In Defence of Marxism No 8

8/9/2019 In Defence of Marxism No 8

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In Defence of

Trotskyism No. 8 £1 waged, 50p unwaged/low waged, €1.50

The CWI and IMT: RightCentrist Heirs Of Ted Grant

“A socialist government would make a class appeal to the Argentin-ean workers. A Labour government could not just abandon the

Falklanders and let Galtieri get on with it. But it would continue thewar on socialist lines.” Militant International Review (Issue 22, June 1982).

“Nevertheless, the (Ulster Workers Council) strike also demon-strated in a distorted form and on a reactionary issue, the colossal power of the working class when it moves into action.”Militant International Review No. 9, June 1974. 10th June 1974.

In their own

words:Top left: UWC semi-fascistuprising, Top right: Over100,000 at Bobby Sands’funeral. Bottom left, The

Marxist stance on the Malvi-nas War, Bottom right:‘Worker in uniform’ holdsTed Grant’s stance.


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Page 2 The CWI and IMT: Right Centrist Heirs Of Ted Grant

Where We Stand

1. WE STAN D WIT HKARL MARX: ‘The emancipa-tion of the working classes mustbe conquered by the workingclasses themselves. The strugglefor the emancipation of the working class means not astruggle for class privileges andmonopolies but for equal rightsand duties and the abolition ofall class rule’ (The International Worki ngmen’ s As sociat ion1864, General Rules).2. The capitalist state con-sists, in the last analysis, of

ruling-class laws within a judicialsystem and detention centresoverseen by the armed bodiesof police/army who are underthe direction and are controlledin acts of defence of capitalistproperty rights against the inter-ests of the majority of civilsociety. The working class mustoverthrow the capitalist stateand replace it with a workers’state based on democratic sovi-ets/workers’ councils to sup-

press the inevitable counter-revolution of private capitalistprofit against planned produc-tion for the satisfaction of so-cialised human need.3. We recognise the necessity

for revolutionaries to carry outserious ideological and politicalstruggle as direct participants inthe trade unions (always) and inthe mass reformist social de-mocratic bourgeois workers’parties despite their pro-capitalist leaderships whenconditions are favourable. Be-cause we see the trade unionbureaucracy and their allies in

the Labour party leadership asthe most fundamental obstacleto the struggle for power of the working class, outside of thestate forces and their directagencies themselves, we mustfight and defeat and replacethem with a revolutionary lead-ership by mobilising the baseagainst the pro-capitalist bu-reaucratic misleaders to openthe way forward for the struggle

for workers’ power.4. We are fully in support ofall mass mobilisations againstthe onslaught of this reactionaryCon-Lib Dem coalition. How-ever, whilst participating in thisstruggle we will oppose all poli-cies which subordinate the working class to the politicalagenda of the petty-bourgeois

reformist leaders of the Labourparty and trade unions5. We oppose all immigra-tion controls. Internationalfinance capital roams the planetin search of profit and imperial-

ist governments disrupts thelives of workers and cause thecollapse of whole nations withtheir direct intervention in theBalkans, Iraq and Afghanistanand their proxy wars in Somaliaand the Democratic Republic ofthe Congo, etc. Workers havethe right to sell their labourinternationally wherever theyget the best price. Only union

membership and pay rates cancounter employers who seek toexploit immigrant workers ascheap labour to undermine thegains of past struggles.

Socialist Fight produces IDOT.It is a part of the Liaison Com-mittee for the Fourth Interna-

tional with the Liga Comunista,Brazil and the Tendencia Mili-tante Bolchevique, Argentina.

Editor: Gerry Downing Assistant Editor: John Barry.

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socialistfight.com/[email protected].

Introduction This polemic was one of the documents atthe founding conference of Socialist Fight inMarch 2014. It is part of a series establishingthe revolutionary Trotskyist positions of theSF and LRCI and a contribution to resolvingthe crisis of leadership in the working classand to refounding and regenerating theFourth International.

The Committee for a Workers International(CWI, of which the British section is the

Socialist Party of England and Wales, SPEW)is a right centrist group of Trotskyist origins.

The same is true of the International Marxist Tendency (IMT), of which the British sectionis Socialist Appeal (SA), which shares a com-mon political heritage with the CWI in theperson of Ted Grant, who developed thetheoretical and political perspectives of bothinternational groups from the late 1940s.

Grant’s basic political error is a failure tounderstand the state, either the capitalist state


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The CWI and IMT: Right Centrist Heirs Of Ted Grant Page 3

or the former degenerate workers’ state of the USSR orthe various deformed work-ers’ states of Eastern Europe,China, North Korea, Viet-

nam, Laos and Cambodia/Kampuchea and Cuba as theyemerged after WWII. TedGrant characterised a wholeswath of left bourgeois na-tionalist regimes as deformed

workers’ states basically be-cause he crudely equated nationalisation withsocialised property relations (socialist

planned economy) and he did not understandthe Marxist theory of the state at all in hislater years, a point we deal in out pamphletThe Marxist Theory of the State .

The Grantites therefore fail to understand oraccept that the state under capitalism is theprime instrument of class oppression whichhas to be overthrown in revolution by the

working class. Under pressure of long-term

deep entryism in the Labour party this hasled them to take a reformist position of so-cialism through parliament via an Enabling

Act and to misidentify the forces of the capi-talist state, the police, the army and prisonofficers as workers in uniform; just morestate employees who are therefore entitled toform trade unions and be represented bytheir chosen shop stewards like any other

workers. They see no problem whatsoever with the Prison Officers Association (POA)being part of the workers’ movement, whenin reality these state forces should be expelledfrom the TUC. Their historic and ongoingrole in torturing Republican prisoners in thenorth without a word of objection from theGrantites reveals their true relationship to thecapitalist state.In their defence they plead that the Enabling

Act orientation is merely a transitional de-mand used to mobilise the working class and

that the demand to unionise the state forcesis, in fact, a clever Marxist tactic to split the

army and police in time of revolution. Soinstead the revolution being the act of the

working class itself led by the revolutionaryparty overthrowing the capitalist state it is theact of a left socialist government, Labour leftin the case of the SA or some other left gov-ernment like the Trade Union SolidarityCommittee or maybe the No to the EU inthe case of the SPEW. The role of the work-

ing class then is to defend the revolutionarynationalisation of the ‘commanding heightsof industry’ which the ‘revolutionary’ govern-ment has already carried out. If the Trotskyistare a majority in this government the result isa healthy workers’ state, if they are a minorityit becomes a deformed workers’ state.

Workers in Uniform?Marxists reject the characterisation of the

police, army or prisoner officers as ‘workersin uniform’. In 1905 Lenin was very sanguineon how to split the army and police in aninsurrection: “The contingents may be of any strength,beginning with two or three people. Theymust arm themselves as best they can (rifles,revolvers, bombs, knives, knuckle-dusters,sticks, rags soaked in kerosene for starting

fires, ropes or rope ladders, shovels for build-ing barricades, pyroxylin cartridges, barbed

Linda Taaffe, secretary of the NSSN, speaking at the lobby of the TUC in Liverpool on 7/9/14. Other speakers included Steve Gillan,general secretary of the Prison Officers Association.


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wire, nails [against cavalry], etc., etc.). Underno circumstances should they wait for helpfrom other sources, from above, from theoutside; they must procure everything them-selves… To launch attacks under favourable

circumstances is not only every revolution-ary’s right, but his plain duty. The killing ofspies, policemen, gendarmes, the blowing upof police stations, the liberation of prisoners,the seizure of government funds for theneeds of the uprising — such operations arealready being carried out wherever insurrec-tion is rife, in Poland and in the Caucasus,and every detachment of the revolutionary

army must be ready to start such operationsat a moment’s notice”. [1]

And Trotsky clearly rejected such an ap-proach also (there was a Social Democraticpolice chief in Berlin at that time as it was apolitical appointment):“In case of actual danger, the social democ-racy banks not on the “Iron Front” but onthe Prussian police. It is reckoning without

its host! The fact that the police was origi-nally recruited in large numbers from amongsocial-democratic workers is absolutelymeaningless. Consciousness is determined byenvironment even in this instance. The

worker who becomes a policeman in theservice of the capitalist state, is a bourgeoiscop, not a worker. Of late years, these police-men have had to do much more fighting withrevolutionary workers than with Nazi stu-dents. Such training does not fail to leave itseffects. And above all: every policemanknows that though governments may change,the police remains”. [2] Of course we do not advocate such tactics asLenin advocated above today but it is in-structive to note that neither Lenin nor Trot-sky regarded the state forces as workers inuniform in any way at all. It is a different

matter when whole sections of an army or ofthe police begin to come over to the side of

revolution. But then they cease to be stateforces and became anti-state forces on behalfof the revolution.In a polemic in 2006 against ‘Michael’, who

subsequently split to join the InternationalBolshevik Tendency, [3] Lynn Walsh reliedheavily on the attitude of Marx to the stateand Transitional Demands in Germany in1848, quoting from the Communist Mani-festo and the later, Demands of the Commu-nist Party in Germany (1848). [4] What heneglects to tell us is that the ONLY point inthe Communist Manifesto that Marx feltobliged to alter is on the question of thestate. Strategy for Revolution in 21st Century tellsus:“The experience of the Paris Commune in1870 led Marx and Engels to revise one as-pect of the Communist Manifesto, in their1872 preface, the only time they ever felt itnecessary to do so. In their words, “Onething especially was proved by the Com-mune, viz. that ‘the working class cannot

simply lay hold of the ready-made state ma-chinery and wield it for its own purposes.’”

