& Workers’ Liberty

SolFor siociadl ownershaip of the branks aind intdustry y No 485 7 November 2018 50p/£1 The DEMAND EVERY Irish left over 50 LABOUR MP years VOTES AGAINST See pages 6-8 The May government and its Brexit process are bracing themselves to take the coming weeks at a run, trying to hurtle us all over a rickety bridge. Yet it looks like they could be saved by some Labour MPs voting for the To - ries’ Brexit formula. More page 5 NUS set to gut BREXIT democracy Maisie Sanders reports on financial troubles at NUS and how the left should respond. See page 3

“Fake news” within the left Cathy Nugent calls for the left to defend democracy and oppose smears. See page 10 Join Labour! Why Labour is losing Jews

See page 4 2 NEWS More online at www.workersliberty.org Push Labour to “remain and reform”

May will say that is still the ulti - trade deals is now for the birds. mate objective, but for not for years Britain will not be legally able to in - to come. troduce any new deals until the fu - The second option, which is often ture long-term treaty relationship John Palmer talked to equated with “hard” Brexit, is no with the EU has been negotiated, at deal. That is a theoretical possibil - the end of a tunnel which looks Solidarity ity. But I don’t think in practice cap - longer and longer. ital in Britain or elsewhere in The job of the left, the supporters S: You’ve talked about a Europe has any interest in that, and of the Corbyn leadership of the “Schrödinger’s Brexit”... the Government knows that. While Labour Party, is to argue for rejec - P: The great Austrian physicist it plays at right-wing populist pol - tion of these terms. Labour has set Erwin Schrodinger, who worked itics, I think at the end of the day out six tests which speak to the with Einstein, discovered that there the interests of capital will be a original Tory promises of reproduc - are particles that have the strange major restraining factor. ing exactly the same benefits as we characteristic of being in two places So we get the third option, this currently have. Those May cannot at the same time, or two states at ambiguous relationship. The key reproduce, because she will be ex - the same time. He illustrated it by issue is that we will only have ne - cluded from all decision-making a thought-experiment of a cat in a gotiated the terms of eventually ex - arenas. box subject to such particles which iting the EU. The Government will May’s deal will be clearly inferior is simultaneously alive and dead. not have yet negotiated a deal de - to what exists now. The question is, I use this metaphor to illustrate scribing in detail the future long- can it be defeated? There is a rea - the character of the Brexit deal term relationship. sonable chance that it can, because to Britain, but a desperate shortage. Party policy, from the “workable which Mrs May’s government will That is going to take years — not of the confluence of different polit - There has been a massive reflux of plan for Brexit”, to “remain and — fairly soon now, I expect — come just the already-agreed transition ical forces. Many on the hard right workers deterred by the “hostile reform”. back with. It will have many of the period, which will last from the end won’t like the deal, and the Tory environment” which the Govern - Yes, I agree with you. The Labour full obligations of EU membership of March 2019 to the end of Decem - majority even with the DUP is quite ment has created for European leadership has not explicitly re - — EU law, Single-Market align - ber 2020, but now, almost certainly, small. The DUP itself may abandon workers, and that has created great jected “remain and reform”. Dur - ment, de facto Customs Union way beyond that. May herself talks the government if arrangement for shortages in the health service, in ing the 2016 referendum, Jeremy membership, payments into the EU about December 2021. Others say it the Irish border involve some new social care, and in some other sec - Corbyn explicitly argued for “Re - budget, being subject to ECJ [Euro - could take seven, eight, nine years controls on trade between the north tors. main and Reform”. Now it has pean Court of Justice] jurisdiction — that is typical of the time it takes of Ireland and the rest of Britain I suspect there is here, as in other fallen silent about what – in detail in a whole range of areas — but we to construct a comprehensive new (some already exist). areas, scope for a Labour govern - – it would do in power if elected will no longer be members of the relationship. The biggest risk of May’s deal ment to negotiate changes which a after the fall of the Tory govern - European Union. We will not have This in/out state is going to go not being defeated comes not so Tory government wouldn’t be in - ment over the Brexit outcome. a voice in decision-making, we will on, I suspect, to 2022. It might last much from old-style Lexiters who terested in, but which would allow The position of the left must still have no votes in the Council of even longer. A general election think that there can be some kind of Labour, if successful, to return with be “remain and reform”. Sooner or Ministers on in the European Par - could and should happen much socialism in one country outside a new “remain and reform” agree - later, if Labour finds itself in power liament or in the selection of Com - sooner, but at the latest it has to the EU. It comes from moderate, so- ment which could be put to the it will face the realities of how to missioners. happen by June 2022. called centrist, Labour MPs, who vote. That has happened before. manage an economy in isolation We will be in as far as obligations are flirting with the idea of voting When Labour rejected the Heath from the rest of the European are concerned, and at the same time So some Labour MPs could with the Government. They argue Tory government’s terms for entry Union if we are Out and not In. But out as regards democratic powers argue that if May proposes a that this would be better than a into the (then) EEC, the newly there are already left political forces of decision-making. deal like that, it leaves things Hard Brexit or No Deal. In this way elected Harold Wilson initiated an — socialist, social democratic, left open, and isn’t it better to vote they could preserve the Tory gov - admittedly rather staged process of Greens, left regionalists/national - A lot of people on the left say for that than to risk another out - ernment in power. renegotiation and a renegotiated ists — fighting for some of the same that the Tories are heading for a come which could close things treaty deal was successfully put to objectives, sustainable growth, eco - very “hard” Brexit, or a “no-deal” off more? The six tests, however, expressly a referendum in 1975. logical reform, far greater democra - Brexit. Do you think this is a The job of the left in this compli - reject the free movement of tisation of the EU itself, greater scare story with the political cated discussion is to hold on to workers across European bor - But shouldn’t the left stand up labour and social rights, greater so - function of rationalising, maybe, some key strategic objectives. The ders which exists at the moment. for the rights of free movement cial equality. some Labour MPs voting for first is that any deal outside full The position of the Labour lead - which already exist, and oppose Labour in office must be part of May’s deal on the grounds that membership of the EU will repre - ership is ambiguous on this. Keir attempts to restrict them? that movement across Europe to those are the alternatives? sent a worsening of conditions, and Starmer, who speaks for the front Yes, of course it should. Defence have any chance of sustaining their There are broadly three alterna - one particularly affecting working bench on this, says that he has of workers’ rights of free move - own reform promises and counter - tives spoken of. One is a “hard” people and the likely level of social raised a number of issues which a ment within the EU (movement of ing the real risk of a swing to the far deal in which we are treated by the standards. future Labour government might capital and trade are already free) right. EU as an external country like Nobody seriously argues that the wish to discuss with the European is essential. The next British Labour “Remain and Reform” in Canada, or, more favourably, Nor - position of working people would, if it were to win an early general government should openly support Britain and in Europe is indivisi - way. The Canadian option, which is from day one, be in any way im - election after the May deal had trade unions in Britain and across ble. a free-trade deal virtually outside proved by Brexit. Even the right been rejected by Parliament. the EU which fight to protect wages the special relationships of the EU wing fears that talk of massive new Among those issues, in my opin - and employment standards. • John Palmer was a leading mem - economy, seems now very unlikely. ion, are likely to be some adjust - Employers have used the EU ber for a long time of what is now ments to British legislation on EU Posted Workers’ Directive to un - the SWP, and later European edi - As soon as we can make space migrant workers which are fully dercut wages and standards when tor of the Guardian . He was talk - in Solidarity , we’ll be printing dis - consistent with EU law but which sending workers on contracts in ing with Martin Thomas. cussion articles on “pause and fix” the British government has chosen other EU countries. But there is a vs “stop and scrap” views on Uni - Page 11, Solidarity 484: In the not to introduce. For example, there proposal going through the EU in - versal Credit. Merseyrail offer in the DOO dis - are questions like making posses - stitutions — European Parliament, pute, the pay freeze is two years eventually Council of Ministers, Some readers have asked what sion of an employment offer a con - Another Europe is not three. The offer doesn’t specify dition for migration and social etc. — to change the Posted Work - that the settlement is only for the the “Antidoto” label on Jim ers’ Directive so as to prohibit the Possible conference Denham’s column means. security benefits. We’re talking here life of the franchise. about European workers, not asy - use of it by employers to undercut The column is meant to be an lum seekers. wages and conditions. “antidote” to the politics of the Page 12, Solidarity 484: a DWP Such measures have never been Saturday 8 December Morning Star . worker tells us: “money earned in introduced by the British govern - The current Labour leadership The Italian form, “antidoto”, very low-pay/part-time work if ment, and one reason is that intro - policy is no longer “remain and evokes the use by Leon Trotsky in calculated correctly does not re - ducing them might involve reform”, but to replace a Tory Birkbeck University, his early years of the pen-name duce the amount of Universal introducing identity cards. Identity deal by what Jeremy Corbyn “Antid Oto”, chosen by Trotsky to Credit given. Equally, a claim isn’t cards are universal throughout the calls “a workable plan”, a better- London signal an effort to offer Marxist an - closed after one month of extra European Union, but not in the UK. negotiated deal. In order to pur - tidotes. earnings”. The real question, however, is not sue the scenario you describe, any excess of EU workers coming we have to change the Labour More: bit.ly/aeip-c Workers’ Liberty @workersliberty NEWS 3 NUS set to gut democracy

