working class it does not follow that somehow the workers can take control of such a party. On the contrary it is an elementary principle of activity contained within its organisations a political analysis that the Labour Party is not reformable. It is a totally bureaucratised party whose leadership maintain their power by any means possible. There is a rigorous system of bans and prescriptions on members ofthe Labour Party, In times of challenge to the leadership these are rigorously enforced and strengthened. If we look simply at the 1960s we can see that the decade opened with the expulsion of many of the leading members of the Labour Party's Young Socialists. Furthermore the first year of the decade revealed in practice once again, af the Scarborough conTerence, the simple fact that the leading members of the Party are in no way under the control of the supposedly highest organisations of the Party such as the Annual Conference. It does not matter whether the Party is in opposition, as in the case of nuclear disarmament in 1960, or in power, as in the case of Incomes Policy, is in 1970, the leaders of the Labour Party will always obey the dictates of capitalism rather than the wishes of their members and if their members object foo strongly or systematically then they are simply expelled. This control extends down also to the selection of candidates. An example of this was the refusal of the Labour party to allow John Pulmer to stand as a candidate in a Croydon constituency despite the fact that he had been selected by the local partyEndless examples could be given of the bureaucratic nature of the party. A fairly typical example of this would be the expulsion from the party of the Secretary of the Haringry Action Committee for Tenants because of activity in opposition to the GL.C's rent rises. This followed the expultion from the Labour group of councillots for action they had taken on housing. The type of action they had to put up with before they were expelled was for example attack the working class. The trade unions on example the refusal of Haringey borough council on two occasions in 1967 to receive a delegation bringing a petition from the tenants" committees Although at that time the council had 51 Labour and only 19 Tory councillors, the motion to receive the delegation was refused by 27-23. This vote was determined by the leaders of the Labour group of councillors threatening to expel anyone who voted to receive the delegation. To take just one example of bureaucratic control at a higher level, we might consider the 1963 LPYS conference. Here a threat to the leadership was solved by simply rigging the vital standing orders committee by removing the only left winger from it. Even in the unlikely event of uny revolutionary tendency surviving inside the Labour Party for long cnough to gain the support of the national conference, this would still solve nothing The real leadership of the Labour Party, the parliamentary members, are quite at liberty to ignore any decisions taken. In short the Labour Party is totally unreformable. The only question facing socialists is how to destroy its influence over the working class (5).
DESTROYING THE INFLUENCE OF THE LABOUR PARTY The Labour Party is not reformable, but that does not mean that there is no point in carrying on a struggle mnside it. On the contrary it is only by a widespread struggle inside the entire working class movement including inside the Labour Party that the working class will be repoliticised. The qualification on that however is that it is not possible to wait until such a struggle has occurred and the working class has become more political before commencing the struggle. On the contrary to wait until then woold be fatal. It is necessary to orgunise the working class for independent action right from the beginning. This point also interlinks with a position on the constituency Labour Parties.
During the 1920c and 1930s if a worker left his constituency Labour Party, it was undoubtedly a sign of political backwardness f the only excepon to tis or course as those woo goned the C.P. during the 1920s). To leave the Labour Party then meant to leave an organisation which was at least on paper incomparably to the left of the present Labour Party, which mass of workers, and which had not yet had a chance to really show what it would do when in office. Now however a worker leaving the Labour Party has a totally different significance.
In many cases it means that they see the futility of slogging their guts out within a constituency, ward, city party which is powerless to influence in the slightest the policies of "their" party. Ideologically these people are still dominated by the ideas of the Labour Party, as we have discussed, but in no way can leaving the Labour Party be now equated with a retreat into political backwardness fas it could undoubtedly have done in the '20s or "30s). On the contrary it is many of these militants who had abandoned work inside the constituency parties who have been responsible for the movement against the Incomes Policy, In Place of Strife, against the Tory anti-union laws etc. What leaving the party means in the present situation is certainly not that the mass of workers are on the verge of joining revolutionary organisations or that they have rejected the ideology of Labourism, but it does frequently mean that they have seen the futility of banging their heads against a brick wall inside a constituency Labour Party.
