Get these passed at Labour Party and trade union meetings. Send a copy of resolutions carried to the Labour Party NEC and to the Defend Clause IV Campaign. 1. We support the decisions of the 1993 and 1994 Labour Party conferences to reaffirm Clause Four of the Constitution. We believe that the basic principles in Clause Four are still valid.
We call on the leadership and the NEC to abandon their proposal to engage in a debate on the Party's constitution. Such a debate can only be divisive at a time when maximum effort should be put into campaigning against the Tory government. 2. We note that the Tories are now in total disarray and cannot be sure of commanding a majority in the House of Commons. This should give Labour additional incentive to step up their attacks on the Tories and keep them on the run.
We believe that Labour should not let anything deflect it from attacking the Tories and campaigning in favour of Labour's alternative policies.
We therefore deeply regret the current proposals to re-examine Labour's constitution and are particularly concerned by the decision to hold an unnecessary and expensive special Party conference on April 29.
This prevents the conferences of Labour's affiliated organisations even considering the proposals. Also the Party should be concentrating on the forthcoming local government elections.
We therefore call on the NEC to call off the special conference in the belief that the Party's annual conference in the autumn gives ample opportunity to debate any constitutional reforms which will genuinely help unite the Party before the next General Election. moment. I mean, l understand why people have raised this, and there are people who have raised it across a whole spectrum of the political party." Frost: "Jack Straw, Neil Kinnock.... Blair: "Absolutely right. But I don't think that anyone is saying now, looking ahead to the next two years in the run-up to an election, that this is what we should focus on. And I think for the vast majority of British People, I don't think they sit out there and debate the intricacies of the Labour Party Constitution."
SOCIALIST OUTLOOK No.75. 7 January 1995, Page 6