Massacre in Marikana, August 16, 2012. DEMOC-RATIC SOCIALIST MOVEMENT STATE-MENT AUGUST 17, 2012:: “We stand for workers’right to defend themselves, in a disciplined way. It

was a mistake for Lonmin workers to respond by

killing first two security guards, on Saturday, andthen two police officers on Monday.” We alsostand for workers’ right to defend themselves inundisciplined ways, we would strongly suggest.


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As Lenin would repeat later in State andRevolution, this means that “that the work-ing class must break up, smash the “ready -made state machinery”, and not confine itselfmerely to laying hold of it.” [5]

The IBT replied to this at length in an ortho-dox Trotskyist document, Marxism vs.‘Militant’ Reformism, [6] with which there islittle to disagree and whose arguments wetherefore do not need to repeat. It serves as auseful supplement to this document, apartfrom obvious differences in method of ap-proach to the working class. Failure to under-stand the Marxist theory of the state was the

specific weakness peculiar to Grantism thatled to the collapse of that tradition into rightcentrism in the late 1940s and early 1950s

with the rest of the Trotskyist movement. Infact Grant was much better than most othergroups in rejecting the capitulation to thepolitical opportunism of Michel Pablo, thepost war central leader of the Fourth Interna-tional, in regard to Yugoslavia up to that

period, as we shall see later.How the Sparts see the DSM and

the WASP The Grantite attitude to the state in Britain ismirrored in every country where the CWI orIMT has sections. Here is the account of theInternational Communist League (Sparts) ofthe activities of the DSM (CWI) and its frontgroup the Wasp. Care needs to be takes as

the ICL never countenances any tactical ori-entation to the working class via its vanguardat all; it is the most dogmatically sectarian ofall the self-proclaimed Trotskyist groups. We

would suggest the ability of the CWI groupto remain in the ANC, albeit as a DEEPentry group, until 1996 was how they builttheir group; a clear revolutionary programmemight have attracted far more repression but

in reality the ANC do not distinguish be-tween self-proclaimed Trotskyist groups. As

long as an outside centre was maintained theentry tactic was at least a possibility. Totalentryism is only possible for a brief period ofa year or two. Nevertheless the account vin-dicates our own position that they are re-

formists everywhere on the state:“According to the Daily Maverick (15 Octo-ber), a meeting of wildcat strike leaders tookplace in Marikana, representing miners fromseveral provinces. The article noted in par-ticular the presence of the Democratic So-cialist Movement (DSM), which has beenactive in the Rustenburg area. The DSM saysthat a national strike coordinating committee

was launched on October 13 and that thecommittee is calling for a general strike onNovember 3. On October 19, Vavi andNUM officials were pelted with rocks bystriking workers at AngloGold Ashanti’smine in Orkney, North West Province. Ear-lier, several DSM members were detained bymine security and grilled by police after ad-dressing the strikers. The workers’ movement

must defend the DSM and all others victim-ized for their role in the miners struggle!However, mineworkers and others need tobe aware of the thoroughly opportunist his-tory of the DSM, which is affiliated to theCommittee for a Workers’ International(CWI [in Canada, Socialist Alternative])headed by Peter Taaffe. The Taaffe groupformed the Marxist Workers’ Tendency ofthe ANC, remaining inside this bourgeoisparty until 1996. In a speech in New Yorkgiven shortly after the 1994 elections, Taaffe,then the leader of the British Militant Labour

Tendency, opposed the call for a workers’party, saying: “The working class in South

Africa has to go through the experience of an ANC government. The slogan of a workers’party was an incorrect slogan in the periodprior to the elections in South Africa. We

wanted the biggest possible ANC major-ity” (WV No. 602, 10 June 1994).


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The DSM emerged from its entrism insidethe ANC when the latter’s “national libera-tion” credentials were starting to wear thin asa result of economic policies aimed at reas-suring investors. Indeed, few if any left

groups persist in uncritically cheerleading forthe regime and its leaders, who are unasham-edly riding the “gravy train.” But the DSM,like the other reformists who hitched their

wagon to the Tripartite Alliance, maintains itsclass-collaborationist politics, which are atbottom the same as those of the SACP andCOSATU tops. This can be unmistakablyseen in the DSM’s attitude toward the state

(see the 1994 Spartacist pamphlet, MilitantLabour’s Touching Faith in the CapitalistState). Just like their reformist big brothers,the CWI/DSM believes that the police arepart of the workers’ movement. In the 1994 speech cited above, Taaffe sup-ported the cop union POPCRU (Police andPrisons Civil Rights Union), enthusing that“these very same black police who were tools

of the apartheid regime, were radicalized bythe situation.” His conclusion was: “We canneutralize the forces of the state and winthem over.” One can cite any amount of evidence dis-proving this suicidal illusion, the cop massa-cre of miners at Marikana being an obviousexample. In the wake of that event, the DSM,in a 17 August statement titled “For a Gen-eral Strike to End the Marikana Massacre,”

violence-baited the Lonmin strikers, rebukingthem for “killing first two security guards, onSaturday, and then two police officers onMonday” (quoted in a 23 August SSA state-ment published in WV No. 1007, 31 August).Now, in a 16 October statement, the DSMrefers to a wave of workers’ militancy sweep-ing through the country, which supposedlyincludes “the police as well as the municipal

workers”! Of the Taaffeites, it can truly besaid that they have learned nothing and for-

gotten nothing. The police, black and white,are enforcers for capitalist rule. We say:Cops, prison guards and security guards outof the unions!

The DSM calls for “nationalisation of the

mines under workers’ control and manage-ment.” A black -centred workers’ government

would expropriate the mines, banks, industryand land without compensation, while strug-gling to extend the revolution internationally.Such a government could only be put inplace through the expropriation of the South

African bourgeoisie as a class, i.e., throughproletarian revolution. The DSM statement

does not mention socialist revolution, andthis is not an accident. They don’t believethat the workers must smash the capitaliststate and replace it with a workers’ state. InBritain, Taaffe’s organization claims thatindustry will be nationalized through themechanism of an “enabling bill” passed bythe bourgeois Parliament. This is just a ver-sion of what the British Labour Party did

after World War II: it’s social democracy, notcommunism. [7]

The Marxist Theory of the StateOf course every Marxist student knowsEngels famous 1884 definition of the state:“The second distinguishing feature is theestablishment of a public power which nolonger directly coincides with the populationorganizing itself as an armed force. This spe-

cial public power is necessary because a self-acting armed organization of the populationhas become impossible since the split intoclasses. The slaves also belong to the popula-tion; as against the 365,000 slaves, the 90,000

Athenian citizens constitute only a privilegedclass. The militia of the Athenian democracy

was an aristocratic public power against theslaves, whom it kept in check; but to keep

the citizens in check as well, a gendarmerie was needed as described above. This public


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power exists in every state; it consists notmerely of armed men but also of materialadjuncts, prisons and coercive institutions ofall kinds, of which gentile society knew noth-ing”. [8] In 1843 Marx in On the Jewish Question at-tacked the idea of a regime of rights in theFrench Constitution of 1793 partially on thebasis that policemen were needed to enforcethese ‘rights’: “Security is the highest social concept of civilsociety, the concept of police, expressing thefact that the whole of society exists only inorder to guarantee to each of its membersthe preservation of his person, his rights, andhis property. It is in this sense that Hegelcalls civil society “the state of need and rea-

son.” … we see that the political emancipa-tors go so far as to reduce citizenship, and

the political community, to a mere means formaintaining these so-called rights of man,that, therefore, the citoyen is declared to bethe servant of egotistic homme, that thesphere in which man acts as a communal

being is degraded to a level below the spherein which he acts as a partial being, and that,finally, it is not man as citoyen, but man asprivate individual [bourgeois] who is consid-ered to be the essential and true man”. [9] So here we see that the policeman protectsthe property of the bourgeoisie against the

worker as his central task, according theMarx. But there are all forms of state, the

democratic, the totalitarian, the fascist andthere are workers’ states. And it was on theanalysis of the new workers’ states that ap-peared after WWII that Grant displayed bothhis adherence to certain Trotskyist principlesand his weakness on the state. It is widelyacknowledged outside his own ideologicalcircles by any that are willing to make a seri-ous objective assessment that his defence

Trotskyism’s heritage on both Yugoslaviaand China in 1949 were principled and cor-rect in so far as they went.In 1957 Bill Hunter produced his anti-Pabloite document, Under a Stolen Flag whichmust rank as a spirited defence of Trotsky-ism, albeit with the left centrist weakness wehave analysed in On the Continuity of Trotsky- ism. However in Ted Grant The UnbrokenThread we find a curious gap in the historyfrom the mid fifties up to the early sixties. As

we learn from A Brief biography in RevolutionaryHistory 2002: “In 1953 a split took place inthe International, with Healy and Cannonleaving to form their own grouping. This leftthe International without a section in Britain.

