L ONG before the Lewinsky scandal hit the headlines, Bill Clinton was reatly aescridea as someone who would "smile in your face while he pisses down your leg":
In the small world of British left politics, the equivalent is the Alliance for Workers Liberty, whose long and grisly track record of failure to work for any length of time and with any consistency with other currents is matched only by its succession of proposals for "unity" and for new "broad" organisations.
The one organisation which appeared to represent an exception to the rule of AWL sectarianism was the Welfare State Network. For over four years the WSN managed to operate as an organisation linking activists and campaigns from a wide range of political organisations and backgrounds - including the AWL, Outlook, Labour Party, Labour Party, and others who simply wanted to fight back in defence of health and welfare services and benefits.
Although there were a number of political - and even some more major programmatic - differences between the various component currents of the WSN, we found in practice that these could easily be contained within a common organisation which remained focused on the unifying issue of welfare state campaign work.
Indeed it was not differences over political line, but the collapse of trust and the eradication of • internal democracy within the Network which eventually brought its demise as a broad The WSN itself staged successful lobbies, marches, meetings and protests as well as conferences, and it launched a newspaper Action for Health & Welfare, Till Mountford: her letter seeks "continued support" Liverpool was artended for the brand new AWL-run newspaper produced with substantial resources from the AWL, but 'with a degree of "power sharing", with John Lister from Socialist Outlook elected as joint editor, and initially open access to a wide range of contributors.
The newspaper won a considerable degree of respect in the wider labour movement, and helped the WSN develop a base of affiliations in the trade unions. H owever this open regime suffered a setback last year, with the decision to move from monthly to fortnightly publication - one forced through the WN Steering Committee on the insistence of the AWL.
Although the newspaper still professed the same cojectives, the frequency of publication was clearly intended to meet the needs of the AWL rather than match the pace of any objective events or the rhythms of movement activity.
Fortnightly publication made Action even more reliant on financial, organisational and political input from the AWL, narrowed the range of contributors, and led to the paper being increasingly filled not with the specific campaignorientated material which had been its early strength, but with general "lefty" political articles on topics unrelated to the Welfare State, largely written by AWLers. Many of these extraneous articles were in themselves politically contentious, and divi1995: The Welfare State Network drew a sizeable audience and a broad platform to its April conference in London by just seven people - five AWL, plus the Chair, Alec McFadden (SLP) and John Lister from Socialist Outlook. That meeung heard Cathy Nugent, the AWL joint editor of Action for Health & Welfare, outline a series of proposals to change the paper, We found including a return in practice that monthly publication differences could which would easily be contained focus more within a common closely on organisation focused welfare state on the unifying issue campaigning issues. of welfare state She appealed for greater practical involvement in editorial and production work and financial input from the other currents. AWL comrades also stated their wish to launch a new, broad newspaper of the left. It was agreed that after the various participating organisations had been able to discuss these proposals, a meeting of the four WSN officers would be convened in Birmingham in early January to decide any changes. he January meeting 'was cancelled at the AWL, with attempt to fix a new date, and has never taken place.
However the AWL was clearly working very different agenda. Even while they were cancelling the WSN officers Inceling, their comrades were preparing an operation to hi-jack the WSN and its newspaper, to transform it into their so-called "broad" newspaper. They were ringing round seeking sponsors for the new paper -but consciously not asking the WSN's other officers and Steering Committee.
•n mid-January, a new publication, "Action for Solidarity", plopped through mailboxes of WSN affiliates and subscribers, accompanied by a letter from WSN National Organiser Till Mountford WSN headed notepaper, carrying also the name of Alec McFadden, who knew nothing of the letter or the new paper asking people to "reaffiliate to the and subscribe to Action".
The letter went on to stress the alleged continuity between Action for Health & Welfare and the new (and unilaterally-launched) AWL As Tonto says in the joke as he and the Lone Ranger are attacked by marauding Indians "What do you mean "we", paleface?" The newspaper and the letter are a transparent political fraud. The renaming and redesign of the paper are unilateral decisions not of the Welfare State Network, but of the AWL and its political leadership. As John Lister, announcing his immediate resignation from the WSN - having been ousted as joint editor by the AWL coup -commented: "Jill Mountford's letter was a sectarian master-stroke. It simultaneously seeks to annex the resources of the WSN for the latest AWL publication, while making it impossible to relaunch Action for Health & Welfare as an independent publication." At has the AWL attempted to secure agreement to these changes with the elected leadership of the WSN. Nor have they made any honest approach to other left wing organisations to invite their involvement. The new paper is not a broad publication, nor serous effort at left unity or "solidarity", but a cynical hi-jack carried out by an organisation which specialises in such manoeuvres. As John Lister comments "This latest, absurd, manoeuvre may in the short term secure a few misguided affiliations from union branches or individuals who fondly cherish the illusion that Action for Solidarity is still the paper of the WSN. "But it will NOT build a broad and it has effectively sealed the fate of the WSN, which can no longer operate in the absence of any basis of trust."
B y destroying over four years' collective work in building a serious attempt at a broad the AWL has now - as many sceptics predicted from the start - reverted to type, contenting itself once more with a tame, sterile, sectarian front organisation pliable to the whims of AWL guru Sean Matgamna, rather than continuing any attempt to link up with wider forces in the real world to influence the class struggle. It is a special irony, therefore, that this blatant and destructive move should coincide with the AWLs publication of a special issue of their magaLeft unity zine Workers Liberty, with a screaming has to start with cover headline honesty, "UNITY! How do transparency, we get left unity?" democracy and Here's a hint, comrades. Start integrity with honesty, transparency, democracy and integrity. If any one of these qualities had informed your organisation's recent antics, we could still have a functioning broad campaign in defence of the welfare state. John Lister's verdict sums up