Campaign news

The Radical Alternative to Austerity

19th May 2012

Cameron and Osborne have repeated again throughout this week that there is no alternative to their failing austerity programme.

I feel that there needs to be a clear statement from the Left that there is an alternative to austerity and it goes beyond just cutting less deep and less fast.

I have set out below a brief statement of what that alternative could contain.

It is not meant as a definitive statement but at least a broad depiction of what a radical alternative would comprise.

I am asking people to consider putting their name to it so that we can continue to circulate it to the movement.

Please let me know if you are willing to put your name to the statement by emailing me at (JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address).

You can help greatly by circulating the statement as well and putting it up on your website or blog or tweeting it.

Thanks

John

See more at John McDonnnell MP’s website

The Radical Alternative to Austerity

The austerity programme of the Coalition government is not just failing; it is prolonging and deepening the recession. Cuts in investment in public services, in jobs, wages, pensions and benefits are creating mass unemployment and mounting hardship.

Austerity is creating a spiral of economic decline as cuts produce high levels of unemployment which in turn reduces tax income and prompts another round of cuts and job losses.

The Government’s austerity measures are also unfair as the only people the Government seems intent on protecting from the recession are the rich.

There is an alternative to austerity.

There is no lack of wealth and resources in our country that we can draw upon to tackle this recession. The problem is that this wealth and these resources are held in the hands of too few people and are not being used productively to create the growth and jobs we need.

If we can release these resources, we can overcome the current recession and start to build a prosperous future for our country, linking with others across Europe and the United States to overcome this global economic gridlock.

Releasing the resources within our own country is not difficult.

It simply requires the introduction of a limited range of redistributive measures which will raise the funds we need from those most able to pay and who have profited most out of the boom years.

This redistribution can be achieved through;

a wealth tax on the richest 10%,

a Robin Hood tax on financial transactions,

a Land Value tax,

the restoration of progressive income tax of 60% on incomes above £100,000

and a clamp down on the tax evasion and avoidance that is costing us £95 billion a year.

Investing the resources released can halt the spiral of decline.

With unemployment rising month by month we urgently need to get people back to work and earning a decent living.

We can do this by investing the resources we have released through taxation in modernising our economy, its infrastructure and our public services to meet the needs of our community.

Instead of cutting and privatising our health, education and local services, this means:

Investing in a mass public housing building and renovation programme, in universal childcare, in the modernisation of our public services, in the NHS, in creating a national Caring Service, in our schools and colleges, in our transport infrastructure and in the extension of broadband.

Investing in alternative energy, combined heat and power and insulation to both tackle climate change and create one million climate change jobs.

Establishing a national investment bank with the resources levied from the banks so that there is no shortage of funds to lend for manufacturing growth and research and development.

To be successful the recovery programme has to be fair.

We will need the support of a significant majority of our people if we are to drive through this type of radical regeneration and redistribution programme.

To gain this level of support means the Radical Alternative must be seen to be fair. This means addressing many of the inequalities of our current system.

For those at the top it means ending the bonuses and limiting high salaries to no more than 20 times the lowest paid in any company or organisation.

For all others it means replacing the minimum wage with a living wage and a living pension and living welfare benefits, reducing the working week to 35 hours, closing the gender pay gap, controlling rents and energy prices, and restoring rights at work.

For young people it means a guaranteed job, apprenticeship, training or college place for every young person with the burden of fees abolished.

There is no shortage of resources to implement this programme of reform.

The problem is the distribution of these resources.

The Radical Alternative simply releases the resources we have to regain control of our economy and invest in our future.

Never again can we let them say that there is no alternative.

Vote Left in Labour elections

13th May 2012

The ballot for the Labour Party National Executive Committee (NEC) and National Policy Forum (NPF) opens on 25 May. These are important elections in the governance and policy-making structures of the Party. However imperfect these structures may be, we need to make sure that as many socialist candidates as possible are elected.

For the NEC, please back the centre-left grassroots alliance slate of Ann Black, Ken Livingstone, Kate Osamor, Christine Shawcroft, Darren Williams, and Pete Willsman. Download the flyer here.

The deadline for returning your ballot paper (which should arrive on or shortly after 25 May) is 13 June.

The NPF elections are done region-by-region. Please vote for the following people in your region:

East Midlands
Julie Lowe, Charmaine Morgan, Marion Smith

Eastern region
Russell Cartwright, Lorna Trollope

London
Gary Heather (download flyer), Alice Perry, Sally Hussain (youth rep)

North West
Elaine Jones, Rhiannon Lowton, John Wiseman

South East
Marjory Broughton, Joyce Still, John Tanner

South West
Ray Davison, Ann Phillips, Helen Rosser

Wales
Nick Davies, Annabelle Harle, Donna Hutton, Darren Williams (download flyer)

Yorkshire & Humber
Richard Burgon, Ann Cryer, George McManus, Denis Thursfield

‘You’re an inspiration’ - LRC message to 10 May strikers

12th May 2012

Up to half a million trade unionists took strike action on 10 May against the government’s attacks on public sector pensions. The LRC sent its solidarity to all those unions taking part: PCS, Unite, UCU, the RMT, NIPSA and the ISU. POA members in the prison service - who don’t have the right to strike - walked out in defiance of the anti-union laws too.

John McDonnell MP (LRC chair), speaking at the London strike rally, told strikers:

“You’re an inspiration to me. You’re heroes and heroines, everyone on every picket line. By fighting on, by showing this determination, you have inspired others.

“With courage and determination, and above all else with solidarity, you cannot just win, you can change the world.”

View video of John’s speech

Resources

• Support the 68 is too late campaign
• See ‘Public Sector Pensions: the facts’ on the LEAP website

Vote No to elected mayors

26th April 2012

People living in ten English cities (Birmingham, Bradford, Bristol, Coventry, Leeds, Manchester, Newcastle, Nottingham, Sheffield, and Wakefield) will have a vote on 3 May asking whether they want an elected mayor for their city.

The LRC recommends voting ‘No’ in these referenda, for the following reasons:

• It puts too much power in hands of one person
• Mayors can appoint unelected deputies with more powers than elected councillors
• Reduces role of elected councillors to an advisory body
• This takes power away from voters at ward level
• Elected mayors would be paid a large salary. Councillors only get expenses
• We want collective leadership, not a personality contest

See also: Northern TUC votes to oppose directly elected mayors

Seumas Milne, writing in the Guardian, said:

“London should be a warning to those cities, including Bristol, Manchester and Birmingham, voting next month on whether to go for elected mayors. They can certainly energise local government and be mobilised for radical politics, as Livingstone himself has shown in the past. But they can also be a vehicle for unaccountable concentrations of personal power and the burying of policy choices in a depoliticised jamboree”

 

Thanks for your NEC nominations for Gary Heather & Christine Shawcroft: Next Steps

2nd April 2012

The deadline has now passed to make nominations for the Labour Party NEC elections.

Thanks to the dozens of CLPs that nominated Gary Heather and Christine Shawcroft. Christine was the second most nominated candidate with 203 nominations, while Gary - standing for the first time - secured 49 nominations (about 1 in 8 of all CLPs that made nominations).

The LRC is working with other organisations in the Centre-Left Grassroots Alliance, and will soon be publishing full details of the agreed slate of grassroots centre-left candidates.

Gary Heather said:

“I want to thank all LRC members and supporters who sought nominations for me in their CLP. The support for left candidates shows there is a real appetite for a more socialist direction in the party.

“However, in the interests of unity on the centre-left, I will not be standing in the NEC election - and I encourage people to use their vote in May to support Ann Black, Ken Livingstone, Kate Osamor, Christine Shawcroft, Darren Williams and Pete Willsman.

“I will however be standing in the National Policy Forum elections in the London region and would appreciate your support in the forthcoming members ballot.”

The ballot period is expected to be 25 May to 13 June, with results announced on 15 June. We will confirm this as soon as possible.

A Budget by the rich, for the rich

23rd March 2012

The Budget on Wednesday 21 March was further evidence that this government is committed to making those who had nothing to do with causing the economic crisis pay for it. Osborne failed to give any indication that he has any plan to bring down unemployment, raise living standards, reduce inequality or create economic growth. Instead, he is committed to driving down wages and taxes on the rich in a global race to the bottom.

The main features of the Budget were:

• Cutting the top rate of income tax from 50% to 45%
• Another cut in corporation tax
• A further £10.5bn in welfare cuts (as yet unspecified)
• Raising the personal allowance on income tax
• But reducing the personal allowance for pensioners (the so-called ‘granny tax’)
• Above inflation increases on cigarettes and alcohol

Read more budget analysis at the LEAP website, including: ‘The most dishonest Budget ever?’ and ‘The consequences of ever vanishing corporation tax revenues’.

LRC Chair John McDonnell MP, who had earlier challenged the Prime Minister over blacklisting at PMQs, said:

“This was a Budget for the rich. The contrast could not be more stark: tax cuts for rich while slashing welfare benefits and tax credits for the many.

“It is now so blatant, this Budget could be political turning point to unite the country against Tories. It is a political gift for Labour, if we can seize it.”

RMT General Secretary Bob Crow, said:

“This is a budget of the rich for the rich. The tax changes mean that a banker on half a million pounds gets a kick back from George Osborne of £17,500, money robbed from our public services and the neediest in our divided society.

“This budget unleashes savage cuts to jobs, wages, welfare and services in the public sector while pandering to the private greed of those same people who dragged us into this economic crisis. It will spark an upsurge in protest and resistance across the country as the vast majority realise that they have been mugged by this Government of the wealthy elite.”

See detailed Budget response from LRC affiliated union BFAWU

URGENT ACTION: Stop the Welfare Bill

29th January 2012

MPs will be debating the Welfare Reform Bill on Wednesday 1 February 2012, which is the day after the Lords final debate. This is quite clearly a tactic to prevent campaigning and lobbying of MPs which is an attack on democracy. There are important issues at stake - protecting the disabled, including young disabled people and those with cancer, people on housing benefit, lone parents and larger families (details below).

Please email your MP today to lobby them to support the amendments passed by the Lords. If you don’t know who is your MP, find out here.

If you do not have time to write your own letter, you can use the PCS template letter here to email your MP.

Amendment 12 - Protecting Housing Benefit
The amendment seeks to prevent a change to the definition of under-occupation currently used by the Department for Communities and Local Government. The Bill paves the way for a much tougher test than at present, with a hefty under-occupation penalty - a cut to the housing benefit - for those whose accommodation fails the new test.
This amendment has been supported by housing charities as it penalises people with extra bedrooms. This means for instance that someone who becomes unemployed who lives alone and has two small bedrooms will be driven further into debt and may face homelessness. In many parts of the country there may not be a supply of one bedroom flats for people to live in.
As an alleged social evil under-occupancy has only really been trailed by the government since the summer. There has not been any period of research and debate about what the effects of these measures may be.

Amendment 36A - Protecting young disabled people
To ensure young people who are very severely disabled and who are assessed as qualifying for the support group continue to be entitled to contributory employment support allowance (ESA) in the future.
This is an important social object as this specific benefit gives independence to young disabled people. Stopping this benefit would not save much money but would wreck lives. The typical disability would be a young person who has learning difficulties. Having contributory ESA makes people much vulnerable to exploitation. Many will go onto means test ESA instead and will require greater support to do so as a result of the greater complexity instead with barely any saving (as the means tested benefit will be for the same amount for most people) to the public purse.

Amendment 38 - oppose the introduction of a 12-month limit on which those in the work-related activity group (WRAG) are able to claim contributory ESA
12-month limit on contributory ESA will cause much more poverty as after one year the benefit will become means-tested. A couple living in the same house, one working just above the minimum wage the other on contributory ESA, the salary of the worker is not taken into consideration BUT once it becomes means-tested it will. Therefore it will increase poverty and takes away independence. Particularly affected will be claimants who have a low paid working partner. Ironically in the view of the policy objective of making sure work pays if partners of contributory ESA claimants move back into work they will be worse off under the government’s proposal. If some moves back into work while their partner is on contributory ESA then the ESA is unaffected and the household gets a clear increase in income. If the contributory ESA is replaced by a means tested benefit any income from a start in work will be drastically reduced by the tapers that exist in the means tested regime.This tapers will become much steeper with the introduction of Universal Credit.

Amendment 38A - Protecting those with limited work capacity due to cancer
(a) where a person is receiving treatment for cancer when entitlement shall continue for so long as the person has (or is treated as having) limited capacity for work; or
(b) the person has (or is treated as having) limited capacity for work as a consequence of a cancer diagnosis.
When people are fighting cancer they need support not being bullied by the state to find work. People with their jobs being held open for them until they get better will be unable to claim JSA as one of the conditions of entitlement of JSA is that you do not have a job. Again the irony is that people will be asking their employers to dismiss them for incapacity in order to have food to eat! Some people will be forced from work and on to long term benefits by this measure. It will also force people into pointless job searching to comply with the JSA rules when they should be concentrating on getting better.

Amendment 59 - Exclude Child Benefit from the benefit cap
The arithmetic does not make sense a household with an earned income of £26000 will be getting the full amount of Child Benefit for the children within it. The important social policy objective of giving women independence within a relationship will be lost. The children will suffer if a male claimant holds back money from his female partner. This does happen in abusive relationships. It also makes escaping domestic violence much more difficult by women in abusive relationships also caught by the benefit cap.

Amendment 62C - Oppose government proposals to charge single parents for using the Child Support Agency
Most women caught in poverty do not have the resources to pursue absent partners. Whether they are on benefit or balancing work with being a lone parent they are not often in a position to deal with getting money from an unwilling or in impecunious absent parent.

Already lobbied your MP? Then sign the petition to stop and review the cuts to benefits and services which are falling disproportionately on disabled people

No war on Iran

26th January 2012

The risk of a new military conflict with, or military strike on, Iran has intensified. A new oil embargo will bans all new oil contracts with Iran, and cuts off all existing deals. Also, all of the Iranian central bank’s European assets are to be frozen. The sanctions come into force on 1 July.

The new sanctions will make it even more difficult for Iran, Opec’s second largest producer, to be paid in foreign currency for its oil exports (which were worth more than $100 billion in 2011). Previous rounds of EU and US sanctions targeting Iran’s financial system have already caused a shortage of foreign currency. A shortage of foreign currency means that Iran cannot import food at a time when food prices have already risen to astronomical levels. The Iranian rial has tumbled to a new low. But the sanctions are unlikely to dramatically weaken the regime. The rich and powerful are able to protect themselves to a large degree from the effects. In fact, leaders of sanctioned regimes are almost always strengthened (and enriched) by sanctions.

However, the sanctions will mean even more misery for ordinary Iranians: many workers will not receive their wages in time (if at all) and social security payments and the remaining food subsidies could be the first to be cut by a theocracy under financial pressure. This will only increase the hardship and miserable conditions that our brothers and sisters in Iran have had to endure for many years.

As the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan prove beyond doubt, democracy can only come from below, from the people themselves. But a people driven to their knees by brutal sanctions are hardly in the position to overthrow dictatorship. We know from history that sanctions are only the first step in wars being waged against ‘unfriendly’ regimes. A military attack against Iran is very much on the agenda. Should the regime in Tehran really decide to close the Strait of Hormuz, this could happen sooner rather than later.

That is why it is so important that we side now with the people of Iran in their struggle against their own theocracy and the threats by imperialism.

What can you do?
Support the Stop the War emergency protest this Saturday, 28 January
See the Hands Off the People of Iran website for more campaigning actions

Further reading:
Jeremy Corbyn’s Morning Star article

LRC chair John McDonnell MP has raised concerns in Parliament, asking the Foreign Secretary William Hague about the dirty war already underway. Hague’s response is hardly reassuring:

John McDonnell (Lab): There have been reports and allegations that covert military operations have already taken place in Iran, with bombings and assassinations. Will the Foreign Secretary confirm that the UK Government and the UK are not involved in the operations and that they do not support such intervention by foreign forces?

Mr Hague: We are not involved in, and we do not support, assassinations. Beyond that I do not comment on intelligence matters.

Miliband and Balls are wrong to join the cuts consensus

17th January 2012

Over the weekend Ed Miliband and Ed Balls came out with a succession of statements shifting Labour policy to within an inch of the coalition government. As well as refusing to pledge to reverse a single cut, Ed Balls said Labour would support the pay freeze and restraint on public sector workers. Today, the Unite general secretary Len McCluskey has written a powerful article in the Guardian, expressing his dissatisfaction with this “Blairite political coup” and warning it could lead to electoral disaster.

John McDonnell MP, LRC Chair, said:

“Len McCluskey’s article sums up the general feeling amongst Labour party supporters of overwhelming disappointment. Most people are reacting more in sorrow than in anger to what they see as Ed Miliband and Ed Balls’ capitulation to Cameron’s economic analysis. The economic crisis is a game changer and for Labour leaders to react to it with the same old failed policies that mean ordinary people will pay for the crisis is such a crushing disappointment.

“On Mohammed Ali’s birthday, they should take a lesson out of his book. He succeeded by a bold change in boxing style, by his popular presentation appealing to ordinary people and by standing firm on his principles. The message is don’t try and slug it out with the Tories on their own terrain, be brave and create your own new ground on which to fight.”

Andrew Fisher, LRC joint secretary and LEAP co-ordinator, said:

“Len McCluskey is right to raise spectre of Philip Snowden. Capitulating to a national consensus for cuts will doom Labour, like it did in the 1930s.

“It’s up to us all to reverse these policies through our local parties, our unions and at conference later in the year.”

RMT General Secretary Bob Crow, said: “By lining up with the Tory-led coalition on the assault on public sector pay, Ed Balls has today signed Labour’s electoral suicide note as he alienates his core voters in their millions”. Similarly Len McCluskey said in his article that this path would lead to “certain general election defeat in my view”. Paul Kenny, GMB general secretary, has even questioned future affiliation to the party.

