Weekly Worker 595 Thursday October 6 2005

Letters

Fighting Blair?

I was on the demonstration in London on September 24, where the hundreds of union members who joined the Stop the War Coalition march were read out a joint statement by union leaders. However, with the exception of Billy Hayes (Communication Workers Union), these leaders “unfortunately could not be on the demonstration”, as they were travelling to the Labour Party conference in Brighton.

The statement read: “On behalf of our unions, we send greetings to the demonstration today, in particular the thousands of members of the trade union movement on the march. We pledge our full support to the campaign to end the disastrous occupation of Iraq, to bring the troops home and to defend British muslims and our civil liberties against any backlash from the criminal bombings of July 7.”

However, remembering the actions of Dave Prentis (Unison), Derek Simpson (Amicus) and Tony Woodley (Transport and General Workers Union) at the 2004 Labour Party conference, when they used their block votes to defeat a motion which would have required the government to set an early date for withdrawal, I wasn’t too optimistic in expecting any action to back up these fine words. Graham Bash may have felt that this Labour Party conference represented a “definite return to Labourism”, but most other comrades simply saw a freezing of debate, to the extent that Iraq was not even discussed, and even those issues that were discussed - ie, secondary picketing - will be ignored by the leadership (Weekly Worker September 24).

Union leaders within the Labour Party are playing a dangerous game - assimilating what they consider to be New Labour’s less-unfavourable policies in the name of defeating the Tories and ‘reclaiming Labour’, whilst raising dissent only when it is ‘safe’ to do so: ie, in obscure fringe meetings, via pressure groups and in debates, where the outcomes will be ignored. These follies should be highlighted and decried by the left, allowing the union rank and file to identify the faults of the leadership and begin to take action against the bureaucrats who claim to speak in their name.

However, this week’s Socialist Worker has the utterly misleading article, ‘Unions demand change, but Blair’s not for turning’, which rightly applauds the unions’ support of secondary action, but has no mention of the union leaderships’ faults or discussion of their tactics in dealing with New Labour (October 1). It is an unfortunate fact that comrades with such voluntary short-sightedness lead the movement.

It is therefore the place for principled minorities, such as the CPGB, to highlight these flaws and inconsistencies, in order that the workers represented by these groups and unions can begin to question their leadership and save the movement from following the misguided path of Labour tailism. It has been said that the Weekly Worker concentrates too heavily on the left’s internal affairs, but those who do not see the necessity of such scrutiny now will often be those who find themselves proposing reactionary measures later.

By the way, I read with dismay the request from some CPGB members that the Alliance for Workers’ Liberty should not be invited to further Communist Universities. I would like to remind comrades that some of these sessions can be very intensive and lengthy, and that a lighter, more humorous session, where comrades can relax and laugh at the AWL, is always a pleasurable break from the more intellectually engaging debate.

Rosie Maclean
email

Flexible

Hugh Kerr displays the usual cynical attitude you come to expect now on the left with his swipe at Graham Bash’s comments on the Labour conference (Letters, September 29).

No socialist needs a lecture on how bad things are in the Labour Party. Indeed what we should be debating is how bad things are outside of Labour. You only have to read back issues of Weekly Worker to see this. While the position of the FBU and the RMT is clear to everyone, it doesn’t seem to have made a fundamental difference to Respect or any other party on the left opposed to Labour.

It is people like you, Hugh, who seem to be waiting for the working class to come to a ‘new’ workers’ party some time in the future. Deep down you know this is unlikely - as your cynical point about the working class voting for Ken Clarke testifies.

What the left inside and outside Labour need to be concentrating on is building the links to win the mass of organised workers to the ideas of socialism rather than just sitting there folding leaflets for the next by-election, where you will be getting only a handful of votes.

Regarding Socialist Appeal/Alan Woods, I suggest you re-read what Bash said in his article and also refer to recent comment on the In defence of Marxism website regarding the Labour conference - especially the need for socialists to be flexible.

Ian Woodland
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WRP heirs

I’m not sure how worthwhile it is working within Respect. In my experience rank and file Socialist Workers Party members have little Marxism in them.

