who advocate local democwith Neil Kinnock or But Kinnock's OMOV was not people voting as equals in a meeting but the use of the secret ballot to mobilise a of the SA. activist minority - a very ditferent thing.
place where a postal ballot has been used in this way in the SA has ironically been by the becas Left Alliance - one of the few local Alliances sympathetic to the SP proposals. We should condemn views. Kinnockite OMOV as prac tised by New Labour whilst defending the rights of SA стосіо днаасо Whilst the adoption of the new constitution is a crucial step forward for the SA, it does not resolve the problem of its future development. which in the view of the ISG should be towards a party in ent than England on the lines of the SSP in Scotland.
Risk
Failure to more forward in that direction risks putting a brake on the political development of the Alliance, and in politics failure to move forward is to risk ans The SWP refusal to shift on this creates an ongoing ambiguity on the role of the SA which will not so away On the other hand the new provides ing the SA than the ad hoc situation we had before the One way of keeping the SA moving forward, short of becoming a political party, is for the SA to have a well produced and regular publication which it build itself -something which was called for in a resolution cabled by the ISG which was subsequently composited.
This unfortunately defeated - although it had There the support of most of the constituent organisations (other than the SWP which opposed it) and a large numhave a publication! It sounded like a tit-for-tat reprisal against those who did not vote for the wl pro posal. Either way, the defeat was damaging for the future Hoskisson argued that tion on it.
political differences which make up the SA, publication could only CORESU denominator politics which would lead nowhere. If it was not this, he said it would be a years. "tower of Bable" patch-work of different with a It is hard to argue, howthat an organisation which was able to fight an clection campaign on a programme as detailed as the SA Manifesto would be unable to produce a publication.
Of course the SA does need to further develop its politics and make them more cohercase. But the production of such a publication is probably the most effective way of pushing this forward. At the would have been the best answer possi would seck le to the walk out of the SP Of course it was the vote of the SWP which ensured the defeat of the resolution on a it the political rationale. in SWP have not did before. argued that the SA is not sut oped to have a publication: iciently politically devel- In the they have argued that it does not yet have the structure or SA.
This ducks the political debate, however, since it is had to see now the resource will be generated until a publication is launched and problem confronted Which comes first- the level.
chicken or the ear!
Independents interesting phenomenon which emerged at the conference was that of propose it.
"organised independents"
was a meeting of about a hundred such inde stituent pendents at lunchume A leaflet entitled To All supported the call for an Alliance pubIn the run up to the Trade Union Conference, Greg Tucker looks at the debate on the political fund that is taking place in the ment of the SA at this stage. RMT. The decision of the SP to revert to the crudest sectari- Referring back to its historic anism in the worst tradition role in the formation of the Labour Party a century ago, the of the British far left is not RMT leadership always held its the responsibility of the SA and is not a political reflec- links with Labour in high regard. Jimmy Knapp was always proud of the deep links tinue the process of reshap- The job of the SA is to con- between Labour and the union ing the English left and chal- at all levels. ( At the top the RMT sponlenging its sectarianism - sored half the shadow cabinet which has been its crucial and had great expectacions of a contribution for the past few Labour government. A signifi Scans number of union activists With the benefit of hindsight we should conclude that it was absolutely right to become Labour councilors and at the grass roots the union take a stand and defend the democracy of the SA despite he danger of a SP walkout. party membership of any trade boasted the hithest density of Not only would it have been But in the last few years it has a concession to far to sacri- democracy, and union bureaucracy to defend been harder and harder for the severely damaging to development of the SA, but our links with a Labour party chae was definitely not listening. would not have resolved the problem of the relationship the last two years RMT confer etween the SA and the SP ences have in effect issued a That will only be resolved yellow card - the Labour Party when the SP turns away as been warned, "don't from its sectarian trajectory expect continued union funding ment the SP said that they unless you start implementing policies in line with our mem an electoral pact with the SA in clections. It is important that the SA fol- bers needs. No U-turn lows this up and tries to hold There is no sign that such a them to it, but it could be U-turn has taken place. On the difficult if they insist on cer- one hand the disastrous cain constituencies as they attempt to privatise London Underground continues.
Membership drive And the falure to take any period there has to be a strat- post conference bers utterly disilusioned. What of the raiways has left memery developed for building This needs to started with Labour excuses about lack of resources include a vigorous member- (Wasn't it more important to ship drive to develop the membership within the new invest in hospitals and schools?) hardened into a unified structure, and tho clear ideological support of the SAs own political projects at both the national and local private sector. This flew in the face of all We need to continue to nce. Their new bosses were argue for the need for a publication in order to develop getting very rich running an the argument for the next time we get the chance to The important thing now is how the incoming leadership of the SA (and the conorganisations)
responds to the adoption of the new constitution and increasingly inefficient system with increasing public subsidy. With subsidy now three times as high as it was before privatisation RMT members were free to ask -wouldn't renationalisation actually sove money for school and hospi cal? Such is the disllusionment that the right at last year's conference were reduced to arguing that, despite all its faults, at least Labour was "our party what we had to do was fight to change it.
But even this rings hollow in most activists' experience. plain that they have no say at local level in what the party in office does, and cannot be bothered to stand for re-election.
Even the right's candidate for General Secretary admits that mate comer to attend meetings of Labour's Regional Executive in the south west on which he sits -because it is utterly irrelevant.
Support for Labour has become irrelevant for helping the union in its struggles. Indeed it is clear that in most cases it is now an obstacle The RMT left has thrown down the gauntles over the question of the use of our political fund.
Whist up to now we have lost resolutions which baldly state the intention to break with Labour it is inevitable that such sentiments will be expressed with increasing 11am to 4pm vigour at successive conferFor now, the approach which has found most favour is to argue for the liberation of the union's political fund to be used as the members see best fit in each circumstance - 10r Labour candidates where individuals will support our policonor one dac where they won't This has already meant the meet with Tommy Sheridan and the SSP to discuss campaigning for renationalsation through the Scottish parlianent - Knapp, and now acting two years battling to ensure this decision is not implemented.
overt support was given to Ken Livingstone in the GLA elections, and many Branches. no longer able to stomach giving local affilations to CLPs. have supported independent political campaigning, such as Tube Privatisation electoral stand and including supporting the socialst Alane, prac tice if not officialy Such local moves need to be deepened. And as the deadline for conference resolutions approaches the formal battle for the future of our links with Labour needs to be uppermost ing up campaigning priorities inside the union.
Socialist Alliance Conference The Political Fund - where should it go? and job cuts