After some discussions, Ted’s group wasrecognised as the official British section. Bythe end of the year Ted again became full-

timer worker, and a new magazine, WorkersInternational Review , was launched”. [10]

Fredrick Engels describes the state: “This public power exists in every state; it consists not merelyof armed men but also of material adjuncts, pris-ons and coercive institutions of all kinds, of

which gentile society knew nothing.”


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Bill Hunter points out that this was on thebasis of supporting Pablo, with whom hecertainly disagreed:“We must remark, in passing, that Pablo andCo. show scant courtesy to the little group in

Britain which made an unprincipled fusion with last year. How now, Comrade G(rant)? You have justified your bargain – two profes-sionals and a magazine, in exchange for a‘section’ in Britain with a few ‘principles’thrown in – by declaring that Pabloism haschanged. This shabby covering has now beentorn away by none other than Pablo himself.On Page 1 of its thesis the ‘International

Secretariat’ informs us that: ‘more and moredramatic events have followed one another inthe USSR, the Peoples Democracies and thecapitalist countries since the 4th World Con-gress, have completely and brilliantly con-firmed this analysis”. (i.e. the whole Pabloite

war revolution nonsense – SF) [11](We will analyse how the CWI’s reformisttheory of the state evolved from a relatively

good position by Ted Grant in the late 1940sand early 1950s to today’s reformist one witha thin veneer of Trotskyism in a separatedocument, The Marxist theory of the state …)

The CWI’s pro-imperialism onIreland

Nowhere is the theory of the state moreneeded than in the north of Ireland, nowhereis the Grant tradition as obviously capitula-

tory as there. We will examine the articlefrom Militant on the 1974 Ulster Workersstrike that brought down the Sunningdale

Agreement which was proposing a timidreformist power-sharing agreement which

would grant some modest protection againstdiscrimination to the Nationalist, i.e. anti-imperialist, community in the north of Ire-land.

In an article in the Irish Examiner, Welcomefor Orange Order is one step on long jour-

ney, July 03 2012, Gerard Howlin commentson the reception given in the ballroom inLeinster House, in the Irish parliament, tothe grandmaster of the Orange Order Ed-

ward Stevenson. Giving the historical back-

ground he comments:“In 1795, as tensions mounted, a clash oc-curred called the Battle of the Diamond inCo Armagh. It was a nasty scuffle involvingCatholic Defenders and local Protestants. Itdid, however, give birth to the Orange Order.If the Seanad chamber is a backdrop for theProtestant Enlightenment in Ireland, theorder can be viewed, as one historian re-

marked, as the key force of counter-revolution. It was the political genius of theOrder that it could hold dukes and dustmenin its popular but sectarian embrace.” [12]

The skilled Protestant workers, the institu-tionalise aristocracy of labour who have tra-ditionally looked to Apartheid South Africa,to Zionist Israel and to the US deep South

Jim Crow for inspiration, despised the poor

‘papist’ nationalist/Catholic workers and were always determined to form a cross-classalliance to deny them employment, housing,

welfare and life itself whenever “croppy”became too uppity. But Militant pandered tothem thus:“At the same time once the effectiveness ofthe strike was demonstrated, it gained sup-port from the Protestant working class. Thefive years of bombings and violence, together

with the fear of being incorporated into acapitalist united Ireland, fuelled their supportfor the strike. Above all, it was the speechesof Gerry Fitt, with his sweeping characterisa-tion of all supporters of the strike as‘fascists’, and Wilson, with his infamous‘spongers’ speech, and the use of the army inthe petrol stations, which served to unitepractically the whole of the Protestant popu-

lation behind the UWC call.


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But the strike was organised for reactionaryends. There were genuine fears on the part ofthe mass of the Protestant working class that

they were to become the new minority - dis-criminated against and permanently subju-gated - in a capitalist united Ireland. But theleaders of the UWC - with their diatribesagainst ‘communists and Trotskyists’ - andtheir political allies, Paisley, Craig and West,played on these fears in an attempt to turnback the wheel of history to the pre-1969situation. They wished to re-establish theProtestant Ascendancy - their own Ascen-dancy.

The strike was aimed not just against‘Sunningdale’ and the ‘Irish dimension’, butin order to force back the Catholic popula-tion into the position they occupied beforethe Civil Rights campaign.Nevertheless, the strike also demonstrated ina distorted form and on a reactionary issue,the colossal power of the working class when

it moves into action. The whole basis of lifein modern society depends on the working

class. Nothing moved in Northern Ireland without the permission of the working class.Even bourgeois commentators, hostile to theaim of the strike, were forced to comment onthe power and ingenuity displayed by the

working class. Thus the Times correspondentcommented on the situation in the ProtestantSandy Row district of Belfast…”Betweenfifty and a hundred men have operated arubbish clearance service, going round in thebacks of lorries while others swept thestreets. At the weekend, brown paper rubbishbags arrived and 22,000 have been given tofamilies in the past three days.” Connections

were made with sympathetic farmers whosupplied the areas with cheap food…” [13]

Amidst all the dross here this is the sentencethat leaps out at you from that article:“Nevertheless, the strike also demonstrated in adistorted form and on a reactionary issue, the colossal

power of the working class when it moves into action.” Who would express such admirationfor a neo-fascist uprising? Would we admire

the strength and discipline of Hitler’s Brown-shirts because this showed us what these workers could do if there were socialists andnot fascists? And remember the materialbasis for discrimination in the north of Ire-land. Here was the real aristocracy of labourthat was originally gathered in 1795 in theOrange Order, whose declared purpose in itsinitiation oath is still to “counter-revolution”.“Nothing moved in Northern Ireland with-out the permission of the working class”cannot but choke you. This “nothing” is pri-marily other workers, Protestants who hadsolidarity with nationalist workers and na-tionalist workers themselves who were as-saulted with fascistic enthusiasm by Loyalistthugs with the covert assistance of the British

Army and the not-so-covert assistance of theRoyal Ulster Constabulary. The various bour-

geoisies, from the Irish pro-imperialists tothe bedrock of imperialist orthodoxy in the

Just another side of the ‘sectarian conflict’ accord-ing to the Socialist Party. Reactionary Loyalism isdirectly compared, often unfavourable, with revolu-tionary republicanism in Ireland.


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columns of The Times, of course, were nothostile to this strike, supported it but had tobe careful in how they expressed their sup-port, as Militant were. Hence the mutual ad-miration between Militant and the pro-

imperialist bourgeoisie here: “Isn’t it great tohave the workers going on strike for us in-stead against us for a change?” is the com-mon theme here supported by Militant.

Those in South Africa will recall MangosuthuButhelezi’s strikes against the ANC inKwaZulu-Natal. Do we all remember howsupportive The Times were to the 1926 Gen-eral Strike and how it complemented the

workers on their ingenuity etc? We thoughnot! But to quote more:“A sectarian catastrophe cannot be ruled outin Northern Ireland; particularly if the tradeunion movement fails to act now. But Marx-ists reject the siren voices who speak and

write of the ‘inevitability’ of religious civil war. Events in Britain and Southern Irelandcan exercise a profound effect in the North

of Ireland. The worsening economic situa-tion in Britain and its effects in Britain willprovide the opportunity for cementing a classmovement of Catholic and Protestant work-ers. But as in the past, these opportunitiescan be missed if the lessons of the last sixyears are not learnt. The bitter religious divi-sions between the working class will not bebridged by Christian homilies. Sectarianism

will not evaporate if the trade union leadersact as if by ignoring it, it will go away by it-self. The working class of Northern Ireland havedemonstrated their colossal power during the Maystrike.” (our emphasis). [14]So workers participating in a reactionary fas-cist attack on other workers demonstratedthe colossal power of the working class! Thisis the most outrageous sentence we have everread for a group which claims to be socialist.

It is true that an earlier article, whilst bad, was written in Ireland and at least had some

clear opposition to the strike: “They wereusing that power for reactionary aims and toassist their own worst enemies, the Craigs,Paisleys and co. Let them use it together withthe Catholic working class – and they will bean invincible force.” [15]

A measure of equalityBut that was the very reason for the strike,they feared the “Catholics”, in fact all thepolitical opponents of British imperialist oc-cupation of the six north eastern counties ofIreland, would gain a measure of equality,

they would be forced to stop discriminatingagainst them and within their own ranks

Over 100, 000 at Bobby Sands’ funeral on 7 May1981. Sands is renowned as a great inspirationalrevolutionary fighter worldwide; to Grantism he is

the leader of a sectarian conflict, worse that BillyHutchinson, the sectarian murderer of MichaelLoughran and Edward Morgan in October 1974,

whom they paraded as a socialist.In Israel/Palestine, Palestinian prisoners incarcer-ated in the Israeli desert prison of Nafha sent aletter, which was smuggled out and reached Bel-fast in July 1981, which read; “To the families ofBobby Sands and his martyred comrades. We,revolutionaries of the Palestinian people...extendour salutes and solidarity with you in the confron-tation against the oppressive terrorist rule enforcedupon the Irish people by the British ruling elite.