It seems to me the whole Respect approach is almost entirely reliant on the charisma of George Galloway, who appears utterly obsessed with Blair. He ended up with Respect allegedly because they were the only group on the left who agreed to his outrageous financial demands. As for credibility as a socialist - owning two homes! A Bristol SWP member justified his place in Portugal on the grounds that it was a cottage, not a villa, and anyway it had a 100% mortgage. Seriously.

The SWP and its cadre are the heirs of the Workers Revolutionary Party. Forget them. Respect is an electoral machine. What is its real strength on the ground - ie, involvement in working class struggles/campaigns? It seems more interested in attracting the pottery/poetry/diversity/ethnic dancing crowd (probably a reflection of its membership).

Doug Lowe
Devon

Hod-carrier

I do not accuse Ian Donovan of “seeking to betray” his principles, but of actually betraying them (Letters, September 29). He calls our motions to the Respect conference “socialist-tinselled” and abstract when they have been designed to be acceptable to all socialists in Respect, including the SWP. In fact he does not critique our motions nor propose better ones, but raises other, unconnected issues by way of excusing his scabbing. To say that voting for socialist motions in Respect means blocking with the CPGB on all issues is to flatter the CPGB, but is not true.

As an aside, I note that ‘s’ is the third letter in Respect and apparently stands for ‘socialism’. Now there’s a bit of tinsel Ian has no problem hanging on his Christmas tree. His opposition to our motions is all bullshit - he is obviously a hod-carrier for the SWP project of developing Respect as a party built on opportunism and popular frontism. All socialists have a duty to oppose this process, including SWP members.

While the SWP has always operated behind fronts, these were supposedly designed to bring people towards revolutionary socialist views. With Respect, the poles of attraction have been reversed, with revolutionary socialists being pushed towards reformist illusions. Given long enough, it will mean the end of the SWP.

In Ian’s muddled mind we should call for the “expulsion of all anti-socialist reactionaries”, who Ian seems to think are muslims. This is not my view. But, to make a little democratic point: first we have to win a majority for socialism, then the majority can decide whether or not to expel anti-socialist reactionaries or not. Historically there have been muslim socialists since the 19th century and communist parties in muslim countries since the early 20th century. Muslims will join a socialist Respect and muslims will also join a non-socialist Respect - but not necessarily the same muslims.

When it comes to the subject of imperialism, Ian neither thinks nor listens. To deal with the listening first. True, our slogan on Ireland was ‘For the IRA, against the British army’. But we did not alibi the IRA’s shortcomings: we tried to turn the nationalist movement into a communist movement and, as far as we are able, we are for developing independent working class politics in Iraq to lead the anti-imperialist struggle, just as we were in Ireland. Ian regards this as a betrayal of the anti-imperialist struggle, because he cannot see beyond the situation as it is at present to what could be and what needs to be.

His support for the Iraqi resistance has been uncritical as well as unconditional. He has closed his eyes to the religious and social bigotry of the nationalists and islamists because in my opinion he sees all anti-imperialist battles as being identical struggles between David (the good) and Goliath (the bad). When in fact they are complex struggles for state power involving every class interest both locally and internationally. He sees the national issues, but is blind to the class and democratic issues.

For example, Zarqawi’s murderous attack on shia civilians was said to be in revenge for the Americans’ bloody assault on Tal Afar, in alliance with Iraqi shias. But the shias, including those in the police and army, are not in general loyal to the Americans or the puppet government. Both sunni and shia are fighting the occupying forces, but with different methods - and at the same time fighting a reactionary civil war of terror against sections of the Iraqi people.

These are not atypical lapses, but considered and deliberate policy, which are part of their ‘anti-imperialism’ and reflect only too well how they will rule if or when either side comes to power. This is the truth and it has to be faced. These people are our enemies, but lesser enemies than our own rulers - the imperialists. The defeat of Britain and the US takes precedence, even if it is at the hands of our secondary foes.

Phil Kent
Haringey

Secret prison

On October 1, London No Borders and No One is Illegal unveiled a banner across the wall of Communications House, declaring it to be a racist prison. It is time people knew what goes on behind the facade of this building.

Communications House is a ‘reporting and enforcement centre’ of the immigration and nationality department (IND). Asylum-seekers who report here can be detained and removed - and may not ever see their friends and family here again. Eighty-five people, including families, were seized this way in the six months to April 2004.