A realisation that the rank and file of tho party cannot change anything is an extremely positive step potentially: If it leads to apathy and giving up ull political activity it is of course disastrous, but whether that occurs depends entirely on whether an alternative is seen to work inside the constituency parties. The key to whether this will be the case is work inside the Trade Unions.
The trade unions stand in a very different relation to the woricing class than does any political party and especially a party like the Labour Party. A political party such as the Labour Party can become a government and the other hand remain defensive organisations of the working class. The working class can leave the organisations of a political party in disgust, the continual pressure of the economic struggle aguinst the bourgeoisie will however keep these same people in the organisation of the trade unions. In particular in a period of intensified class struggle the internal life and authority of the trade unions can only increase. In addition the structural relation of the leaders of the trade unions to the working class is different lo the relation of the leaders of the Labour Party to the working class.
The leaders of trade unions ure bused on organisations of the working class at the point of production. These organisations are involved in relatively continual struggles. Any movement inside the working class is therefore reflected fairly directly inside the trade unions.
The situation of the Labour Party is very different. It is related to the working class in two ways. Firstly directly via the constituency Labour Parites, and secondly indirectly via the leaders of the trade unions. What has happened during the 1950s and 1960s is that the first of these links has shrivelled almost completely. This means that the only strong organisational link which the Labour Party retains with the working class in an organisational sense is via the trade unions and the leaderships. (Which is not the same as saying, to repeat for the nth time, that the ideological relation does not still exist).
Given this situation the people who naturally emerge as the leaders of opposition inside the Labour Party are not the "left wing" members of the constinency and parliamentary parties, their base inside the working class is now croded for that, bur the leaders of the Trade Unions. This means that now these men represent to the mass of woricers not merely trade union leaders our the only really credible political altemative to the present policies and leaders of the Labour Party. It is men like Jones and Scanion who now possess the credibility, because of their "left" positions, and the base inside the the working class to directly challenge for the position of the leadership of the working class. They can in fact play a directly political role if they wish. Without a complete change in the entire political situation, it is extremely unlikely that the left of the constituency and parliamentary Parties can summon either the political militancy or the organisational base to challenge the leadership of the Labour party in the way that the trade union leaders now can, Whereas in the 1920s, "30s, '40s, "50s and even "60s the key political struggle inside the Labour Party was that between the constituency parties and the leadership (with trade unions frequently standing to the right of the leadership), now the organisational decline of the local parties makes such a conflict extremely unlikely, and its significance less even if it does occur. This point is confirmed by the whole trend of recent years. If we look merely at the annual conlerences of the Labour Party what we typically see is a struggle between the constituency labour parties, who continue to cast their votes for people like Barbara Castle, and the trade union leaders. Even in the event of a resurgence of the CLPs, it is clear that the core of opposition to the party leaders will remain the trade unions. It is in the light of this situation that revolutionaries must consider their tactics and Stralegy:
WHAT NEXT?
It is of course impossible to foresee in detail the short term course of the class struggle in Britain. What however is clear is that there is no possibility of British capitalism solving its economic problems. This rules out a period of relorns granted through Parliament. If there is u real struggle it will come from the trade unions. This will continue the situation where their Icaders are the main alternative pole of attraction to the present Labour leaders.
There may of course be a revival of activity inside the constituency Labour parties, and particularly inside the LPYS, in the coming period. If this occurs then obviously some revolutionary forces may have to concentrate their efforts on these groups. However even if these do revive, the core of any oppositional movement will be the huge organised power of the trade unions. The main line of argument for revolutionaries would be to argue that the Trade Unions should impose their will on the Labour party conference so as to create a state of continual conflict between the unions and the parliamentary party. This would also really put people like Foot and Heffer on the spot.
The tasks facing revolutionaries are therefore twofold. On the one hand they must of course continue to put forward their traditional slogans of nationalisation, workers control, etc. which present an alternative policy for the working class and which educate people as to the nature of the leaders of the working class movement. But you do not build a real movement simply by putting forward chunks of the transitional programme at the appropriate time. This is a view of politics which consists of "unveiling" the programme as an instrument of recruitment and not of strugee. It fails to understand that the relationship between the working class and a political organisation, especially a revolutionary one, is never a direct one but is mediated through a whole series of organisations, and that to say "build the alternative leadership" settles nothing.