We salute the heroic struggle of Bobby Sands andhis comrades, for they have sacrificed the most

valuable possession of any human being. Theygave their lives for freedom.”


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“Rotten Prods” would emerge to show soli-darity with the nationalists and anti-imperialists, as they did in the late teens andearly 1920s. This labour aristocracy was notgoing to yield its privileges to anyone because

they knew that covertly the entire Britishestablishment supported them, including thetrade union bureaucracy and the Labourparty, whose left flank was guarded so assidu-ously here by the pro-imperialist Militant

Tendency of Ted Grant. The strike was tostop the possibility of the nationalist commu-nity gaining that limited measure of equalityand its success guaranteed just that for an-

other generation at least. The “power of the working class” was exercised to prevent workers unity and the Socialist Party, whilstadvocating unity, believes it can only be onthe basis of the support for the British Em-pire. They are THE most pro-imperialist secton the left (apart from the AWL, of course).“Irish Marxists – gathered around the MilitantIrish Monthly – are the only tendency in the Irish

labour movement, on the basis of a Marxist programme and perspective, capable of furthering the process of re-arming the Northern Ireland workers onclass lines”. [16]This is a complete lie. Thisutterly shameful article, still proudly displayedin the archives of the SP/CWI, displays thisas a political current prepared to go to alllengths to defends the interests of British andglobal imperialism, and covering this up witha thin veneer of leftist pseudo-Marxist gob-bledegook.But that was 1974 what about today? Thepolitics are the same, as Socialist Fight No 12pointed out:“In an article on 16 January 2013, NorthernIreland: Flag issue turmoil illustrates failureof the ‘peace process’ Ciaran Mulholland,CWI Northern Ireland, (the Socialist Party)gives us this on the riots:

“Whilst the total numbers involved are rela-tively small there is no doubt that the issue

has acted as a lightning rod for widespreaddissatisfaction with the peace process whichhas built up over time in the Protestant com-munity. There is real and genuine angeramong large layers of Protestants. There is a

sense that “everything is going in one direc-tion”, that is, Protestants are losing out toCatholics. In the view of many Sinn Fein arepushing too hard for concessions-as Progres-sive Unionist Party (the PUP is linked to theUVF) leader Billy Hutchinson has argued“Sinn Fein are acting outside the spirit of theGood Friday Agreement”. This is the reasonthat the PUP have given for reversing their

previous conciliatory approach on the flagsissue. A banner displayed in the Mount

Vernon, where Hutchison works as a com-munity worker, proclaims “North Belfast

Against Cultural Apartheid”.

What ‘The Protestants’ and ‘TheCatholics’ Believe

The stuff that “the Protestants” believe is

completely false however as the article goeson to explain. They are blaming “the Catho-lics” who are sufferings a great deal morethan themselves:“At the same time many Catholics continueto believe that they are subject to sectariandiscrimination. They hold that they are dealt

with more harshly by the police. They believethat they are more likely to be poor and un-employed than Protestants for historic rea-

sons, reasons of geography and because ofthe residues of sectarian discrimination, thereare still differences between the two commu-nities in economic terms. The poverty rateamong Protestants at 19 per cent is lowerthan the 26 per cent rate for Catholics. In thethree years to 2010 on average, 28 per cent of

working-age Protestants were not in paid work compared with 35 per cent of Catho-

lics.”


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So the stuff that “the Catholics believe” is, infact, true. But nonetheless we must be carefulto avoid drawing any conclusion about

whose beliefs are correct and whose are far-right reaction:

“The views expressed in each community aresometimes true, or partially true. Sometimeshowever genuinely held beliefs are simply nottrue. The reason that such a complex situa-tion can arise is that there are genuine inter-

woven grievances on both sides. The realproblem is that the peace process has failedto deliver for working class or young people

whatever their background. The peace proc-

ess has failed because under capitalism genu-ine peace, and real economic advancementfor working people, is not possible. Underthe structures established by the Good Friday

Agreement it is assumed that everyone be-longs to one or other of two mutually exclu-sive communities. Under capitalism all that ispossible is a sharing out of political power,and a sharing out of poverty and unemploy-

ment… Whilst all sections of the protestantcommunity have been affected by the flagissue it finds its sharpest expression in themost deprived working class areas. The riot-ing and the road blocks are in part a distortedform of class anger directed at the unionistpolitical establishment represented in theassembly and on the executive.” But the problems predate the GFA and in-deed the Orange state itself from 1921, al-though both made a bad situation much

worse. It is a complete lie that the ‘two com-munities’ are equally to blame. In the medie-

val church that type of argument as it is madeabove was known as equivocation. [17] And“class anger” my arse. Was it class anger thatdrove some backward German workers todon Brownshirts and attack Jews? Leon Trot-sky said they were the “storm troopers of

finance capital” and that is what we are see-ing emerging in Belfast. Of course it is a lie

that Loyalist anger is directed primarily at theUUP/DUP and the police. However somerioters justified attacking the police because ithad too many Catholics (by February 2011,29.7% of the 7, 200 officers were from the

Catholic community). But anger is only di-rected against all these because they seen asslacking somewhat in their traditional job ofdiscriminating against ‘the Catholics’. In a 1999 review of Loyalists, by Peter TaylorSocialism Today told us that the PUP“initially moved in a socialist direction”. TheSocialist party described the neo-fascist upris-ing that was the Ulster Workers’ Council

strike of May 1974 was displaying “the latentpower of the working class” in the “interestsof the majority of the Protestant population”as they saw it; right or wrong we must re-spect this prejudice!In October 1974 current PUP leader BillyHutchinson, murdered Catholics MichaelLoughran and Edward Morgan in Northum-berland Street, Belfast (which links the Prot-

estant Shankill to the neighbouring FallsRoad, a Catholic area). Hutchinson has oftenstressed the importance of the working classnature of Loyalism and has argued in favourof socialism, he is an atheist and has neverbeen a member of the Orange Order. The SPhave always pandered to this neo-Strasserite[18] Loyalist ‘socialism’ – which opposes therights of the nationalist community – a“socialism of idiots”, as SPD leader AugustBebel famously described it c. 1890.

The Malvinas War; the CWI de-fends the Empire

If we scroll on eight years we come to theMalvinas war against Argentina in 1982.

AgainTedGrantcouldbereliedontherushtoth-eassistanceoftheempirethreatenedbyan uppitysemi-colony claiming back their national ter-ritory seized as a colony by the British Em-


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pire in 1690. Here is another shameful articlein defence of Empire but also containing thekey rejection of Marxism on the state andrevolution:“The Falklands war is not a reason for calling

off the struggle against the Tories – on thecontrary, the slaughter of the war and theadditional drain on British capitalism, for

which big business will try to make the work-ers pay, underlines the urgency of steppingup the struggle to bring down the Tory gov-ernment.

The labour movement should be mobilisedto force a general election to open the way

for the return of a Labour government toimplement socialist policies at home andabroad. Victory of a socialist government inBritain would immediately transform thesituation in relation to the Falklands. The

Junta would no longer be able to claim to befighting British imperialism.

A socialist government would make a classappeal to the Argentinean workers. A Labour

government could not just abandon the Falk-landers and let Galtieri get on with it. But itwould continue the war on socialist lines. First, asocialist government would carry through thedemocratisation of the British armed forces,introducing trade union rights and the elec-tion of officers. Working class interests can-not be defended under the direction of anauthoritarian, officer caste, which is tied tothe capitalist class by education, income andfamily and class loyalties. The use of forceagainst the Junta, however, would be com-bined with a class appeal to the workers inuniform. British capitalism will probably de-feat the Junta, but only through a bloodybattle and at an enormous cost in lives. Usingsocialist methods, a Labour governmentcould rapidly defeat the dictatorship, which

was already facing a threat from the Argen-

tinean working class when Galtieri embarked

on his diversionary battle with British imperi-

alism (our emphasis).” [19] The above passage contains all the reformistrepudiation of the Marxist position on thestate as well as the gross national chauvinistpro-imperialism so characteristic of this sect.For instance the “workers in uniform” stuff

was explicitly repudiated by Lenin and Trot-sky in their writings on the capitalist state as

we say above. And as for continuing the warif they were in government that is simply apiece of gross social imperialism, socialist inname but clearly imperialist in content totoady to British ruling class interests andplacate British middle class and workers’ pro-imperialist prejudices. We recall the pressuresof the time (having been assaulted for de-fending Argentina’s right to the Malvinas)but what good is a Marxist who cannot standup to the pressures from his or her own rul-

ing class? They are simply playing games.


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Workers Power’s Document The key elements of the reformism ofGrantism under a thin veneer of Marxistgobbledygook are exposed in the 1989 docu-ment by Workers Power. Whilst not agreeing

with many details in the piece it does addressthe essence of the group’s anti-revolutionaryreformism:“In place of the strategy of the proletarianseizure of power Militant puts forward theschema of a Labour government with a par-liamentary majority and a socialist pro-gramme, implementing the transformation ofsociety by legislative means. Peter Taaffe

argues:. . . in the pages of Militant, in pam-phlets, and in speeches, we have shown thatthe struggle to establish a socialist Britain canbe carried through in Parliament backed upby the colossal power of the labour move-ment outside. This, however, will only bepossible on one condition: that the tradeunions and Labour Party are won to a clearMarxist programme, and the full power of

the movement is used to effect the rapid andcomplete socialist transformation of society.