This is why it is so important to fight for socialism and greater democracy within the Party. Please try to secure nominations for Gary Heather and Christine Shawcroft for the NEC.

Read more:
Read Owen Jones’ take in the New Statesman
Labour left rebellion heats up
Union rebellion against Ed Miliband grows

Towards 30 November - Build the Resistance

21st November 2011

Up to 3 million public sector workers from 28 unions are planning to take co-ordinated action on 30 November. Every union that has balloted has returned a majority in favour of taking strike action in what will be the largest strike for a generation.

On 30 November make sure you visit picket local lines and join marches and rallies in your area. Find your nearest strike day march or rally

Labour Party members and many MPs supported the action on 30 June, but now we have to win the fight to make the Labour Party leadership support the unions’ case and their strike action on 30 November. Please try to get the model motion on Public Sector Pensions passed at the next meeting of your CLP.

Labour MSPs are refusing to cross picket lines at Holyrood (see below), Labour AMs are refusing to cross picket lines at Cardiff Bay, so let’s make sure Labour MPs and councillors refuse to cross picket lines at Westminster and at town halls across the country. Lobby your local Labour MP and councillors not to cross picket lines.

John McDonnell MP has tabled EDM 2083 ‘Industrial action over pensions’. Please lobby your local MP to support.

Action

• Download the LRC model motion on public sector pensions and get it passed in your CLP
• Sign the Fair Pensions for All petition
• Urge your MP to sign EDM 2083 ‘Industrial action over pensions’
• Sign the e-petition against the change from RPI to CPI on pensions indexation

Resources

• NEW: PCS analysis of the government’s ‘final offer’ announced on 2 November
• Download the Fair Pensions For All pamphlet - published by PCS, Unite, NUT, UCU and the NPC
• Read the LEAP guide - Public sector pensions: the facts
• Listen to Mark Serwotka and Francis Maude debate public sector pensions on BBC Radio 4 Today programme
• Read the Unite briefing on public sector pensions
• Read Mark Serwotka writing for Guardian on 30 June and for Telegraph on 14 September
• Read the FBU briefing on public sector pensions
• Read the Channel 4 Factcheck analysis of public sector pensions debate between government and unions

The LRC’s sister organisation in Scotland, the Campaign for Socialism, has called on MSPs not to cross picket lines at Holyrood.

Scottish Labour Left asks Labour MSPs not to attend Parliament on 30th November

The Campaign for Socialism is calling on Labour MSPs to make good recent advances in reclaiming Labour’s historic relationship with the trade union movement by showing their support on 30th November. The CfS believes this can best be done by Labour MSPs not going through the picket lines that will be set up by PCS.

Neil Findlay MSP for the Lothians said:

“The left of the Scottish Labour Party have been delighted by all of the leadership and deputy leadership candidates pledging to support action on 30th November. What we would love to see now is real solidarity by all Labour MSPs. This will mark us out clearly from other MSPs like those in the SNP, who tell us that they totally oppose the actions of ConDem government but are nevertheless attacking public sector pensions in Scotland and will show no solidarity on November 30th.”

ENDS

The response has been almost instant: Scottish Labour leader Iain Gray MSP issued the following statement:

“The Labour group at Holyrood today took the decision to oppose the business motion in Parliament tomorrow to schedule a programme for 30th November. We do so in support of the day of action being taken by your
and other trade unions. We do not believe that the Parliament should continue with business as usual while tens of thousands of workers take to the streets. They are being asked to pay the price for a crisis they
did not create.

“Labour group members at the meeting today signalled their intention to join demonstrations and protests in their constituencies to support local people in their fight. I will be doing so also.”

LRC Conference 2011 - Labour’s Resistance

20th November 2011

The LRC’s annual conference ‘Labour’s Resistance’ took place on Saturday 19 November in London. Conference debated and voted on policy - everything from adult social care to Iran - elected new officers and a national committee, and held hustings for LRC nominees for the centre-left Labour Party NEC slate. Around 250-300 individual members and delegates from local groups and affiliates attended.

With the exception of motion 4, all the conference resolutions were passed, though motions 3 (passed 79 to 48) and 15 (passed 72 to 60) required tellers to be sure. The National Committee statement was also passed overwhelmingly. An emergency motion on Iran was also passed.

The elections booklet spell out the elections held at the conference: Jenny Lennox and Susan Press were re-elected as vice chairs in the only contested officer seats. Susan and Jenny polled 84 and 78 votes respectively, while Kevin Bennett polled 48 votes. View the new National Committee in full.

Conference endorsed all three candidates who stood to represent the LRC on a centre-left slate for the Labour Party NEC. Conference ranked the candidates (by secret ballot) in the following order: 1) Christine Shawcroft; 2) Gary Heather; 3) Patrick Hall.

Speakers at the conference included campaigning left MPs John McDonnell, Jeremy Corbyn (watch video of Jeremy’s speech) and Katy Clark; Dot Gibson, General Secretary of the National Pensioners Convention; Haringey community and youth worker Symeon Brown, whose excellent speech can be watched at LRC TV. Conference also heard from Steve Kelly of the Unite sparks campaign (watch video of his speech), and Unison NEC member Jon Rogers gave the closing speech.

Conference also paid tribute to LRC National Committee member Andy Viner, who died this year. Fellow ASLEF delegate Mark Daniels led the tributes at conference.

All photos and video by Louise Whittle - view LRC Conference 2011 online gallery.

Emergency Action on Legal Aid, Sentencing and Punishment Bill

28th October 2011

UPDATE: Thanks to all those who have already lobbied Labour MPs, shadow housing minister Jack Dromey and Labour leader Ed Miliband. John McDonnell MP has now tabled two amendments to New Clause 26, supported by Crisis and the Squash campaign. Please email keep lobbying MPs to vote against New Clause 26 or at least to support the amendments to it tabled by John McDonnell MP.

Download the Crisis briefing on squatting amendments
Download the Squash campaign briefing
Read LRC NC member Sarah Evans’ article for the Morning Star ‘Britain’s squats scandal’
Guardian letter from 160 leading legal figures says squatting law change is not needed

The Government is trying to rush through a New Clause to the Legal Aid, Sentencing and Punishment Bill next week to criminalise squatting. We need your help in urging Labour MPs and Labour’s Front Bench to oppose this appalling attack on the homeless.

Under the Government’s proposal anyone squatting in a residential property could be jailed for a criminal offence for up to a year or fined up to £5000.

The housing charities, Crisis, Thames Reach, Shelter, Homelessness Link, Housing Justice, St Mungo’s and the Squatters Advisory Service have expressed serious concerns about this proposal to criminalise squatting, arguing that squatting is a symptom of the worsening housing crisis and that for many homeless and vulnerable people squatting is the only way of avoiding rough sleeping.

There are already laws in place to deal with squatting. In its evidence to the Government the Metropolitan Police said that “despite some of the claims in sections of the press, the reality is that there are already more than adequate means for removing squatters.” 

The Government’s consultation on its proposals only ended three weeks ago and over 90% of the organisations responding were against the proposals. Even the Magistrates Association expressed its “reluctance to see new laws created without proper analysis of why existing powers may not be working satisfactorily”

Please help us persuade Labour’s Front Bench and Labour MPs to vote against this New Clause 26.

The Bill starts in the Commons on Monday and so there is no time to lose.

Please contact urgently your local Labour MP and any Labour MPs in your area or union to urge them to vote against New Clause 26.

It would be helpful if you could also contact Labour’s Shadow Housing Minister, Jack Dromey MP ((JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address)) and Labour Leader Ed Miliband MP ((JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address)), urging Labour’s front bench to vote against New Clause 26.

Thank you,

John McDonnell MP
LRC Chair

Defend welfare, Stop workfare

20th October 2011

The welfare state is under increased attack from the coalition government. Since coming to power they have announced over £20bn in welfare cuts, while giving £25bn in tax breaks to businesses. The LRC is urging all members to fight against attacks on welfare by challenging anti-welfare attitudes within the Labour Party and in wider society (download new LRC flyer ‘Defend Welfare’) and by taking direct action in conjunction with other organisations. If you are a Labour Party member, please get this model motion passed in your CLP.

It is important that we demonstrate the Labour left’s commitment to the welfare state and that we do not share the bigoted attitudes of the Labour Party leadership and former secretaries of state for welfare. The LRC has produced a new flyer for members to download, print and distribute. Download the LRC’s Defend Welfare flyer. If you would like bulk hard copies of the flyer email (JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) with the quantity you require.

Resources / further reading:

• Disabled People Against Cuts website
• PCS pamphlet - Welfare: an alternative vision
• Boycott Workfare website
• CarerWatch website
• National Pensioners Convention website
• LRC flyer: Defend Welfare
• Sarah Evans on Britain’s care home shame
• Andrew Fisher on defending welfare
• Louise Whittle on workfare
• John McDonnell MP on the 2009 Welfare Reform Bill
• LRC: Fight to defend welfare goes on
• TUC: Are people on disability benefits swinging the lead?

 

Labour Party conference needs democracy and debate, not abolition

10th October 2011

Joint secretaries Pete Firmin and Andrew Fisher had a letter published in the Guardian calling for greater democracy and debate at party conference to make it relevant again, and for the Party to find the policies that can win back members and voters to defeat the coalition government.

Martin Kettle is correct in his analysis of Labour party conferences as “public relations presentations”, but wrong in his prescription (These demeaning rituals are a waste political parties can ill afford, 7 October). We held our own fringe outside of the conference cordon. It attracted over 150 people, including dozens of delegates from conference, but also local party members, trade unionists and activists. Interspersed with some excellent speeches were even better contributions from the floor – from people desperate to speak about policy based on their daily experience. Opening up conference to real policy debates and decision-making would allow these views to come through rather than those of the Westminster bubble.

The last Labour government lost membership (almost two-thirds left between 1997 and 2010) and voters (5 million voters stopped voting Labour in the same period) precisely because it ignored the party. The 200,000 Labour party members and four million affiliated trade unionists are more in touch with public opinion than the shadow cabinet and their tiny cliques of advisers.

If the Labour party regains its faith in democracy and open debate, it might find popular policies that relate to people’s needs and make it relevant again.

Andrew Fisher and Pete Firmin
Joint secretaries, Labour Representation Committee

For some real debate, come to the LRC annual conference ‘Labour’s Resistance’ on Saturday 19 November.

LRC launches Fighting Fund

8th September 2011

The LRC has launched a Fighting Fund to support workers fighting back against the government’s austerity measures and bosses’ cuts to maintain profit margins. The LRC has established the fund to support protracted industrial disputes: donating to local hardship funds to help to sustain workers in struggle.

Alongside these donations, we will also report on disputes and publicise them to our members, supporters and the wider movement. Seeing other people fighting back breeds confidence that the cuts can be resisted and that we don’t have to accept a decline in our living standards to pay for the crisis caused by the investment banker and speculators.

You can donate to our Fighting Fund online or by sending a cheque payable to ‘Labour Representation Committee’ to LRC, Fighting Fund, PO Box 2378, London, E5 9QU. 100% of any donation will go to workers in struggle.

From our reserves we have already made donations, including to the Unite and Unison action in Southampton, and NUJ dispute in Doncaster. We are now asking members and affiliates to support a dedicated fund for workers involved in long-running disputes. Please give what you can.

The two disputes we have so far backed have been long-running disputes. In south Yorkshire, NUJ members have been on strike for 55 days over job cuts, office closures, reduction of quality to their titles and workload. Strikers have returned to work today 8 September after the employer finally agreed to meaningful negotiations. Read more on the NUJ website.

We have also sent donations to both the Unite and Unison branches now in their 14th week of action against Tory-led Southampton City Council. The note below was recently sent out to supporters, and explains the background to the strike and the next steps:

As we now enter into the 14th week of industrial action in Southampton, it is worth remembering why we went into dispute in the first place.

This is extensively a local dispute over the imposition of cuts to pay and allowances that will mean a loss of remuneration for many of our members by as much as 20%. Southampton City Council took the decision to dismiss 4,300 employees and re-engage them on inferior terms and in effect rip up collective bargaining in the process.

However as we all know, this dispute has had significant national implications as we build towards the resistance to a massive 27% cuts in local government spending and to unprecedented attacks on the public sector and welfare state in general.

The dismissal and re-engagement of employees at Southampton City Council on 11th July, by a particularly nasty Tory led council and for political ideological reasons is proving to be only the beginning of the onslaught on our members livelihoods and the services our families rely on and October/November will see a fresh round of budget consultations for 2012/13 which will no doubt result in further major cuts to jobs and services.

Working jointly with Unison we have been taking selective strike action and action short of strike across all council services since 23rd May. A joint strike committee was immediately established making decisions on all forms of strategy including the selection of service areas.

Services affected so far on a rolling basis have been: Refuse collection, Parking Enforcement, Toll Bridge collection, Street Cleansing, Vehicle Fleet maintenance, Building Maintenance, Port Health inspection, Library staff and Social Care workers.

Leading up to the 11th July dismissal date, the campaign demanded a lifting of the dismissal notices and to engage in dialogue to reach a negotiated solution.

Despite talks taking place during the whole of the period resulting in a number of revised proposals, a negotiated settlement has not yet been reached.

Since 23rd May Unite and Unison have staged a number of joint mass meetings and rallies the likes of which have rarely been seen in Southampton, keeping members involved totally in the process including a democratic vote at every stage to agree future strategy.

Senior National figures in our respective unions have addressed mass meetings (such as Unite’s Peter Allenson, National officer and Gail Cartmail, AGS) and on 2nd June a meeting of around 700 Unite and Unison members, addressed by Len McCluskey, took the decision unanimously to continue with the strategy of selective action.

On 30th June, Unite and Unison members took strike action to coincide with that of Teachers unions, PCS and ATL on their national day of action over pensions; at a mass rally in Southampton on that day, Unite’s Diana Holland among many other high profile national and international speakers addressed over 1,500 union members in Guildhall Square.

11th July saw the dismissal and re-engagement of workers, with SCC reporting a 98% take up of new terms – hardly surprising as union legal advice to members is that they should sign albeit under duress. Doing so does not remove the right either to continuing with industrial action or claims for unfair dismissal.

This same week also saw the largest number of strikes in service areas and on Wednesday 13th July one of the largest demonstrations in Southampton took place (photo’s attached) coinciding with a lobby of the Full Council meeting; hundreds of members packed the public gallery at the Guildhall making clear to Council leader’s our commitment and resolve to see this through.

During the dispute Unite and Unison members have distributed close to 100,000 leaflets throughout the community, explaining to residents the reason why we are in dispute. We have released countless press articles and even placed full page adds in the local press. We wrote individually to every member with a Southampton post code (17,000 Unite and 8,000 Unison members) and to this date public opinion still appears to be on the side of striking workforce.

A rolling process of issuing strike notices (in some weeks almost on a daily basis) has kept the dispute firmly on the front pages of local newspapers and TV channels and has also been picked up by the national media helping us to get the message across to the public.

We have now entered into a pause as we prepare to implement the overwhelming decision of our most recent mass meeting, at which a 4 to 1 vote decided to reject the Council’s 5th final proposal of pay cuts and continue with industrial action.

Whilst that meeting had full knowledge that the 12 weeks protection period against dismissal had now ended, we also wrote to all members informing them of this fact before calling further strike action. Now that this is complete, we will be meeting with service areas with a view to continuing selective strike action.

We have also suggested to Council leaders however that they take advantage of this pause to meet with us and resolve the dispute before further strikes are announced.

Industrial action is a vitally important part of the strategy to fight the imposed cuts, but it must be recognised that there were always 3 pillars to the long term campaign for the restoration of nationally agreed pay and conditions.

Industrial – our strategy of continuing selective strike and Council wide action short of strike has not ended and we will continue for as long as members are willing to. Both Unite and Unison have the support from their respective executives to continue.

Legal – A joint ET claim from Unite and Unison has already been submitted for the failure to consult over dismissals, which if successful could result in SCC having to compensate each employee with up to 3 months salary; much more than has been saved by imposing the pay cuts. 2,400 individual members are now being encouraged to submit unfair dismissal claims and we have already received hundreds of completed forms from both sets of members.

Political – We have vowed to work politically with Labour to remove the Tory administration at the 2012 local elections and have engaged with the Labour group in Southampton City Council to discuss how terms can be re-instated when they gain overall control next May

The fight goes on – We are not finished by any stretch of the imagination and we are determined to carry on the campaign to a satisfactory conclusion.

Donations and messages of Support – We have been so inspired by the messages of support we have received, not only from Unite branches up and down the UK, but from other trade unions and organisations from all over the world.

We thank each and every one of our brothers and sisters throughout the movement for the solidarity they have shown us; it has given us the strength to carry on.

To continue this action we need those messages of support and donations to keep coming in and we ask you please to consider making a further donation from your branch, organisation or workplace.

Donations can be sent to me at:
12 Douglas Crescent, Thornhill Park, Southampton, SO19 5JQ
Please make donations payable to:
TGWU 2/8 strike fund

Mark Wood
Unite Convenor Southampton City Council

Contemporary motions for Labour Party conference

6th September 2011

The LRC has prepared three draft contemporary motions ahead of Labour Party conference (25-29 September in Liverpool). You can download the model motions here:

• Rail Fares and Renationalisation
• The Riots and Young People
• One Million Climate Jobs

Get one of these motions passed in your CLP and to submit it to the 2011 Annual Conference by 12 noon on Friday 16 September. Each CLP is entitled to make one submission to Annual Conference - either a contemporary motion or a constitutional amendment (proposed rule change). If your CLP has already submitted a rule change then it cannot also submit a contemporary motion.

