Constituencies must go a step further, and make real links with those in struggle against the Tories. Practical support for workers in dispute will forge alliances that the press can less
This will mean, for easily break.
many CLPs, breaking the habit of a lifetime and not just passing a resolution in support of the workers down the road, but actually getting out of their armchairs and down the road on to the picket line, on the demonstrations with the banner and behind the duplicator.
The links with the specially oppressed must continue, and grow. A
Labour Party reaching out to women isolated in the home, to youth cast on the scrapheap by the Tory government, to Black families terrorised in their homes by white thugs encouraged to attack those who, the Tories imply, are the cause of the problems, can win massive stocks of votes by enpredominantly heterosexual organisations.
represented in the solidarity contingent of the carnival parade.
within trades unions, trades councils, and political parties.
House, Albion Avenue, London SW8 2SE, tel. 01 720 7139.
Model Resolution:
"This..
being justitied as legitimate "public health"
In view of the mounting violence.
... to stand up and be counted.
gay organisations in London on June 27. 1987.
organisation permit this.
Please return a copy of the resolution you passed ments made to the model, and numbers of votes for, against and abstaining to Mary Rushton at the above address.
franchising those who usually don't vote at all. More than this, it can rejuvenate itself, and harnass greater forces for the struggle for socialism.
If this kind of political activity can become routine for Labour Party members, rather than having to resort to the passive "Labour will"
will be campaigns, Labour Parties able to say "join us and fight!"
- and be believed and supported.
However, all this will be in vain unless the left in the Party can wake up to the destructive role of the Party leadership and take the appropriate action.
The fight will not be easy. It will be difficult to harness even the forces that fought the democracy cam:
paigns in the early seventies: many of these forces are still sitting on the or have moved, under the fence, prevailing pressure, to the right. The
Carnival Parade
Solidarity Contingent
27 June 1987
IN VIEW of the mounting hostility towards lesbians and gays this year's
Pride Steering Committee has decided to appeal for support from
We hope that as many working people's organisations as possible will be
Our slogan is Equal Rights for All - Defend Lesbian and Gay Rights.
We encourage you to take up the task of raising our model resolution
If you would like further information concerning the work of the Pride
Committee's solidarity work, please contact Mary Harper, 11 Rushton
.. rejects the attempts of the gutter press, bigots and right wing politicians to make use of the fear of AIDS to whip up hostility against gay
We are deeply concerned that the denial of rights to lesbians and gay men. and the increasingly common calls for greater repression are now discrimination and hatred being directed against lesbians and gays we believe that it is imperative for this
We support the organisers' standpoint of Equality for All - Defend Lesbian and Gay Rights and we resoive to send our banner and as many of our members as possible to march in solidarity behind the lesbian and
Please add a clause pledging a donation, if the standing orders of your
- including any amend-
Socialist Viewpoint No. 16 April 1987 p4 way forward does not lie through loose coalitions of the Labour left, where too many are still reluctant to challenge Kinnock for fear of "rocking the boat" — and are desperately seeking alliances with the forces to their right in an attempt to seem larger than they are.
If we are to reorientate the Labour Party towards a class approach, a challenge to Kinnock must be built with those who have the same problems with his backers — the union bosses. The Party left must build alliances with all the forces prepared still to fight in the trade unions, and wage a common fight for our interests as a class.
The leaders have clearly shown what kind of agenda they want. It is up to us to put socialism back on the agenda.
Perhaps it is clearer to see in the trade unions. In dispute after dispute, trade union leaders have put their own position, their own interests above those of their members. They will not fight, they will not offer a strategy to take on the Tories' attacks and win. They will manoeuvre to keep the membership docile, to deliver what the Tories want, in order to be useful to the ruling class and be allowed to keep their privileges.
It is these same union leaders who installed Neil Kinnock at the head of the Labour Party.
After the press had attacked the Labour Party Black Sections for holding an AGM, some members of Black Sections made an approach to Neil Kinnock, imploring him to let the press attacks go by, not to answer them, so as not to provide further amunition for attacking Labour and ruining Labour's electoral chances.
Up until the Wednesday morning Neil Kinnock denied any knowledge of any moves to discuss the issue at the National Executive Committee: by Wednesday affernoon he was supporting a resolution attacking Black Sections, distancing the Labour Party from half a dozen of its prospective candidates at the NEC meeting.
The left must realise the implications of the leadership's actions. It is not just that they are junking Conference policies. It is not that they are refusing to reverse the Tory attacks. The Labour right would actually prefer to pay the price of losing an election, of letting Thatcher in for a third term, if they can defeat the left by throwing them out the Party if песеввату-
The left must not stand silent about Kinnock "Unity" in the interests of getting rid of Thatcher has not worked. As always, "unity" has proved to be unity with the right wing - on their terms. Action at local level to provide a Labour Party which stands up for the working class must be coupled with action to show that there is a fight on at national level.