At the level of strategy this amounts to aparliamentary road to socialism via an estab-lished reformist party — that is a bourgeois

workers’ party. Nowhere in the pages of Mili-tant or its associated journals do we find anyreferences to the need (in Britain) for work-ers’ councils as the organs of struggle and ofproletarian power in order to effect the revo-lution. Nowhere do we find the argument fora workers’ militia as an alternative to thecapitalists’ military machine. Nowhere do wefind the call for a revolutionary party, distinctfrom all shades of reformism and centrism,as the necessary leadership for the proletariatin the revolution. Parliament and the existingorganisations of the working class aredeemed sufficient. Indeed, the job of work-

ers’ organisations is merely to supplementand enhance the work of the left parliamen-

tarians. Even these existing reformist ledorganisations are not cited as an alternativeform of political power to Parliament.

As Taaffe explains: “The struggle to enhancethe position of Labour in Parliament has

always been supplemented by the struggleoutside Parliament, both of the trade unionsand the Labour Party.” This parliamentarystrategy leads to a crucial error; the down-playing of the role of the working class, of itsself-organisation as the key to its self-emancipation in the course of revolution. Ifanyone, particularly the reformist leadershipof the Labour Party, were in any doubt about

the Militant’s commitment to Parliament,Rob Sewell (now a leader of the rival IMT

which retains the politically identical posi-tions on the state -GD) repeated the essenceof their position in an indignant reply to thereformist Geoff Hodgson: “The idea putforward by Hodgson that we want to ‘smashparliamentary democracy’ is completely un-true. Unlike the sectarian grouplets on the

fringe of the labour movement we havestressed that a socialist Britain can be accom-plished through Parliament, backed up by themobilised power of the labour movementoutside.” The swipe against the left in orderto appease the right is a classic characteristicof centrism.” [20] But perhaps they have advanced since thosedays? Not a bit of it. Now that they are nolonger in the British Labour party they canfeign well to the left of the IMT/British So-cialist Appeal on domestic as well as in inter-national issues. But the essential reformistpolitics remain the same. They are still forthe parliamentary road to socialism only nowthey are sure the Labour party cannot do itbut a more radical, reformist workers’ partycan perform this task and tread the path ofthe old Communist parties via parliament.

This radical party is the Trade Union andSocialist Coalition (TUSC) in Britain and the


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Workers and Socialist Party (WASP) in South Africa, to name but two. The line is still thesame, lacking even the radical posturing ofGerry Healy’s WRP in its strident denuncia-tions of all such reformist ideas whilst cosy-ing up to the reformist Ken Livingstone anddefending his sell out of the in 1984 andtoadying to Gaddafi, Saddam Hussein andthe Ayatollah Khomeini.

Libya and Syria TodayIn recent international questions they havebeen begun to adopt a third camp position,as can be seen in Libya and Syria. That is theysupport the imperialist sponsored‘revolutions’ on the ground but denounce allopen imperialist intervention. This is theclassic “neither Washing nor Moscow” (or inthese cases Tripoli or Damascus) but interna-

tional socialism” line. They therefore seek the working class fighting in their own class in-

terests which naturally, for them, means they will not defend the semi-colonial regimeagainst a proxy way by imperialist-sponsoredforces. But it is at least refreshing not to hearthe gross apology for imperialist-sponsored

outright reactionary forces in Libya and Syria(Obama’s ‘revolution’) that we get fromgroups like their former comrades in theSocialist Appeal/IMT, The Socialist WorkersParty (SWP/IST), the Mandelite Fourth In-ternational, the Alliance for Workers Liberty,

Workers Power and the Austrian-basedRevolutionary Communist International Ten-dency, (RCIT) on these questions. But they

began in Libya as straight forward pro-imperialists:“No serious left force can advocate a policyof abstention where working people are sub-jected to murderous attack by a ruthless dic-tator like Gaddafi. Clearly, we had to givepolitical support -the position of the SocialistParty and the Committee for a Workers’ In-ternational (CWI) from the outset – to the

people of Benghazi when they drove Gad-dafi’s forces from the city in a revolutionaryuprising.” [21] But the “people of Benghazi” were led byCIA ‘assets’ (who turned out subsequently tobe liabilities) and were lynching Black work-ers right from the start. The flying of KingIdris’ flag and the whole history of CIAsponsorship of these groups and leadershipsshould have been enough to identify who the‘revolutionaries’ in Benghazi were. But withthat un-repudiated history of pro- imperial-ism the shift is only a tactical one to capturethose who are seeking genuine Trotskyistrevolutionary politics and will not trouble toomuch to examine what they are really sayingand how it gells with past positions. As So-cialist Fight No 7 said: The Socialist Party(CWI) are somewhat more circumspect than

their former comrades in the IMT:

“No serious left force can advocate a policy ofabstention where working people are subjected tomurderous attack by a ruthless dictator like Gad-dafi. Clearly, we had to give political support -the

position of the Socialist Party and the Committee

for a Workers’ International (CWI) from the outset – to the people of Benghazi when they drove Gad-dafi’s forces from the city in a revolutionary upris-ing.” Socialism Today May 2011. The ‘working

people’ (at least they had the good grace not todescribe them as a ‘class’) celebrate the foul andcounter-revolutionary butchery of Gaddafi onbehalf of US imperialism and NATO on20/10/2011


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“While many Libyans are celebrating, social-ists have to be clear that, unlike the ousting

of Ben Ali in Tunisia and Mubarak in Egypt,the way in which Gaddafi has been removedmeans that a victory for the Libyan people

was also a success for imperialism. WithoutNATO acting as the rebels’ air force or thesoldiers, weapons, organisation and trainingthat NATO and some other countries likethe feudal Qatar autocracy supplied, Tripoli

would not have fallen to the rebels in the way

that it has.” So a more truthful approach, the ‘revolution’ was won with the assistance of imperialism. That has sorted out their former comrades inSocialist Appeal but one is left floundering bythe idea that the “victory for the Libyan peo-ple was also a success for imperialism.” Weknow that was what they said on the TVcomrades but it was a lie. You cannot ad-

vance imperialism’s victory and the victory ofthe working class at the same time, they aremutually exclusive, and one must advance atthe expense of the other, a ‘zero sum’ ratherthan a ‘win- win’ situation we would suggest.Of course the use of the word ‘people’ mightmean that they accept that capitalists and

workers have ultimately the same politicaland economic interests in faraway lands. Butonce you pay the first tranche of the protec-

tion money the Mafia will always be back formore.

The CWI take a similar third campist line onSyria today. This does put them to the left ofthose like the Alliance for Workers Liberty(who do equivocate, it is true), the FourthInternational (Mandel) and Workers Power

and the RCIT, who are still batting for theirreactionary pro-imperialist ‘revolution’ aban-doned now by the more pragmatic leftists.

The History and Genesis of theNational Shop Stewards Network

The NSSN was founded at a conferencecalled by the National Union of Rail, Mari-time and Transport Workers (RMT) on July7, 2007. The proposal to re-establish a shopstewards movement came from an RMTsponsored conference to discuss workingclass political representation held in January2006.Its founding conference saw a dispute overClause 3 of the constitution, which pledgednot to interfere in the internal affairs of TUCaffiliated unions. This effectively meant that

no criticisms were allowed of the left tradeunion bureaucracy, whose mouth piece it wasto become. Following a unanimous decisionof the steering committee, on 22 January2011, the NSSN held a conference to discusslaunching its own anti-cuts campaign. A mo-tion from a majority on the steering commit-tee proposed establishing an anti-cuts cam-paign “bringing trade unions and communi-

ties together to save all jobs and services”, whilst a minority on the steering committeeargued against the motion, opposing settingup an anti-cuts campaign and argued for“working with Coalition of Resistance, Rightto Work and other groups, to build andlaunch a single national anti-cuts organisationearly in 2011”. In the debate both sides hadequal speakers and shared responsibility forchairing the debate which lasted two and ahalf hours, with the conference voting 305 to


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89 to establish an anti-cuts campaign com-mittee which was elected immediately after-

wards.So after four years of having successfullyresisted attempts to delete Clause 3 at succes-

sive conferences in 22 January the NSSNsplit and became a more openly an obviousfront for the TU bureaucracy. All non-SPmembers, apart from one or two, resignedfrom the Steering Committee. Here is GerryDowning’s resignation letter: I hereby resign from the Steering Committeeof the NSSN because the decisions of theSpecial Conference of 22 January effectively

meant that the NSSN had openly become afront for the left trade union bureaucracy.Such aspirations as it had to represent theindependent interests of the rank-and-file ofthe working class was now totally abandoned.Despite its left posturing on correctly de-manding of anti-cuts campaigns no platformfor Labour councillors who vote for the cutsthe fact is that no national trade union, right

or left, has demanded that Labour council-lors it sponsors, supports or influences voteagainst the cuts or refuse to implement them,let alone seeks to mobilise its members forindustrial action to defeat the cuts, againstLabour Councils where necessary.In fact Unite has explicitly instructed itscouncillors to set legal budgets to implementthe cuts and all other national union leader-ships have a similar attitude. Therefore hol-low left posturing by the NSSN SP leaders

whilst covering up for these left bureaucratsis no opposition at all. The RMT now callsoff legally endorsed strikes on “legal advice”that a judge MIGHT grant an injunction! TheNSSN, in gaining the support of RMT Gen-eral Secretary and having RMT President