Submitting your motion: CLP secretaries may submit the contemporary motion online via Membersnet at: http://members.labour.org.uk/contemporary-motions or from the Membersnet homepage at http://members.labour.org.uk/home look for “Party Activity” on the red bar at the top of the page and then choose “Contemporary Motions” from the drop down menu or call 020 7783 1374 or email (JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) to arrange for a form to be posted or emailed to you.

Process: at its meeting on 19 September the Conference Arrangements Committee (CAC)will consider all contemporary motions received. CLPs which have submitted contemporary motions that do not meet the CAC’s criteria will be notified and the delegate(s) or other member appointed by the CLP will be entitled to appeal to the CAC on the afternoon of Thursday 22 September in London by attending in person, or in writing (by letter, fax or email) or by speaking directly to the CAC via a telephone conference call.

A Priorities Ballot will be held at Conference between 1.30pm and 4pm on Sunday 25 September to determine which contemporary motions will be timetabled for debate. The top four motions in the CLP ballot and the top four motions in the affiliates’ ballot will be debated and voted on by Conference.

Compositing meetings will be held on the evening of Sunday 25 September. At the end of the Sunday session of Conference - immediately after the announcement of the priorities ballot results - delegates from organisations with a subject successful in the priorities ballot will be asked to attend a meeting to draw up a composite motion and to choose a mover and seconder. Detailed information about compositing meetings can be found in the Delegates Report which will be sent to delegates in September.

At Labour Party conference 2011? Then coming along to the LRC fringe meeting ‘Resistance: The Path to Power’

Keep our NHS Public - Kill the Bill & Defend abortion rights

31st August 2011

The Health and Social Care Bill will be returning to the House of Commons on 6th and 7th September for the Report Stage and Third Reading. This is when MPs vote on the amendments and vote the Bill through (or not) before it goes to the House of Lords). It is absolutely clear that we have to put pressure on MPs in their constituencies to demonstrate how the public want to reject this Bill, and will reject their MP at the next election if they vote for the Bill. Lobby your MP today to vote against the Bill.

The Bill would break up and sell off parts of our health service.

• Lobby your MP today and save the NHS! See the Unite4theNHS website on how to lobby your MP
• In London? Join the demonstration on Wed 7 Sep
• Sign the ‘withdraw NHS Refom Bill’ on Government e-petitions website

Independent lawyers for 38 Degrees have found that:

independent lawyers identified two major problems in the new legislation: 

• The Secretary of State’s legal duty to provide a health service will be scrapped. On top of that, a new “hands-off clause” removes the government’s powers to oversee local consortia and guarantee the level of service wherever we live. We can expect increases in postcode lotteries – and less ways to hold the government to account if the service deteriorates.
• The NHS will almost certainly be subject to UK and EU competition law and the reach of procurement rules will extend across all NHS commissioners. Private health companies will be able to take new NHS commissioning groups to court if they don’t win contracts. Scarce public money could be tied up in legal wrangles instead of hospital beds. Meanwhile, the legislation lifts the cap on NHS hospitals filling beds with private patients.

In London, Unite has organised a demonstration on 7 September at St Thomas’ Hospital at 6.30pm, prior to the TUC candle-lit vigil outside Parliament at 9.30 pm.

For more information see the Keep our NHS Public website

Right-wing Conservative MPs have also tabled amendments to the Health and Social Care Bill designed to delay women’s access to abortion. The LRC has a clear pro-choice policy and is affiliated to the Abortion Rights campaign. Lobby your MP to support the right to safe, legal abortion in this country and the right to impartial information. Follow the link on the Abortion Rights website.

Public sector pensions - win the fight in the Party

1st July 2011

Over three-quarters of a million trade unionists took co-ordinated strike action on 30 June. The unifying issue was the attack on public sector pensions, which would mean people paying more and working longer for a lower pension - even though public sector pension costs are falling, and are entirely sustainable.

Ed Miliband and the UK Labour leadership played a pathetic role in the run-up to the strikes. He was, as ATL leader Mary Bousted put it “a disgrace”. Though it should be noted that Welsh Labour leader Carwyn Jones supported the strikes, and Welsh Labour AMs refused to cross picket lines. Likewise in Westminster, several Labour MPs including John McDonnell and Jeremy Corbyn refused to cross picket lines there.

We must now campaign within the Party to win the arguments and put pressure on the leadership to reflect the movement they represent. Download the LRC model motion on public sector pensions and get it passed in your CLP. East Worthing & Shoreham CLP already has passed the motion.

Neither the jobs, pensions nor pay of public sector workers caused the deficit and neither did public services, welfare benefits or students - yet this is precisely what is being targeted by the coalition government, which has announced over £25 billion in tax breaks to business since coming to power. If Labour is to become re-electable it needs to be clearly on the side of those under attack from the coalition government. Pass the model motion in your Labour Party branch or CLP and start the fightback.

Public Sector Pensions Resources

• If you are a PCS member see what you could lose with the Pensions Calculator
• If you are a NUT member see what you could lose with the Pensions Calculator
• If you are an ATL member see what you could lose with the Pensions Calculator
• WATCH: John McDonnell MP address PCS conference in May 2011
• WATCH: PCS ‘Pensions Robbery’ video
• Read Mark Serwotka’s article about public sector pensions on Guardian Comment is Free and in the Guardian on 30 June
• Read LEAP’s ‘Public Sector Pensions: The Facts’
• Listen to Minister Francis Maude and Mark Serwotka (PCS) on Radio 4 Today programme
• Sign the petition for Labour Party members in support of workers taking strike action on 30 June
• Sign the Fair Pensions for All statement, supported by NUT, PCS, ATL, UCU and the National Pensioners Convention

LRC pays tribute to life of Andy Viner

20th June 2011

LRC National Committee member Andy Viner has died following injuries sustained in a car crash. The LRC wishes to pay tribute to Andy, who was an elected official of the ASLEF union and a hard-working trade unionist and socialist. We offer our condolences to his family and to all those who knew Andy as a friend and a comrade. Andy’s funeral will take place on Friday 1 July in Wheathampstead, Hertfordshire. (JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) for more details

John McDonnell MP, LRC Chair, said:

“It was deeply shocking to hear this tragic news. Andy was a firm socialist and dedicated, hard working trade unionist. He served his trade union, the LRC and our movement with absolute commitment.

“He will be greatly missed but always remembered. I send my deepest sympathy to his family and all his friends.”

Nick Toms, LRC National Committee member, said:

“I am very sad indeed to hear about Andy. I have known him since the mid 80s when we both worked for a well known socialist paper. He remained a good friend and comrade.

“When I was a visiting lecturer at the University of Westminster he gave regular guest talks on trade unions and the law.

“He was a solid guy - principled loyal and steadfast. He was nobody’s fool and had sound judgment. He was a committed socialist and marxist to the end. It is tragic for his two children who he brought up alone when his partner died some years ago. I will miss him.”

Pete Firmin, LRC joint secretary, said:

“I only knew Andy for the last couple of years through the LRC, but he was one of those many people who form the bedrock of our movement who was always there, always reliable, without a fuss. You knew when he contributed that he had given it serious thought.
“He will be sorely missed.”

Steve Brown, LRC National Committee member, said:

“I knew Andy very briefly, though heard more about him than I knew.  A well respected and dedicated comrade, this is a big big loss for our movement.  My thoughts are with his family.  He will be missed.”

Andrew Fisher, LRC joint secretary, said:

“Andy was a good socialist and trade unionist who I know many people valued as an honest and comradely voice on the LRC National Committee. He spoke thoughtfully and with clarity, and was respected by everyone for his integrity and warmth.”

Refounding Labour - LRC guidance

15th June 2011

Following Labour’s defeat at last year’s general election, there is recognition that the Labour Party is in need of fundamental change. Peter Hain is now chair of the National Policy Forum and was asked by the Labour leader, Ed Miliband, to write a consultation paper that both takes stock and asks some key questions on what Labour needs to do to regain the trust of British people. This is therefore an opportunity for the LRC to influence the change that will inevitably take place in the party.

The consultation document entitled: “Refounding Labour – a party for the new generation” has been published and members and party units have been invited to submit their views by 24 June.

The National Executive Committee will then be considering rule changes at its meeting in July to go to Labour Party annual conference in September.

Download the LRC guidance to making a submission.

NEW: Download Islington North CLP’s submission to Refounding Labour
NEW: See Hampshire LRC’s submission to Refounding Labour

Fight to defend Welfare goes on

15th June 2011

The Welfare Reform Bill passed its 3rd reading in the House of Commons on 15 June by 288 votes to 238. Although it passed, our campaigning helped ensure that Labour MPs voted against it, having abstained at 2nd reading stage. However, recent comments by Ed Miliband and Liam Byrne prove we have to fight to continue to move party policy away from the workfare model promoted by New Labour and now being developed by the coalition.

Both John McDonnell and Jeremy Corbyn spoke in the Bill’s final debate on 15 June and argued against the cuts to the Social Fund and the welfare benefits cap. Writing in the Guardian, Tom Clark said “It is a moment to be grateful for what remains of Labour’s hard left: an amendment to scrap the cap was at least tabled by John McDonnell and Jeremy Corbyn”. Also read John McDonnell MP’s letter to the Guardian on the benefit cap.

Our Welfare Reform Bill briefing sets out why we opposed the Bill and has been sent to every Labour MP. It remains a useful resource for members debating welfare issues. The Bill is an attempt to scapegoat those on welfare, part of the coalition’s plans to slash £18 billion from welfare payments. The plans will also further privatise welfare delivery and result in a less generous and more punitive welfare system at a time when people need it more than ever.

Please make sure your CLP passes the model motion on welfare to start to turn around the party’s policy on welfare - and to stop the scapegoating of those on benefits.

PCS has also recently launched a new pamphlet, ‘Welfare: an alternative vision’. The 24-page booklet was unveiled at a public meeting in Brighton – during PCS’s conference in the city. The aim is to arm activists with the information needed to campaign against attacks on benefits – and to put forward ideas for the future of the welfare state. Speaking at the launch, LRC Chair John McDonnell MP, said:

“This small booklet challenges the big lies that form the basis of this government’s welfare reform policies. Every time a politician or political commentator tries to spew out the same old myths about scroungers and benefits fraud or the abuse of the system, just swat them intellectually with the facts and arguments set out in this excellent booklet.”

Defend jobs. Even though unemployment remains high, in May the government announced a further 2,400 job cuts in the Department for Work and Pensions. Lobby your MP against these cuts.

Victory as EU blocks relocation grant to Twinings

3rd June 2011

Campaigners have been waging a two year battle to save jobs at Twinings in Andover. Part of the campaign has focused on a proposed £10.5 million EU relocation grant which would have subsidised Twinings’ move to Poland and funded them to dump a loyal workforce here.

Andover TUC President, former Twinings USDAW convenor Pete Millward, also an LRC National Committee member, said:

“Twinings turned its back on the massive contribution made by its loyal workforce to its financial success and chose to chase cheap labour overseas, but our campaign to stop that move being subsidised by taxpayers has finally paid off and this is fantastic news.

“There is no doubt that Twinings would have got away with this had we not campaigned so long and hard to expose it, and I hope that it will now be far harder for employers to dump UK workers and abuse EU funding in this way.

“I am still gutted that Twinings has axed 400 jobs, including my own, but I am proud to say that we stopped them fleecing the taxpayer in order to do it.”

Sarah Evans, LRC National Committee member and local Labour Party activist said:

“This is a massive victory for working people across Europe and it sends a clear message to greedy company bosses who think it is ok to dump a loyal workforce and use our taxes in the form of EU grant money to relocate.

“It is the hard work of community campaigners, USDAW shop steward Pete Millward and Andover TUC that has won this victory, and Andover Labour members are proud to have played an active role in this campaign.

“We congratulate the South East’s Labour MEP Peter Skinner for the leading role he has played in the European Parliament, after being contacted by campaigners to block the grant - from writing the first letter to commissioners and his persistence in securing this victory alongside North Shields Labour MEP Stephen Hughes.

“Twinings workers in Andover and North Shields are rightly angry that UK jobs have been axed, so a profitable company can chase cheap labour overseas and it is with massive regret that we couldn’t have done more to get Twinings to reverse its ill-thought out decision.”

LRC Chair John McDonnell MP had tabled EDM 200 ‘Twinings’ in the previous parliamentary session to highlight the cause.

For more information see the Hampshire LRC and Andover TUC websites

Save the NHS - kill Lansley’s Bill

26th May 2011

The LRC is campaigning against Andrew Lansley’s Health and Social Care Bill, which threatens the NHS as universal, comprehensive public healthcare system. The LRC is working alongside campaigning groups Health Emergency and Keep our NHS Public as part of our campaign to kill Lansley’s Bill.

Find out more about the Bill and lobby your MP to vote against the Health and Social Care Bill

• Get informed: Download the briefing on the Bill and share it with your friends
• Get informed and be entertained: watch the ‘Wake Up Call’ video with Dr John Lister
• Be entertained and get informed: watch MC NxtGen’s ‘Andrew Lansley rap’
• Read more: read the article by Dr Allyson Pollock and David Price for the Channel 4 News website
• Watch the video of the Save the NHS march on 17 May 2011, including speeches from Jeremy Corbyn MP and healthcare workers
• Watch the Unite union’s video explaining the dangers of the Health & Social Care Bill

“The NHS will last as long as there are folk left with the faith to fight for it” - Aneurin Bevan

Elections 2011: Labour must offer an alternative

9th May 2011

People punished the Lib Dems for betraying their promises but while they were rightly condemned, the Tories got off lightly. This is because no party is challenging their central claim - underpinning the ideological assault on the public sector and welfare state - that it was public spending that caused the crisis and cutting public spending is the solution. The Labour leadership only offers slightly fewer cuts slightly more slowly.

Nevertheless, the Tories are still nowhere near capable of winning an election, and their share of the vote declined. Labour did well - gaining 800 council seats and control of 26 councils - as people rejected the coalition government. These Labour councils will only sustain if they represent their communities against the cuts.

Labour did especially well in Wales where it was seen as protecting its people from the Westminster government’s agenda, and offering some ‘clear red water’.

The same was true in Scotland where the SNP swept to power as Scottish Labour, still associated with Brown and Darling, offered a weaker message of resistance than either Welsh Labour or the SNP. But even in Scotland where the Labour message was strong it did well, with socialist Labour MSP Elaine Smith bucking the national trend and increasing her share of the vote in Coatbridge and Chryston.

There is a lesson here for Labour nationally and at local level – these cuts must be resisted and the ideology that underpins them confronted: Labour must offer people an alternative.

See Why Councils should fight the cuts on the role Labour councils must play.

Vote No to AV

4th May 2011

The LRC National Committee voted in February 2011 to advocate a ‘No’ vote in the referendum on the Alternative Vote (AV) on 5 May.

LRC affiliated union ASLEF is advocating a ‘No’ vote. General Secretary Keith Norman said:

“The current voting system gives everyone one vote and leads to clear decisions. Why on earth would we want to change it for one that is more complicated, less fair, more expensive – and gives some people more votes than others?”

Both the FBU and RMT are advocating ‘no’ votes in the referendum, because they support proper proportional representation. RMT General Secretary Bob Crow said: “RMT, which supports proper proportional representation rather than this shoddy Clegg-inspired stitch-up, is calling for a No vote in Thursday’s referendum”. FBU General Secretary Matt Wrack described the referendum as a “wasteful diversion from the fact that this government has embarked on wrecking our public services and destroying the living standards of millions of people.”. Read their comments in full in the Morning Star.

Labour Party NEC member and LRC Executive Committee member Christine Shawcroft has outlined her opposition to AV in an article for Labour Briefing, and LRC National Committee member Owen Jones argued the case against AV in the Morning Star.

Guardian columnist Martin Kettle, advocating a ‘yes’ vote, said, “If the AV referendum carries, there may never be a Labour overall majority government in Britain again”.

Vote No to AV

 

Northumberland LRC launches on 28 April

19th April 2011

A new LRC group in Northumberland will launch next week on 28 April, with two local Labour MPs speaking at the launch meeting. The LRC has a strong presence in the North East - with local groups already established in Teesside and Durham, as well as a regional grouping.

LRC Northern Region Co-ordinator Steve Brown said:

“This launch of the Northumberland LRC symbolises a big turning point for the LP in this area.  We are unique, in that we have two socialist MP’s residing in adjacent constituencies, recognised on the left as being solid advocates on behalf of the working class. 

“This is an opportunity to bring together socialists, activists and trades unionists in the county, to begin a discussion on the way forward for our party and our movement as a whole.  We want as many people as possible to attend this event. The tide comrades, is truly turning!”

Speakers at the event at Ashington Football Club include: Ronnie Campbell (MP for Blyth Valley), Ian Lavery (MP for Wansbeck), Terry McPartlan (LRC National Committee). Chair: Steve Brown (LRC Northern Region Co-ordinator) in the chair.

For more information see the event listing Launch of Northumberland LRC or (JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address)

March with the LRC on 26 March!

23rd March 2011

Join with the LRC contingent on the TUC organised ‘March for the Alternative’ demonstration on 26 March. Meet by the LRC banner at Temple Place, near Temple Tube station from 10:45am-11:30am (see map).

The demonstration promises to be one of the biggest in UK history. Make sure you mobilise your friends, workmates and family to come along.

Watch the RMT video on why you should ‘Demonstrate against government cuts’.

For more details about the TUC ‘March for the Alternative’ see the official website. See also UK Uncut’s Occupy for the Alternative plans.