start, NUS must open its books to a By Maisie Sanders democratically accountable and The National Union of Students elected investigation. [NUS] announced last week, in a A lot of money could be saved by letter to affiliated student unions, cutting pay of senior managers, by that it is on the verge of bank - not putting NEC members and ruptcy. NUS officers up in the Hilton, and The NUS Group, which includes by scrapping pseudo-conferences NUS UK plus NUS Services, the in expensive venues with no dem - union’s commercial arm, could face ocratic function. a £3 million deficit this year and in NUS’s democratic structures future years. “Radical reforms to have already been stripped away democratic and corporate struc - by successive governance reviews, tures” which will “drastically sim - the most drastic of which were plify and modernise NUS” are to be pushed through in 2007-9 despite announced at NUS Conference opposition from several annual 2019, which will take place in conferences. It now works more spring. like an NGO than a union, with Student union presidents and barely any real control by rank- Chief Executives will be invited to and-file members. a “strategic conversation” meeting NUS Conference is now so short in late November. that most motions are never de - These reforms will likely be gut - bated, while unions’ delegate enti - tlements have more than halved in ting. The student left must respond The stage was invaded at NUS Conference 2018 because debate was guillotined on decriminalisation of sex work by organising around a democratic size. Delegates at 2017 conference programme for NUS that can trans - stormed the stage in Glasgow radically expand the delegate enti - comments. for Students, and blocked a motion form it into a political fighting force venue when it became clear that tlement for unions. Decision-mak - Surrey, Newcastle, Loughbor - on organising a national demon - that students have real control over, motions calling for support for ing power must be taken from the ough, Hull and Essex voted to dis - stration for free education from alongside a drive for democratic abortion rights in Northern Ireland currently existing semi-elected affiliate. These campaigns were even being discussed at the NEC. It and autonomous student unions, and the decriminalisation of sex trustee board and given to the mainly driven by the non-Labour made no effort to support this particularly in Further Education. work would not be debated, thanks elected National Executive. right, who argued NUS was “too year’s UCU strike, even showing We don’t know whether the to filibustering from the right. Highly paid senior managers radical” on issues that didn’t con - hostility to the wave of student oc - claims of financial crisis are true. It We must demand a longer con - who have lots of day-to-day control cern “the average student”. The left cupations. certainly can’t be campaigning that ference, with the additional “zones should be replaced by coordinators responded by arguing the need to Workers’ Liberty students will be NUS has spent all its money on. To conferences” replaced by a second on a workers’ wage. Training days fight campaigns collectively, while arguing for the Student Left Net - annual conference. NUS needs to and events should be free, accessi - the right-wing Labour Students work which launches itself on 18 ble and controlled by elected full faction which still dominates NUS November to call for the student Socialist Feminist Campus Collective Launch time officers. Regional organising, argued students shouldn’t give up left to unite around a democratic with conferences, full-time officers, the right to discounted alcohol and programme and left unity charter. and campaigns, should be free McDonald’s burgers provided The left should call for NUS to Meeting restarted. by an NUS discount card. The dis - weave together and link up student And the part-time stipend must affiliation campaigns were used by struggles over rent, precarious Saturday, November 17, 2018 at 12 PM – 5 PM, be returned to the NEC so they can the Labour Students faction to work, climate change and mental travel the country as organise rs, stress the narrative that NUS was health services and make them part UCL, London helping activists with campaigns “in crisis” under a left leadership of a programme it campaigns and implementing NUS policy. and needed to resume to normality. around, alongside mobilising stu - Between 2016 and 2017 a string In fact, Bouattia’s year in office dents alongside the labour move - of student unions held referen - did little to disturb the “normality” ment around broader issues such as National Student Left Organising Meeting dums on NUS disaffiliation follow - of weak grassroots organising. on Brexit and migrants’ rights, anti- ing the election of left-winger Malia Since then, under Shakira Martin’s fascism, for a living wage and end Sunday, November 18, 2018 at 11 AM – 5 PM, Bouattia (whom Workers’ Liberty leadership NUS has shifted to the to zero hour contracts. critically supported) as president right: it has worked with the Lib We need to remake and re - UCL, London and controversies over antisemitic Dems and the government’s Office shape the student left.

To fix climate change, we need accountable democracy

budget which did not mention cli - able resource usage. mate change, nor move towards They demand a “Citizen’s As - tackling it. sembly” is formed to oversee these Almost all of £30 billion invested changes, comprised of citizens ran - By Mike Zubrowski in transport has been in roads, domly selected by lot, rather than rather than public transport. There elected. Over 1,000 protesters blocked is a planned 95% decrease in invest - Bold demands on the govern - roads around Parliament on 31 ment in renewables between 2017 ment to positively enact necessary October calling for urgent action and 2020. changes — rather than simply stop - on climate change. The action Protests like 31 October’s, led by ping a few bad things — are a fresh saw 15 protesters arrested and “Extinction Rebellion” — a cam - and vital change from the often de - placing random and unaccountable change will require radically trans - was the launch of an “escalating paign in turn run by “Rising Up!” fensive politics common on the left. people technically in charge. forming industries. This should be campaign of civil disobedience”. — demand that the government, Extinction Rebellion are right to With random selection by lot, the led by the workers in these indus - This came the day after a major working with the media, communi - be concerned about democracy, but net result is an unorganised selec - tries. report warning that population cates the gravity of the situation their proposition is not democratic. tion of random, transient and unac - Beyond that, we should aim for sizes of most forms of animal and the urgency for change. That it Allocation by lot removes the abil - countable individuals. a federated system of workplace wildlife have decreased by 60% enacts policies to make UK at least ity of wider movements to place Orientating towards workplaces and community councils, elect - globally since 1970. And two days carbon neutral by 2025, and co-op - pressure on their representatives to is more democratic, as most of the ing recallable delegates. after the Tory chancellor unveiled a erates internationally on sustain - keep them accountable, instead necessary changes to tackle climate 4 COMMENT Email your letters to [email protected] “We are losing Jews from the Labour Party”

hostile to the majority of Jews because we are Adrian Cohen spoke to a local the “wrong kind of Jews”. Then they invert Workers’ Liberty supporter that, and say the people in the mainstream community pick on them and tell them they S: Our CLP [Constituency Labour Party], are the wrong kind of Jews. The politics get Hornsey and Wood Green, with one of the sunk in an argument about who are the right largest memberships in the country, voted kind of Jews. at its October meeting it affiliated to Jew - The letter is not a Labour Party response. ish Voice for Labour [JVL: a group con - This is Jewish residents of Haringey and rep - cerned to reject complaints about resentatives of the two synagogues saying a antisemitism in the Labour Party as spu - mess has been created. It takes one fool to rious]. drop a stone down a well and eight wise men Now we have a letter from people in the to pull it out. local Jewish community to the CLP calling What do we want to happen? Logically we for the affiliation to be stopped. want the resolution revoked but I realise that Adrian, you are the chair of the London is not going to happen. I’m not sure what I Jewish Forum and a Jewish Labour Move - want to happen. Adrian Cohen (right) with Chief Rabbi Ephraim Mirvis and London Mayor Sadiq Khan ment delegate to the CLP, and a signatory to With Naz Shah [a Labour MP charged in the letter in your capacity as the deputy for April 2016 with having made an antisemitic What do you think can be done by the national out. Highgate Synagogue to the Board of comment on Facebook], the heat was taken Labour leadership? This generation of Corbyn and his milieu Deputies (BoD). I spoke and voted against out of it very fast by her accepting she had The official answer (to which I subscribe) can only keep a grip on all of this for so long. JVL affiliation, but I think the letter poses made a mistake and talking to the JLM and is what the Board of Deputies and the Jewish Some of the newer people and the younger things wrongly. It is an attempt to try and the community. Leadership Council said when they met with people will be fed up by this and will want overturn the Labour Party vote by external JVL are too niche, obsessed by one partic - the leadership and Seumas Milne in April. things to change. I am sceptical we can pressure, not to continue and change the dis - ularly narrow aspect of the issue. The other There has been no progress on those points. achieve much in the short term. cussion. notable thing about them is how few young The IHRA text was adopted, but will it stay Even with the adoption of the IHRA text, Just saying that JVL is “divisive” can only people are involved. put with the new National Executive Com - Corbyn had his last stand with his “free get you so far. The issue is the politics they I am not going to resign from the Party. I mittee? What is the situation with the out - speech” clause. I can’t see Seumas Milne stand on. feel very invested in it. I joined in 1982 and I standing cases (e.g. Jackie Walker) and the shifting. Jeremy just hasn’t read the memo. A: We are about the last surviving people still want to be involved. I have no plan to fact that Chris Williamson MP shares plat - in the [Labour] party from the mainstream give up on the GC meetings. It wasn’t a forms with them? I don’t think things will What did you think of Emily Thornberry’s community. Most of the people in my syna - staged walk out after the vote. I was very an - move forward until those issues are ad - speech at Labour Party conference [condemning gogue in Highgate think I am barking mad to noyed and David (the other JLM delegate) dressed. antisemitism]? still be involved. Things are at a real impasse. was very upset. He is a local rabbi. He has to That is where things are officially. Unoffi - That was very well received, but not so JVL oppose the adoption of the IHRA text explain what has happened to the local com - cially, we are losing Jews from the Labour much in the Jewish community. Because of [on antisemitism] and continue to support munity. Party. Particularly young left wing Jews, es - the line about “fringes of the movement”, it people who are expelled or, in the case of Liv - The mainstream community believe that pecially those who are involved in organisa - doesn’t ring true. ingstone, have left the party. I could have said JVL is being used to try to silence them. I tions like Yachad and who have more radical JVL are a pernicious astroturf organisation think that this feeds into a Stalinist culture politics on Israel-Palestine. They are the ones • Solidarity has approached leading mem - that gaslights people. I chose not to. within the movement: the cynical use of ar - leaving. People like me, the “centrist dads”, bers of JVL to offer them a chance to explain People identify with some of the JVL sup - guments when it suits your ends. will stick around! I don’t want to do the bid - their stance, but all so far have declined. porters as “our Jews”. They end up being ding of the people who might try to drive me Arron Banks, the EU, and the Morning Star

