Attacking the left, grovelling to monarchy New realism turns to old royalism

One is thinking of voting for that John Smith chappie in future No wonder they call Labour Her Majesty's opposition. Party leader John Smith, eager to maintain Labour's invisible profile, was reportedly furious when shadow cabinet members Jack Straw and Mo Mowlem dared raise the scarcely radical subject of reforming the royal family last week. Yet a poll published in The Sunday Telegraph reveals that 24 per cent of Labour MPs favour a republic, while a further 32 percent want to see the monarchy scaled down. 30 per cent had no comment or gave no view, only 14 per cent explicitly favoured a no change policy. Nevertheless, Labour's spokesperson on constitution• al affairs, Graham Allen, told the Telegraph that the quesLabour's agenda. become.' Printed by Tridant Press, Edenbridge, Kent. Published by Idolrare Ltd, PO Box 1109, London N4 2UU tion was certainly not on Out-and-out right-winger Austin Mitchell MP rightly commented: The Labour Party's policy on this is ridiculous... and shows how absurdly conformist we have Only Keith Vaz - once a member of the hard left Campaign Group - spoke up for the House of Windsor: I absolutely support the monarchy. There should be no change! A democratic republic has been a basic demand of British radicalism for centuries, stretching back through the Marxist tradition to Tom Paine and the Levellers. Socialists today should demand nothing less.