MPs debate Libya: 2% of MPs against, but majority of UK public opposes military action

22nd March 2011

The House of Commons last night (Mon 21 Mar) voted to support the military action in Libya by 559 to 15 votes - meaning only 2% of MPs voted against. In contrast two polls - one for the London Metro and the other for ITV News show a majority of the UK public against military action.

The 15 MPs who voted against are: Graham Allen (Lab), John Baron (Con), Ronnie Campbell (Lab), Katy Clark (Lab), Jeremy Corbyn (Lab), Mark Durkan (SDLP), Barry Gardiner (Lab), Roger Godsiff (Lab), Caroline Lucas (Green), John McDonnell (Lab), Yasmin Qureshi (Lab), Linda Riordan (Lab), Margaret Ritchie (SDLP), Dennis Skinner (Lab), Mike Wood (Lab)

Labour MPs Jeremy Corbyn and John McDonnell both spoke in the debate:

Jeremy Corbyn: My right hon. Friend will be aware that, although what he is saying is of great importance, there are also lessons to be learned. Does he not think that it is time for a wholesale review of our policy of military co-operation and arms sales in the case of Bahrain and Saudi Arabia, and of what is happening in Yemen and further afield in the Congo, the Ivory Coast and other places? At what point is he prepared to say that we should be involved or not involved, and at what point is he prepared to say that we will seriously scale down our arms export industry, which actually leads to much of the oppression in the first place?

Edward Miliband: Let me deal with those two very serious points. On the first point about arms exports, we have rightly said that there should be a comprehensive review of the implementation and nature of our policy on arms sales. When we see what has happened in parts of north Africa, we are worried about the use of British arms for internal repression.

[...]

Jeremy Corbyn: I welcome the debate today. It is important that Parliament plays a key role in deciding whether this country is involved in wars. I endorse the points that my hon. Friend the Member for Nottingham North (Mr Allen) made in an intervention about war-making powers. The House has a right to ask the Government many questions about the enterprise on which we are embarked and where it will lead. We should not be fooled by newspapers telling us, in a gung-ho and frankly offensive way in the case of The Sun and the News of the World, that the public are behind this. I am far from convinced of that. The public are concerned about public expenditure and the money that has been spent on the armed forces for the enterprise, and they are very worried about where it leads because they have been through the miserable experience of Iraq and they also have deep concerns about Afghanistan. It is therefore appropriate in today’s debate to have a serious discussion about where the action will lead.

An opinion poll in Metro this morning-I do not know how scientific that is-suggested that 58% of those questioned were against British involvement in Libya. Although I do not know how accurate that is, many people are very worried about the action. We must ask questions about the troops that we have committed through the Air Force. How long will they be there? What command structure are they currently under? That is far from clear. Several air forces are involved, and it is not clear who is co-ordinating them, who is in charge or who decides what targets to bomb at what stage. That is enormously worrying.

My hon. Friend the Member for Hayes and Harlington (John McDonnell) asked several questions about cluster bombs and depleted uranium. Cluster bombs are illegal. Children are still dying in Iraq and Afghanistan because of the use of cluster bombs in the past. Depleted uranium was used in the Gulf war in 1991 and that has led to a high level of cancers in southern Iraq. I hope that no other forces are using depleted uranium weapons because of the long-term effects.

What is the mission all about? Only three weeks ago, we were training Libyan forces and selling arms to Libya. British companies were happily trading with Libya and British universities were happily accepting vast sums of money from Libya until a few weeks ago. It is an awfully short time in our relations with Libya in which to go from hero to zero. The rest of the world may be concerned about that.

My hon. Friend the Member for Bolsover (Mr Skinner) intervened on the Prime Minister to ask about the end game. One hopes that there will be an urgent ceasefire and some kind of political settlement in Libya, and that Libya’s independence as a state will be preserved. However, there is another scenario: a client state in the east around Benghazi; and a pariah state in the west around Tripoli, led by Gaddafi, and a source of constant conflict, disturbance and danger in the region. That is eminently possible, with oil companies trying to get their hands on the huge resources that are there.

Graham Allen (Lab): Is my hon. Friend as concerned as I am about the composition of what is currently called “the rebel force”, which is a catch-all for anti-Gaddafi forces? Many of us could support that as a concept, but is my hon. Friend a little worried that we could end up with something even worse than the current regime? Libya is not a repressed democracy. We have not spent the past 30 years building up a democratic base there. It will not be Nick and Dave who take over, but unknown people. We are not sure about the end game and we should be careful what we wish for.

Jeremy Corbyn: My hon. Friend makes a valuable point. I do not know the politics, aims, ambitions or anything else of the people in Benghazi any more than I suspect he does. We should be cautious about going to war on behalf of a group of people whom we do not know or understand and of whose aims we are not aware. Many were Ministers in the Gaddafi Government, again, only three weeks ago. It is a very short time.

There is a danger that we do nothing about Bahrain because of close economic and military involvement, despite the US fifth fleet being there. There is a danger that we say nothing about Saudi Arabia because of the vast arms market there. The former Prime Minister, Tony Blair, felt that Saudi Arabia was so important that he stopped the Serious Fraud Office investigation into the al-Yamamah arms contract. In Yemen and Oman, people are dying. They thirst for exactly the same thing. I was at a conference this morning of Bahraini opposition groups who made strong points. They said that they were not campaigning about human rights in Bahrain yesterday, but last year, the year before, the year before that and so on. Indeed, I first met Bahraini opposition groups who were concerned about the overwhelming power of the king in 1986 at a UN human rights conference in Copenhagen.

Angus MacNeil (SNP): Does the hon. Gentleman believe that action in Libya now helps the case for action in the countries that he mentioned later?

Jeremy Corbyn: I do not believe that it does because the economic interests in Saudi Arabia and Bahrain far outweigh any humanitarian concerns. I simply do not believe that it will happen.

However, we must use the opportunity to reassess our foreign policy, our arms sales policy and the way in which we get into bed with dictator after dictator around the world. We should also think for a moment about the message that goes out on the streets throughout north Africa and the middle east.

When Israeli planes bombed Gaza during Operation Cast Lead in 2008-09, I did not hear any calls for a no-fly zone over Gaza. F-16 jets pounded Palestinians, killing 1,500 civilians. We have to understand the bitterness of that period and the experience of the Palestinian people because many Palestinian diaspora, living out their lives in refugee camps in Jordan, Lebanon, Syria, Egypt-all over the region-want the right to return home. They see the double standards of the west: interested in supporting Israel at the expense of the Palestinian people; currently intervening in Libya but doing nothing to support the Palestinian people.

We are in an interesting period in history. There was an Arab revolution in the 1950s, supporting the principle of pan-Arab unity. Nasser was one of its leading figures. That degenerated into a series of fairly corrupt dictatorships that still run the Arab League. None feels very secure when they attend Arab League meetings. Indeed, they go home as quickly as possible afterwards, lest there be a coup.

We are seeing a popular revolution for accountable government, peace and democracy on the streets throughout the region. We have been on the wrong side in selling arms and supporting dictators. We have not thought through the implications of what we are doing now in Libya. I suspect that we might end up in a Libyan civil war for a long time and that this is not the only occasion on which we will debate the subject in the House. This is the easy bit; the hard part is yet to come.

[...]

John McDonnell: I found it touching that the hon. Member for Keighley (Kris Hopkins) and others expressed trepidation about entering a debate when we are sending troops into battle. I have been in the House for 14 years now, and I have done that on four occasions. I can tell them that it gets no easier. The more I have experience of conflicts and the more I understand the human suffering involved, the more I am committed to peace and conflict resolution, and the more I oppose such military interventions.

There comes a time in all such conflicts when the collateral damage-a disgraceful term-is reported to us, and evidence comes to light of families and children who get killed and maimed as a result of being in the wrong place at the wrong time. When coffins draped in the Union flag come back, all hon. Members will ask, “Did we do enough to avoid the conflict? Did we do enough to ensure peace?” That is why my hon. Friend the Member for Islington North (Jeremy Corbyn) and I tabled an amendment today. I appreciate that it was not selected for debate, Mr Deputy Speaker, but because it has been referred to, I should like to do so as well.

The amendment sought to demonstrate that we are using every means possible-straining every sinew-to gain peace, and not, as the Prime Minister set out, just doing that before the conflict. Often, the most successful peace talks are those that take place when military action has already been undertaken.

Mike Gapes (Lab): My hon. Friend says that we should do everything we can to avoid conflict, but the conflict has already happened. The people of Benghazi are under attack, and the people of Tripoli are suffering from the Gaddafi regime’s repression. In that sense, standing out of the conflict is also taking a position.

John McDonnell: I am saying that we should secure peace now that the conflict has started. I oppose Britain’s involvement in the middle east because we have a century and a half of involvement-in pursuit of the region’s mineral wealth-that is steeped in blood, murder and maiming. We do not have the credibility to intervene constructively.

Nevertheless, the conflict has started, and our role is to secure peace as quickly as possible. That is why the amendment seeks to secure peace through negotiations. Already, there have been offers of mediation, in particular through the ALBA group of Latin American nations. We should take that offer. The amendment also states-

Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Nigel Evans): Order. Passing reference to the amendment is allowed, but we must not have a detailed debate on it.

John McDonnell: May I refer to those points to which the Prime Minister referred? He said that he would support the sentiments of the amendment, particularly in respect of ensuring that we keep civilians out of harm’s way. When I asked him about depleted uranium, he assured me that we do not use it, but we have used it consistently over time, and it has caused all sorts of harm to people in the middle east. This country, along with France, objected to the international ban on the use of such weapons, but I hope that the Prime Minister’s statement today means that we will now support the ban.

The Prime Minister said that he supports what we say about the need for a middle east conference. We need to engage to try to secure peace and stability and to promote democracy in the region. My view is that we need to do all we can to demonstrate our commitment to peace. The military action has already caused deaths. We do not know whether they are civilians, but the reports from Tripoli are that they are not dividing people from Gaddafi, but actually consolidating his support. The sight of the same countries that invaded Iraq killing Arabs again is of immense value to Gaddafi in his argument that this is another crusader invasion.

We have heard already that the Arab League is falling apart, with different statements coming out in different languages to hide the dissent. The UN is also dividing, with Russia and China, as we speak, urging that military action cease. They are not abstaining, but are convening the Security Council to try to end the action. NATO itself is displaying divisions as well. We have also heard statements from Turkey refusing to take on a longer term role. I have to say that statements in the House and by Ministers are increasingly confusing about the objectives of the military action. The UN resolution does not refer to regime change, but ministerial statement after ministerial statement clearly lead to that conclusion. Although the resolution states that there will not be a troop invasion or occupation, we now know that there is the potential for special forces and boots on the ground. That is all playing into Gaddafi’s hands by calling up images of a foreign invasion.

The charges of hypocrisy cannot go away. There is the lack of action in Yemen, Bahrain and Oman. I am talking not about physical action, which I would oppose anyway, but about the mealy-mouthed ministerial statements. There has been no threat to use the international courts against these killer regimes or to seize their assets, and there has been no threat even of diplomatic isolation. Neither has it helped that the images are still fresh in people’s minds in the middle east of our Prime Minister’s recent tour of the region to sell arms to these barbaric regimes. Finally, of course, my hon. Friend the Member for Islington North has mentioned the hypocrisy of refusing a no-fly zone when Gaza was invaded. We now face the prospect of a long-haul engagement in military action in Libya.

We risk being dragged into on-the-ground bloody combat, followed by a counter-insurgency struggle and then vulnerability to a lengthy terrorist campaign. It will all threaten the peace and stability of the region and have consequences for our own people and the global economy. That is why the message today from the Chamber should be that we seek peace, that we want to ensure the safety of civilians and that our concern is for the peace of the region and the promotion of democracy overall. I urge the Government to take up the offer of mediation from the ALBA countries. I urge the Chamber to send the message that we strive in every way possible to bring all parties together to seek peace. In that way, we might yet have the opportunity to restore some credibility to the role of this country in the middle east. I do not believe that that will be done as a result of the bombs and missiles now hurtling down on the Libyan people and causing death and destruction.

Solidarity with UCU strike

17th March 2011

UCU members have begun walking out on strike today (Thu 17 Mar) over attacks on members’ jobs and pensions in both further and higher education. For more information see the UCU website. UCU members in Scotland are taking strike action today (17 Mar), in Wales tomorrow (18 Mar), in Northern Ireland on Monday (21 Mar) and in England on Tuesday (22 Mar). The action will culminate with a national strike on Thursday 24 March. We encourage LRC members to get on picket lines and show their solidarity with UCU members - as well as taking up the issue of public sector pensions and Hutton in their CLP and trade union.

John McDonnell MP, LRC Chair, said:

“Education is in the firing line of this target as it seeks to demolish the universal public services. The UCU is leading the way in resisting this government’s attacks on education.

“UCU members are now at the forefront of the struggle to maintain a decent education system for our children and young people. They deserve our whole-hearted support in their fight. Solidarity.”

Veronica Killen, LRC and UCU member, said:

“Thursday 24th March will be a momentous day. It will be the first time that all FE Colleges and all University UCU members will be out on strike, together, on the same day. The day of action is about a combination of national disputes affecting staff in both sectors. It is about pay, job security and pensions.

“In additional to the callous cuts to the teaching and research budget, and the extension of a life time of debt to students through rising top-up fees, it beggars belief that we have to go to the wire to get inflation matched pay rises while the top bankers carry on with business as usual. The callous approach to the value of education and the growing casualisation of teaching staff demonstrates how this government education policies are written on the back of cigarette packets by people who treat education with utter contempt.

“The slash and burn of key subjects, such as modern foreign languages, arts and social science will push this country further away from being a world leader of education. We can afford state funded education (see the LEAP paper and publications from the UCU).

“On top of all that the public sector is facing salami cuts to pensions. Public sector pensions are deferred pay and a retirement is reward for a long working life – something that everyone is entitled to – not just the rich. UCU members are angry – we have every right to be and we will be showing that anger on the streets on the 24th. Defend jobs – defend education – defend pensions!”

Nick Matthews, LRC and UCU member, said:

“I am surprised UCU members are not even more angry than they are. At this time of year most academics are run ragged yet during the period leading up to this strike over jobs and pensions many Vice Chancellors have been raking it in. In the last set of published accounts for my institution (Coventry University) for 2009 the Vice Chancellor’s salary increased by over £12,000 to almost £200,000 and her pension contribution increased by £1,700 to a total of £28,000. Of course we are all in this together.
“The days of work in HE being a vocation have long gone with successive Government attacks on the sector and moves towards performance related pay and the erosion of conditions in search of profit. Workers need to get wise to what is going on in the education industry there is no doubt we need to build a stronger union to defend the interests of education workers”.

 

Libya, North Africa and the Middle East: we need less western intervention, not more

15th March 2011

It is clear that Libya is now entering a state of civil war as the Gaddafi regime fights back against the uprising that began in Benghazi.

There have been calls from the West and client Arab states for a no-fly zone in Libya – a demand which has been supported by some rightly concerned about the well-being of the Libyan people.

There can be no doubt that atrocities have been carried out by the Gaddafi regime in recent weeks, but there can also be no doubt that the enforcement of a no-fly zone would be more likely to exacerbate the situation.

No-fly zones have had little success as a form of humanitarian protection. A no-fly zone over Bosnia did not stop the Serbs from shelling Sarajevo or stop Srebrenica from happening.  The expulsion of Kosovar Albanians accelerated while there was an effective no-fly zone over Kosovo.

The Iraq no-fly zone led to the deaths of innocent civilians – not to mention civilian military personnel who work at air traffic control and radar monitoring sites – and was a precursor to the full-scale re-invasion of 2003.

A no-fly zone would increase foreign military intervention in Libya, replacing the agency of the Libyan people with the demands of western governments whose primary aims will be to keep the oil flowing. As Jeremy Corbyn MP has rightly said, “the parallel of no discussion whatsoever of a no-fly zone over Gaza during Operation Cast Lead is but one example of the double standards in operation”.

If the Gaddafi regime resists the no-fly zone, by using the arms supplied to it by the same western nations, and fires on US, French or UK planes what will be the response?

A no fly-zone could clearly be a precursor to the full scale bombing of Tripoli and invasion. That would surely not be in the interests of the Libyan people or of any humanitarian.

While we totally oppose any military action by the West and its proxies, as socialists and internationalists we do not simply stand and await the outcome of the struggle against Gaddafi. The international workers’ movement has a long and proud record of taking action against repressive regimes, including such as Pinochet in Chile and apartheid South Africa. We would encourage and support any such action against Gaddafi. We would also welcome any support which could be given by the victorious movements in other North African countries, such as Tunisia and Egypt, to their brothers and sisters in Libya. Such action could only strengthen the fight for freedom throughout the whole region.

While the media focuses on Libya, we should not forget that the uprisings across the region continue.

Saudi Arabia has invaded Bahrain to repress its democratic movement, in a move yet to be condemned by the West. The Saudi dictatorship states they are there at the “invitation” of the Bahrain dictatorship – but they are mercenaries against the unarmed people of Bahrain who are protesting for democratic rights.

As live rounds, tear gas and water cannons are also being used on protesters in Saudi Arabia, Yemen and Iraq, we should step up our campaign against the UK arms trade, and demand less western intervention, not more.

Neither should we forget that while protests in Tunisia and Egypt have succeeded in bringing down their rulers, the regimes are largely still intact. We must pledge our full solidarity with those still fighting for democracy and freedom, and build links through the labour movement.