“Breaking Point” poster. “neoliberal and nationalist extremists” and What the Electoral Commission has re - called on trade unions, the Labour Party and ferred to the National Crime Agency is the the left to “develop an independent position question of whether Better for the Country of their own, one which represents the real Limited – Banks’s campaign firm – “was the interests of workers and the mass of the peo - By Jim Denham true source of donations made to referendum ple across Scotland, England and Wales.” campaigners in its name, or if it was acting as TUAEU’s links with Leave.EU and Banks Arron Banks is a millionaire who quite fre - an agent”. have been public knowledge at least since the quently threatens legal action against As well as “lending” £6m to Leave.EU, Bet - publication (in March 2017) of Banks’s book those who cross him, so I’ll be careful ter for the Country donated around £2.4m to Bad Boys of Brexit in which he describes how what I write here. other anti-EU groups like Grassroots Out, he funded an anti-TTIP (Transatlantic Trade What can be stated as a matter of straight which was supported by some Tory MPs, in - and Investment Partnership) leaflet pro - fact is that his highly complex business and cluding David Davis, and a few Labour Brex - duced by TUAEU and how in January 2016 financial arrangements were of sufficient iters like Kate Hoey. the Labour anti-EU campaigner John Mills concern to the Electoral Commission that Donations were also made, between March put him in touch with a key TUAEU contact: they have now passed their investigation into and June 2016, to WAG TV Limited (who “I just spent an hour on the phone with Brian ultra-nationalist John Boyd continued to con - the £8 million he gave to Leave.EU, and other made an anti-EU film), Ukip (led at the time Denny from the RMT signing off anti-TTIP tribute articles to the Morning Star long after pro-Brexit groups, over to the National Crime by Farage), Veterans for Britain... and Trade leaflets for the trade unionists. This is the their affiliation to Leave.EU was announced. Agency. Unionists Against the EU (TUAEU). kind of thing we should be doing much more And even though Denny and Boyd no Oh, and it’s probably safe to quote what Hang on a minute! Trade Unionists Against of.” longer have major articles in the Morning the Guardian ’s Matthew d’Ancona has al - the EU! Isn’t that a supposedly “left wing” Brian Denny, as well as being an employee Star , other TUAEU people still regularly con - ready written about him: “Banks is the John organisation, regularly promoted in the of the RMT, one of the few unions to back tribute rabidly nationalist anti-EU tirades. As Gotti of populist campaigning, a dapper don pages of the Morning Star ? And it received Brexit, was at that time probably still a mem - recently as 3 November, the paper published who relishes his public profile.” If you don’t funding from Arron Banks? Yes, dear reader, ber of the Communist Party of Britain (CPB) a little-England rant from TUAEU secretary know who John Gotti was, check Wikipedia. I have to tell you that it did: £54,000 accord - which backs the Morning Star . CPB people Doug Nicholls. It would be interesting to What can also be safely stated is that Mr ing to the Electoral Commission. have said he’s since left the party, but was read Mr Nicholls’ explanation for having ac - Banks is right wing. In fact, he’s very right But surely now the Morning Star knows certainly still a regular contributor to the cepted Arron Banks’s money. wing, having switched his backing from the about TUAEU’s links with Banks, it will have paper. And in any case, Denny was also a In fact it would be quite interesting to Tories to Ukip (which he’s since broken with) no more to do with them. After all, as long leading light in the Campaign Against Euro read anything in the Morning Star about in 2015 and then, during the referendum ago as June 2015 the Morning Star carried an Federalism (CAEF) which in October 2015 Banks but at the time of writing, the paper campaign, funded Leave.EU, the group editorial (“Left Reasons to ditch the EU”) de - announced its affiliation to Leave.EU: has had precisely nothing to say about fronted by Nigel Farage with its infamous nouncing right wing anti-EU campaigners as Denny and fellow CAEF people like the him. Workers’ Liberty @workersliberty WHAT WE SAY 5 Demand every Labour Fund stands at MP votes against Brexit £3075 so The May government and its Brexit process are bracing themselves to take the coming weeks at a run, trying to hurtle us all over a rickety bridge. far Yet it looks like they could be saved by some Labour MPs voting for the Tories’ Brexit formula. Constituency Labour Parties and trade unions should insist that all Labour MPs vote against the Tories’ deal. There is a real chance of bringing down the Tory government. No- Australian supporter Boyd has sent us one who will vote to save the Tory govern - £200 this week, and Lambeth AWL have ment deserves to be a Labour MP. sent £105 raised at a Halloween party. According to a recent leak, the government And we have another £10 from a plans to get a deal at an EU summit on 17-18 Lewisham reader who bought a copy of November. Then, nine days of political cam - paigning between 19 and 27 November — our new book In Defence of Bolshevism and with 22 November as a “take back control of paid £10 extra for it. our borders” day against free movement — Two North London readers plan a sec - to build up to a Parliamentary vote on 27 No - ond-hand book sale to raise funds, at the vember. School of Oriental and African Studies on Big business bosses are being lined up to 29 November. cessfully slapped down by Diane Abbott. but formed in Nottingham, Sheffield, Leeds, raise a chorus of support. Comrades in North London and else - Whether the Tories can actually do that, we his stance will surely encourage the “centrist” Haringey, and South London. They have Labour MPs thinking of voting with the To - gone out on the streets to win people against where are starting to discuss fund-raising don’t know. But for sure they will be trying events in 2019 linked to 30th anniversaries to get some deal through Parliament soon. It ries. Brexit. of events in the popular revolts which will probably be only a semi-deal, with big If the Tories are brought down, then further Over the next weeks and months they need issues fudged or pushed away into future ne - progress will depend on changing the Labour to double their efforts. Those should include overthrew Stalinisn in Eastern Europe in gotiations, but it will be their formula to get leaders’ stance. At present they say they want campaigning in areas which are heavily pro- 1989. Brexit “over the line” in March 2019. to replace the Tories’ negotiations by a Remain, and in places like university cam - Discussing with a left-wing NGO organ - For their own reasons, the DUP and a sec - “workable plan” — a message which really puses with strong pro-Remain opinion, in iser recently, we were told, disconcertingly, tion of the Tory right will dislike the semi- just claims “we can negotiate better than the order to connect with and draw in more ac - that they reckoned that another £60,000 an - Tories — and they explicitly oppose continu - tivists. deal, and may vote against. The Tory nual income for them would cover the The message needs to be “Remain and government can be brought down, and the ing free movement for EU and British citizens Rebel”, a battle for a different Europe re - costs of one additional staff member. way opened to stop Brexit, by Labour MPs across European borders. shaped in the interests of the working As an activist organisation based in the voting solidly against the Tories. But there is no case for saving the Tories. class by active working-class solidarity in working class, Workers’ Liberty operates The Labour Party leadership is on course The Tories may try to blackmail us by saying the broad class-struggle arena created by differently. Most of our activity is unpaid to vote against a Tory deal, but there is a real that the only alternatives are “no deal” or a the capitalist semi-unification of Europe. risk that enough Labour MPs will break “hard Brexit” of the type proposed by the To - volunteer activity. We need an office staff, ranks to save the Tories. And as yet the ries’ right-wing fringe. but most of the staff depend on part-time Labour leadership’s studiedly non-committal In fact the great bulk of big business is outside work, or incomes such as Pension line — condemning the Tories for being firmly against those “ultra-Brexiters”: there Credit, to support them. “chaotic” and “divided”, rather than in more is little chance of the Tories replacing May as Every extra book or pamphlet or leaflet substantive terms — weakens it in pushing leader by an “ultra-Brexiter”, and almost no AWL we print, every extra bunch of placards chance that this “ultra-Brexiter” could win a against such breaking of ranks. produced for a demonstration, every extra On 31 October the New Statesman magazine parliamentary majority for their favoured schemes. fare for an organiser or speaker to travel reported that: “At a recent strategy meeting, across the country, every repair or replace - Andrew Murray – who works part-time as No-one should let scaremongering corner conference ment of our makeshift office equipment, is [Unite union leader] Len McCluskey’s chief them into supporting a supposedly “lesser- of staff and part-time in Corbyn’s office – ar - evil” Brexit. When the Tories are in trouble, On 24-25 November, members and covered by stretching a tight budget. Our gued that the Labour Party should vote for that is an opportunity to stop Brexit alto - friends of the Alliance for Workers’ Lib - current fund appeal is not for £60,000, but Theresa May’s deal to avoid a no-deal exit”. gether. erty will meet for our annual conference. for £15,000 by June 2019. Murray, reports the New Statesman , was suc - Left Against Brexit groups have been Since August we’ve been circulating With £15,000, however, we pledge that draft documents and organising regional we will do much more than any NGO pre-conference meetings to prepare the does with £60,000. conference. One of the main documents for the con - Ways to donate: ference, on what sort of organisation we • Subscribe to need, has been published in Solidarity: Solidarity bit.ly/rev-org. Another main document, on You can subscribe to Solidarity for a trial Brexit, is largely a codification and collation period of 6 issues for £7, for 6 months for of material published in Solidarity on the £22 (waged) or £11 (unwaged), or for a issue. whole year for £44 (waged) or £22 (un - The conference will discuss a short mo - waged). See back page for form. tion summing up ideas from our May 2018 • Take out a monthly standing order pull-out on trans rights, bit.ly/g-ch, and If you take out a standing order you will some detailed amendments to it. also receive Solidarity . Go to workerslib - It will also discuss reports on areas of erty.org/donate for instructions. work, take another look at our 2017 de - • Make a one-off donation online bate on the second round of the French presidential election, and hear a call to You can donate by sending us a cheque, change our voting system for the com - setting up a bank transfer or via Palpal. Go mittee we elect to guide the organisa - to workersliberty.org/donate for instruc - tion between conferences. tions. More online at www.workersliberty.org Workers’ Liberty @workersliberty Threading together strugg Whether the Provisionals will revert to gious (mainly Catholic, of course) control. armed struggle, I don’t know. They are pretty That has to be combatted. far gone into reformism. Without the rifle in hand, the Republican is a reformist. Have the Irish Trotskyists, over the last 50 T: How would you sum up the idea of per - We remember what happened to the Stick - years, been adequate on the fight against manent revolution in a few words? ies [the Official IRA of the 1970s]. They kept clericalism? L: The development of the proletarian rev - up some sort of armed struggle until 1972, I think we played a pretty principled role olution out of what starts as a democratic then they gave up because they thought they — demanding legal contraception, divorce, bourgeois revolution. Then the proletarian could get a democratic Northern Ireland, abortion and gay rights even when many on revolution has to be internationalised. which I think is impossible. the left were putting their toes into the water Until the struggle is treated as an all-Ire - on the special position of the Catholic How does the experience of the last 50 land struggle, it won’t be permanent revolu - Church. I do not think this is a field in which years in Ireland, with the 20-odd years of tion. we made many mistakes. The one criticism the Provo war and the 20 years since, re - of our role is that we were like the fabled late to that idea? You talked of permanent revolution as horsefly on the coach wheel. Still, we propa - The failure was that there was no revolu - proletarian revolution coming out of a