Alex Gordon on the Anti-Cuts Committeemeans the prospect of endorsing the illegal

strike action and occupations now increas-ingly necessary to fight cuts and privatisation

has all-but disappeared from the perspectiveof the NSSN. I therefore call on all serioustrade union militants to build a rank-and-filemovement independent of ALL TU bureau-crats and attend the London meeting on

April 9th of those who supported Jerry Hicksfor Unite General Secretary to found theGrass Roots Left in Unite and encouragesuch formations in all unions. Non-unitemembers who agree with the perspective

welcome. Details of venue etc to follow. Workers Power’s Jeremy Dewar made thefollowing analysis:“Gordon (Alex Gordon, RMT President at

that time) claimed that the NSSN opposition wanted: The NSSN conference to take a position onthe Unite leadership campaign (presumablyi n s u p p o r t o f J e r r y H i c k s ) The NSSN to oppose the Trade Union Free-dom Bill on the grounds that it did not go farenough To refuse a £5,000 donation from the RMT

because this would put the NSSN in hock tothat union’s leadership. None of these claims are true. It was a smearspeech, aimed at undermining the minoritybefore the debate. Nevertheless, Gordon’sspeech did more than show what an unprin-cipled bureaucrat he is, it showed that Crowand his cronies in the RMT bureaucracy hadreached a deal with the SP leadership. Crowand co. would support the SP’s bid to splitthe anti-cuts movement with a rival cam-paign, in order to weaken the Socialist Work-ers Party (which they both hate, especiallyafter a series of articles in Socialist Workercritical of the RMT’s leadership of the tubedispute) and secure the NSSN as uncriticalcheerleaders of the left wing union leaders.[22]

As we wrote at the time: The SP have an

almost totally compliant membership, clearlyto the right of the SWP, for instance. if we


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ignore the odd cloud of doubt thatpasses over the faces of leftists likeRob Williams and others when aparticularly nasty piece of chicaneryis imposed, like the forced split in

the NSSN on the 22 January. JaneLoftus, a member of the Socialist

Workers Party voted November 52009 to accept the interim agree-ment and call off the strikes, just asthe strength of the postal workers

was starting to be realised and she was forced to resign from the SWPas a result. But the SP backed this

same sell-out deal with the usuallame excuses:“But once they had a chance of looking atwhat was achieved by their mass strikeaction, many of the workers have drawnthe conclusion that the deal (unanimously agreed itseems by the elected postal executive committee) doesallow the CWU to regain some element of tradeunion control in the workplace and therefore does

push back the attacks of the bosses. One local CWUleader in the South West wrote to his members: “Wehave forced a vicious employer back to the table”. Hewent on to say: “We know the interim deal does notsettle every single problem in the industry but it givesus a foothold … Royal Mail set out to destroy yourunion. We are still here”. The idea, often put forwardin the right-wing media, that workers are ready tostrike at the drop of a hat is wrong. In this casemany think the interim deal opens the way to the

reversal of the attacks on them and their union.” [23]

The CWU are now proposing to accept privatisation because it is “illegal” to strikeagainst it and will only seek to mollify someof the worst excesses of the deal afterwards.

And Billy Hayes and Jane Loftus, CWU GenSec and President are still touring to left cir-cuses as part of an anti-cuts and privatisation

opposition! Counterfire has no pretence atinternal democracy so is a most fruitful arena

for reformist demagogs like Tony Benn whose bottom line is the parliamentary roadto socialism with the working class as a stagearmy who will assist in getting Labour gov-

ernments elected. God forbid that theyshould do anything to seriously threaten capi-talism or even seriously damage ‘the econ-omy’ by any strike longer than one day.

The SP/NSSN Alibis LenMcCluskey’s Betrayal At

Grangemouth The Socialist party Scotland statement, Tradeunions must learn lessons fromGrangemouth setback, on 25 October 2013said:“There was huge pressure on the shop stew-ards at Grangemouth following the closureannouncement on Wednesday 23 October.More than half of the permanent workforceat the whole Grangemouth site had been toldtheir jobs were gone. The oil refinery wasclosed. According to Ineos it would remain

so, unless the union agreed to huge cuts in workers’ terms and conditions. The possibil-

The Socialist Party: “The sell-off of the remaining publiclyowned parts of Royal Mail was completed over the last week.

This represents the sad passing of the last remaining form of publicly owned communications”.

Of course genuine revolutionary socialists, trade union mili-tants and fighters for the class are not ‘sad’ at these betrayals atall but hopping mad and even more determined to expose theseclass traitors and replace them with a genuine revolutionaryand fighting leadership.


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ity of closure enduring was a real one. Inaddition, the Unite Scottish secretary, PatRafferty, supported by the Unite general sec-retary Len McCluskey, was at that point urg-ing that the union sign up to the company’s

demands.” It laments more in sorrow than in angerMcCluskey’s “mistake”. Then on the 28th onthe Sunday Politics show hosted by AndrewNeil Bob Crow said he “takes his hat off” toUnite for saving jobs. On the 29th the Social-ist party piece was reposted but “This versionof this article was first posted on the SocialistParty website on 25 October 2013 and may

vary slightly from the version subsequentlyprinted in The Socialist.” The only difference

we noticed was that the words, “supportedby the Unite general secretary LenMcCluskey” were gone so that it was alldown to that nasty Unite Scottish secretary,Pat Rafferty. They really cannot fart now

without Bob’s say so. Of course they can attack the Labour party

leaders and Miliband for starting the wholeaffair but that is because, unlike the Socialist Appeal, they are no longer in the Labourparty. But essentially their politics are thesame. So the SA can be fighting syndicalistand the SP can be fighting anti-Labour andstill end up in the same place. They bow, likeRob Sewell, to Stalinist class traitor JimmyReid also. And of course there is no mentionof their voting for McCluskey against JerryHicks in the election and no mention of arank and file movement to defeat and replacethe bureaucracy. However they did mentionelsewhere the fact that Jerry Hicks got 80,000

votes as evidence of the strength of the leftin Unite (which obviously excludes them-selves as leftists in Unite). Even ‘sadder’, theythought, were the actions of Billy Hayes,another sponsor of the NSSN with Bob

Crow, who likewise expects and gets no criti-cism in return: “The sell -off of the remaining pub-

licly owned parts of Royal Mail was completed overthe last week. This represents the sad passing of thelast remaining form of publicly owned communications”. Of course genuine revolutionary socialists,

trade union militants and fighters for theclass are not ‘sad’ at these betrayals at all buthopping mad and even more determined toexpose these class traitors and replace them

with a genuine revolutionary and fightingleadership.

These are the affiliates of the NSSN: Na-tional Union of Rail, Maritime and Transport

Workers (RMT), Public and Commercial

Services Union (PCS), Communication Workers Union (CWU), National Union ofMineworkers (NUM), National Union of

Journalists (NUJ), Prison Officers Associa-tion (POA), Bakers Food and Allied WorkersUnion (BFAWU)

Notes

[ 1] V. I. Lenin, Tasks of Revolutionary Army

Cont ingen t s , O c tobe r 1905 .h t tp s : // www.marxists.org/archive/lenin/works/1905/oct/31i.htm[2] The German cops and army, From WhatNext? Vital Question for the German Proletariat,1932. http://www.marxists.org/archive/trotsky/ works/1944/1944-fas.htm[3] The State: A Marxist Programme and Transi-tional Demands, Lynn Walsh, http:// www.social ista lternative.org/li terature/state/

ch5.html[4] Marx and Engels Collected Works Volume 7,p. 3; (March 21 and 24, 1848).[5] Strategy for Revolution in 21st Century,http://sfr-21.org/civil-war-france.html[6] Marxism vs. ‘Militant’ Reformism, The CWI’sKautskyan Caricature of Trotskyism, http:// w w w . b o l s h e v i k . o r g / P a m p h l e t s / C W I /militant_reformism.html[7] Miners Struggle Shakes Neo-Apartheid Capital-ist Order, The following article is reprinted from Workers Vanguard No. 1011, 26 October, news-paper of the Spartacist League/U.S., http://


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www. i c l - f i .o r g/ pr in t/ e ng l i sh/s pc/ 175/miners.html[8] Frederick Engels, The Origin of the Family,Private Property and the State, http:// www.marx2mao.com/M&E/OFPS84.html