Further reading:

• Jeremy Corbyn MP - Morning Star column 10/03/11
• War on Want’s John Hilary, CiF article
• EDM 1565 ‘Libya, North Africa and the Middle East’ tabled by Jeremy Corbyn and signed by John McDonnell MP, Kelvin Hopkins MP, Mike Wood MP, John Cryer MP, etc
• Stop the War Coalition: 10 reasons to say no to western intervention in Libya

 

‘March for the Alternative’ - mobilise for 26 March

12th March 2011

The TUC organised ‘March for the Alternative’ demonstration on 26 March promises to be one of the biggest demonstrations in UK history. Make sure you mobilise your friends, workmates and family to come along. Watch the RMT video on why you should ‘Demonstrate against government cuts’.

The main assembly point will be at Victoria Embankment from 11am, but there are also a growing number of feeder marches - from Kennington Park, Malet Street, Lincoln’s Inn Fields, Highbury Fields, Islington, from Cambridge Circus (for LGBT marchers), and from the NUT (for members) - and even a call ‘don’t go home’ afterwards! See also UK Uncut’s Occupy for the Alternative events on 26 March.

Model motion

This CLP will do its utmost to encourage and enable every Party member, including MPs and Councillors {insert AMs or MSPs where appropriate] to attend the “March for the Alternative” called by the TUC in opposition to the government’s drive to cut public spending on March 26th. We particular urge the Labour leader and NEC to attend and to do all they can to encourage others.

The motion has already been passed in several CLPs, including Truro & Falmouth - as reported in The Falmouth Packet.

For more information on the 26 March demonstration see the official TUC website

LRC calls on Labour leadership to oppose Hutton proposals

11th March 2011

The LRC - a grassroots membership organisation of Labour party members, trade unionists and Members of Parliament - is calling on Labour’s leadership to reject Lord Hutton’s proposals that public sector pensioners should pay higher contributions and receive a lower pension.

The LRC will be co-ordinating with unions and grassroots members to build opposition to these proposals (download model motion) and to have that reflected in the Party leadership. It is totally unjust that public sector workers should pay to fill the hole left by the banking crisis.

Lord Hutton has clearly found a more appropriate home for his politics in the Conservative-led government and should now be relieved of the burden of Labour Party membership.

John McDonnell MP, said:

“We call on the Labour leadership to oppose proposals that will force public sector workers to pay for a crisis caused by the banks. Hutton’s report effectively calls for a tax on public sector workers that will be used , as Osborne has clearly said, to fill the deficit.

“The National Audit Office confirmed in December that public sector pensions are affordable and sustainable in the future. It is difficult to take the Government’s rhetoric about affordability seriously when it is slashing corporation tax at the loss of billions of pounds of revenue.

“The LRC will stand in total solidarity with all trade unionists in opposing these unfair attacks, starting with UCU members on strike later this month.”

Essential reading on public sector pensions:

• Mark Serwotka ‘Lord Hutton has made scapegoats of public sector workers’, Guardian
• Economists letter on public sector pensions
• Faisal Islam’s blog on public sector pensions, Channel 4
• National Audit Office, The impact of the 2007-08 changes to public service pensions, Dec 2010
• Official Labour Party response to Hutton, Angela Eagle MP, Shadow Chief Secretary to the Treasury

Draft motion for CLPs

PUBLIC SERVICE WORKERS’ PENSIONS

This CLP believes that the state should provide pensions for public service workers so that those who spend their working lives serving our communities do not face poverty in retirement.

We therefore condemn the Tory led Coalition Government for;

(1) Changing the basis of uprating pensions in payment from the Retail Price Index (RPI) to Consumer Price Index (CPI) with effect from April 2011. We note that this change has reduced the lifetime value of the pension promise to public service workers by between 15% and 20%;

(2) Deciding to impose an increase in pension contributions of an average of 3% of salary from April 2012. This represents an increase of approximately 50% in pension contributions for many workers.

We further note that the recommendations of Lord Hutton to increase retirement ages for public sector workers and adopt a ceiling for employer contributions to pensions at the expense of the interests of employees will further undermine the value of public sector pensions.

We recognise that the Government may go further even than Hutton recommended - and we deplore the decision of a Labour parliamentarian to allow himself to be used by the Tories to attack and undermine the pensions of public sector workers.

We further recognise that an important motivation for reducing the value of public servant’s pensions is to make it easier to privatise public services. The attack upon public service pensions is part and parcel of the Tories’ attack upon the welfare state.

We believe that the Tories disgraceful attack upon public sector pensions could provoke massive opting out of pension schemes by low paid workers, worsening pensioner poverty for future generations and imposing a cost on the state as future pensioners claim means tested benefits.

We therefore call upon the Parliamentary Labour Party [and our MP] to pledge to reverse all of the Tory attacks upon public sector workers and their pensions.

We pledge our support to the trade unions in their campaign to defend public service pensions and agree to join and support demonstrations and picket lines in the event of industrial action.

Download this model motion (pdf file)

Frontbench abstains, but left MPs vote against Welfare Bill

9th March 2011

The Labour frontbench abstained on tonight’s vote on the Welfare Reform Bill. John McDonnell MP, LRC Chair, was among just 22 MPs who voted against the Bill. John tweeted, “Ed Miliband decided PLP should only vote for amendment to Tories Welfare cuts Bill & then abstain.It is so appalling I am voting against”. The LRC previously wrote to all Labour MPs urging them to vote against the Bill.

The 22 MPs who voted against the Bill were: Ronnie Campbell (Lab), Katy Clark (Lab), Michael Connarty (Lab), Jeremy Corbyn (Lab), Jon Cruddas (Lab), Mark Durkan (SDLP), Jonathan Edwards (PC), Dai Havard (Lab), Kelvin Hopkins (Lab), Stewart Hosie (SNP), Sian James (Lab), Elfyn Llwyd (PC), Naomi Long (Alliance), Caroline Lucas (Green), Angus MacNeil (SNP), John McDonnell (Lab), Angus Robertson (SNP), Jim Sheridan (Lab), Dennis Skinner (Lab), Eilidh Whiteford (SNP), Hywel Williams (PC) and Mike Wood (Lab).

Download the model motion on welfare and get it passed in your CLP or trade union branch

The full text of John’s speech in the debate is copied below

John McDonnell (Hayes and Harlington) (Lab): I have sat through the debate and listened to the contributions and I will try to address some of the points raised. First, let me say that no one in the House doubts the integrity of the Secretary of State. I commend him for the work he did in opposition in setting up various working parties, touring around and meeting various agencies. He met a particularly influential person in Scotland, Bob Holman—a comrade of ours who knows a lot about poverty and who has expressed his disquiet about the proposals. Also, a number of us have been campaigners for the citizen’s income, which I think the universal credit is a step towards, so I do not doubt the Secretary of State’s good intentions.

However, as we have debated at length over the years, if the universal credit is to work, three conditions need to be met. First, it needs to be set at a level that will lift people out of poverty; otherwise it will inflict universal misery. Secondly, there have to be jobs to go into. Thirdly, those jobs must have decent pay. The problem with the Bill is that it does not ensure that any of those conditions will be met. In that respect, it discredits the whole concept of the universal credit, which I find worrying.

On the first condition, I am worried about the amount being taken out of the social security system. In the comprehensive spending review in October, and before that in the emergency Budget, the Chancellor identified £18 billion that was being taken out of the system. When the Prime Minister was challenged about that, he said:

“We face a choice—make cuts in welfare or cuts elsewhere”.

I believe that is happening—that we are witnessing cuts in welfare. When the Under-Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, the hon. Member for Basingstoke (Maria Miller), was asked specifically about the disability living allowance cuts, we were told that the figure of £1 billion of cuts—or savings, depending on how one wants to describe them—had been set before any policy description had been laid out as to how they would be achieved. I think the Prime Minister and the Government did make that choice, because at the same time as the Government were taking £18 billion out of welfare they were reducing corporation taxes by £24 billion. Businesses are now taxed at the lowest level in 40 years, at the expense of the poor.

The debate then starts to degenerate, as it has in the House today, into attacking unemployed claimants as a justification for cuts. I remember the Deputy Prime Minister’s statements about alarm clock Britain, and today we have heard references to shirkers and so on. I have come to the view, and all the Government research under past Governments has demonstrated, that people are desperate to get back to work. Sanctions do exist already, and are implemented if people fail to comply.

Reference was made to fraud. Let us get it on the record again: £1.5 billion of fraud, £16 billion of benefits unclaimed. Who is ripping off the system? It is not the poor. As was said earlier, £120 billion of tax has not been paid as a result of tax evasion and avoidance.

On the second condition—the existence of jobs to go to—with 2.5 million unemployed, including 1 million youngsters, even if we filled all the 500,000 vacancies, there would still be one in four chasing every vacancy; and it is going to be made worse, as was also said earlier. Another 1.2 million will be put on the dole queue as a result of the cuts.

On decent pay, I have asked others what is happening in their constituencies, but the jobs offered at the moment in my constituency are increasingly casual and increasingly low-paid, and large numbers of my constituents are now working on zero hours contracts, in which they are simply paid for the hours that they are brought in to do, on an irregular basis. According to the most recent survey, published only a month ago and based on Government figures, 1.7 million people are now in involuntary part-time and temporary work, and wages are so low that half the children living in poverty are in families that are in work. Even in the boom period, wages actually fell as a percentage of GDP. Last month, RPI was at 5.1% and wages were at 2.3%, and many in my constituency and elsewhere, especially in the public sector, are facing a pay freeze over the next two years. The reasons for the low pay are fairly straightforward. We now have less than a third of workers in this country covered by collective bargaining agreements, as a result of the weakening of trade union rights.

My fear is that, under these proposals, universal credit will fail, because none of the elements are in place to make it a success—a decent level of universal credit, the existence of jobs, or decent pay in those jobs. I think we will be left with the harsh residue of all the complaints and problems that have been described today: the sanctions—the loss of benefit for up to three years if a person refuses to co-operate in seeking work; cuts in housing benefit; the linkage of the housing allowance to CPI, which will inevitably result in cuts; the housing benefit caps; and the room unoccupied scheme, which I think is scandalous. All those factors will discredit a decent proposal, and that is why the Bill is not supportable today.

I want to use my last few seconds to say how appalled I am by the brutalisation of claimants by the privatised companies that have taken over the assessments and the administration of benefits. The brutal treatment of my constituents is a harshness that denigrates the entirety of the work of the House and the Government.

Labour must campaign against the Welfare Reform Bill

7th March 2011

MPs will debate Iain Duncan Smith’s Welfare Reform Bill on Wednesday 9 March. Ahead of the debate, the LRC has written to every Labour MP asking them to speak in the debate and oppose the Bill. Our Welfare Reform Bill briefing (which was sent to every Labour MP) sets out why the Bill should be opposed.

The Welfare Reform Bill is being presented to Parliament in the context of a massive £18 billion cuts programme to welfare benefits, as outlined in the June 2010 Emergency Budget and in the Comprehensive Spending Review of October 2010.

David Cameron has said, “we face a choice – make cuts in welfare or cuts elsewhere”. This is a false choice and is a smokescreen to hide the abject failure of this coalition government to have any strategy for growth and job creation. The costs of welfare can most effectively be cut by investing to create jobs. Instead this government is attacking those on benefits, persecuting the sick and disabled with dubious assessments, and cutting the already low level of benefits.

At the same time that the £18 billion of welfare cuts was announced, this government announced a package of measures amounting to a £24 billion tax break for businesses. That is the choice this government of millionaires has made: to feather the nests of the rich, while attacking the poor.

While this government emphasises the cost of benefit fraud (£1.5 billion, DWP statistics), it does little to close the tax gap, estimated by the Tax Justice Network to be over £120 billion.

Download the model motion on welfare and get it passed in your CLP or trade union branch

The letter we sent is copied below, why not write to or email your MP to ask them to show their opposition to the Bill by voting against it on Wednesday.

Dear Labour MP,

We are writing to ask you to oppose the Welfare Reform Bill which is being debated in the House of Commons on Wednesday 9 March.

As you will be aware, the Emergency Budget in June and CSR in October announced a combined total of £18 billion in welfare cuts. Those same announcements included £24 billion in corporate tax breaks over the same period. This Bill is not about supporting people in need, it is concerned with making some of the poorest people in society pay for the economic crisis.

We believe the whole bill is predicated on a myth – that welfare disincentivises seeking employment. The reality is not about ‘perverse incentives’ but lack of jobs. This government is failing to create jobs while cutting hundreds of thousands of public sector posts. There are already 2.5 million unemployed and fewer than 500,000 vacancies, yet the government demonises those out of work.

The attached briefing details our concerns about the Welfare Reform Bill and we urge you to speak in the debate on Wednesday to reject the false, pernicious and dogmatic arguments used to justify this bill.

We urge our Labour MPs to argue for full employment and job creation, increased benefit levels, and for a publicly delivered service that treats people as humans not profit-making opportunities.

Yours sincerely,

Pete Firmin & Andrew Fisher
LRC joint secretaries

For more information on welfare see:

Disabled People Against Cuts briefing
PCS website: welfare campaign
TUC Congress 2010 decisions (motion 16 - Defence of the Welfare State)
John McDonnell’s 2009 Guardian article opposing Purnell’s Welfare Reform Bill

 

Building local resistance to cuts

7th March 2011

The late February / early March round of local council budget meetings produced the first demonstrations outside, and sometimes inside, town halls for nearly a generation.

The lack of a rebellious council leadership willing to fight Tory cuts in 2011 should come as no surprise. It was not until the mid-1980s that there was a local government-led fightback against Thatcher.

Many Labour councils were elected as recently as May 2010. Yet when faced with Pickles’ demands for budget cuts were only too ready to tear up the manifestos on which they were elected, their commitments to their local communities, and dance to the tune of the coalition government. We need to build confidence locally to make councillors realise that their primary obligation is to their local community and not to Whitehall.

The national Labour leadership has retreated from advocating “cuts deeper and tougher than Thatcher” but still only offers slightly less cuts over a slightly longer time period. This is hardly the sort of stirring stuff to inspire town hall rebellions.

Nevertheless there has been a noticeable distinction between those councils and councillors that have sought to protect local services – using innovative accounting, dipping into reserves and defending priority areas to minimise cuts – and those that have enthusiastically embraced cuts. This distinction at local level reflects the tensions at national level where the Ed Miliband-Balls axis fights the Darling-David Miliband axis for supremacy. While this distinction is important, it is also illusory – passing on the cuts in whatever form does nothing to help defeat the government’s assault on the welfare state, but rather deflects it.

However, anti-cuts activists must exploit the tension between these positions. The advocates of the ‘dented shield’ cannot sustain their position, because there is no way in which they can even profess to protect local services in years two, three and four of the government onslaught – even if this has been partially achieved in year one (which in most cases it hasn’t).

On top of the planned cuts in future years, we must also consider the increasingly likely prospect that cuts to local government will be increased as the damage of Osborne’s cuts programme impacts on economic growth and government revenues. The ‘dented shield’ is single use weapon. Next year the choice will be cut deep or resist. We have to build a movement that supports councillors to resist.

However, we cannot wait until next year. The cuts this year will mean local services – libraries, day centres for the elderly, sure start centres, local law centres, youth services and more – will cease to exist. Hundreds of people in every borough face losing their jobs. The task for activists is to unequivocally defend their local services, through petitions, protests and occupations – and also to support industrial action wherever local government workers fight.

For those areas that are holding elections in May we must mobilise the Labour vote to send the clearest possible message to the coalition government that their policies are not welcome.

As activists, we need to be working to raise local awareness of the impact of cuts, building links between local trade unions and community groups and ensuring that we elect Labour councillors to resist the cuts in 2012 and beyond.

LRC statement on Libya

27th February 2011

LRC members have been inspired and humbled by the determination of the Libyan people to fight for their freedom; and appalled by the murderous response of the Gaddafi dictatorship.

While much of Libya has now been liberated from tyranny, it has come at a terrible price. It is likely that thousands have been slaughtered; soldiers have been massacred for refusing to turn their guns on their own people; and cities have been laid to waste by mercenary fighters in the pay of the dictatorship. The reports of people struggling for liberation being bombed from the air, is reminiscent of Guernica.

This is also a time to reflect on the cynicism of Western foreign policy. Tony Blair led the West’s embrace of the Gaddafi regime in 2003. It was not just a profitable arrangement for major oil companies, who have thrived in Libya since. Britain has sold tens of millions of pounds worth of arms to the Libyan dictatorship, including armoured personnel carriers, ‘crowd control ammunition’, tear gas/irritant ammunition, sniper rifles and water cannon. As in Egypt, Bahrain and elsewhere, it is likely that Libyan protesters are being maimed or killed at the hands of British weaponry.

This episode highlights again the double standards of the “western world” which now talks about bringing Gaddafi before the International Criminal Court. Yet this is not suggested in relation to others, such as Bahrain and Iraq, where brutal and repressive measures have been also been used.

Across the world, hundreds of millions have been inspired by the great Arab revolt against tyranny. But all of these despots, to varying degrees, have depended on Western support to maintain their illegitimate rule. Western governments have armed them to the teeth and provided them with extensive economic and diplomatic support. Half of Britain’s £7.2 billion annual arms sales go to Middle Eastern regimes. This week, David Cameron has acted as the head of a travelling arms fair across the Middle East.

In 1989, the people of Eastern Europe revolted against Moscow proxies; today, the Arab people are liberating themselves from Western client regimes.

Although the US today is a power in decline, we must stand against all attempts to subvert the right of the people of the Middle East to determine their own future. When the people of Palestine had the audacity to vote for the ‘wrong’ party in 2006 the West subjected them to collective punishment. This must not happen again.

The people of Libya, Egypt, Tunisia and elsewhere have given the West an instructive lesson. Real democracy and liberation comes not through Western bombs, bullets and tanks, but through the bottom-up struggle of working people and the oppressed. Workers’ strikes played a crucial role in finally determining the fate of Mubarak, and since the overthrow of the dictatorships in Egypt and Tunisia there has been a rapid growth in independent trade unions.