gandised and agitated. tionary socialist party to take the lead when democratic bourgeois revolution. What it began in 1968-9. You had an agitation sort of democratic bourgeois revolution What is your assessment of the political which was attacked by the state, and then do you envisage, starting from now? journey through which Gerry Adams and that brought a response from the South The potentialities of working-class revolu - those around him took the Provisional Re - tion would be threaded together with the publicans? which the Provisional movement believed Rayner Lysaght has been active on the irish could give support for an aggressive armed left for over 50 years, and is the author of The democratic struggle. The British government It was done more intelligently than before. struggle. The aggressive armed struggle itself Republic of Ireland and other books. He was is not really interested in running Northern But it’s not new. In the 1880s there was the was seen as one that could be kept and interviewed by Martin Thomas in advance of a Ireland democratically (its wiser members New Departure which brought a lot of Feni - should be kept within the Six County bound - debate with Sean Matgamna on 9 November. may recognize it as an impossible task). This ans into the Home Rule party. Then the aries. It couldn’t be won that way. fact can stimulate actions by workers in the Treatyites fought a civil war to enforce a lim - Her victory was one of a cross-class national - South. That can start the chain reaction. It will ited Dominion status. So are you saying that the decisive loss of ist unity campaign. It was repeated in 1970, need a revolutionary organisation to do it. Then there was De Valera and Fianna Fail, the possibility of permanent revolution but by 1974 its bourgeois elements and those Whether there is one strong enough to do it then Clann na Poblachta, then the Officials. came back in 1968-9? they influenced had moved to the SDLP. is another question. There is a consistent failure of analysis in There were always potentialities, particu - Bernadette had failed to organize a socialist the Republican movement. It has the idea larly in the strikes [in the South] after Bloody base and she came third in the first general What would be the democratic bourgeois that the movement is the Republic virtually Sunday [January 1972]. The Irish government election that year. objectives of this democratic bourgeois established, so they can just send people out handed over the British Embassy [in Dublin] The same sort of confusion was true of the revolution, the demands comparable to with guns and bombs and they will win the to be burned — that’s what they did: I was republic. The [Irish] Labour Party had a rel - land for the peasants and a Constituent support of the majority. there, I saw it — and then the British govern - atively large left then, but it wasn’t going to Assembly in Tsarist Russia? They find those methods just kill off the ment prorogued Stormont [the old Northern play a role in a proletarian revolution. The demands would be, in the North, what support for an united Ireland, an independ - Ireland parliament]. But the Republicans, the Some of the left is much stronger than it the Provisionals are maintaining, except that ent Ireland. They abandon the armed strug - provisional Republicans didn’t realise what was in 1969. There was no question then of they’re not doing much with them except gle, which is probably a good thing, but then was happening. They thought they only had groups like the Socialist Workers Network using them as counters over the restoration the alternative is just a step to reformism. to carry out a few more actions, and they today [group linked to the SWP in Britain] of the coalition government. The liberal de - Now the Republicans are even talking of would win. getting seats in the Dail. mands for the right of abortion and equal going into a coalition government [in Dublin] There were mass mobilisations in the marriage — which we now have in the South, as a minority partner with one of the bour - What would it have looked like if the po - North then. Those developed only after the after all the years of the liberal Unionists say - geois parties. tentialities for permanent revolution had invasion of the ghettoes in 1969. There might ing that they couldn’t have Irish unity be - been realised? have been a mobilisation in the South if there cause the South was too illiberal. What is your summing-up on the develop - It would have meant proletarian responses had been a revolutionary socialist party. But There’s the language issue, the whole ques - ment of the revolutionary socialist cur - — strikes, occupations of British-owned fac - there wasn’t. tion of the symbolism of flags. And there are rents in Ireland over the 50 years since tories — and then possibly a movement from Now in the Six Counties the Provisional many other points. The Brits are in fact dol - 1968-9? And of Irish Trotskyism in partic - that to the development of alternative gov - movement has all but hegemonised the na - ing out money to the sectarians — to Sinn ular? ernmental powers. It’s difficult to say what tionalist population. There was no such hege - Fein, mind you, but also to people who are At the moment the two dominant Trotsky - would happen if you got that far. As Trotsky mony in 1969. known Loyalist murderers. ist bodies are the Socialist Party, which now pointed out, you cannot assume that revolu - The question is: can these problems be - calls itself Solidarity, and the Socialist Work - tion in other countries would be a carbon Anyway, what happened, happened. How come sufficiently extreme to move the South? ers Network. Both the SW and the SP see the copy of the Russian experience. do you see the idea of “permanent revo - Also, if there is a hard Brexit there could struggle in Partitionist terms. The SP, which lution” in Ireland now? Starting from now? well be a bigger crisis around the Border. is even more determinedly Partitionist than You say that the problem was the lack of There’s the neo-liberal problem. Peter That would be an extreme expression of the the SWs, tries to do work with the Unionist a revolutionary socialist party, but in fact Casey [a maverick right-wing candidate] got overall democratic deficit in the settlement of workers in East Belfast, but it doesn’t get very revolutionary socialists were more second place in the presidential election [on 1921. far. The SWs claim to be crossing the sectar - strongly-placed in Northern Ireland in 26 October]. He represents a feeling that has ian divide, but its vote is overwhelmingly 1968-9 than they have been at any time been pushed around by the mainstream The hold of the Catholic Church in the from the nationalist population. since. media, and in response by the alt-right,that South has been shaken through a series Both of them have done fairly good cam - The left was relatively strong in 1969? It de - the undoubted economic failures of neoliber - of scandals. How do the old arguments paigns in the South. The SP ran a good cam - pends what you mean by “the left”. There alism are due to its social and political as - about “Home Rule means Rome Rule” paign against water charges, but it is very were relatively small and underdeveloped pects, of liberalism, not to the economic side look in the light of this? agitationally confined. Its Marxism is not nuclei in Belfast (Farrell, Toman) and in of privatisation and deregulation, which is As to “Rome Rule”, the republic is now very developed. The SWs are maybe at a Derry (McCann), along with individuals, pretty much accepted by those people. considerably more liberal than Northern Ire - slightly higher level. some of whom were more sophisticated, but The peace process is in danger. The peace land on day to day issues.[DUP leader] Ar - What went wrong over the 50 years? There who were active, if at all on an individualist process wasn’t a great peace process. Its lene Foster raised a liberal critique of the wasn’t a revolutionary organisation that basis. The rise of the People’s Democracy whole principle was very dubious. The col - southern state in 1991, including its ban on could do what was necessary. The bad thing gave the revolutionary left more credibility lapse of the Stormont coalition [DUP — Sinn abortion. Now she’s on the wrong side on that [Sean] Matgamna did in the Irish Work - but the faultlines soon affected it. Fein] government was not the end of the that issue. ers Group [of the late 1960s] was not so much Moreover much of its support was essen - world. But there is the danger that if the A more sophisticated Unionist would be splitting the organisation, as instilling the tially cross-class nationalist. This is particu - whole process collapses we’re back to the justified in remarking, however, that there is idea that internationalism was simply anti- larly true of, perhaps, its greatest success, bloody armed struggle, for which the dissi - still much work to be done. Too much of the nationalism. It was almost going back 60 putting in Bernadette Devlin to Westminster. dent republicans are pushing. education system and of health is under reli - years, to William Walker [a Belfast socialist of 50 YEARS OF THE IRISH LEFT 6-7 gles the early 20th century]. The idea that any initiative by revolution - aries for what could be deemed nationalist aims is wrong affected the League for Work - ers’ Republic [the main product of the IWG split] even after it broken with Matgamna. You mustn’t fight nationalist struggles as a nationalist, but you can’t avoid them either. National struggles are usually a struggle be - tween an oppressor nation and an oppressed nation, and the right side is with the op - pressed nation. Our comrades in the North [in 1968-9] were rather intoxicated by getting lots of peo - ple onto the streets. They called it People’s Democracy. We founded the Irish section of the Fourth International in 1971, and by the time we united with PD in 1978 we in fact the larger group, which tells you something. By then the Provos’ campaign was on in earnest. They had the blood of the martyrs, Catholic areas in Derry declared themselves “Free Derry” and excluded state forces for some months in 1969 and again in 1971-2 they were the people who were doing things. disastrous. We had hopes of them, I admit. credited. The revisionists saw their chance of The revisionists have become very op - Sean will debate what you say about him Perhaps we could have won some of them if rationalising this mood. posed to any working-class mobilisation, for never supporting national struggles at the we knew what we know now. We now know They raised some important questions. But any idea. Another revisionist, David Fitz - meeting on 9 November! Leave that for much more, for example, about what the in fact they have tended to parrot the tradi - patrick of Trinity College Dublin, came to now. The LWR became the Irish Lam - Irish Trotskyists from the late 1930s to the tional Republicans on some issues. A lot of speak to the Labour History Society, and his bertists [linked to the “Lambert” group in early 1950s said. Republicans argue that Connolly abandoned idea was that there is no such thing as labour France]. Why did they collapse? socialism and simply became a Republican in history and we should look instead at the his - Simultaneously with the political develop - The LWR increasingly became almost Stal - the last 18 months of his life. The revisionists tory of work. ments, we have seen the rise of the “revi - inite in their attitude to discussions. Then say the same. It’s not true. So you get agree - Peter Hart produced a book proving to sionist” school in Irish historical writing. Carol Coulter, who was probably their lead - ment between the revisionist and the tradi - himself that the IRA was simply a Catholic What is your assessment of that trend in ing theorist, was given the boot. I don’t know tionalist Republicans. sectarian organisation. He used the example historical writing? when they wound up. I still see Paddy Healy If you read Conor Cruise O’Brien’s States of of a number of murders of Protestants in from time to time, but how far he could be Basically, it was going to happen anyway. Ireland , he attacks Connolly’s analysis on the south Co.Cork in April 1922, backed by long called a Trotskyist now, I don’t know. The history departments in the National Uni - base of three or four quotations. That wasn’t chunks of a document produced by British versity of Ireland were dominated by oppo - a proper investigation. I would suggest that intelligence saying that very few Protestants There’s been some attention recently to nents of republicanism.They were Cruise O’Brien should have read all of Con - helped the British forces, so that that was not the Saor Eire group of the late 60s and encouraged in the 1960s by the opening of nolly! But his whole approach there and in a factor. He left out a passage saying that early 70s. What’s your assessment of that the economy It raised exaggerated hopes of other works was dependent on subjective there were many Protestants helping the in hindsight? how much things would be better. The old forces – perceptions. He was almost as hostile British forces in that one particular area. I deal with a lot of this in my pamphlet They were urban guerrillas. It was rather Sinn Fein economic nationalist idea of “burn to considerations of economic factors as he everything British except their coal” was dis - was to the IRA. The Great Irish Revolution . Building for workers’ unity

