unity!
scottish-communists.org.uk April 2017
No thanks Nicola SeConD referenDUm
PeoPle’S aSSembly
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he forty eighth screening of the film I Daniel Blake, held under the auspices of the People’s assembly, took place in glasgow last month. in Scotland six more are to be held bringing total screenings to over 50 from aberdeen to berwick with attendances of 70 to almost 300. Not bad for a film that was in cinemas for three months and can be bought for less than a tenner in most supermarkets. What makes it stand out is the fact that it tells a story that while hidden in mainstream media is a daily reality for working people and their families throughout Britain. This was apparent by contributions given by those who had personal experience of the governments iniquitous sanctions regime, these contributions highlighted how the film if anything did not tell a horrific enough story harrowing though it was. That the People’s Assembly organised these events is not surprising given that most trade unions in Scotland are affiliates along with a variety of political and
community groups. With the Labour Parties Campaign for Socialism and the SNP Trade Union Group both represented on the Scotland wide steering group it is perhaps the only organisation that can rightly claim to be the broadest based group opposing austerity now. With its key demands deliberately focused on the concerns of working class families it offers an opportunity to campaign on issues rather than constitutional arrangements. 1 A fairer economy for a fairer Britain 2 More and better jobs 3 High standard social housing 4 Protect and improve public services 5 Fairness and justice 6 A secure and sustainable future Local assemblies based around Trades Councils are in the forefront of campaigns in support of claimants unjustly sanctioned by the DWP, highlighting and opposing cuts in local services, antifracking and environmental concerns. These local groups are re-establishing the links that existed between trade unions and working class communities. Earlier this year every council group leader and every councillor were sent a
Peoples Manifesto highlighting the implications for working people if they went ahead with proposed cuts. We also offered alternatives and assistance in creating budgets that halted any more cuts and could even expand services. Some councils like North Ayrshire and Renfrewshire have set no cuts budgets and are expanding services, it can and should be done across Scotland. The PAS are not against councillors we see them as our allies in the anti-austerity movement if they listen to voters concerns we will support them. People came to the film show because of anger and it is time for the movement to help focus this anger where it belongs. Not on the DWP worker most probably in receipt of benefits after years of zero pay rises but at the governments in Westminster and Hollyrood not forgetting the faceless ones in Brussels the architects of “our” austerity via the neo liberal Lisbon treaty. They need to be challenged and the People’s Assembly in Scotland is in the forefront of this so come on board and be part of the fight back. KEITH STODDART
Partnership no more ClaSS Collaboration
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he CommUniSt Party has never supported Partnership working with the employers or government. it recognised such a “partnership” was bogus, dampening down militancy in the workplace, fostering passivity, isolating activists and incorporating unions into the employer agenda. One partner made the other pay for austerity with cuts to pay, terms and conditions, and job losses. It led to a lazy approach to organising — why bother with such time-consuming tasks as face to face meetings with members when you were guaranteed a seat at the top table. It also led to an unhealthy relationship, and even collusion, with the bosses by senior stewards and full-time officers combined with the targeting of trade union militants and “trouble-makers.” Employers saw the role of union full time officers as policing their stewards and dealing with the
“hotheads”. Concessionary bargaining became the order of the day, with give and take, with workers always doing the giving. Accept cuts in real pay and terms and conditions and it will save jobs, workers were told. It was a proven myth, a dead end for workers with the employer always coming back looking for more concessions. Areas covered by collective bargaining were removed piecemeal and no less fatally, it created a political divide between trade unions and service users and the wider community, something that militant trades councils are well aware of. The partnership approach has been pushed by union leaderships in many unions and by the STUC and TUC. Recently the STUC General Secretary, probably recognising the unease felt by many lay activist of the extremely close relationship between the STUC and the Scottish Government, warned of the danger of dependency in that relationship. However interesting developments are