These revolts have partly been provoked by neo-liberal economic policies, implemented - to varying degrees - across the Middle East. As elsewhere, their consequences have impoverished large swathes of the Arab world.

Free-market capitalism is playing another deeply sinister role in the region. As people across the region are laying down their lives for freedom, we are witnessing disgusting scenes of profiteering by speculators in food and in oil supply futures.

Despots across the region should be rightly scared that their turn is coming. We look to a new Middle East, liberated from Western domination, and freed from the disastrous neo-liberal policies forced on the people by the dictatorships.

Solidarity with the Libyan people - and with the Arab people rising up across the region.

Six Hackney Councillors sign joint statement against cuts

17th February 2011

The statement below, signed by six Hackney Labour councillors, was prepared for a tabloid paper published by Hackney Unites.
Hackney Unites is a diverse coalition of Hackney-based groups and individuals that have come together to challenge social exclusion and promote social justice.
Hackney LRC is one of its founding groups.
The tabloid will be distributed door-to-door in Hackney in the coming weeks.

The Con-Dem Coalition is attacking the fabric of a civilised society: NHS jobs and services are being cut and wholesale privatisation is planned. 3,500 young people in Hackney will lose Educational Maintenance Allowance and student fees are tripling. Access to legal aid is being choked off. Housing benefit restrictions threaten people’s homes. Disrepair stemming from cuts in the Decent Homes programme will affect health and increase stress.

Money available for local councils is to be cut back for four successive years. Some think we should protest - and wait for the next election. Our view is that we cannot wait until the damage is done. Nobody voted to privatise the NHS or make our communities pay for the bankers’ crisis. The government has no mandate. The bankers’ greed caused the crisis - they and their rich friends should pay for it through targeted taxes and a crack down on the tax loopholes used by millionaires and big corporations. As Labour Councillors, along with supporters of the Labour Representation Committee, we support a campaign to defeat the policies of this government through public protest, opposition and defiance.

We would like to see local Councils across London leading the charge and refusing to adopt cuts budgets as a result of government enforced policies and producing a Needs Budgets to show what should be funded. This won’t give local Councils the money to keep services running - but it would give a big boost to the campaign to defeat the government.

Labour needs to reinvent itself as a political movement - not just a party of management and government. Local residents and community organisations need to share their concerns and inform local councillors of the impact of cuts particularly where women, older people, the young, people with disabilities and Black and Minority Ethnic communities will be disproportionately affected by the cuts.

We are facing a national and international emergency and this calls for exceptional measures to mobilise our people and defeat the Con-Dem Coalition. If we do not speak out, our silence will be taken for agreement.

Cllr Barry Buitekant  
Cllr Michelle Gregory
Cllr Linda Kelly
Cllr Deniz Oguzkanli
Cllr Ian Rathbone
Cllr Patrick Vernon

Hackney LRC can be contacted at: PO Box 2378, London E5 9QU / (JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address)

LRC says ‘No’ to AV

16th February 2011

The February National Committee meeting voted overwhelmingly to oppose AV in the referendum now confirmed for 5 May 2011, and so the LRC will be recommending that members vote ‘No’.

LRC affiliated union ASLEF is also committed to campaigning for a ‘No’ vote.

Susan Press, LRC vice chair, said:

“Ignoring the obvious temptation to just give the Lib Dems a bloody nose with a massive “No” vote, AV should be opposed for several reasons. Firstly, it was none other than Nick Clegg who described it as a “miserable little compromise.”

“FPTP is by no means perfect but does mean that coalitions are less common, and it also sticks to the principle of ‘one person, one vote’.

“However, the whole thing is at best an irrelevance, and at worst a distraction from the real struggles people are facing in the face of this Government.”

Winning the argument on councils resisting the cuts

8th February 2011

In response to the LRC’s leaflet calling on Labour Councillors to refuse to make cuts, we received the following from an activist:

“What you are arguing for is for Pickles to take personal control of Labour councils. In [my borough], that would mean that they would scrap the policy of universal free school meals and probably reduce the anti-poverty initiatives that we have found extra funding to support.
It would also mean that, during the period until a legal budget is set, local authorities would lose their ability to collect council tax.  This would further endanger the services that councils provide and would probably mean a greater number of redundancies to union members.
That is before we even get to the danger of judicial review, followed by contempt proceedings. Councillors could also be suspended by standards committees, raising the prospects of Tories and Lib Dems able to form opposition majorities on formerly Labour Councils.
I think that the party should be far more forceful in its campaigning against cuts to local councils. But what you’re suggesting is a re-hashing of a tactic that didn’t work very well 30 years ago, and has now been made impossible by legislative changes.”

Pete Firmin, joint secretary, responded on behalf of the LRC:
The issue of what (Labour) Councils and Councillors should do in response to the cutting of their funding by central government is an important (though not the only) part of fighting the government’s assault on jobs, conditions and services. It is an issue which most Councillors and Labour Parties are agonising over, and which local (and national) anti-cuts campaigns are having to come to grips with. It is a serious issue requiring serious thought and we would reject the idea that the LRC has flippantly decided on the policy of non-implementation.
What is the alternative to non-implementation? And, before you object that these are hypothetical, they are all happening in Brent, where I am the chair of the local anti-cuts campaign and, no doubt, in most other places.

• The Labour Council gets the blame for making the cuts. Not everyone is on top of how Council finance (and politics) work. They see the Council taking a decision to close their facility and blame the Council. This can also be cynically exploited by local Liberal Democrats and Tories for party political purposes. Even where people are aware of how the system works, they think the Council should stand up to government more.
• The Council retreats even more than usual into administrative mode, refusing to deal with the issue politically. We see this in the real lack of protest from Councils at the decisions (they feel) they are being forced to make.
• When a campaign arises around a particular facility, the response of the Council is to say “if we don’t close this, what should we close instead”, effectively encouraging campaigns to compete with one another, rather than link up in opposition to all the cuts in services.
• The Council ends up encouraging “big society” responses – the take over of what should be public services and resources by volunteers, with all the problems that go with that. This again deflects from the political pressure which should be directed at the government. And in Camden the Council has decided to appeal to the local rich to donate to save services.
• Councils resort to special pleading – London/our borough/sports facilities/whatever are being disproportionately hit. Again, this amounts to urging competition between different parts of the country or services rather than building opposition to all the cuts in every area.
• Councils say they are limiting the damage to front line services (or in your case to anti-poverty initiatives). Yet the scale of the cut in funding means this is not the case and cannot be the case, even with the best will in the world. Saving one “front line service” means cutting another. And we all know front line services depend on “back room” support to function.

[As an aside, when a delegation from Brent Fightback meant Sarah Teather, MP and minister, last Friday she told us the effect of the cuts would be much worse if she wasn’t in the government. How many layers of protection do we need?]

• Councils are making staff redundant. Many have now moved on from `voluntary’ to compulsory redundancies, but in many ways it is irrelevant whether the redundancies are `voluntary’ or compulsory, since voluntary redundancies only work when there are volunteers, otherwise they become compulsory. It is also irrelevant whether the redundancy is in a front line service or not – the person made redundant is unemployed and dependent on benefits whatever they previously worked as
• Councils which make cuts are forced to make decisions if their is resistance. What do they do if there is an occupation of a library, for instance? Do they call the police, take the occupiers to court? What if staff take industrial action against job losses or a reduction in terms and conditions? Do they encourage strike breaking? Do they call the riot police on anti-cuts protestors as Lewisham Council did?

All these are real dilemmas faced by Councils/Councillors deciding to make the cuts.
I very much agree with you that we need more forceful campaigning by Councils against the cuts. There is very little sign of this from Labour Councils and no sign at all of them coordinating this, which could have a serious impact on the public perception, at least. This may, of course, stem from the fact that the national Labour leadership refuses to campaign against the cuts. That is something we have to change.

There is also a serious concern that, if Labour does campaign against the cuts it will be a “Labour Party only” campaign – i.e. will refuse to link up in a common campaign with the unions, users groups and other political groups already campaigning against the cuts. It would not be a campaign aimed at defeating the cuts, but at encouraging people to vote Labour at the next possible election (local or national). By which time, of course, services will have been lost/privatised completely and jobs lost. There is no commitment that Labour would reverse anything. Again, this is not hypothetical, there is already talk of such a campaign in Camden and Brent, and no doubt elsewhere.

The policy of non-implementation is in fact the only policy which offers any serious chance of challenging the cuts and keeping Labour Councils and Councillors on the right side of the opposition to the cuts, rather than being seen as some kind of agents/bailiffs for the government. It is also a policy which can significantly strengthen rather than weaken that opposition movement.
In opposing this policy, you view it completely passively – Labour votes not to make cuts, Pickles steps in, more cuts are made. But that leaves out of the equation any linking up with trades unionists, service users, tenants etc. Councillors refusing to implement the cuts could be key to building a massive campaign of resistance. Any attempt to move in commissioners could be met by occupations, strike action, blocking their entry to Council offices, certainly not simply a passive “let them take over”.
What is the worst that could happen to Councillors refusing to make the cuts, since the law was changed and they can no longer be imprisoned or surcharged for refusing to set a balanced budget? They could end up not being Councillors. If threatened with suspension, disbarring from office, whatever, there is no reason they could not resign and other labour anti-cuts candidates stand in the subsequent bye elections. Again, a mobilisation of the local working class could block action against them and/or ensure their replacement by equally committed substitutes. If, in you worst case scenario, the Lib Dems and Tories took over the running of the Council, you again assume there would be no resistance.
You say the tactic of non-compliance didn’t work very well 30 years ago, but you don’t say why. Surely primarily because very few Councils/Councillors were prepared to go through with it. In some ways it was never tested except in a couple of areas. If it had been seen through by a significant number of Labour Councillors (rather than be shunned by the national leadership) it could have brought the Thatcher juggernaut to a halt.
For us, non-implementation by Councils is the only realistic policy – the one most likely to have a chance of actually defeating the government’s cuts programme rather than (at best) making a noise about it while carrying it out. As the old saying goes, if you don’t fight, you definitely lose, at least if you fight you have a chance of winning.

• The People’s Convention on Sat 12 Feb will also host a debate on this issue, chaired by LRC Chair John McDonnell MP
• There has also be an ongoing discusson in the Morning Star letters page.

Vote ‘yes’ in the Welsh referendum

7th February 2011

On 3rd March, the people of Wales will be asked to vote on whether our National Assembly should have increased powers to make legislation. Welsh Labour Grassroots (WLG) – the organisation of left and centre-left activists in the Welsh Labour party and sister organisation of the LRC – is strongly supporting the ‘yes’ campaign in this referendum.

The proposal that is to be decided upon on 3rd March is, in many ways, a modest one. It will not increase the number of AMs. It will not extend the Assembly’s responsibility into new areas like justice or defence. And it will not create new tax-raising powers or address the chronic underfunding of Welsh public services under the ‘Barnett formula’. It will simply enable the Assembly to pass legislation in the areas for which it already has responsibility, without needing the approval of the UK Parliament. In other words, laws that apply only in Wales will be made in Wales. 

At present, the National Assembly cannot pass legislation in the same way that the London and Edinburgh parliaments can. So, even though the Assembly has responsibility within Wales for important areas of government policy like health and education, it does not have the authority to make laws relating to these areas. Since 2007, the Assembly has been able, in principle, to pass its own laws (called ‘Assembly Measures’) but each time it wants to do so, it must get the UK Parliament’s permission by using a mechanism known as a ‘Legislative Competence Order’. This involves a highly complex process, with 27 separate stages, and has taken up to three years when MPs have been reluctant, for political reasons, to grant the Assembly the powers it has asked for. Thus, after existing for twelve years, the Assembly is still dependent on Westminster to make decisions in areas for which Wales is supposedly responsible – and it is potentially subject to a political veto by London MPs and members of the unelected House of Lords.

There are two main reasons why socialists should be concerned about this state of affairs:

• First of all, as citizens of Wales, we should be concerned that when we elect Assembly Members to decide Welsh government policy on devolved issues, such decisions are subject to the approval of politicians from elsewhere in the UK – and, moreover, that obtaining such approval can waste enormous amounts of time and public money. Giving the Assembly full law-making powers over already-devolved matters would be more democratic and more efficient than the existing arrangements.
 
• The second reason to vote ‘yes’ is that the political consensus in Wales is more favourable to trade unions and to public services than that in the UK overall. We now have a government in Westminster that is determined to carry out the deepest public spending cuts since the Second World War – cuts that could cost hundreds of thousands of jobs, wreck public services and thrust the economy back into recession. Even with the additional powers on offer in this referendum, there is a limit to what the Welsh Assembly could do about this threat, given its limited powers in financial and other areas – but it could at least provide, more robustly than at present, one valuable line of defence for the people of Wales. Working together with unions and other civic organisations, it could mount an effective political challenge to the UK government’s plans and start to develop an alternative vision for Wales.

In March 1979, the people of Wales voted overwhelmingly to reject the proposal for a Welsh Assembly. Two months later, the Thatcher government took office and began to wreak havoc on the economy and society of Wales, along with many other parts of the UK. It cut public spending when the economy was already in recession, driving up unemployment and forcing many manufacturing companies out of business. Benefits were slashed and union rights taken away. The steel industry saw huge job cuts and eventual privatisation, and a pit closure programme ripped the heart out of many Welsh mining communities. The Tories never won even a third of the votes in Wales, yet the Welsh people had no protection against damaging Tory policies for which most of them had never voted. It took the bitter experience of the 1980s and 1990s for many people began to see the value of having an elected Assembly that would stand up for the interests of Wales. With Thatcher’s heirs now in Downing Street, we cannot afford to repeat the mistake of March 1979.

Vote YES on 3rd March!
Download this article as PDF flyer

Why councillors should fight the cuts

26th January 2011

Labour councils are being put in an invidious position by the government. They want councils to act as their bailiffs, carrying out part of their attack on welfare provision. This is not what most Labour councillors wanted to do when they stood for election. Many councillors believe they can mitigate the effects of the government’s attacks, but the scale of the attack makes this impossible: councils carrying through the cuts are having to cut front-line services.

Download the LRC Resist the Cuts flyer, which explains why Labour should oppose the cuts nationally, and why local Labour councillors should refuse to implement the cuts.

At the LRC Conference 2011 ‘Resist the Cuts, Rebuild the Party’, motion 9 (see Resolutions booklet for full text) was passed overwhelmingly.

In a Morning Star feature article, Pete Firmin and Andrew Fisher (LRC joint secretaries) set out ‘why councillors should fight the cuts’ and why conference voted through motion 9.

What should Labour councils do in the face of government demands to cut?

This is an important issue for our movement to debate, as the Labour Representation Committee (LRC) did openly and frankly at its conference Resist the Cuts, Rebuild the Party two weeks ago.

Delegates voted overwhelmingly in favour of a resolution which stated unequivocally: “Labour councillors have a clear political duty to resist these unprecedented attacks on working people.

They cannot allow themselves to become the local agents of this anti-working class coalition government.”

The resolution also called for councillors to “work with representatives of community groups, local authority workers and trade unions, trades councils, Labour Party members and other political activists” so that “a national movement can be forged to defeat and bring down the coalition government.”

It is important to explain what motivated the 300-plus activist Labour members and trade unionists to vote so overwhelmingly, but first we must clear up the consequences for councillors, as it is relevant to the debate.

There is some confusion across the left - as highlighted by the Morning Star’s own Industrial Spotlight column this week - about what the legal context is for councillors refusing to implement cuts.

Far from councillors having to be “revolutionaries who are prepared to go to prison for their stand,” councillors refusing to make cuts today are not faced with prison, or even surcharging, as the rules have changed since the stand made by some councils in the 1980s.

Today councillors refusing to set a balanced budget would first be warned by officers that they could not do this and if they persisted would be replaced by government commissioners.

During a debate on how Labour councils and councillors should act, LRC member and Islington councillor Charlynne Pullen set out why she would vote for cuts.

While there was some heckling she was perfectly audible throughout, and she was politely applauded when she had finished her speech.

Her defence of her position was honest and brave - no other councillor spoke in the debate - but as the conference overwhelmingly decided, her message was wrong.

Let’s be clear.

Labour councils are being put in an invidious position by the government.

The government wants councils to act as their bailiffs, carrying out part of their attack on welfare provision.

Without doubt this is not what most Labour councillors wanted to do when they stood for election.

Many councillors believe they can mitigate the effects of the government’s attacks but the scale of the attack makes this impossible.

With the best will in the world, councils carrying through the cuts are having to cut front-line services.

But there is an even more compelling argument for Labour councils to refuse to do the government’s dirty work, and that is that doing so brings them into conflict with both trade unionists and users of the services.

It is not only that these councils will be seen by many as making the cuts, without the subtle distinction that they are being forced to by the government.

We may well see the occupation of libraries, day centres etc. against their closure. Where do councils and the councillors stand then? Do they call on the police and courts to evict the occupiers?

And trade unions locally, regionally and nationally will inevitably be taking industrial action against attacks on the terms, conditions and jobs of their members in local government.

Other trade unionists will support them. Will councillors urge the breaking of those strikes so that they can continue to carry out the cuts?

Yes, councillors should protest at the decisions the government is forcing them to make - although too little has been seen of that to date - and yes, we need to build a mass movement against the cuts both among workers in and users of services.

But councillors could contribute massively to such a movement - they are after all the elected leaders of their communities - if they refused to do the government’s bidding instead of putting themselves in the position of shielding the government by doing its dirty work.

If we are to defeat this government we need our movement united in opposing the cuts, not hamstrung by feeling that they are obliged to administer them.