mands were allowed to appeared to Protes - ister Terence O’Neill. I don’t know that this tants to be demands for them to lose some was ever denied. It fits in with the logic of of what the Catholics were seeking to gain – what PD said it was doing in that election. houses, jobs etc. Then they came to be seen I didn’t say that at the time that because as the thin end of the wedge for an IRA at - the struggle was divisive, they should have T: In 1968-9 there was a political explo - tempt to force the Six Counties into a united bided their time. I don’t say it now. sion in Northern Ireland, focused around Ireland. democratic issues. Do you think that ex - The leftists who were prominent in the How could those leftists have done bet - plosion had within it the potential to de - civil rights movement after the police baton - ter? velop into an all-Ireland socialist ing of a demonstration in Derry in October As AWL’s predecessor said at the time, by revolution? 1968 were destructively ultra-left. They saw including class demands for increasing the Sean Matgamna was in 1969 the M: No. The Irish working class was di - their main enemy as the liberal Unionists total number of houses and jobs at the same representative in the Derry Citizens’ Defence vided in the North, and between North and then seeking reforms; they were even will - as they demanded equal rights. Association of the “outside” volunteers who South. Everything that roused up the North - ing to make alliances with the worst die- helped defend “Free Derry” against Northern ern Ireland Catholics antagonised a large hard Unionists against them. If they’d done that, would it have created Ireland state forces, and has written and growing part of the Protestant popula - Bernadette Devlin, one of them, would get a dynamic of “permanent revolution” frequently for Solidarity and its forerunners. tion. elected to the Westminster Parliament as the (merger of bourgeois-democratic revolu - He was interviewed by Martin Thomas in Westminster Parliament in an April 1969 by- tion and working-class socialist revolu - advance of a debate with Rayner Lysaght on So are you saying that the Northern Ire - election for Mid-Ulster, but as the Unity tion)? 9 November. land Catholics should not have rebelled? (Catholic Unity) candidate. Ian Paisley It might have made the struggle less divi - No. The Catholic civil rights movement would allege on US television that before sive, and helped a possibility of building a relationship of the 6 Counties with inde - was a progressive upsurge of oppressed the February 1969 Northern Ireland election strong socialist organisation within it. No pendent Ireland and with Britain — came to people. Its great political weakness — per - the same Bernadette Devlin came to his more, and certainly not “permanent revolu - dominate. The leftists made no attempt to haps especially the weakness of the left house and proposed to him collaboration to tion”. within it — was that the civil rights de - bring down the liberal Unionist prime min - In fact the “constitutional question” — the Continued on page 8 8 50 YEARS OF THE IRISH LEFT More online at www.workersliberty.org From page 7 getting Britain to act as a “persuader” to push Some scheme of local autonomy for the the Protestants into a united Ireland. In fact, Protestant north-east is still a necessary part relate to it. At the beginning all the prominent as the 1974 general strike had shown very of any plan for a united Ireland. It is encour - socialists said that the “constitutional ques - powerfully, Britain had no such power of aging that even the Provisionals now say: tion” should be avoided. Even the Republi - “persuasion” with the Protestants. “British identity can and must be accommo - cans (then led by the Stalinists who would “Persuasion” here meant financial, political dated in a united Ireland, and I believe na - become the “Officials”) said that. That left the and military coercion. The Provisionals’ war tionalist Ireland is open to constitutional and “constitutional question” to be shaped by the was now a war to compel Britain to force the political safeguards to ensure this” (Mary Provisionals on one side and the Paisleyites Orangeists into a unitary Irish state, with an Lou McDonald). on the other. unmediated Catholic majority. It was a piece For centuries the fear of a foreign military Lenin wrote in What Is To Be Done? that of absolute political nonsense. landing in Ireland to use Irish disaffection Marxists must be able to offer answers on all Troops in Belfast With the hunger strikes of 1981, in which against Britain shaped British policy in Ire - the big questions of political and social life, ten Republicans died, the Provos developed land. Now the whole of the EU is interven - not just the “socialist issues”. We must be like But we did not construct fanciful ideas that a new political dimension — “the Armalite ing! The whole of Europe is on the side of the “the tribune of the people, who is able to the Provos were other than what they were, and the ballot box”. Ireland against Britain on the question of the react to every manifestation of tyranny and as a lot of people who should have known In 1985, the Anglo-Irish Agreement gave Border within Ireland and Brexit. oppression, no matter where it appears... to better did. We criticised the Provisionals, Dublin a share of political power in Northern The EU dimension also (as long as Brexit take advantage of every event, however over “Bloody Friday” in July 1972 for exam - Ireland. Arguably the Provisionals won that, can be stopped) provides the confederal links small, in order to set forth before all his so - ple. but in practice it meant little. Executive between Britain and Ireland which could fa - cialist convictions and his democratic de - power remained exclusively British. cilitate a united Ireland. In fact, in spite of mands”. And later? and because of the long history of conflict, The leftists did not have those answers on Really there was not one Provo war. There Couldn’t you say the Provisionals’ war there were already special links between the “constitutional question”. The only con - were two Provo wars, at least. The first, in won the Good Friday Agreement of 1998? Britain and Ireland before 1973. Irish people ceivable answer was and is a federal Ireland, 1971-5, had the goal of driving Britain out of You might say it was a concession to the had full citizen rights in Britain, including with regional autonomy for the Protestant Ireland, and succeeded in ending Orange Provisionals. But in essentials the same thing voting rights, as soon as we got off the boat. north-east. That should have been combined Home Rule in Northern Ireland. had been won by 1974. And the Good Friday with confederal links with Britain. The 26 The Provos won that objective within a Agreement was possible only because the As you say, the hold of the Catholic counties then had been fully independent for year of the start of the bombing and shooting. Provisionals had tacitly accepted that they Church in the South has been shaken decades. Socialists could and should have The British abolished Belfast Home Rule in had been defeated in their war. through a series of scandals. How do the proposed confederal links with Britain, to March 1972. There was then a ceasefire by the Then Sinn Fein accepted the Good Friday old arguments about “Home Rule means conciliate and reassure the Northern Union - Provisional IRA for a couple of a weeks Agreement — after fighting a war for the Rome Rule” look in the light of this? ists. The UK and Ireland in fact formed such (June-July 1972) and a ceasefire by the Offi - twenty years after Sunningdale for what? To Indisputably, “Home Rule” did became a confederal link when both joined the EU at cial IRA (from May 1972) which has lasted put Sinn Fein and the Paisleyites into govern - “Rome Rule”. Honest people have to ac - the start of 1973. ever since. Their ceasefire came in response ment in the Six Counties! knowledge that. The sort of things once de - All that would have limited the communal to a big demonstration by Catholic women in picted in sensation-mongering anti-Catholic polarisation, and increased the chances of Derry against The Officials, in protest at one Has the Good Friday Agreement been a tracts such as The Awful Revelations of Maria building a strong socialist organisation. But of the most stupidly savage episodes of the success? Monk came to exist in independent Ireland. there was never, in the events of 1968-9, and war: they captured and then shot an 18 year On a certain level, yes. Overall, peace has You had cases of women escaping from Mag - after, a possibility of “permanent revolution”. old member of the British Army who had come to visit his family in Derry. lessened tensions. But there are still “peace dalene Houses and, in effect, seeking political walls” on the interfaces between working- refuge in Northern Ireland or in England. The What is your assessment of the Provision - The aftermath to the abolition of Belfast class communities in Belfast. priests ruled Ireland in a regime which in - als’ military campaign, which started from Home Rule was a confused period. The Pro - I argued against voting for or endorsing cluded predatory sex against children early 1971? visionals resumed their war after mid-1972, the Good Friday Agreement at the time, but wrapped in impenetrable layers of hypocrisy I’d said in the 1960s that there was no pos - now without much of a clear effective objec - that was not because I thought it could do no and cant. Self-torturing nuns beat and abused sibility of the Republicans launching a revo - tive. Instead of sectarian Protestant rule in good at all. I thought socialists should not generations of Irish children. Schools in the lution. I was wrong on the question of Belfast, in the 1973 Sunningdale Agreement take political responsibility for a system of North were segregated at the insistence of the whether they could launch a physical-force Britain offered the Catholics essentially bureaucratically-balanced institutionalised Catholic Church. movement. They could and they did. everything they were going to win with the sectarianism. Ireland is now experiencing its third revo - Unfortunately, I was not wrong that they Good Friday Agreement 25 years of war later lution. The first was the revolution in land were incapable of launching or leading a gen - — namely, constitutionally-enshrined power- How do you assess the impact of the Eu - ownership, the second was the political rev - uine Irish revolution. Sinn Fein today repeats sharing, no government in which Catholics ropean Union on Ireland? [Britain and Ire - olution 1916-22. The third is the end of what for maybe the fifth time an old pattern: the did not have a part. The Orangeists had had land joined the EU in January 1973]. might be called the revolt against Rome Rule. physical-force revolutionaries of one period, a veto over an all-Ireland state. Now the The border had remained high for military In one of his articles on the Home Rule cri - once they have to recognise that their mili - Northern Ireland Catholics got a veto over reasons. One consequence of the end of the sis of 1912-4, Lenin comments on the fear of tary campaign is a dead end, become the re - Protestant majority rule in