Communications House contains a ‘short-term holding centre’, managed by private prison company GSL (previously part of Group 4 and subject of two major media exposes of racist abuse by employees). Those seized are held incommunicado until a Wackenhut van removes them to their unknown fate. Friends, lawyers and family may not discover what has happened to them for days.

Communications House is part of a spreading Gulag of prisons, known as ‘holding’, ‘detention’ or ‘removal centres’, that hold thousands of people who have committed no crime and are almost all run for private profit. It is right in the heart of London, yet few know it is there, or what happens there. Many people will be appalled to learn about it.

October 1 was a day of action across the country for the rights of refugees and migrants who face detention and deportation, who are denied welfare rights and under new rules - section 9 of the Asylum and Immigration Act - could face the choice of eviction and having their children taken into care or returning to a country where danger, death and poverty await them.

London No Borders, No One is Illegal
nooneisillegal@gmx.net

Protest

On October 4 TV soap and film actor Jeremy Sheffield, gay rap star Q Boy, comedian Scott Cappurro, Big Brother contestant Josh Rafter, out gay Labour MP Chris Bryant and human rights campaigner Peter Tatchell joined a 50-strong protest outside the Iranian embassy in London.

The protest, also backed by Little Britain TV star Matt Lucas, Hollywood actor Simon Callow and pop singer and DJ Boy George, was part of an ongoing series of global demonstrations against the Iranian government’s arrest, imprisonment, whipping and execution of gay men. It was organised by the gay magazine AXM and queer rights group Outrage.

Speakers included Maryam Kousha of the Iran Civil Rights Committee, Maziar Razi of the Iranian Workers Solidarity Network and Bahram Soroush of the Worker-communist Party of Iran. These groups have backed the LGBT freedom struggle in Iran, assisting Outrage in the translation of messages and smuggling out of Iran information about the persecution of LGBT people.

Two teenagers were hanged in the Iranian city of Mashhad on July 19 on charges involving homosexual acts. A 22-year-old gay man, Amir, recently fled Iraq after being given 100 lashes. He was lashed for merely being gay, not for having gay sex. The lashes left his back covered in open bloody wounds. The police warned him that if they caught him again he would be executed like the teenagers in Mashhad.

Iranian agents, posing as gay men, have been arranging dates in gay chat rooms, luring respondents to rendezvous, and then arresting, beating and torturing them. This is part of a sustained witch-hunt of gay people by the islamic fundamentalist regime in Iran. The government routinely makes up false allegations - such as rape, drug-taking and spying - to discredit the people it executes and to discourage public protests.

We express our solidarity with lesbian and gay Iranians, and with all the people of Iran who are struggling for democracy and human rights. The ayatollah’s clerical fascist regime is the problem. There can be no freedom for any Iranian - gay or straight - while the islamists remain in power and enforce the barbarism of sharia law. Outrage supports the efforts of Iranian democrats, socialists, communists, trade unionists, students, feminists and gays to overthrow the Iranian theocracy.

Thousands of AXM readers have signed the ‘Homophobia kills’ petition, condemning the Iranian executions. The Iranian embassy refused to accept it. Instead, the petition will be delivered by openly gay Labour MP Chris Bryant to the UK foreign secretary, Jack Straw MP, with a request that he calls on the Iranian government to halt its persecution of the LGBT community in Iran.

According to AXM editor Matthew Miles, “The shocking images of the executed Iranian teenagers have galvanised our print and online readers, with thousands of people signing our petition in a 10-day period. As LGBT people in the west finally gain most of the rights we deserve, it seems we are proving that there is such a thing as a global gay community by focusing on the struggle for equality in more hostile parts of the world.”

The international community should issue an ultimatum to Iran: either respect human rights or face economic sanctions. There can be no normal relations with an abnormal regime that executes gay people, unchaste women, muslims who renounce their faith, and political, religious and ethnic minorities.

Peter Tatchell
Outrage

A bit thick

Maybe I’m a bit thick ... Why is it crude for Arthur Scargill to associate nationalism with socialism (Weekly Worker July 1 2004)? Surely taking the means of control away from private ownership is the key to an egalitarian socialist state.

Stuart Adams
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