2011 LRC Conference Report: Resist the Cuts, Rebuild the Party

17th January 2011

The LRC conference passed the National Committee statement, an emergency motion from CWU on the Royal Mail, and motions 1-9 and 11-16 from the Resolutions booklet. Motion 10 was lost by approximately 2:1.

Conference elected a new National Committee, which meets about every two months to discuss LRC strategy, and to oversee the running of the organisation. View the new National Committee for 2011. There was a contested election for Section B ‘Individual Members’ and you can download the election results.

Conference also heard speeches from Tony Benn, Jeremy Corbyn MP, John McDonnell MP, Clare Solomon and Matt Wrack (FBU), and from guest international speaker and Tunisian national Mohamed Ali Harrath. You can watch all these speeches online at LRC TV

Read the 2010 LRC Annual Report

Katy Clark MP, who had to pull out of the conference, sent this message of solidarity:

Please send my best wishes to the LRC conference. I am sorry I can’t be there. I am up in Scotland to attend a CLP meeting which has been fixed for this weekend. It will probably be the last time that we meet before the Scottish Parliament elections later this year where the majority of my seat is held by the SNP with a 48 majority. It is a beautiful part of the world and anyone who is able to come and help us campaign will be made more than welcome.

It is vital we do well in the Scottish Parliament, Welsh Assembly and local council elections. We need to take the Tories on and equip our movement with the arguments and policies it needs. We need to win the argument that these cuts are not necessary and that there is an alternative. It was failures of the market which created the economic problems we are now dealing with. We need to argue for the vision of a different society and ensure that steps are taken to ensure that it does not happen again. If we are bold and united we will be successful.

   

Read Morning Star report of the LRC conference.

LRC Conference: Resist the Cuts, Rebuild the Party

12th January 2011

Come to the LRC Conference ‘Resist the Cuts, Rebuild the Party’ on Saturday 15 January. The conference will set LRC campaigning priorities for the year ahead, elect a new National Committee and officers and will hear from speakers including: Tony Benn, Christine Blower (NUT), Jeremy Corbyn MP, John McDonnell MP, Clare Solomon (ULU President), and Matt Wrack (FBU).

LRC Chair John McDonnell MP, writing in the Morning Star, said:

“A great responsibility rests on the shoulders of the delegates to the LRC conference to demonstrate that the Labour left is not only up for this fight but is also willing to throw itself enthusiastically into working with all those potential allies within our community that are willing to fight back.

“Simply waiting for the demise of the coalition government will neither inevitably secure Labour’s return to power nor ensure the return of the type of Labour government that we need.

“The message that the LRC’s national executive is putting to the conference is simple: we can fight back and there is an alternative.”

Come to the LRC Conference 2011 ‘Resist the Cuts, Rebuild the Party’

Downloads:
Conference timetable
National Committee statement
Resolutions booklet
Elections booklet

 

LRC calls for NEC inquiry into Jack Straw’s comments

11th January 2011

The LRC condemns the statement made by Labour MP Jack Straw that “there is a specific problem which involves Pakistani heritage men… who target vulnerable young white girls ... who they think are easy meat”.

We call on the Labour leadership and the whole labour movement to disown Straw’s disgraceful comments. We also call on the NEC to open an inquiry into whether Straw should be allowed to continue as a Labour MP and party member. (Download the model motion to add your support)

It is obvious that the crimes committed by these men were heinous, but the fact is there is no statistical evidence to support Jack Straw’s statements.

Straw has clearly failed to examine all the evidence, which would contradict his assertions. He also used incredibly provocative language in doing so, which made his statement all the more inflammatory.

To make matters worse, his comments were made in the run-up to the Oldham East and Saddleworth by-election, following the despatching of Phil Woolas – whose own racist comments brought shame upon the Labour Party, and which were condemned by the LRC and many others.

It is deeply problematic that there appears to be an acceptance of casual racism in the Parliamentary Labour Party – where Woolas was defended. There has also been little condemnation by the PLP of Jack Straw’s comments.

While it is important that politicians are able to address controversial issues, this should be based on facts and rational debate, not prejudice and hyperbole.

There is of course a more important need to tackle the underlying issue of violence against women. This requires significant cultural and political change in all communities.

We call on all labour movement bodies to support our call for the NEC to investigate Jack Straw’s comments to determine whether he has brought the Party into disrepute.
Download the model motion to get your Labour Party or trade union branch to support.

The Cuts - the impact on LGBTQ communities

2nd January 2011

We are all affected by public spending cuts, whether as workers or in the services being cut from our communities. It is this government’s intention to make ordinary people pay the price for an economic crisis which they did not cause.

The savage attacks on the public sector - both in terms of jobs and services - and the cuts in welfare will mean that there will be a disproportionate impact on women, disabled, LGBT and black and minority ethnic people. The cuts will be felt by the most disadvantaged who bear no responsibility for the banking crisis but will now suffer its harshest consequences.

In a series of articles the LRC has asked key campaigning organisations to explain how the cuts will impact upon particular communities, entrenching disadvantage.

The third article in this series comes from Left Front Art. Download the paper here. As well as looking at the impact of cuts on Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender, Queer (LGBTQ) communities, the paper also examines how LGBTQ issues have been marginalised.

Download the paper.

Solidarity with ASLEF members on Boxing Day

24th December 2010

The LRC has written to ASLEF to offer its solidarity to its London Underground members taking industrial action on 26 December. We note the strong mandate from members for this action who voted nine to one to take industrial action.

We also welcome the court victory in staving off the employers’ attempt to gain an injunction. This again highlights the pressing need for repeal of the anti-trade union laws which allows employers to use the courts to override the democratic will of members, and to replace industrial bargaining with legal wrangling to the advantage of the employer.

For more about the dispute, see the ASLEF website.

LRC guidance on Partnership into Power review

15th December 2010

A review of the Labour Party policy making process was launched at party annual conference this year and a report will be presented to Annual Conference 2011.

The Joint Policy Committee will be listening to views and gathering evidence from party units and members, and would like maximum input.

The deadline for submissions to the review is 10 June 2011, but it is important that party units and members make their views known as soon as possible.

Submissions can be made either:

- Via the Labour Party website at: members.labour.org.uk/pip-Or in writing to:
Review of Partnership into Power
Policy and Research Department
The Labour Party
39 Victoria Street
London
SW1H 0HA

When making a submission the party want to know who it is from – member, CLP or affiliate – and if a meeting was held to discuss the submission. Download this briefing

LRC guidance on making a submission

Submissions will be more influential if they are made in your own words after discussion at a meeting.

The following points are to give guidance in discussing and writing your submission:

1. All the Labour leadership candidates recognised that party members are not adequately involved in party policy making.
2. The active involvement of members in party policy making makes the party stronger and our policies more relevant to the people we aspire to represent.
3. If party units and members had been listened to about the public desire for more progressive policies – such as building more council housing, progressive taxation, scraping ID cards and Trident and public ownership of railways – Labour could have avoided defeat at the last General Election and still be in government.
4. Members must have a clear and transparent process whereby their policy idea can be submitted to party annual conference and be voted upon to become party policy.
5. Feedback to party units and members on the progress and outcome of their policy idea within the process is crucial.
6. Annual Conference must remain the sovereign policy making body of the Labour Party with voting on policies and conference decisions acted upon by the leadership.
7. In relation to Annual Conference, members, via party units, must be able to submit motions, amendments to policy documents. Also, delegates must be able to move reference back on sections of policy documents at conference. The nonsense of all or nothing policy making must end, with policy documents voted upon section by section. The Conference Arrangements Committee must facilitate democratic debate on policy at Annual Conference, not block it by using very restricting “contemporary” criteria and other shoddy fixes. Prioritisation and compositing of motions must also not be used to restrict policy options open to conference to debate and vote upon, rather the intention must be to maximise decision making on such policy options.
8. The National Policy Forum must be reformed to be much more open and democratic, and be made accountable to, and involve, party units and members in its policy making process. Party units and members must be able to submit amendments to policy documents being considered by the NPF, and a workable process with timescales and resources to facilitate this must be developed. Where the NPF cannot reach a consensus on a policy, minority positions should be voted upon at Annual Conference.
9. Trade unions and other affiliated organisations at all levels must be fully involved in party policy making.
10. Local policy forums must feedback accurately the actual policy content they generate into the party policy making process.
11. The policy making process must be a genuine rolling programme approved by party annual conference, with all policy areas being covered.
12. Party policy must feed into the party general election manifesto in a democratic and transparent fashion that includes the widest possible consultation within the party that includes the party policy making structures.
13. When the PIP report is presented to Annual Conference 2011, party units/delegates must be able to amend it and vote on it.

Link to PiP consultation document

http://www.labouremail.org.uk/files/uploads/752201ad-cfaa-9694-c121-9f0f7d5be065.pdf?utm_source=taomail&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=5687+Partnership+into+Power+-+The+Review&tmtid=25029-5687-3-224-1635209

Download this briefing

Gary Heather
Coordinator
LRC Labour Party Liaison Unit
15 December 2010

 

The Cuts - the impact on older people, by NPC

12th December 2010

We are all affected by public spending cuts, whether as workers or in the services being cut from our communities. It is this government’s intention to make ordinary people pay the price for an economic crisis which they did not cause.

The savage attacks on the public sector - both in terms of jobs and services - and the cuts in welfare will mean that there will be a disproportionate impact on women, disabled, LGBT and black and minority ethnic people. The cuts will be felt by the most disadvantaged who bear no responsibility for the banking crisis but will now suffer its harshest consequences.

In a series of articles the LRC has asked key campaigning organisations to explain how the cuts will impact upon particular communities, entrenching disadvantage.

The second article comes from the National Pensioners Convention. Download the paper here. It looks at the effects on older people of cuts to local government, the welfare state, and the NHS and highlights the current situation:

• 3.5m pensioners are living in fuel poverty;
• Nine pensioners died every day during last winter of cold related illnesses;
• The government will give no guarantee that the Winter Fuel Allowance will not be cut in 2011;
• Since the link of the state pension to national average earnings was removed in 1980 by the Thatcher government, the basic state pension (currently £97.65) has declined from about 20% to about 15% of average earnings;
• 2.5m pensioners are living below the OECD poverty level of £170;
• 90% of these are persistent poor;
• Over 50% of pensioner households are on means-tested benefits;
• Pensioners are up to £710 a year worse off than other households as a result of the rising cost of living according to the commercial arm of Age UK;

LRC voices as Parliament votes to trebles university fees

11th December 2010

On Thursday 9 December Parliament voted to treble university tuition fees. Outside 30,000 students and their supporters protested for free education. Below is how LRC members, in Parliament and in Parliament Square, reacted.
John McDonnell MP spoke at the demo at Malet Street, before tweeting from inside the Commons:

“Don’t ever forget this day. It is the day education became no longer a right but a commodity to be bought and sold.

“The fight against cuts in education and tuition fees doesn’t end here. This is just the beginning. Solidarity”

Jeremy Corbyn MP, spoke in the debate (full speech here). He said:

“The Secretary of State should be utterly ashamed of himself, because in effect the Government are reducing to 40% the level of funding for universities, increasing the privatisation of universities and courses, and ending academic independence. We need to tax the wealthy. We do not need a graduate tax or an increase in income tax to pay for it. Some £6 billion has not been collected from Vodafone thanks to a cosy deal with Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs. That is actually more than the total amount paid through tuition fees over the past year.

“I signed a pledge not to vote for a fees increase, I voted against the fees increase in 2004 and I voted against the introduction of fees in 1998. Liberal Democrats were on the same ticket at the time-hon. Members should stand up for what they believe in and vote no.”

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Read reports from LRC members of the protest here, here and here.

The Cuts - the impact on disabled people, by DPAC

7th December 2010

We are all affected by public spending cuts, whether as workers or in the services being cut from our communities. It is this government’s intention to make ordinary people pay the price for an economic crisis which they did not cause.

The savage attacks on the public sector - both in terms of jobs and services - and the cuts in welfare will mean that there will be a disproportionate impact on women, disabled, LGBT and black and minority ethnic people. The cuts will be felt by the most disadvantaged who bear no responsibility for the banking crisis but will now suffer its harshest consequences.

In a series of articles the LRC has asked key campaigning organisations to explain how the cuts will impact upon particular communities, entrenching disadvantage.

The first article in this series comes from Disabled People Against Cuts (DPAC). Download the paper here. It shows:

• 75% of disabled women and 70% of disabled men are already at the bottom end of Britain’s income distribution scale living in poverty
• A tenth of disabled women have incomes below £31 per week and a tenth of disabled men have incomes below £59 per week including earned income and benefits
• Already 30% of disabled people live below the poverty line and 1 in 4 families with disabled children cannot afford heating
• The median level of total wealth for households headed by an employee is £217,500 compared to only £21,100 for households headed by someone who is sick or disabled
• Under the coalition government’s economy drive disabled people are set to lose at least £140 per month through direct cuts to disability benefits (initially devised to pay the extra costs of being disabled) alone

Support the students - Days of Action and Occupations

2nd December 2010

Students across the country have been occupying their universities and taking part in national days of action against the cuts and against fees. MPs will vote on the fee increase on Thursday 9 December, and there will be another day of action in London. Join the Facebook group. More details soon, but start mobilising, organising, and publicising NOW!

There are university occupations across the country. Download the list (pdf file) and:

  1. Send solidarity messages (including from your BLP, CLP, local LRC or trade union branch)
  2. Get in touch and invite a speaker from the occupation to your meetings
  3. Support local protests/events on days of action
  4. Lobby your MP to vote against tuition fee increases on Thu 9 Dec

There are local events planned at campuses across the country on Wed 8 Dec (the day before the vote). Please do all you can to support these actions locally and nationally and, if you can, join the Day of Action in London on Thu 9 Dec. Meet at 12 noon in Malet Street. Download the flyer for more information and to spread the word.

You may also have heard that Tory Peer Baroness Warsi has written to Labour leader Ed Miliband regarding LRC Chair John McDonnell MP’s support for the students and for direct action. John said: “I am happy to talk to whip’s office any time but my position remains and will remain the same. I support the students demos and occupations.”
Read an account of the Newcastle University occupation by LRC Northern Region Co-ordinator Steve Brown

Support the Open Letter on Housing

23rd November 2010

We believe current Government proposals are not fair or just. Cuts to Housing Benefit, replacing future secure and assured tenancies with time limited short hold tenancies and up to 80% of market rents, are an unfair and ill-conceived threat to tenants and would be a disaster for communities.

These measures will create more evictions, homelessness and fear, but will not curb high rents.  They do nothing to create secure, affordable homes for rent desperately needed for all those who are priced out by the housing market.  They will create exclusion zones driving out the low-paid, the sick and the poor, and their families.

We call on Councillors, MPs, tenant and trade union organisations, housing, disability and poverty campaigners and all who want sustainable, mixed communities across the UK to join in a campaign around these Action points:

• Defend security of tenure for existing and future tenants
• Resist and campaign against the cuts in housing benefit: we call on Councillors and other landlords not to implement cuts in HB where this is under local control, and not to evict tenants who get behind with their rent as a result of the new cuts in housing benefit
• Oppose raising rents up to 80% of market levels
• Shortage of housing is a result of underinvestment and failure to build - it is not caused by existing tenants of whatever race or religion
• We need regulation to control private sector rents
• We are committed to campaign instead for a programme of investment in new and improved council and other house building at genuinely-affordable rents.

Contact (JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) to join us.

Signed
Austin Mitchell MP, Chair Council Housing Group of MPs
Eileen Short, Chair Defend Council Housing
Dot Gibson, General Secretary National Pensioners’ Convention
Ken Livingstone former Mayor of London
Councillor Phil Waker Barking & Dagenham Council lead member for Housing
Paul Brandon, Chair Right to Work Campaign
Linda Burnip, Disabled People Against Cuts
John McDonnell MP
Mark Serwotka, PCS General Secretary
Pete Firmin & Andrew Fisher, LRC joint secretaries

For more information, see the Defend Council Housing website.

This letter appeared in the Guardian on 3 December 2010. but please continue to (JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address).

Make Labour a racist-free zone

17th November 2010

It is time for Labour to make clear that someone prepared to, as the election court heard, “stir up racial tensions”  in their campaigning is not fit to hold high office and not welcome in our Party.

The Labour Party should never again be associated with such campaigning, and members and affiliates must be vigilant in challenging racism at every level within the party and in society. Labour needs to run an explicitly anti-racist campaign in the forthcoming by-election in Oldham to restore the Party’s standing in that community and in the country.

The main problem with the literature produced by Phil Woolas’s election campaign was not that it lied about his opponent, but that it was a disgusting racist attack on an entire community.

The fact that such a negative campaign was run by Woolas also highlights how little positive Labour had to say at the 2010 election. We need wholesale policy renewal that rejects the underlying racism of New Labour’s imperialist wars and attacks on civil liberties and asylum seekers.

We must also recognise that it was a mistake for Ed Miliband to have appointed Phil Woolas to the post of Shadow Immigration Minister, knowing the views that his election campaign had espoused.

LRC Executive Committee

Fight Duncan Smith’s welfare proposals

13th November 2010

Iain Duncan Smith has published a welfare white paper proposing a Universal Credit. Behind the rhetoric of simplification and fairness, it proposes a massive extension of workfare delivered by private contractors, paid by results. It also promises harsher conditionality to deal with ‘welfare dependency’ and ‘worklessness culture’. It follows £18 billion of welfare cuts announced in the June Budget and October spending review.