the Six Counties. military struggle in Ireland, since the mid- “Rome Rule” that it wouldn’t and couldn’t formist constitutional nationalists of the next It would have been better if the Provo war 1990s, has been a rush to catch up on 20 years happen because England, which under the period. had stopped after that. It didn’t. Britain pro - ceeded to set up a power-sharing govern - of European economic integration. then-projected Home Rule would still have Ireland has benefited greatly from mem - overall control, wouldn’t allow it. Do you think the Provisionals should have ment in Belfast in January 1974. The Provo bership in the EU. There have been tremen - In fact England allowed the Northerners to bided their time? war’s main effect now was to exasperate the dous economic and social advances. run an Orange sectarian state for 50 years. In A socialist would never have voted for the Orange working class. The SDLP, the consti - The question of Irish unity might now con - fully independent Ireland we had a theo - Provisional IRA war that started in March tutional nationalists, were the main pillar in ceivably get a Yes in a referendum in North - cratic state, more so than in fascist Portugal 1971. What would its objective be? The the power-sharing government, because the ern Ireland. I would like a united Ireland. But or Spain in the mid 20th century. Northern Ireland Protestants could not have Unionist component in it did not have such a referendum majority would not nec - If Ireland had remained united, the pres - been, and should not have been, coerced into enough support among Protestants. That first essarily resolve the issue. History suggests ence of the North might have made a differ - a united Ireland. The Provisionals should not attempt at a power-sharing government was that the Protestants would never accept it un - ent. But we can’t know how things would have launched their war. brought down by a great Orange general less there were arrangements to meet their have gone if a united Ireland had won Home Once that war got underway, socialists had strike in May 1974. concerns. Rule and then expanded it. to respond to it as a fact. We responded by Britain then decided to call a Convention None of that justifies or excuses the parti - giving them critical support against the to work out an agreed constitution for the Six The traditional Protestant-Unionist objec - tion that was imposed on Ireland, or the Or - British army. Counties. The Provisionals called another ceasefire for most of the period during which tions to a united Ireland cited the lower ange sectarian Home Rule regime set up in social and economic development of the Northern Ireland. Why? the Convention met. Predictably the Conven - South, and the clerical domination of its Because they were part of the revolt of an tion resolved nothing. politics. The economic growth and liber - Have the Irish Trotskyists, over the last 50 oppressed people, even if they were not Then what might be called the Provision - alisation of the South over the last years, been adequate on the fight against doing what we wanted to have done. To an als’ second war was launched. This was a decades have changed things there. clericalism? extent they were something not far from a war against Partition, but it had no coherent Have you heard the new Irish joke? The I don’t think so. A background dispute on militia of the Catholics held within an op - rationale. Protestants of Northern Ireland now object to that question, about an anti-religion piece pressive state structure. In 1971 the Provisionals had adopted a new Irish unity because the South is too liberal which I wrote, contributed to the split in the We backed their right to fight, and rejected programme called Eire Nua, which advo - and the people there have stopped listening Irish Workers’ Group in 1967-8. the idea, then very common on the British cated an Ireland of four federal units, one of to their old spiritual advisers! left, that they could be dismissed as “individ - them a nine-county Ulster. That contained The Northern Ireland Protestants’ objection What is your assessment of the “revision - ual terrorists”. We were the only British so - what might have been the beginning of a ne - to a united Ireland was never just a negative ism” of recent decades in Irish historical cialist group to have our headquarters raided gotiated settlement for Protestant autonomy. thing, of complaints about the South. It was writing? by (armed) police (in September 1973) be - Now there was talk of a long war, twenty also their own positive identity as British- “Historical revisionism” began about the cause of what we said on Ireland. years of war. Over the time the Provisionals dropped federalism and talked instead of Irish. time of the 50th anniversary of the 1916 Ris - Workers’ Liberty @workersliberty HISTORY 9 ing. To a serious extent it is a healthy move - ment. It debunks the Republican revolutionary tradition — but it cannot but be good to es - tablish the facts. Much of the tradition is en - crusted in mysticism and other sorts of nonsense. Serious Irish history-writing really begins with the revisionists. Up to 50 or so years ago Irish history-writing was little more than an ethnic-sectarian chronicle. But it included the idea that things that had seemed immutable could be changed, and were changed, by revolutionaries over - coming great odds. Dressed up in talk of the upper classes as a mere British garrison “alien in race and creed”, it held within itself an idea and a story of class struggle. All of that passes down to the working- class revolutionaries. Historical fiction and confusion, cultivated or otherwise, never did anyone any good. There is a historical parallel. There was a great agarian socialist tradition in Russia in the 19th century, the Narodniks. They killed the Tsar in 1881. The ideas of that movement dominated the intellectuals for a long time. Then a sort of revolutionary debunking of that tradition developed, showing that Rus - sia was heading for capitalism rather than agrarian socialism. Some of the debunkers came to use a Marxism reduced to economic determinism, which is not Marxism. As Trot - sky put it, “the sharp knife of Marxism was the instrument by which the bourgeois intel - Karl Liebknecht and Rosa Luxemburg, leaders of the 1918 revolution, murdered by right-wing gangs ligentsia cut the Populist umbilical cord”. The revolutionary Marxists claimed the heroic Narodnik tradition as its own, without the mystification and confusion. The Irish revolutionary tradition — the ple - beian revolutionary tradition, the Fenians’ — is ours, the socialists’, the Marxists’. We can Revolution in Germany, 1918 benefit from the work of the revisionists, even if often in conflict with them and in crit - Typically, workers’ mass strikes and demon - (KPD-S) aiming to lead a workers’ revolution icism of their conclusions. By Paul Hampton strations would break out, then soldiers in Germany as the Bolsheviks had done in In November 1918 German workers over - would join the revolt, and then a joint work - Russia. Finally: there has been some attention re - threw the imperial government and ended ers’ and soldiers’ council would oust the old But the KPD-S did not have the political cently to the Saor Eire group of the late the First World War. authorities. self-education and training that the Bolshe - 1960s and early 70s. What is your assess - What began as a sailors’ revolt within On 3 November officers fired on a massive, viks had acquired over decades. It got caught ment? weeks saw workers’ councils take charge of unarmed demonstration in Berlin, killing up in a ragged and premature semi-attempt Saor Eire was a strange hybrid, a mixture various German cities. A social democratic eight. The next day the Berlin workers re - at a revolutionary uprising in Berlin, together of people with revolutionary political moti - government took power amidst a situation of sponded with a general strike. The SPD Ex - with the “Revolutionary Shop Stewards” vation and gangsters. They robbed banks and dual power. ecutive demanded the abdication of the aligned with the USPD, in early January, and killed a policeman. A brave Marxist, Peter The revolution, however, would be de - Kaiser [Emperor]. In a private meeting with in the wake of that right-wing gangs spon - Graham, got entangled in their affairs and feated, or at least limited to the replacement top army chief Wilhelm Groener, SPD leader sored by the SPD murdered Luxemburg and died at the hands of certain members of Saor of the old monarchist government by a par - Friedrich Ebert said: “If the Kaiser does not other revolutionary leaders. Eire. liamentary democracy, and a parliamentary abdicate then social revolution is inevitable. The revolution was not over. Short-lived What they did could never have made any democracy so flawed that it would within 15 But I will have nothing to do with it. I hate it workers’ republics would be formed in Mu - like sin.” nich and in other cities in 1919. A general sense. 26-Counties Ireland was a functioning years fall to the Nazis. On 9 November 1918, hundreds of thou - strike in March 1920 would smash a right- bourgeois democracy. Even according to At the end of October 1918 the German ad - mirals decided on a last-gasp operation, com - sands of workers demonstrated on the wing attempt at a coup and lead even conser - Guevarist theory, such as it was, guerrilla streets. In Berlin, SPD leader Philipp Scheide - vative union leaders to talk of a “workers’ warfare in such conditions made no sense. mitting the fleet against the superior British forces. To crews, it looked like a suicide mis - mann proclaimed Germany a republic while government”. I had personal connections with some of Another revolutionary opportunity was sion. the Kaiser was in Belgium, aiming to pre- them, but never thought what they did made missed in October 1923 before the capi - When ordered to sea, sailors from Wil - empt Karl Liebknecht’s call for a socialist re - sense, or was serious revolutionary politics, public at the same demonstration. Ebert talist order restabilised. still less working-class politics. helmshaven mutinied. Mass arrests were or - dered, but the revolt spread. On 3 became chancellor [equivalent of prime min - In Irish history, the way things were going November, Karl Artelt, a member of the In - ister]. •Workers’ Liberty will be publishing a was often telegraphed by funeral marches. In dependent Social Democratic Party [USPD, a On 10 November 1918, a Council of Peo - pamphlet telling the story, and including 1861 the funeral of Terence Bellew Mac - semi-revolutionary party built by people ple’s Delegates was formed, with three SPD new translations of some of Luxemburg’s Manus was a tremendous demonstration of who had been expelled from the old Social members, led by Ebert, and three USPD. articles from 1918-9. In the meantime, more the Fenian revolutionaries. Democratic Party (SPD) for opposing World Ebert now led the government both by regu - at bit.ly/g-1918 and bit.ly/rl-sp In 1915 the funeral of Diarmaid Ó Donnab - War One], was elected leader of the first lar appointment from the old order, and as háin Rosa was a formidable nationalist affair, sailors’ council, a committee representing chief of the “People’s Delegates”. at which Patrick Pearse made his famous ora - 20,000 sailors. The SPD, by mobilising less-politically- Socialism, Ireland, Permanent tion declaring that “Ireland unfree will never On 4 November, SPD politician Gustav aware soldiers to disrupt a workers’ and sol - Revolution and the Provo War be at peace”. It presaged the nationalist Ris - Noske arrived in Kiel. Since most sailors (and diers’ gathering, retained control of the Rayner Lysaght debates Sean ing in the offing. soldiers, and even workers) still saw the SPD Executive of Berlin’s workers’ and soldiers’ Matgamna, 7:30, Friday 9 Novem - In 1970 the funeral of an unarmed Garda, as the big more-or-less party, Noske was councils. An all-German congress of workers’ coun - ber London Welsh Centre, 157-163 Richard Fallon, shot down by Saor Eire peo - elected chair of the newly formed Kiel Sol - cils, on 16-21 December 1918, had 292 SPD Grays Inn Rd WC1X 8UE ple robbing an Arran Quay bank, produced diers’ Council. But the SPD worked to con - trol, deflect, and limit the revolution. supporters among its 425 delegates, 94 a great spontaneous popular demonstration