As we noted the muin strugyle in the present period is going to be between the trade union movement and the capitalist class and between the trade unions and the Labour leadership. In this situation it is not the task of revolutionaries to say that workers must first go through the "stage" of engaging in years of impossible struggle inside the constituency Labour parties. On the contrary, the task of revolutionaries is to say, "Yes, we agree thar the trade unions are at the moment the only organcations actually fighting the bourgeoisie, and that it is therefore necessary to work steadtastly within the unions. But it is impossible to fight capitalism's attacks simply through trade union action. If you believe the trade unions are a weapon of struggle then you must see that they must also becorne a political weapon. They must impose their policy in the political arena. They must become the core of a political movement against the present leaders of the working class. In short, any anti-capitalist, that is to say, workers" government must base itself on the trade unions and the trade unions must become the key instrument in struggling for such u government."
It is this orientation that the slogan "A workers' government based on the trade unions" indicates It indicates a ine of advance and not'some abstract and immediate call for the dictatorship of the proletariat. Neither is it a slogan to be counterposed to a call to vote Labour at any General Election. Nor is it a substitute for concrete demands aired at showing the real nature of the Labour leaders. It simply lays down the main line of argument and development for a real struggle against the present Labour leaders, and it retains that validity whether that struggle is conducted mainly inside or outside the Labour Party, It can, cE course, in certain circumstances become an agitational demand and one counterposed to the Labour Party. This would be the case if, as cun be by no means ruled out, any future Labour government entered a coalition with the Tories to "save the country", "prevent anarchy", etc. En these circumstances it becomes a direct call to the Trade Unions to break with the Labour Party and organise politically independently of it. In the coming period however its main significance is to define an orientation of muking the trade unions into the core of a struggle against the Labour leaders, and making trade unionists conscious of the fact that this is the CISC.
In short the position as regards the Labour Party is us follows: Orgunisationally it has suffered a catastrophic decline. This must however not be confused with an ending to its ideological domination of the working class. This hold cannot be broken without a struggle inside the labour movement. The task of revolutionaries is to heighten this struggle by increasing at all times the tension between the Trade Unions and the Labour Party. Such an orientation is summer up in the slogan "A workers government based on the trade unions". It is only by adopting suc un orientation that socialist demands for 'workers control, nationalisation, etc. ceases to be mere propaganda and become instruments of struggle. Without it the only answer you can give to a worker who says "I agree with your policies, how am I to organise to implement it". is to say "join us" and that is a formula for a sect not a struggle. The agitational demands which flow from this orientation say organise politically inside the trade unions, use your trade union as a way of organising to fight for these policies inside and if necessary outside the Labour Party." It is only in this way that demands for nationulisation & workers control move out of the realm of 'exposure politics and into the realm of the class struggle.
constituencies with more than 3,000 members , 14 witl more than 2,000-(3) All figures from the : 18.1.71 (4) Lenin expressed this brilliantly • when he wrote in poddea organisation of che trade umon movement and later repeated the statement when bo said that the garise in trade umitate conser of titsarkets organised in trad political ing mon. However, whether or not a party is really a political party of the worker does not depend solely content of its actions and its poll VALUE COLLICA CANES ERO IREICE OCEEDICS WER MICE me arial. Regarded from this, the only correct, point a view, the Lahour Parry is a thoroughly bourgeoi is wh Hogan. It appears to sugest Cat the Labout party car. is such an atrocious and openly terisionist ranze theretor LABOUR TO POWER ON A SOCI IST PROGRAMMI HORTE STOR OCEE TIC DOSI TRY DID BESE THE YOU CAL CULM SAke re IE TO LOEM JOST IN STAMPER ARE THE type of "thought + Tune 107E Po?
----- pull-quotes -----
at ourse not every una who advances the slagan of Last the tour Party can ace pra sarist plete