taking place in the Scottish movement with a lot of interest being shown in the writings of the US labour organiser Jane McAlevey and her call for “Deep Organising” in the workplace and a PCS motion to Congress calls for such an approach. McAlevey criticises the collaboration approach to industrial relations which will be music to the ears of many stewards, and the need to identify what she calls “organic leaders”. She recognises, again not be new to active trade union councils, of the importance of winning our case not just in the workplace but also in our communities and pays respect to the left and communist organisers in the US Congress of Industrial Organisation who adopted such an approach. Shortage of space curtails a fuller account of her writings but interesting developments indeed. A case of “Back to the Future”? For some of us it never went away. TOM MORRISON
Trumped US left wing view
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ontrary to the impression put out by media elites, the working-class vote was not overwhelmingly for trump, nor was the working class vote the backbone of his success. The Electoral College totals swung his way thanks to narrow victories in a few key rust-belt states. Many factors contributed to the Trump victory, but two stand out. First, there was a discernable shift among many voters in working class strongholds previously giving majorities to Obama to turn in the direction of Trump in 2016. As (liberal pundit) Paul Krugman noted in his 2008 alert and warning to the Democrats, addressing relevant economic issues is decisive in winning the working class vote. With the Sanders economic program strangled in the cradle, desperate voters saw nowhere to turn but to the false, demagogic hope of putting the industrial toothpaste back into the tube, of creating jobs out of Trump’s magic. Democratic Party operatives and their media lapdogs have done their most to evade blame for the Party’s abandonment of working people’s interests. Instead, they have painted workers as pathologically bigoted and ignorant.... By diverting the spotlight to working class dysfunction, the third-way, New Democrats who dominate the party can escape blame for their willful neglect of the multiracial working class’s increasingly desperate plight. Second, Trump was a magnet for every backward, reactionary, racist element in the US. They, too, saw the arrogant, abrasive, loud-mouth as someone in whom they could place their hopes. Trump’s aggressive break with the typical politician’s syrupy civility was taken as a sign of contempt for the alien, the different, those perceived as threatening (Ironically, these same hates and fears were, in the past, invested in softspoken religious leaders and smoothtongued conservative gentlemen). Trump engages in the Old South tactic of drawing attention by surpassing all others in racebaiting and fear-mongering, but it’s important to note that this simplistic tactic only works where an atmosphere of racial friction and fear already exists. edited extract from Zoltan Zigedy’s blog http://tinyurl.com/znbentp
iS niCola Sturgeon justified in calling for a second Scottish referendum and to demand it before summer 2019? Certainly she has the right to do so. every nation has that the right to selfdetermination – and hence there must be an associated right to be able to assess whether this is the will of its people. in 2014 this was not the case. but, the first minister argues, the eU referendum and the different results in Scotland and england have materially changed the situation. however, the real question is not about rights but, as the first minister herself argues, about circumstances and, for socialists, this means about how far exercising this right will help or hinder working people in securing class justice and ultimately a society in which capitalist exploitation is ended. and this is the rub. in using the outcome of the eU referendum as justification, the first minister is now linking the issue of independence to membership of the eU and will be asking people to vote for both. there are two problems here. first, as Jim Sillars has said, although he is a foremost independence supporter, he could not vote for independence on these terms. in doing so he would be voting to leave one union and to ‘join an even worse one’. by that he means an economic union which enforces neo-liberal policies that will be disastrous for Scotland. the eU’s convergence terms for the single currency will mean drastic austerity, a massacre of public sector services and jobs and the prohibition of any effective public sector intervention in the economy. the rule of corporate capital will be intensified. there is, however, a second reason. the next two years will see a massive battle at british level to ensure that the anti-working class, neo-liberal regulations of the eU are not permanently written into british law – and that any proworker regulations are preserved. to have an independence referendum scheduled for spring 2019 at the latest will mean that the crucial months required for securing a progressive outcome on the eU will be overshadowed by an independence campaign – and one in which the Scottish government will portraying the eU quite uncritically as uniformly good for working people and not acknowledging its neo-liberal, antiworker economics. nothing could better suit theresa may if she wants to maintain, as she does, these elements in british law. this is why this is not the time for a second referendum and why it should not be linked to eU membership.