Making our voices heard

Can the Labour left learn to live with Partnership in Power (PiP)? Mike Marqusee, Islington North CLP, reads the runes.

Over the last six months the Labour left has argued that the passage of the constitutional reforms contained in the PiP package would be a disaster for Labour Party democracy. Well, now they’re passed and disaster is upon us, how do we respond? If socialists are to remain in the Labour Party, there is no point in remaining as passive spectators, waiting for a turn of events in the outside world to boost our fortunes. We have to find ways to make our voices heard. We have to find ways to make ourselves visible in the Party’s parched, post-PiP landscape.

It is well to bear in mind that in some respects PiP has merely consolidated what had become custom and practice in the Labour Party over the past decade: the shaping of the Party agenda by adept manipulation of the media, the rule of policy “experts” beholden only to the inner circle of the leadership, and the effective disenfranchisement of both trades unionists and constituency party members. Blair has accelerated this process, and appears now to be constructing a post-party politics, dispensing not only with ideology but with mass political affiliation of any kind. The formal coalition which Tony Benn has warned against may emerge at some point in the future, but in the meantime we are faced with an insidiously informal coalition, incorporating major players in big business and the media, and claiming to govern in “the national interest”.

Navigating in such a depoliticised environment is difficult, but the left will find its way not by abandoning party politics, but by reinvigorating them. We have to champion the idea of the Labour Party as a democratic corporate entity, and take action to make this idea a reality.

We need to analyse the new structures and locate the points which are in any way vulnerable to pressure from below. We need to shine a strong, searching light into the dark recesses of our post-PiP Party, and ensure that not only Party members but the public in general know who is making Labour (and government) policy, and whose interests they represent. We need to monitor in detail the work (and personnel) of the National Policy Forum and lobby it in conjunction with single issue campaigns. Blair claims to have opened up policy-making to groups and individuals outside the Party structures; let’s make sure the NPF hears not only from hand picked experts brought in to bolster the leadership’s predetermined line; let’s push our own experts and campaigners to the fore wherever we can.

Although the new structures are inherently anti-democratic, that does not mean we cannot improve them incrementally. We need to begin promoting a series of constitutional amendments to check leadership prerogatives and strengthen rank and file input. A few preliminary suggestions: rules to ensure free circulation of accurate information among members, the establishment of a democratic process for setting Annual Conference agendas and speaking rights, a mechanism to allow rank and file members to trigger One Member One Vote (OMOV) ballots on key policy issues (a privilege currently enjoyed only by the leadership). The results in this year’s NEC ballot confirm that the left has nothing to fear from OMOV. Indeed, as government policies gradually alienate Labour voters, our strength in inner-party elections will grow — if we get our act together.

As soon as possible, the left needs to agree upon a single, broad-based slate of candidates for the Constituency representatives on the NEC (MPs will no longer be allowed to stand) and launch a high-profile, co-ordinated campaign to win the votes of ordinary Party members.

This requires a vigorous, long-term media strategy. The left has been far too shy about projecting itself on to the national stage. We need to master (some of) the spin-doctors’ arts, briefing the press formally and informally on a regular basis. We need to ensure a steady flow of letters and articles in all sections of the press and on a wide range of issues. We need our NEC candidates to appear on radio and television as often as possible to challenge the assertions made by government spokespersons and explain the left’s positive alternative. With the Tories competing with Blair for the so-called centre ground, the principal line of divide in British politics will be between the Labour Government and the left, and the media are therefore likely to give us more space than in the past — if we have the energy and the wit to use it.

We need to establish as a matter of priority a modestly-resourced “think tank” to undertake research and publish details of the left’s policy alternatives, particularly on the economy, welfare reform, education, criminal justice, defence, the environment and international relations. This could make submissions directly to the Policy Forum and its commissions, and provide activists with a substantial, credible programme we can argue for at all levels of the labour movement. The Socialist Campaign Group of Labour MPs are well-placed in terms of resources to initiate this.

Liaison between left-wingers in the constituencies and the trades unions remains an essential but elusive goal. Historically, the virtual quarantine of the two wings of the labour movement was at the heart of Labourism. But the irresponsible behaviour of the trade union leaders at Brighton demonstrated yet again the terrible costs of this separation. With conflict over public sector pay likely in the next year, we need to begin assembling a broad-based alliance for a living wage for public servants which can penetrate both trades unions and Constituency Parties.

While recognising the difficulties facing left MPs, we have to tell them that we simply cannot function without a clear and consistent pole of attraction in Parliament. The left MPs must understand that their supporters in the constituencies are often working in a highly parochial environment, clouded with countless apolitical considerations. The tens of thousands of Party members who voted for left candidates in this year’s NEC election will be galvanised into a force to be reckoned with at the national level only if they are given high-profile national leadership.

One of the few meaningful powers left to Party members is the selection of candidates for local government elections. Yet over the last decade local government has become ever more inhospitable terrain for socialists. However, simply walking away and leaving local government to time-serving hacks, middle class do-gooders and neighbourhood busy-bodies is not acceptable. It is absurd to remain in the Labour Party, and to expect to wield any influence, without a programme for, and involvement in, local government.

The tasks I’ve outlined are demanding ones and will require a much greater degree of co-ordination, ingenuity and initiative than the Labour left has shown in the past. I admit there is little here to entice young people or indeed anyone who rightly wants to see a radical challenge to Blairism here and now.

But the reality is that should a radical popular challenge to Blairism emerge, it will require expression through party politics if it is to leave a lasting mark. The extent to which it finds such expression will depend upon the Labour left’s effectiveness in establishing a public presence both inside and outside the Party’s new structures.

NEC results

(* indicates the candidates elected)

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