[9] On the Jewish Question, Autumn 1843 http:// www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1844/jewish-question/[10] Unnamed author, A Brief biography, Revolu-t i o n a r y H i s t o r y 2 0 0 2 , h t t p : / / www. revolutionaryhistory.co.uk/ted-grant/marxist-writers/ted-grant/eg-biog.htm[11] Trotskyism Vs Revisionism Volume 3, Undera Stolen Flag, W. Sinclair (Bill Hunter). p 7.[ 1 2 ] I r i s h E x a m i n e r , h t t p : / / www.irishexaminer.com/analysis/welcome-for-orange-order-is-one-step-on-long-journey-199449.html[13] John Throne, Militant International ReviewNo. 9, June 1974. Northern Ireland – the crisisdeepens – Postscript, http://www.oocities.org/socialistparty/Archive/1974UWC.htm[14] Ibid.[15]UWC strike – Trade Union Defence Forceonly answer to crisis Militant, 24th May1974,http://www.oocities.org/socialistparty/

Archive/UWC1974.htm[16] John Throne.[17] Equivocations and amphibologies in the me-diaeval church imply an untruth that is not actuallystated. In equivocation with strict mental reserva-tion the speaker mentally adds some qualificationto the words which he utters, and the words to-gether with the mental qualification make it a trueassertion in accordance with fact. (Wiki) We areunaware of what mental reservations comrade

Mulholand might have made when he made thatstatement.[17] May 2011 edition (issue 148) ofSocialism Today, Libya: the no-fly zone and thelef t , ht tp ://www.soc ia l i s tpar ty .org .uk/articles/11905[18] Strasserism refers to the strand of Nazismthat called for mass-action and worker-basedforms of National Socialism, hostile to Jews froman anti-capitalist basis, to achieve a national re-birth. It derives its name from Gregor and OttoStrasser, the two Nazi brothers initially associated

with this position. Otto Strasser was expelled fromthe NSDAP in 1930, while Gregor Strasser was

killed by Hitler’s secret police, either theSchutzstaffel (SS) or the Gestapo (GeheimeStaatspolizei), during the Night of the Long

Knives in June 1934 – watch your back, Billy![19] Socialism Today 108 – April 2007, Falklands war: what lessons for the labour movement? A(proud!) reprint of the original by Lynn Walshfrom Militant International Review (Issue 22, June1982), http://www.socialismtoday.org/108/falklands.html[20] Workers Power: Militant’s peaceful parlia-mentary road Stephen Foster and Mark Hoskis-s o n , 3 0 / 0 3 / 1 9 8 9 , h t t p : / /

www.fifthinternational.org/content/militants -peaceful-parliamentary-road.[21] May 2011 edition (issue 148) of Socialism Today, Libya: the no-fly zone and the left, http:// www.socialistparty.org.uk/articles/11905[22] National Shop Stewards Network splits,http://www.workerspower.co.uk/2011/01/national-shop-stewards-network-splits/[23] Postal workers force management back, From The Socialist newspaper, 11 November 2009,h t t p : / / w w w . s o c i a l i s t p a r t y . o r g . u k /

articles/8338/11-11-2009/postal-workers-force-management-back.

“Billy Hutchinson spoke to the News Letter this week about his violent past.” Workers Hammer,Spring 2007: “Taaffe’s organisation is particularly

egregious on Northern Ireland — an acid test forsocialists in Britain — having refused for decades tocall for immediate withdrawal of British troops. Italso has a history of making common cause withanti-Catholic Loyalist scum, such as in 1995 whenthe Taaffeite group in Northern Ireland invitedLoyalist paramilitary leader Billy Hutchinson to itsmeetings.”


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In Point 11 of the Platform ofthe Socialist Fight we set out

our internationalist perspectives:“For socialists there are ultimately

absolutely no progressive ‘nationalborders’ within the global monop-oly capitalist system… Conse-quently we oppose all … cam-paigns to make a national align-

ment for jobs or industries as in thecall for ‘British jobs for British workers’ that means capitulation tonational chauvinism and so to thepolitical and economic interests ofthe ruling class itself. Similarly in2009, the No2EU campaign based its elective

view on an opportunist British particularity inseparation from the Europe-wide proletariat

with reformist pleas under capitalism. Thereis nothing progressive in this and we must atall times patiently explain this fact to workersirrespective of national origin. We are there-fore unreservedly for a Socialist United Statesof Europe. And point 20 spells out our policy on im-

migration controls that flow from that inter-nationalism:

“We oppose all immigration controls. In-

ternational finance capital roams the planet insearch of profit and imperialist governmentsdisrupts the lives of workers and cause thecollapse of whole nations with their directintervention in the Balkans, Iraq and Af-ghanistan and their proxy wars in Somaliaand the Democratic Republic of the Congo,etc. Workers have the right to sell their la-bour internationally wherever they get the

best price.” In SF No. 8 winter 2011/2012, we editori-

alised on the global capitalist crisis and theconflicts this was forcing between imperialistpowers and semi-colonial countries. On thenight of the 8-9 December 2011 David Cam-eron had vetoed the Lisbon treaty designedto solve the Euro crisis and was isolated 26to 1 in Europe. How would the working classreact to this major crisis? We opined:

“Crucially how would its combativity affectthis power struggle? Would it be able to fightits own corner as a global class? To answerthat we must discover how the trade unionbureaucracies are reacting and to find this out

we must look in the pages of the CommunistParty of Britain’s paper, the Morning Star.

The Star had nothing to say on Monday apartfrom a letter extolling the difficulties and thegood position Workers Liberty were taking.

But by Tuesday 13th Bob Crow spoke andthe Star knew where it was going; with Cam-eron and the euro-sceptics. “It is no surprise48 percent of the British people now support

withdrawal (from the EU) with only 33% infavour of staying.” opined Bob. The Star

Immigration Controls, Racism, the SocialistParty, No2EU and TUSC

David Cameron at the EU summit in Brussels on 8 December2011 where he used his veto to block the revised Lisbon treaty.


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then quote Clacton Tory MPDouglas Carswell who “praisedCameron for putting the nationfirst” and followed this up with acall for a referendum.

And Communist Party generalsecretary Rob Griffits said:“Cameron’s stance is bound upentirely with defending the City ofLondon against any new tax orregulatory regime, while Merkel

wants to advance policies beingdominated by the German banks.” On

Thursday 15th Brian Denny, of No2EU was

warning of a “green light for Germany toimpose a common EU austerity policy anddeepen the germanisation (what a word, soredolent of British anti-German chauvinism!)of Europe” and finished up by demanding a“people’s movement to resist corporatepower by demanding the repudiating of thedebts of the banks and a referendum on EUmembership to regain democracy here and

across Europe”. And on Friday 16 we were treated to Bobagain demanding British jobs for British

workers over the Bombardier Derby traincontract: “ministers had no reason to carryon with a procurement process “loadedagainst Bombardier. Political inaction cametogether with EU diktat to deliver a hammerblow to train building in the nation that gaverailways to the world”.

Clearly the Star and Crow are arguing here what is in the best interests of the British“nation”, i.e. they think they have a betterplan to save capitalism, in this case scleroticBritish Imperialism, than Cameron. As Char-lie Walsh says on page 28 any defence of theImperialist Nation State is a reactionary trapfor the working class:

“So British workers should ally with one

section of the British Imperialists (led byClegg and Miliband) and place demands on

another section (led by Cameron, who onlysometimes gets things right, to abandon the

City and turn to manufacturing. And we willachieve this by appearing to be better organ-isers of British Imperialism than the currentmisguided Cameron, to know what is goodfor it and to offer it very sensible and con-structive advice; “look if you want capitalismto work as we do, this is how you must doit”. As Trotsky says:

“These wretched revolutionists, in a con-

flict with any serious enemy, think first of allof how to imitate him, how to repaint them-selves in his colours, and how to win themasses by means of a smart trick and not byrevolutionary struggle. A truly shameful pos-ing of the question!”

