The Executive met on April 13, under pressure of time to finish in time to allow comrades to get to the demonstration in support of the Palestinian struggle taking place later that afternoon. The brisk unable to complete its four- & and business-like meeting was inevitably going to be unable to complete its fourteen item agenda. evo discussions dominated the time there was. First a report back from the trade Laos conserence. and the subsequent meeting of the trade union committee by Mark Hoskisson and debate around his proposals together with a resolution on the same issues from Martin Thomas.
There Wak manitos agreement that the conference had been a huge success for the alliance, and a vote of thanks for those who had worked so hard to make it possible.
The meeting was also intention pleased to hear reports of the successful fringe meetings that had taken place subsequently at NUT and RMT Train Crew conferences, and that similar meetings were planned for the all the major Fred Leplat UNISON has started a historic review of its political funds, that could result in a new relationship with the Labour Party and the New Labour goverment.
Against opposition from UNISON's leadership, delegates at last year's union conference voted to review the Affiliated Political Fund (APF) and the General Political Fund (GPF).
It has taken nine months for the leadership to start the consultation process. During this time, UNISON members have seen an unprecedented exercise to promote the APF by claiming that the union has obtained concessions from Labour.
Any significant concessions, such as on the minimum wage, have been obtained by campaigning, as. when UNISON organised in 1998 a 15,000 strong demonstration in Newcastle.
rules.
Despite the "special relationship" through the APF, New Labour has continued with its agenda of privatisation, deregulation and a flexible workforce.
Representatives of UNISON through the APF on Labour's NEC have in the past voted against resolutions which were identical to the union's policies. stituencies.
place activists should not be proposal from the recipients of the general Thomas was also not voted material produced encourage local Socialist Alliances locally. socialist alliances to produce There was great enthusiregular workplace bulletins. asm for the fact that the What was agreed was to pro- GMB has decided to put six national 1-sided questions to all candidates in leaflet which could be used forthcoming as a resource either by com- elections around their suprades working around differ- port for public services ent trade union conferences something that we support and which will definitely be Lack of time prevented me to our advantage.
the original It was agreed that the quesmotion suggested that work- tion of pamphlet sales now needed a new push. money taken at the conference itself for the pamphlet covered printing costs and already gave a profit of over £100. Now we need to write to branches It is now clearly time to unions where the debate is review the functioning of the most developed, and those political funds, as they are who sent delegates to the both undemocratic and in the case of the APF, there them to make bulk orders. has been hardly any return Probably the most important proposal to come from UNISON members are Hoskinsson's report - the appalled at the pro-big busi- idea of organising a follow ness stance of New Labour. up trade union conference The CBI has more influence privatisation than the unions - although November was not voted on.
The Executive UNISON's leadership is try- recognised that there are a ing to keep the lid on a boil- number of proposals about ing kettle, but will get burnt conferences the should be organising in the Only three resolutions on months ahead. The deferral the union's political funds come in „The have been allowed on to the everyone was committed to agenda for this year's con- ensuring TITA had ference - and twelve ruled public focus to ensure that we build on the success of The consultation on the the existing conference. future of the Funds has pro- As well as the trade union posed only three outcomes: disaffiliation from the Labour proposal to organise a major Party, a minor improvement conference on anti-globalisation and the new internafunds, or support for other tionalism, in develop a greater audience In framing the options in for the such a manner, the leader- young people.
The first trade union conship is deliberately excluding a necessary fourth option ference seriously developed that would be maintaining our trade union work. Now a affiliation, democratising the similar initiative is needed to funds and supporting only bring into the Alliance those those candidates, from the thousands of young people Labour Party and other par- radicalising on from Palestine to third world debt who currently don't see forthcoming reterendum on the Euro. This is obviously a crucial discussion and one on which there are major differences amongst Alliance supporters. Given that the referendum will be an important turning point in British politics, the Socialist Alliance needs to take a clear position - in the view of ISG members a clear position to campaign for a No vote on the basis of internationalism. It is possible (just) to hold all these events, particularly if the AGM is combined (probably in a 2-day event) with the debate on the Euro. But it will only be possible if there is careful planning to make sure that the events are organised in the sequence that maximises their effectiveness - and tar by apart that they can all be seriously built. Discussion It was in any event agreed that there should be e-mail council discussion between utive members over the next week to come up with a proposal on all this to go to the National Council on May 11. The second major discussion was on Palestine, which took place not only in the The context of the actual situation in the Middle East itself, but of the burgeoning movement here in Britain. Certainly it was a debate that needed more than the 30 minutes we gave it (although in those out of a 2 hour meeting that was by far the longest item) -and this was recognised by the meeting 1n encouraging there should be debate at the Council in May. However what was also clear to everyone was that it was necessary to take posinons on wnat slogans in should use in the meantime. The debate was structured sensibly around two posinois.
Secretary Rob Hoveman of the SWP argued that the two main slogans we should use should be "Freedom and "Victory to context that the Intifada".
Martin Thomas of the another AWL on the other argued that there should be 3 slogans: Israel withdraw from the Occupied tories, Solidarity with there is also a Palestinians and Peoples, Two States. The preoccupation of the overwhelming majority order to those present was to sure the Socialist Alliance amongst wessen to he and prominent in the radicalisation which is currently taking place in revulsion against the genocidal actions of the стате against Palestinian people. While Martin Thomas questions opened his remarks with a condemnation actions, i this position objectively undercut by his behaviour of the Israeli government towards the Palestinians has been outrageous for years. While this is the true, it is also the case that like the level of barbarity being excericised today was last seen in the massacres at Shabra and Shatilla - also at the the hands of war criminal Ariel Sharon. But what really infuriated me and many others was that he equated the oppression of with a the Palestinians with the oppression of the Jews. There was of course not time to debate this properly, or the two state solution which is its logical conclusion. appealed that the two state slogan not be voted on -it seemed to me wrong to conflate the question of immediate slogans which we needed to sort out with our more developed programmatic position on the issue -which should be properly discussed on May 11. However while Martin had been prepared to let other resolutions on the trade union issues lie on the table, he insisted that this was voted on. The meeting supported all the other slogans apart trom that one and agreed that Freedom for Palestine and Victory to the Intifada should be the main enough slogans on our placards.
Apart from those two major discussions the meeting obviously took a report on the local and decided that serious action should be taken to ensure Ехес- that the policy document is finalised and 4710e within the next few days. Serious press work is planned, though it was recognised that organising a press conference as such was not a good use of resources. Unfortunately ume was also lost discussing a somewhat strange resolution from Marcus Strom of the CPGB. The resolution noted that some local Alliances had decided that comrades standing as candidates in the local could not include their agreeing membership of one of the further supporting organisations in National their personal statements. It argued that the Executive should uphold the constitution - thus suggesting, though not actually saywe ing so, that these Alliances were breaching the same. The resolution as it stood was not something that anyone could logically vote against - and those comrades who suggested that for implied that people should be forced to declare their affiliations just hadn't read it properly. But the problem, as hand I argued, was how it would be used. Fortunately Marcus Terriaccented at lenst some of the the arguments and agreed that Two the resolution not be voted on, but this had consumed rather a lot of precious time of by this point. make The result of this combined with the necessity of getting was to the demonstration was that a whole lot of items -most notably the report back from the Rifondazione conference were not reached. the All in all this was a positive meeting, demonstrating the political maturity of the Executive Committee that Israelis was elected from the was December conference.