst 450 celebrities and employers invited to pav £500 each for the Labour Party's gala dinner at London's Savoy Hotel on July 11. Private donations now account for £6.5 million of party income each year— more than any trade union gives. Presidential hunger striker: A picket of London's Argentine embassy protested asant ne imor conment at Alcidect hrs. tiansen. Christiansen was the presidential candidate of the MAS (Movement to Socialism). He was imprisoned atter police attacked a peaceful demonstration for unemployed rights at Neuquen. On May 15 Christiansen started a hunger strike to demand freedom for himself and fellow imprisoned MAS member Horacio Panario.
Complled by Duncan Chapel Dafydd Morgan THE Welsh Assembly and Maastricht were key issues at this year's Welsh Labour Party conference, the most animated for many years.
Tony Blair's speech to conference struck a strange note, given Labour s recent emphasis on a Welsh Assembly:
"You still believe in British values, in decency. hard work and fairness You are proud to be British but too much of that pride depends on history and nostalgia and not on what Britain is today."
Little wonder that many delegates complained that the speech was "too British" and or little relevance to wales.
Conference voted against the executive, affirming its opposition to any kind of se ecton in education ano is commitment to a compreensive system.
A vote on renationalising the public utilities was lost 2:1 on a show of hands.
Strikers from Cardiff County Unison, who were opposing the Labour council's cuts in housing staff, picketed the conference and moved an emergency resolution Welsh Labour Action (WLA), which is campaigning to strengthen Labour's Assemoly poncy, was extremely acuve and effective, with a successful fringe meeting and a good intervention into the assembly debate_ desnite attemnts hv the conference platform to demonise and marginalise the campaign.
Evidently deep divisions exist on the Assembly within the Welsh Executive. On one wing Anita Gale, Ken Hopkins and Terry Tomas, represent the worst kind of arrogant, complacent and bureaucratic labourism.
The other wing consists of Ron Davies and his supporters, including a large number of Welsh MPs who favour change but shy away from an open fight.
Differences over Proportional RepreCertation terect thece almanne Ron Davies spoke at the IPPR meeting of the need for an "inclusive assembly" and for a "consensus amongst pro-devolution parties to make it a truly Welsh Assembly and not simply a Labour Assembly". He also expressed his support for PR and his view that the policy might change Maastricht's economic consequences will spell disaster for peripheral regions like Wales, which rely so heavily on social spending and public sector employment.
between the general election and the elections for an Assembly. While Socialist Outlook disagrees with Ron's approach-we believe that most would be gained by staging an open fight within the nartv-it is clear that he was giving the green light for others to campaign around the issue. Of course, our vision of the Assembly must also go much further. Cardiff councillor Sue Essex said in the fringe meeting: *the Assembly that we offer must be something genuinely new, which wakens and enlivens Welsh politics.
The issue of Maastricht arose at another fringe meeting, organised by Llew Smith MP to oppose the Single European Currency.
Its economic consequences will spell disaster for peripheral regions like Wales, which rely so heavily on social spending and public sector employment.
The Socialist Outlook view is that the Welsh Assembly should decide whether Wales joins up or not—and that it should decide to reject Maastricht.
The Assembly should be able to choose what nowers to retain in Wales and what to pass on to a British or European level.
We favour electing the Assembly on a proportional basis and allowing it to decide on all the key questions which affect the Welsh people.
In this way it could express Welsh autonomy within a wider British and Euronean federation
Socialist Outlook 104 • June 29,1996. writes HARRY SLOAN