USPD, and only 10 from the loose radical fac - against what Saor Eire stood for and did. Between 1 and 15 November, workers’ and The story of the Limerick Soviet soldiers’ councils took charge of many Ger - tion in the USPD led by Rosa Luxemburg, the Some people of the Mandel Fourth In - Spartacus League. It voted to cede power to with Rayner Lysaght ternational wove fantasies around Saor man cities, including Leipzig, Hamburg, Bre - 5:30, Saturday 10 November, men, Chemnitz, Brunswick, Düsseldorf, a parliamentary National Assembly to be Eire. But what it did never made sense. elected on 19 January. Brunker Hall, 152 Lever Street, What the Mandel Trotskyists did and said Mülheim an der Ruhr, Kiel, Lübeck, Flens - EC1V 8BG burg, Oldenburg, Cuxhaven, and Hanover. On 30 December the Spartacists joined in relation to it made no sense either. with others to form a Communist Party More online at www.workersliberty.org Workers’ Liberty @workersliberty Where we stand “Fake news” inside the left Today one class, the working class, lives by selling its labour By Cathy Nugent power to another, the capitalist class, which owns the means of On 26 October, the Red London production. Facebook page, purportedly a The capitalists’ control over the site run by Corbyn-supporting economy and their relentless drive socialists, posted a meme (pic - to increase their wealth causes tured right) indicating that the poverty, unemployment, the Clarion magazine and one of its blighting of lives by overwork, editors, Sacha Ismail, support imperialism, the destruction of the child abuse. Sacha is a member environment and much else. of Workers’ Liberty and one of Against the accumulated wealth the parents of a young child. and power of the capitalists, the The claim is ludicrous, reckless, working class must unite to and malicious. It is not the first time struggle against capitalist power that Red London have smeared in the workplace and in wider members of Workers’ Liberty. society. Who are Red London? What are The Alliance for Workers’ their politics? What other attacks Liberty wants socialist revolution: have they made on us and other so - collective ownership of industry cialists? and services, workers’ control, Red London’s administrators and a democracy much fuller than have always been anonymous, but the present system, with elected it is clear that they are part of a representatives recallable at any clique or set of cliques around the time and an end to bureaucrats’ Labour Party, Momentum, and the London say the USSR in the 1930s which has homophobic dren in Rotherham: “The bottom and managers’ privileges. RMT union. was the best, North Korea is a roots) as general swear words. line here is that everywhere, a mi - We fight for trade unions and Red London say they exist to workers’ paradise, and Enver They have used it to smear Trotsky - nority of abusive men, often in - the Labour Party to break with promote “a confrontational attitude Hoxha was a great leader. Some ists in general (who along with an - volved in criminal gangs, will look “social partnership” with the in all socialist struggles”. Their pro - take those claims as ironic or joky, archists are their next favourite hate for vulnerable children to prey on. bosses and to militantly assert lific daily content is usually not but they provide an “extreme” and figures) and Workers’ Liberty in If the system does not believe chil - working-class interests. confrontational, but similar to authoritarian mindset to frame Red particular. dren who report abuse, regards every other Corbyn fan club site. London’s targeting of its hate fig - Towards the end of 2016, Red children who are sexually active as In workplaces, trade unions, The bland serves as a backdrop for ures. London began to say that Workers’ ‘sluts’, and does not trust trained and Labour organisations; the less frequent but more “edgy” Red London’s stock-in-trade is Liberty supports paedophilia workers or give them the resources among students; in local content, including praise of “High unkind and unsophisticated ridi - and/or child abuse (the group they need, it will continue to fail campaigns; on the left and in Stalinism”. culing of “identity politics” people never makes any distinctions). vulnerable children.” wider political alliances we Red London’s extreme attitude is whom they caricature as always They have always ignored our clear In Red London’s way of using stand for: not only “online”. It has infected saying “woke” and “intersec - and considered statements on these snippets to create “fake news” and • Independent working-class “on the ground” political life. The tional”; so-called RadLibs; so-called issues. to whip up “death to nonces” fever, representation in politics. meme smearing Clarion and Sacha snowflakes and melts. “Gold - there is little difference between • A workers’ government, appeared when the left in smiths” (that is, students from SNIPPETS them and the alt-right. The politics based on and accountable to the Lewisham Labour was split over Goldsmiths College) is a stand-in They, and an anonymous blog are not the same but the method is: labour movement. candidates in a constituency elec - word for all those. which is associated with the misinformation, angry identity • A workers’ charter of trade tions. Sacha is the secretary of the Red London are not interested in group (bit.ly/fake-p), have based claims, and calls to ditch empathy union rights — to organise, to local left caucus Lewisham for Cor - reasoned critique of identity poli - themselves on four snippets out all drive out reasoned discussion. strike, to picket effectively, and to byn. tics. They are interested in stirring of hundreds and thousands of In early 2018 Red London’s take solidarity action. Red London’s Stalinism is much up a hardcore audience, mainly of texts that our political tendency smears became entangled with a re - • Taxation of the rich to fund cruder than the Morning Star ’s. Red young white men, to hatred and has published over fifty years. port made online of an historic sex - decent public services, homes, contempt. Their stance has some - Those snippets were “read” by ual assault in the AWL, where the education and jobs for all. times licensed sneering hostility to - way of ripping them out of context. victim was under 18 and over the • A workers’ movement that wards oppressed groups and One is an exchange of letters dating current age of consent. The case fights all forms of oppression. Full marginalised people (such as sex back to 1981, one of which opposes had not been reported to the rele - equality for women, and social workers): (see image on far right). censorship laws and another which vant AWL bodies at the time (2005). provision to free women from Red London style themselves as calls for a discussion around the We investigated. We immediately domestic labour. For reproductive a forum for the expression of an age of consent. Both texts are im - stated that individually and collec - justice: free abortion on demand; “authentically” working-class iden - possible to understand without tively we had not provided the the right to choose when and tity. This is confused. Class is most knowing something about the proper support — that is facilitated whether to have children. Full importantly a relationship to the 1980s left and the topic under dis - access to professional help, as part equality for lesbian, gay, bisexual means of production and only sec - cussion. of a safeguarding duty to that and transgender people. Black ondly a cultural identity, and a Another snippet is a postscript to young person. and white workers’ unity against complex one at that, varying be - a letter opposing “Megan’s Law” Red London’s smears helped racism. tween times and places. (making the sex-offenders register only to exploit and instrumentalise • Open borders. Their take on class takes them public) on the grounds that it the case; young AWL members and • Global solidarity against into dangerous territory. Red Lon - would encourage counter-produc - some allies were called “nonces” at global capital — workers don have tried to relate to Tommy tive vigilantism. That meaning is a February 2018 London Young everywhere have more in Robinson’s followers as misguided lost in Red London’s presentation. Labour. The atmosphere made it common with each other than Max Shachtman’s Under the members of “our class”, saying, The fourth is from an article by impossible to get a proper discus - with their capitalist or Stalinist Banner of Marxism , which forms “we need our own Tommy or Tom - Gerry Byrne published in 2003 sion on the serious issues. rulers. the bulk of this book, deserves to mies”. (bit.ly/gerry-b). The basic position The recklessness, the authoritari - • Democracy at every level of be considered one of the classic In this context Red London have here is very clear: “Any sexual re - anism, and fake-scandals of Red society, from the smallest polemics of the Marxist foregrounded their anti-paedophile lationship between an adult and a London are geared to stoke up sec - workplace or community to global movement, alongside The Poverty message by way of a border-line child is necessarily exploitative, tarian division on left. social organisation. of Philosophy, Anti-Dühring, and authoritarian “lynch mob” mental - even if there is no physical coercion Those who value words, • Equal rights for all nations, others. It defends the Bolsheviks, ity against paedophiles. Socialists involved... ‘consent’ is meaningless meaning, and dialogue should against imperialists and predators their revolution, their work to oppose child abuse, but we also op - in the structurally unequal relation - challenge Red London. big and small. build a revolutionary socialist poses vigilantism: it drives child ship of adult to child”. That posi - • Maximum left unity in action, movement, and the continued abuse underground, works against tion is never acknowledged by Red • More on how Red London cre - and openness in debate. relevance of their approach. rehabilitation, and will not keep London. ates fake news: bit.ly/fake-pol Order online for £12* children safe. Our actual record is of consistent • Our Working Group report on If you agree with us, please including UK postage. Red London have an obsession support for an age of consent and the 2005 case: bit.ly/res-2005 take some copies of Solidarity www.workersliberty.org/books with paedophila which predates often-expressed strong views on • Website collection on the new to sell — and join us! *£15 Including study guide Robinson’s campaigns. They use tackling child abuse. For example, Stalinism: “paedo” and “nonce”(a word on the sexual exploitation of chil - workersliberty.org/new-stal REPORTS 10-11 Women say: “Not OK Google” Leicester Uni security

By Kelly Rogers staff fight cuts

