On 6 May 1999 Tommy Sheridan, head of the Scottish Socialist Party list in Glasgow, was elected as a beating, Member of the first Scottish Parliament for three centuries. This electoral breakthrough put the SSP, created only a few months earlier, at the forefront of the political scene. But the roots of the new party are much deeper. FRANCIS CURRAN and MURRAY and SMITH, International coordinators of the SSP, explored what happened in an article for Inprecor, French language magazine of the Fourth tax International. Below we print an edited version. y introducing the direct action. poll tax in 1989, hatcher made | double error. Until cess was Tommy Sheridan's A wide network of local to Glasgow council when serving a six committees developed, federated at a national level, with month jail sentence for try.
Wing to stop a warrant sale of a as the main spokesperson. poll tax non-payerBut, while Militant played CO SH OUTHHEUTS a dominant role, this strug- of so called debtors. th al oae real nity minti In 1992 Thatcher's succesSor ola WORC militants, Trotskyist and lib- Election. ertarians, alongside Labour Scotland his victory created double disappointment. Tr nemoco nc unon We were condemned to five bers, Nationalists and many moreyca Tories and Labour's defeat, coming into political activity set back the perspective of collaboration Coasa a HOTOMOUs Scottish Parliament. between forces from diverse strengthened backgrounds and began to consciousness change ways of behaving and social demands. T'he Jurch to the right of LP begun Scottish Militant Kinnock, Labour leaves the reign Smith, who died in 1994, and extended under Tony and the normalisation of the The T40% a oourxcois natonas Neil Kinnock, party with a petit-bourgcois Militant left the eadership and a Labour Party in 1992 (a year basc, was tryig, witn some before comrades in England)
780CECH rotes of disappointed Labour TUICES Profiting from the author- On the Left the idea was ity gained in the campaign growing that it was necessary against the Poll lax. to create cially in working class arcas Labour. The potential was first clectoral success of the demonstrated anew far left in Scotland, securing success of Tommy Sheridan several in the European elections in and 1994, where councillors in Glasgow. percent in the The most spectacular suc- Glasgow. The fight against the Poll Tax came sooner and stayed stronger in Scotland It would have been ver casy for SML to fall into self proclaimed triumphalism. But the organisation underthe alternative by itself; it was necessary to work to try to create a united, anti-capitalist force. In Struggles and debates on the Left of lory by the In the carly 1990s Socialist Forums began mectinks orcanisca Joldus This Socialist Movement nationalist (SSM, left Liberation current linked left) and the Communist Party of scouand tonc or the fragments born out of the under explosion of the CPGB), continued under In 1994, for the first time, representatives of SML participated. Subsequently they accepted an offer to jointly National organise McCombes, name SML, launched the idea of an elecpopular DIOC. develop a left Alliance, to contest the first clections for the Parliament, perspective which was gaining credence given expected victory of the L.P in the next legislative elections. following ycar marked by new struggles: the strike at limex in Dundee. the campaign against water privatisation. In 1994-95 the whole Criminal| Justice Act was characterised by mass, illegal demonstrations. Although the law never been used against militant ecologist advocates In a campaign against the building of a motorway in SOlTASOW HS OH traditional left encountered radical ecologist some of whom subsequently became part of the Socialist Allance and then the SSh A lost opportunity The sdca or a socialist Alliance was making some vations in the SSM where a section the Party and even more so in Liberation grated into the SNP Things accelerated, howCc aana co c Bascaycu tion of Arthur Scargill who 1995 announced his intenThis interested a number of political forces in Scotland, pluralist as st did in England, and could have been the opportusocialist party. Unfortunately Scargill's 14001 CC 08S Dos tial, with the result that conceptions wasted this annual Party, OCHISI reduced to a shadow of itself. It is only today, five years the later, that one can begin to (SNP see in London the outline of a new English radical left. discussions berween Scargill organisations from the OTUEH JouHucrcuol points. He rejected pluralism, the entry into the new party of forum. organised political currents The especially wanted to bas publiciy the Militant and SiVP). And Scargill refused to contemSOCRISE plate an autonomous section of the party in Scotland. By his inflexible attitude Scargill made his sole contribution to the emergence of a new political force. i ne noson toar ne was going nis ovn party baciu do matter what, ine inco an Sc CC the launch of the February 1996. The Scottish was What did this new SSA represent at the moment of its direct birth? SML joined, as an The Movement also joined, members SUBIE though many militants, CULICHE wing militants from the SNP joined cither then or later. The CPS also opted not to join, though a number of its members and officials did so, inc tolns Secretary Bill Bonnar. There were als0 several small far left groups as well as independents from a wide supporters Talks SUCiRE HUTCECHS such as Rosie Kane, the leading figure in the radical ecol. current, Making the link between ccology and the anti-capital15t strugoic, one or tac siu-
Scottish Socialist Party The rise of
:: the and 3: the SSP was If vou × Red". destiny.
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decided percent ferred gles, defence SOURER and NovemberGlaciers party ycars.
causing General Ine most the question really In British the only clections The in Glasgow. clection marked by landslide, lished for the This turning Those point in May 2000: Engineering corkers occupy the Kramer Energy Clydebank, supported by campaigners outside defeat of the Tories but also devolution would lead to the creation of an The autonomous Parliament in between world Political life in bribery: became Store national, distinct from that in England. A referendum in September approved the autonomy project proposed by Blair, open- lo the party ang the way to the creation of organisations. a Scottish Parliament.
The SSA had taken an decision which positioned it well in this new political frame- which pendent socialist This became its identity card nationalism only marginally charac Carter antiEnglish rather more the expression of the profoundly democratic aspirations of the Scottish people to control their own Historically this aspiration has always been championed inc Icit and the workers' movement than by the right, and today support for independence is stronger among the working class and It is, therefore, natural to fuse this democratic aspira.
social transformation. In this fusion is found the key to every project for emancipaits and SP Tommy Sheridan pro The On a historical scale it is true that important questions will action not today elections are an excelway political activity, making our before the deas known on a mass scale There is no contradiction been ROSCO with struggles - elections and Did they strussics compiement cach other. The new porters and us draws scandals The 600-800 party workers' representatives who stand as April. will live on workers' half his salary, giving the rest Our profile is important:
gave and put forward proposals SSP meet the needs of the here and crucial to involved in struggles, small and large, and not simply disappear when thoge are no We reject leftist platitudes that 'elections aren't our ter stood in 4. But of carrying our the of Tommy Sheridan. But bad news. began to SSA. in the SLE richest of Tommy mORe has estabenergies which has become the the first Communist Republican ol neW the SSP call reformist. in Electoral con114807 and elector per the parWCEC With branches Outlook 1p: san: SitIOE arterve