Active campaigns boost Alliance election effort
The Socialist Alliance ran a highly dynamic campaign – far outstripping all the other organisations who stood in the General Election in England and Wales.
In a high proportion of constituencies in which the Socialist Alliance stood activists delivered two or even three leaflets through every door, as well as producing the freepost leaflet.
Public meetings were held in the majority of areas, and hundreds of street stalls gave us a high profile. Many local Alliances visited workplaces as well as participating in hustings that were organised by other organisations.
Locally and nationally, the Socialist Alliance participated in a myriad of broader campaigns and showed solidarity with workers in struggle.
We were active in support of postal workers striking against the attacks management meted out to soften them up in advance of privatisation, and on London Underground workers’ picket lines.
We were on the streets showing our opposition to Son of Star Wars and the new Terrorism Act and in solidarity with Belgian, French, Spanish and other trade unionists protesting against the closure of Marks and Spencers’ European outlets.
Local Socialist Alliance groups were involved in actions in defence of the NHS and education, against the sell off of council housing, in defence of asylum seekers and in what ever local activity was going on as well as giving local profile to our national policies.
Our election broadcast not only allowed us to get across many of our key political ideas to a wider audience than we would otherwise have done, but also illustrated that our supporters were different from the career politicians of the mainstream parties.
The feedback both from our own supporters and those who phoned in for information subsequently was extraordinarily positive.
We bombarded the media with information about our policies and activities nationally and locally. It was frustrating that the BBC didn’t stick to its own guidelines and give us the coverage they promised – never mind what we merited from the point of view of newsworthiness in a campaign that was usually as dull as ditchwater.
It was particularly irritating that most of the media barons, echoing Millbank’s own line, consistently focused on the differences between the SLP and ourselves – despite the absence of Scargill’s party from any visible campaigning.
While the Socialist Alliance was not given the serious discussion of our policies and campaigns that was merited, at least in the broadsheets we were mentioned in passing on a number of occasions.
Some of this was a result of paranoia from the Blair leadership which was desperate to brief against us – but actually succeeded in promoting name recognition for us.
All of this led to hundreds of phone calls, e-mails and letters into the national office as well as many new contacts made on the ground.
Sitting taking calls in the Socialist Alliance office as the Election Broadcast went out and subsequently was exhilarating as well as exhausting. Two thirds of the calls we took were from people who wanted to join up there and then.
A majority of those we spoke to were current or recently departed Labour Party members, furious with the record of the Blair government and the manifesto for the second term.
Many wanted to use the skills they had gained over years of campaigning for the Labour Party to get out an argue for people to support the Socialist Alliance.
Two issues dominated political discussions with callers. A number people supported most of our policies but were not convinced about our stand on asylum seekers.
Sometimes the subsequent discussion seemed productive, but on other occasions stalemate was reached. While this was initially depressing, on reflection it is not surprising that the weight of the myths and prejudice peddled by the media and the mainstream parties means that one conversation might not be sufficient to undercut the lies.
The answer must be to continue to campaign on this issue both as the Alliance and through involvement in broader campaigns.
Particularly in the last ten days of the campaign, many wanted to know what our stand was on the question of Europe. It was clear that the Tories’ determination bring this issue to centre stage, along with asylum, had an impact on the topics that people wanted to address even though this was not a priority in determining how people voted.
Some were critical of the fact that we had not included our attitude to the single currency in our list of key pledges, although in fairness I don’t think anyone could have predicted quite how high profile this debate would become.
Most were convinced when we explained why we opposed the Maastricht convergence criteria, but at the same time distanced ourselves from the "little England" attitude not only of the Tories, but also to some extent of the SLP.
All of this work, nationally and locally meant more political engagement with potential supporters than the other parties even attempted.
And it meant that the Socialist Alliance had to garner more central resources than it had previously had, as well as persuade activists on the ground to put in an enormous amount of time and effort.
In building on this impressive start for the future, we should learn from some of the things we could have done better.
The logistical effort in producing the national material to the tight timetable we had was enormous – and what suffered was thorough discussion about content.
We didn’t engage enough with questions that potential supporters were likely to want answers to. Setting out the Socialist Alliance’s own policies is vital – but it is not sufficient.
We should have predicted that there would be a competition to win voters who were breaking from New Labour, and addressed more explicitly the questions that such people wanted answered.
Other than producing one poster stating that the Liberal Democrats supported privatisation – but with nothing to back this up – we didn’t challenge the image that Charles Kennedy was able successfully to put forward that his party was a left alternative to New Labour.
Of course many local Alliances took this up through their local activity. In London for example, where the Liberal Democrats were often active campaigning against tube privatisation, we were able to point out that they were supporting privatisation of other services.
But an examination of their record was essentially absent from our national material.
We didn’t really deal with the fact that the Greens have a record of winning protest votes. Our manifesto had some positive things to say on the environment, though it needs further development.
Even the priority pledges took up ecological questions – but in my experience this was not a issue that was actually highlighted on the ground. As well as rectifying these problems, we also need to find ways of engaging with the weaknesses of the Greens’ overall platform and their record where they have achieved any influence at local level.
The question of how we responded to the SLP was more difficult, given the fact that the media wanted to bang on about the differences between them and us. We had tried to push for co-operation, but had been met with a blank wall from Scargill.
It is not clear that we could have done very much to shift this situation. But we need to address whether we would have gained from producing something setting out our attitude.
We should look for the future at producing more material which gives details of policy commitments on particular areas or debates with other forces.
A debate surfaced in some areas about the balance between agitation and propaganda. To what extent was the priority to make sure that every potential voter knew the Socialist Alliance existed, to what extent was it possible and important to debate through the arguments behind the policies – and the record of other parties – with as many people as possible?
This discussion needs to continue, and within the context that while the organisations involved have different practices and traditions, none of us have the blueprint for the most effective way to build the new type of formation that the Socialist Alliance represents, in the particular conditions we find ourselves in today.
There is a commitment from the Executive of the Socialist Alliance to draw together the experiences of best practice in the campaign, and hopefully as well to learn from the weaknesses in order to better prepare us for the future.