On Thursday 1 November thou - security during the UCU pension sands of Google workers staged By Clara Bennett dispute. As a consequence to this, an international walk-out to the Unison members are now protest against the company’s Security staff at the University meeting with the University of handling of sexual harassment. of Leicester are currently in dis - Leicester student activist group Thousand of workers from cities pute with management, who who, during the UCU strike, occu - as far apart as New York, London, wish to cut their working week pied the office of the vice chancel - Berlin, Zurich, Singapore, Tokyo to 35 from 37 hours, with the lor Paul Boyle. and more, took part. Many of them loss of two hours’ pay. The UCU branch is likely to dis - took to the streets, or gathered in Effectively this works out to be cuss how to support security staff squares and parks holding placards about £800 per year. A large sum too. with slogans like “O.K. Google, re - for relatively low paid workers I spoke with a couple of the se - ally?”. but a tiny sum for the university, curity team who are very keen to The action followed revelations especially when the team they are receive messages of support form targeting is very small. that Google had paid millions of cluding an end to its use of private London and across the world today other trade unionists and activists A consultative ballot was held dollars in exit packages to male ex - arbitration in such cases, the publi - (Thursday 1 November) over how but were hesitant to give their last week where 100% turnout ecutives found to have committed cation of a transparency report, fur - the company tackles allegations of name as they were concerned achieved 100% in favour of indus - sexual harassment and had covered ther disclosures of salaries and sexual harassment. about reprisals. On security trial action. This, from the 100% up the incidents. Most notably compensation, an employee repre - “The employees are rightly de - worker said “I used to think that unionised team, should send a Google had paid Andy Rubin, the sentative on the company board, manding key changes in how sex - trade unions were a waste of time, very clear message to the bosses creator of the Android mobile soft - and a chief diversity officer. ual misconduct allegations are but they’ve been brilliant” that a cut in wages will not be tol - ware, a $90 million exit package, While the global strike was not dealt with at the tech giant, includ - They have urged people to go erated. The security workers re - despite the company finding that co-ordinated by any union in par - ing a call to end forced arbitration the web link below and sign cently won a change in their rota sexual harassment allegations ticular, Unite in the UK has been or - — a move which would make it their petition calling on the Uni - and hope the momentum of win - against him were credible. ganising Google workers at offices possible for victims to sue. versity to reverse its plans to ning will carry them through this The organisers of the walkout in London. Unite said about the “Unite the union began organ - cut wages. dispute. produced a list of demands, calling strike: “We applaud the principled ising and recruiting Google staff There were definite signs of sol - on Google to change how it han - stand taken by Google workers in in London six months ago and • Sign the petition: bit.ly/2Doteoj idarity between staff students and dles sexual harassment cases, in - membership continues to grow.” Libraries demo: missed opportunity Tube station staff plan ballots ford Circus, Piccadilly Circus, By Ollie Moore Charing Cross, Lambeth North, national demonstration. “Thank you Unison for showing and Elephant and Castle, over By Ruth Cashman, Lambeth Sadly this demonstration took a — once again — what an effective, London Underground station Unison (p.c.) workers at Baker Street are short-staffing. A union activist told year and a half to organise and then campaigning union looks like. I Solidarity : “There simply aren’t was called at the last minute for hope Theresa May hears your mes - preparing to ballot for strikes to Since 2010, more than 500 public demand the reinstatement of an enough staff to cover the work. If Saturday 3 November by Unison sage loud and clear.” someone goes off sick, their duty libraries have been closed HQ without coordinating with I’m proud to be a Unison rep in unfairly sacked colleague, and to across England, Scotland and resist unfair disciplinary proce - will often be left uncovered, mean - local union reps, limiting turnout. libraries, proud of my workmates ing people are working on incredi - Wales. One branch trying to build the and how they’ve fought again and dures. More have faced crippling staff The RMT union says the proce - bly busy gatelines on their own. demo tried to order 1000 leaflets again, proud of my local commu - Staff feel like they’re being ham - and budget cuts. That is set to con - only to be told that only 1000 had nity who occupied Carnegie Li - dures used to dismiss a Customer tinue despite the Chancellor’s Service Assistant after his proba - mered.” The RMT said that short- been printed for the entire national braries, proud of my comrades staffing “creates undue stress on claims that austerity is ending. mobilisation. across the country who have been tion were unfair. A statement on the There have been local fightbacks RMT London Calling website said: our members and puts them and In the end roughly 100 people campaigning against job losses, clo - the travelling public at risk.” by Unison members in Lambeth, marched from the British Library to sures and privatisation. But the 3 “We note the company has under - Barnet and Blaenau Gwent and taken to review the dismissal of RMT also plans to ballot its train Parliament Square. Most marched November demonstration certainly driver members at the Morden Unite members in Greenwich. For with union and community ban - doesn’t show what an effective, Bro. Mahoney, and state here and many years, grassroots library cam - now that unless Bro. Mahoney is depot on the Northern Line over ners on the road, whilst the march’s campaigning union looks like. If substandard conditions in the staff paigners have been calling for a na - stewards made up of Unison staff we want to save Britain’s public li - reinstated without delay; this union tional, cross union coordinated will issue them the notice and com - accommodation areas. bizarrely walked alongside the braries we need to build the cross- And, as went to political and industrial strategy. In mence a ballot of our members for Solidarity march on the pavement with the union shop stewards network that press, RMT and Aslef 2016 reps in PCS, Unite and Unison industrial action.” national Save Libraries Banner. reps have been calling on Unison to driver members on the Central along with community campaign - The RMT also cites “spurious Labour Party deputy leader Tom facilitate since 2012. We need to co - Line, were due to strike on 7 No - ers organised the Libraries, Muse - disciplinary procedures” against Watson welcomed the demonstra - ordinate our strikes and campaign vember. Piccadilly line strikes for ums and Galleries demonstration two members, one of whom is the tion but clearly hadn’t been warned nationally and locally against Tory the same day have been sus - attended by 3000 people. Unison local union rep, as reasons behind of the poor organisation in the run cuts. We need Labour to stand up pended. conference 2017 supported another up, commenting: for libraries. Alan Wylie, library the dispute. The union has also declared a campaigner, has warned Labour’s • For more on these disputes, see policy on libraries will have to con - dispute on the Bakerloo South Cover Group, which includes Ox - the Tubeworker blog at worker - front the question of the actions of sliberty.org/twblog. Labour Councils: TGIs workers declare win “‘What about Labour councils like Lambeth, Lewisham and Sheffield that are cutting, closing, Rail catering workers strike As Solidarity went to press • Payment for trial shifts privatising and/or handing li - Unite announced that workers • Payment for unpaid online braries over to volunteers?’ I hear at TGI Fridays had won their training you ask By Ollie Moore ment for additional duties. An dispute. • Re-establishment of the Tronc “We need to get Labour to de - RMT statement said: A post on Facebook said “work - Committee [a method for deter - velop a national policy and then Rail workers employed by Rail “This is a fight for workplace ers at TGI Fridays won their well mining fair distribution of tips] use it to whip these and other coun - Gourmet, which provides cater - justice involving a crucial group publicised dispute after taking • 60%/40% split of tips changes cils into line and commit to uphold - ing services on board mainline of staff servicing the catering highly effective industrial action to 65% / 35% in Feb preventing ing and strengthening the statutory trains, struck on 30 October. functions on LNER trains and they deserve to be treated with and embarrassing the company move to 50%/50%” basis of public libraries. The workers, who work out of an More details will follow in next dignity and respect just like any into concessions. “Then we stand a chance of Edinburgh depot on LNER Inter week’s . other group of transport work - The victory has meant: Solidarity reversing/halting the damage.” City services, are resisting manage - ers.” • Reinstatement of staff meals ment bullying and demanding pay - SolidaFor a workers’ giovertnment y No 485 7 November 2018 50p/£1 25 years in jail for Catalan leaders? By Colin Foster On Friday 5 November Spain’s Supreme Court Prosecutor called for sentences of up to 25 years for the Catalan national - ist politicians jailed after the 1 October 2017 referendum on independence for Catalonia. The prosecutor’s case is that the Spanish constitution says that such a referendum could be Podemos, went to the prison to called only with the agreement of talk with the jailed Catalan na - the Spanish government. The tionalists and seek their support Spanish government did not for the budget which Podemos agree: in fact it mobilised state has agreed with PSOE. forces to try to disrupt the refer - The Catalan nationalists say BRAZIL NEEDS endum. they want the prisoners freed be - The referendum ended incon - fore they back the budget. The clusively — only a 43% turnout, government claims that it has no though 92% for Catalan inde - power to free them now that the pendence. court processes are underway, A December 2017 election for and that it has done the most it the Catalan regional parliament can by having its Solicitor-Gen - OUR SOLIDARITY eral make representations to the was similarly inconclusive: sepa - By Kelly Rogers MST has expressed fear that these kinds of attacks are ratist parties won a majority of court to have the “rebellion” going to grow in the wake of Bolsonaro’s election. seats but a minority of the vote. charge against them replaced by The left and the labour movement, feminists and There has been a more generalised surge in mob vi - Since then the Catalan separatists the lesser one of “sedition” (still LGBTQ people, are on the defensive after the elec - olence surrounding the election. Women and LGTBQ have focused on pressing for carrying up to 12 year sentences). The trial is expected to start in tion of far-right candidate Jair Bolsonaro as pres - individuals have born the brunt of the spike in vio - Spanish government agreement 2019 and last at least three ident on 28 October 2018. lence. Workers’ Party supporters and leftists have also to a referendum, and freedom for the jailed politicians. months, with the decision not Bolsonaro takes office on 1 January, but already the been targeted and reports have even been made of From June 2018 the new known before the local and re - right wing are energised. Street parties were held all people being attacked simply because they were wear - Madrid minority government, gional elections scheduled for 26 over the country on the night of his election. Many ing red. headed by the “centre-left” May 2019. places saw military vehicles parade through the However, many are continuing to oppose Bol - PSOE, has attempted a balancing On 4 November, about 15,000 streets. Thousands of people poured out to show their sonaro. Tens of thousands of people have taken to the act. It depended on votes from people protested outside Lle - support. streets in some of Brazil’s major cities — São Paulo, Catalan nationalists to take office, doners prison calling for the pris - More than 20 universities have been subjected to in - Rio de Janeiro, Porto Alegre and Recife among them. and needs them to pass its oners’ release. As the vasions by military police and the confiscation of The demonstrations have been backed by the Frente Budget (though in Spain a gov - revolutionary socialists of IZAR teaching materials relating to anti-fascist history and ernment can survive losing its point out: activism. It is unclear where the orders came from, but Brasil Popular, a coalition of left-wing organisations that was formed in 2015. Budget, by rolling over the previ - “‘The acts of force, aggres - since the invasions took place in the days immediately sion and violence’ existed but The FBP encompasses LGBT organisations, stu - ous year’s). following Bolsonaro’s victory, it seems very likely that were used by the Spanish state dent organiations, the Landless Workers’ Move - On the same day that the Pros - they are linked. ecutor demanded drastic sen - against the Catalan people ment (MST) and the main confederation of trade A Landless Workers’ Movement (MST) camp was tences, a key parliamentary ally who only wanted to vote and set on fire by a group of Bolsonaro supporters in the unions in Brazil, the CUT, in its list of almost sev - of the PSOE, Pablo Iglesias of decide their future”. state of Mato Grosso do Sul, in southern Brazil. The enty affiliates.

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