No2EU and TUSC The following are culled from the Weekly Worker, mainly from the Editor Peter Man-

son’s articles on Bob Crow, the RMT,No2EU and TUSC. Thet are vital evidencebecause participation in No2EU and TUSCdepended on accepting the position of BobCrow and the CPB on immigration; the CPaccepted this with no problem, the SWP hada few but accepted it also as the price forparticipating in TUSC. However the death ofBob Crow on 11 March and the election of

Mick Cash as his successor has altered thepolitical landscape substantially. No2EU is


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now a dead duck, as an RMT official an-nounced in an off the cuff remark at a publicmeeting and the future of TUSC is also inquestion. A more rightist and opportunistcoalition than TUSC it included the following

groups in its 2009 launch by Bob Crow: Alli-ance for Green Socialism, Communist Partyof Britain, Indian Workers’ Association, Lib-eral Party (rump left who refused to go along

with the fusion with the Social DemocraticParty (SDP) in 1988), the Socialist Party,Socialist Resistance and Solidarity (TommySheridan’s split from the Scottish Socialistparty after the aligned with the state and

Murdock to jail him).Fortunately Left Unity refused to ally with

TUSC at its last conference on the very cor-rect grounds that this would also tar them

with the racist anti-immigrant brush and theSWP has now launched an appeal for aunited left electoral alliance to oppose La-bour. Of course it will get the usual 87 votesagainst Labour but it places the SP in a di-

lemma and probably force TUSC to becomea simple SP front, without the RMT, theCPB or the SWP as allies. Their oppositionto all racis t immigration controls will then betheir sole responsibility and they will beforced into the open as supporters of immi-gration control, a Ukip-lite in all but name. Apologies if some attributions to Weekly

Worker are missed. The basic premise Man-son seeks to prove in these articles is that theMorning Star/CPB, the late Bob Crow andthe Socialist Party are capitulating to racismby use of the formula that they are opposedto racist immigration controls only and theSWP had also capitulating on this point untilthey abandoned TUSC and launched the callfor a unite left slate at the May 2015 generalelection, despite having a correct formal pol-icy of opposing all immigration controls be-

cause they are intrinsically racist. The CPB has historically used this very

formula to hide its capitulation to Britishcapitalism itself, Manson recounts:

From CPGB (as was) to SPEW“In fact the policy of the ‘official’ Commu-

nist Party of Great Britain (and, after it, theCPB) has been one of ‘non-racist immigra-tion controls’ for over half a century. Here Iam grateful to Dr Evan Smith and his web-site, Hatful of History , for having collated thestatements of the CPGB on this questionsince the early 1960s. For example, Evansquotes the Communist Party weekly, Com- ment , which in 1963 stated that the previousyear’s Commonwealth Immigrants Act mustbe opposed, because it was “not an act tocontrol immigration in general”, but consti-tuted “colour discrimination in immigration”. This CPGB policy of non-racist (or, to use

the terminology of the time, ‘non-racialist’)border controls was most clearly laid down ina 1965 statement, which declared: “Everygovernment, whatever its character, and

whatever the social system, will naturally

make regulations concerning immigrationand emigration. This is an understandableexercise of its power by any sovereign gov-ernment. The Communist Party has neverstood for general unrestricted immigration,but has always opposed racialism and racialdiscrimination in Britain.” In the same year aCPGB pamphlet informed its readers thatthe 1962 Commonwealth Immigrants Act

was “not an act introduced for normal immi-gration purposes, but designed to introducean element of racial discrimination into thesystem of immigration”

…However, by the time of the next Immi-gration Act in 1971, it was business as usual:“Governments have the right to regulateimmigration and emigration”, declared aresolution published in Comment , but immi-

gration policies introduced by both Labourand the Conservatives had been “racialist”,


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since they were “directed specifically againstblack immigration”. This resolution de-manded the repeal of the 1971 act, which was“a racialist measure”, and for Labour to“introduce new legislation relating to immi-

gration on a strictly non-racial basis”.” In a CPGB pamphlet published at the end ofthe 70s, Vishnu Sharma actually engaged in apolemic (of sorts) against those to the party’sleft who favoured open borders. Such peopleare just plain “foolish”, he said - they are“out of step with reality”. Although“Communists want to see … a world wherethere are no immigration controls of any

kind”, the “first and urgent responsibility”must be to “turn the spotlight onto the racistcharacter of the present laws”. Unity wasneeded to combat the “immediate causes ofracial oppression”, but this cannot beachieved “under the slogan, ‘No immigrationcontrols at all’”. What struck me about this was its similarity

to the position of the Socialist Party in Eng-

land and Wales, as can be seen from the rele- vant section of its 2013 perspectives docu-ment, which the Hatful of History site help-fully reproduces:

“Of course, we have to stand in defence ofthe most oppressed sections of the workingclass, including migrant workers and otherimmigrants. We staunchly oppose racism. Wedefend the right to asylum and argue for theend of repressive measures like detentioncentres.

“At the same time, given the outlook of themajority of the working class, we cannot putforward a bald slogan of ‘open borders’ or‘no immigration controls’, which would be abarrier to convincing workers of a socialistprogramme, both on immigration and otherissues. Such a demand would alienate the vastmajority of the working class, including many

more long-standing immigrants, who wouldsee it as a threat to jobs, wages and living

conditions …. “We have to put forward a programme

which unites the working class in dealing with the consequences of immigration.”

This is, of course, pure opportunism:

‘While we in SPEW may believe in open bor-ders (perhaps “may” is now the operative

word), the working class is far too backwardto agree with us.’ SPEW stands four-squarebehind the CPGB’s Vishnu Sharma: whatmatters is “unity”, and we just have to facefacts - unity is only possible on the basis of‘common-sense’ (i.e., rightwing) ideas.

SPEW too is part of the mainstream con-

sensus, which would have you believe thatpeople should have no right to live, settle and

work anywhere on this planet; that, far fromthe whole world belonging to all of its peo-ple, it must remain divided up; that each na-tionality must protect its ‘own’ patch at theexpense of outsiders. But for communists,for whom the common interest of the inter-national proletariat is an absolute principle,

this consensus is poison.In that sense, SPEW, like the MorningStar’s CPB, is “aping Ukip”. It too is playingthe same “fool’s game”. End of extract from Manson: http://

weeklyworker .co.uk/worker/1014/ playing-a-fools-game/:[email protected] an article in Weekly Worker, Immigrationcontrols kill by Eddie Ford the politics of theLabour party on immigration controls is ex-posed:

Yvette Cooper and Rachel Reeves. “Cooper, the shadow home secretary, an-nounced on November 18 that under a La-bour government a £10 surcharge will belevied on the 5.5 million annual visitors tothe UK. In this way, she hopes, that will

more than generate the £45 million neededto employ 1,000 additional guards to defend


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our borders from illegal migrants and in gen-eral “restore public confidence in the immi-gration system”. For instance, she com-plained, Labour has discovered that 175,000failed asylum-seekers may not be removed

because the government has “limited re-sources”. Shocking. Instead, she promisedLabour would be the “sensible”, patriotic

voice expressing “people’s genuine concerns”- unlike the Tories or UK IndependenceParty, which want to up the “arms race ofrhetoric” over immigration.

On the same day, Reeves, the shadow workand pensions minister, penned an article for

the Daily Mail saying that Labour wouldclamp down on tax credits claimed by about252,000 working European Union migrants -the period for which they are prevented fromclaiming out-of-work benefits would be ex-tended from three months to two years. Shesaid that Labour would also end the“absurdity” of child benefit and child taxcredits being claimed for children living in

other countries.Reeves insisted that she would “never pan-der” to those who would deny the positivecontribution that immigrants have alwaysmade to the country, arguing it was the To-ries who were “desperately attempting” to“out-Ukip Ukip”. However, the Mail ’s sub-headlines were more accurate and honest,telling us about Labour’s “attempt to out-flank Tories and Ukip on immigration” withits plans to “curb welfare tourism”.” Lastly lest we think the that other heir of TedGrant, Socialist Appeal/IMT are far betterthan the SP/CWI here is their attitude to thereactionary 2009 Lindsey Oil Refinery strikes.It is identical with that of the SP. The follow-ing quote if from February 2009 and spellsout their position clearly:

“The British workers are fighting to main-

tain wages and conditions in the industry. Though we don’t support the slogan, ‘British

jobs for British workers,’ we support theirfight. British workers are in effect being ex-cluded from consideration for the jobthrough the operation of the subcontractingmechanism. IREM will bring in their entireteam to do the job. The job vacancies willnot be advertised in Britain. In the relentlesssearch to drive wages to the bottom, British

workers are effectively being discriminatedagainst by IREM. If that is not illegal, itought to be.”

Wildcat strikes sweep Britain, Socialist Ap-peal 4 February 2009, http ://

www.marxist.com/wildcat-strikes-sweep-britain.htm

Teresa Hayter has written a formidably comprehen-sive book on the history, mechanisms, and debatessurrounding immigration controls in Britain ... Thecrux of Hayter’s argument is that immigration con-trols do not, will not, & should not work ... essentialreading.’ Red Pepper


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“A trade union led by reactionary fakers organ-izes a strike against the admission of Negro

workers into a certain branch of industry. Shallwe support such a shameful strike? Of coursenot. But let us imagine that the bosses, utilizingthe given strike, make an attempt to crush the

trade union and to make impossible in generalthe organized self-defence of the workers. In this

case we will defend the trade union as a matterof course in spite of its reactionary leadership.”

Trotsky 1939

Socialist Fight (SF) unequivocally opposesthe ‘wildcat’ strikes and their outcome

because they were called on the reactionarybasis of ‘British jobs for British work-ers’ (Bj4Bw), it was on this xenophobic basisthey were spread, with the assistance of theright wing media and on this basis they were

tacitly endorsed by the entire Unite andGMB leaderships. And it was on this basisthey were settled. We place the blame for thissituation squarely on the backs of the reac-tionary Labour movement leaders; GordonBrown and the Labour party leaders for en-dorsing the reactionary slogan, borrowedfrom the BNP, the Unite, GMB and other

TU leaderships for tacitly endorsing and pur-

suing negotiations on that basis. A major weight of responsibility also rests on theshoulders of those left groups and organisa-tions, the Communists Party of Britain(CPB), the Socialist Party (SP) and others

who have acted as left apologists for thesebureaucratic misleaders of the working class.

When similar demands were made on theFrench

In Defence of Marxism No 8

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