Below is the letter in the Guardian at the weekend from LRC joint secretary, Andrew Fisher:

Martin Kettle (Stop hoping for the worst – give Duncan Smith a chance, 12 November) misrepresented Beveridge to justify IDS’s savage attack on welfare rights. Beveridge did indeed say social insurance should be the “minimum income needed for subsistence”, but he wrote in his report that the minimum was a “matter of judgment; estimates on this point change with time, and generally, in a progressive community change upwards”. Instead unemployment benefit has become increasingly devalued: if it had increased in line with earnings since 1979 it would be worth £110 per week today not a measly £65, one of the lowest rates in Europe. Beveridge was also fundamentally opposed to means-testing, and stated “unemployment benefit will continue at the same rate without means test so long as unemployment lasts”.

At a time when there are 2.5 million people out of work and less than half a million vacancies, that principle has never been more important to avoid the demonising and bullying that dominates the welfare debate and IDS’s proposals for workfare. The underlying Beveridge principle was to provide people with social insurance to give them dignity and an income when out of work or incapacitated. It is shameful that Labour has abandoned that principle too, but we must fight to restore it.

Andrew Fisher
Labour Representation Committee

LRC Hampshire launches with unity call

12th November 2010

A packed rally in Winchester on Thursday (11 Nov) responded enthusiastically to John McDonnell’s call for action to unite the labour movement around a massive anti-cuts campaign.

He made the call during a meeting to announce the formation of the Hampshire Labour Representation Committee on Thursday night.

Mr McDonnell tore the Con-Dem government of millionaires to shreds and said it was using the deficit as an excuse for its “ideologically driven and economically illiterate attack on the welfare state and public services.”

His sentiments were echoed by LRC joint secretary Andrew Fisher, who mentioned the positive alternatives that could boost the economy, based on public investment, fair taxation and the harnessing of the banking system for the good of the economy rather than the greed of the few.

In a withering attack on the government, Usdaw union convener at the Twinings tea factory Pete Millward urged public and private-sector workers to fight together, saying that every public-sector job destroyed by cuts would take a private-sector job with it.

Mr Millward condemned Associated British Foods subsidiary Twinings’ plan to ditch most of its UK workforce for cheap labour in Poland and China with the aid of a £10 million EU grant, despite already making huge profits.

“Today more than ever we need to make sure that the Labour Party represents working people in the momentous battle to come,” said rally organiser and chairwoman Sarah Evans, Labour’s candidate in north-west Hampshire in May’s general election.

*The above is a report from the Morning Star

You can download a copy of Pete Millward’s speech here.

Hampshire fights back against the ConDem cuts

5th November 2010

LABOUR MP John McDonnell and communication workers’ leader Maria Exall will headline a rally against the ConDem government’s savage cuts that will launch Hampshire Labour Representation Committee in Winchester on November 11.

The public meeting, at 19:30 at the East Winchester Social Club at 50 Chesil Street, will also be addressed by Twinings Andover union convenor Peter Millward, and Sarah Evans, northwest Hampshire’s Labour candidate in the recent general election.

The aim will be to bring together trade-unionists, community groups and progressives across the county to forge a united movement against the cuts – and to help transform the Labour Party into an organisation that fights in the interests of all working people.

Meeting organiser Sarah Evans says: “The ConDem government has unleashed the most savage attack on public services since the 1930s, and if we allow it to happen it will destroy the welfare state that working people have fought to create for decades,”

“Here in Hampshire the cuts will mean disaster for working people, pensioners, children and students as safety nets and services are systematically dismantled, benefits are slashed, pensions are eroded and thousands of jobs are destroyed.

“If we get together we can stop these cuts, and people across Britain are already fighting back, refusing to pay for a crisis we had no part in creating.”

John McDonnell MP says: “Britain’s crisis has not been caused by public spending, but by the unfettered speculative greed of the bankers, yet the banks and corporations have been given year-on-year tax cuts and for them it is bonus as usual.

“The government’s claim that there is no alternative to these cuts is nonsense, not least when tax-dodging costs the economy £120 billion a year and the government wants to waste £80 billion on replacing the Trident nuclear weapons system.

“Even a tiny Robin-Hood tax on financial transactions at just 0.05 per cent would bring in £30 billion a year, yet by contrast if the cuts go ahead they will cost 600,000 public sector jobs and destroy another 700,000 in the private sector.”

Fight the cuts – unite the movement
Launch of Hampshire Labour Representation Committee
November 11, 2010, 19:30
East Winchester Social Club,
50 Chesil Street, Winchester, SO23 0HX

Speakers:
John McDonnell MP and LRC chair
Maria Exall, Communications Workers’ Union executive and LRC vice chair
Peter Millward, USDAW convenor, Twinings, Andover
Andrew Fisher, LRC joint secretary
Chair: Sarah Evans, NW Hants Labour candidate

LRC rally in Manchester calls for unity against the cuts

30th October 2010

The LRC rally ‘Stop the Cuts! There is an Alternative’ in Manchester on Saturday 30 October brought together campaigners in unity against the cuts. NUJ General Secretary Jeremy Dear outlined the alternative to cuts before briefly outlining the NUJ’s dispute with the BBC, which will see NUJ members on strike on 5/6 November (LRC members and supporters are encouraged to get to picket lines outside BBC buildings).

POA General Secretary Steve Gillan also addressed the meeting and emphasised the importance of trade union rights, and expressing his dismay at the failure of enough Labour MPs to back the Lawful Industrial Action Bill. Steve added that these unjust laws must not constrain action against the cuts.

The Rally heard from former Halifax Labour MP and LRC member Alice Mahon, who was followed by CWU Executive member Peter Keenlyside, outlining the threat to UK postal services from the Coalition government’s Postal Services Bill 2010, which aims to privatise the Royal Mail. FBU General Secretary Matt Wrack highlighted the struggle faced by firefighters in London, all of whom face the sack from 27 November as the Tory Fire Authority seeks to impose new terms and conditions. The meeting pledged its support to striking firefighters and LRC members and supporters are encouraged to attend picket lines in solidarity on Monday 1 November, and then Friday 5 and Saturday 6 November.

Preston Labour councillor Matthew Brown spoke to the meeting, and there was a lively discussion about the importance of engaging with Labour councillors, and prospective councillors, in anti-cuts campaigns - building local anti-cuts campaigns that will support councillors who resist the cuts. The coalition government is forcing local councils to implement its cuts and it will take time to build confidence and opposition among a new generation of councillors to refuse to pass on these cuts to their communities.
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John McDonnell MP, LRC Chair, rounded off a very positive event with a call for unity and solidarity against the cuts and attacks on public services and the welfare state.

Trade unionists from the UCU, NUT, PCS, Unison, GMB - as well as a range of campaigners - also spoke in the debate from the floor.

Solidarity with striking Tube workers

27th October 2010

Calling all trade unionists! Threat to London Underground Jobs
Join our Day of Action - Friday 29th October 2010

Tory Mayor Boris Johnson is threatening to axe 2,000 jobs at London Underground. Tube workers are clear that this will damage the service afforded to passengers and undermine safety. This Friday (29th October) RMT and TSSA will hold a mass distribution of leaflets across the Tube network explaining why we are fighting to protect this vital public service and we would be very pleased if other trade unionists could join us in a show of solidarity.
We would like to invite you to join our members at 8am leafleting outside the following stations on Friday 29th October 2010:

*Earl’s Court
*Finsbury Park
*Kings Cross
*Liverpool Street
*Manor House
*Oxford Circus
*Victoria
Download the RMT and TSSA’s briefing on the dispute, which demonstrates the widespread concerns of Londoners.

It is clear that the actions of the Tory Mayor are a foretaste of the coalition Government’s austerity cuts where essential public services are not protected. Our Unions have formed a broad coalition with pensioner groups and transport campaigners as well as other unions to fight these proposals.

Thank you for your support.
Yours sincerely,

Bob Crow, RMT General Secretary
Gerry Doherty, TSSA General Secretary

Lawful Industrial Action Bill falls in Parliament

22nd October 2010

The Tories and Lib Dems today (Fri 22 Oct) talked out the Lawful Industrial Action Bill, proposed by John McDonnell MP, and supported by every trade union - having won the unanimous backing of the 2010 TUC Congress in September.

John McDonnell MP, LRC Chair, said:

“Today we have seen a revisiting of past practices of filibustering to deny the will of the House—practices that brought this House into disrepute and that we thought this new Parliament would put to one side. I believe it is a shame and a disgrace.”

An attempt was made to force a vote on the Bill, which required 100 MPs to vote in favour. Only 87 MPs (82 Labour) turned up to vote in favour. Download the Excel spreadsheet which details which MPs voted and which did not. Download the spreadsheet here.

Lobby your MP to back the Lawful Industrial Action (Minor Errors) Bill

8th October 2010

John McDonnell MP is sponsoring the Lawful Industrial Action (Minor Errors) Bill as his private members Bill in Parliament. The Bill would tackle the increasing practice by employers of using minor technical errors in the balloting process - which have no material effect on the outcome - to take unions to court in order to prevent them from taking industrial action.

The Bill is being debated in Parliament on Friday 22 October, and requires 100 MPs to attend the debate and to vote for it. If you have a Labour MP, please lobby them to attend and vote for the Lawful Industrial Action (Minor Errors) Bill. Come to the Lobby of Parliament and Rally on 13 October to tell your MP to back the Bill.

You can lobby your MP by email using the e-action through the PCS website or download the model letter from the RMT website to print out. You can also download the briefing on the Bill, prepared by John Hendy QC.

John McDonnell MP said:

“We have seen in the current BA Cabin Crew dispute and many other recent disputes, employers have been able to exploit loopholes in the existing law by using minor technical errors in a trade union ballot to thwart trade unionists from taking strike action.

“This resort to the courts by some ruthless employers is bringing current employment law into disrepute and undermining industrial relations in this country. This cannot be right and in the interests of good industrial relations needs to be addressed.” 

Read Prof Keith Ewing’s article from the Morning Star (09/10/10), urging Labour MPs to back the Bill

Keep the Post Public

18th September 2010

The Coalition Government has announced plans to privatise Royal Mail. The government’s ideologically driven cuts programme is about redistributing wealth and power from poor to rich - and the privatisation of the Royal Mail is part of that. An opinion poll in August 2010 showed that only 15% of the public agrees with privatising Royal Mail while 60% believe the Royal Mail should remain a wholly publicly-owned organisation.

Here’s what you can do to keep the post public:

• Download the model motion and get it passed in your CLP or trade union branch
• Download the petition and get signatures in your local community
• Download the postcard and sent it to your MP
• Ask your MP to sign EDM 738 ‘Royal Mail’
• Visit the CWU website for more information

Billy Hayes, CWU general secretary, said:

“Privatisation is old politics. It’s the failed politics of history which brought disruption to Britain’s utilities and railways and astronomical prices for consumers. Dangerously in this case, we fear the government may also be plotting to seize the pension assets.

“Privatisation would be devastating for Royal Mail and the whole country’s postal services. The universal service has been a key part of the UK post for 170 years but because it isn’t the profitable element of mail, the privatisation will put it at risk. This could damage the service for all customers including millions of small business and potentially harm the UK economy. Privatisation will also mean separation of Royal Mail and the post office network, putting the very existence of many more post offices that play such a key role in Britain’s communities at risk.

“Closures, cuts and profit will rule while customers, small businesses, communities and tax payers lose out. This report is politically motivated to please the ideology of the coalition. People who work in the industry know that privatisation has no positive role in this public service. Richard Hooper’s report of 2008 was flawed and his vision was proved to be unachievable. He still doesn’t have the answers to the challenges facing the postal service but faithfully trots out what his political masters request.

“Royal Mail has always been a privatisation too far and there is a public majority out there who will vote this government out for flogging off our national assets and breaking our public services.”

Contemporary motions at Labour Party conference

26th August 2010

Democracy returns to Labour Party conference this year as CLPs again have the right to submit motions to conference and delegates to vote on them. CLPs have until 12 noon on 17 September to submit a contemporary motion to conference.

The criteria are:
• Motions must refer to an issue which arose after the publication of the reports of the National Policy Forum (NPF), Policy Commissions or National Executive Committee on 31 July or has not been substantively addressed in those reports.
• Motions must not exceed 250 words
• Motions must be on one subject only

The LRC has drafted two motions on Tax Justice (download pdf file) and on the Lawful Industrial Action Bill (download pdf) and we urge you to try to get one passed by your CLP. Please email (JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) to let us know if you get either of these motions passed (CLPs can only submit one contemporary motion or rule change to conference).

For more information on LRC campaigning for the Lawful Industrial Action Bill see our campaign news

For more information on the issue of Tax Justice, see Richard Murphy’s recent Guardian article and the Tax Justice Network website.

Back Susan Press and Christine Shawcroft for the NEC

11th August 2010

The LRC is supporting our vice chair Susan Press and National Committee member Christine Shawcroft for election to the Labour Party NEC this year. Labour Party members will receive ballot papers for the NEC elections in September, and we urge all members and supporters to vote for Susan and Christine - and to urge fellow party members to do so too.

Both Susan and Christine are committed to reporting back and being accountable to all Labour Party members, to extending party democracy, to break from New Labour and to build a Labour Party on core Labour values of peace, socialism, justice and equality. Please download the statements in support of Susan Press and Christine Shawcroft, and distribute them to your fellow party members

Susan and Christine were democratically elected by LRC conference 2009 to go forward as LRC reps on the centre-left slate. Unfortunately, despite extensive negotiations, there was no consensus to form a Centre-Left Grassroots Alliance this year, and so we urge members to vote for Susan and Christine.

Joe Marino, BFAWU General Secretary said:

“I am supporting both Susan Press and Christine Shawcroft for the Labour Party NEC because of their lifelong commitment to the party and to restoring full democracy to Labour conference and every part of our party.

“They also value the party’s vital links with its trade union base, and are committed to strengthening these links to make our party more reflective of the needs of ordinary working people”

Download the article supporting Susan and Christine by John McDonnell MP and the LRC’s joint secretaries.

LRC statement on the Labour leadership

9th August 2010

The LRC has written to all candidates in the Labour leadership contest, asking them their views on three key issues:

• The immediate withdrawal of troops from Afghanistan;
• Complete opposition to public sector cuts and further privatisation of public services so that ordinary people to do not pay for the economic crisis; and
• The fight for trade union freedom so that we can protect ourselves at this difficult time – including supporting John McDonnell’s Private Members Bill to tackle employers taking trade unions to courts over minor irregularities in the balloting process.

We also asked them about the nomination process for Labour leadership elections. Responses have so far been received from Diane Abbott and David Miliband, which you can download.

Following further consideration, the LRC has decided to critically support Diane Abbott for Labour leader

LRC statement on Labour leadership

The Parliamentary Labour Party disenfranchised thousands of Labour Party members and trade unionists by not nominating John McDonnell – the most credible left candidate with the most grassroots support, and consistent champion of socialist policies in Parliament.

A complete democratic transformation of our party is needed to ensure power lies with the many and not the few, and reform of the nomination process for Leader must be an urgent part of this campaign. Nomination must be the right of all sections of the Party, not just MPs.

However, the voting record of Diane Abbott and some of her policy positions makes her the only candidate with a left track-record in the Labour leadership election. Indeed all the other candidates were New Labour cabinet ministers who never dissented when in office from the policies that alienated Labour supporters.

In response to correspondence from the LRC, Diane stated that she is “calling for withdrawal of our troops from Afghanistan”, in “complete opposition to the Lib Con cuts” and “supporting John McDonnell’s trade union freedom bill”.

However we do have concerns that her statements throughout this campaign have not been consistent. For example she has publicly stated on several occasions that she supports a phased withdrawal from Afghanistan, and wants 50% of government budget ‘savings’ to be found by cuts to public services.

We urge members of the Party, affiliated unions and socialist societies to vote for Diane as their first preference, but to call on her to be more consistent in her opposition to cuts in public services and the withdrawal of troops from Afghanistan. We also urge her to cooperate with all sections of the left to help achieve these aims.

LRC backs Ken Livingstone as Labour candidate for Mayor

9th August 2010

Vote Ken Livingstone for London Mayor

Members of the Labour Party and affiliated unions and societies in London will shortly be balloted on who should be the Party’s candidate for Mayor of London in the election to take place in 2012.

We urge everyone to vote for Ken Livingstone. During his terms as Mayor, Ken made great improvements in public transport around London, while opposing public-private partnerships, something in which his judgement has been fully borne out.

Livingstone has a record of opposing racism and has not made the concessions to racism that many Labour politicians have done. He promoted the annual anti-racist festival since scrapped by Boris Johnson. He also opposed Blair’s wars and worked hard to avert a racist backlash after the London bombings in July 2005. However, his defence of the police action in the aftermath of the shooting of Jean Charles de Menezes is a serious blot on this record.

Livingstone’s promise to work to protect Londoners from the effects of the ConDem government’s cuts in public spending is welcome, but in order to do so he must develop a more positive relationship with trades unions and their activists than was the case during his second term.

We encourage LRC supporters to support Ken Livingstone as the best Labour candidate standing for London Mayor.

Get nominations for NEC and NPF candidates

13th June 2010

National Executive Committee

The LRC is backing Susan Press and Christine Shawcroft for the Labour Party NEC. Download their statements here.

Susan is LRC vice chair, a town councillor and member of Calder Valley CLP; while Christine is a sitting NEC member and based in Nottingham South CLP. Download their statements here, and let us know if you get them nominated at your CLP by emailing us at (JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address)

National Policy Forum

Please also seek nominations from your CLP for candidates in your region:

East of England: John Aitken (Southend West), Russell Cartwright (Luton South), Jenny Holland (Harlow), Lorna Trollope (Castle Point), Toby Brown (South West Norfolk – Young Labour)

East Midlands: Val Graham (Chesterfield), Charmaine Morgan (Grantham), Ian Morrison (Sherwood),

London: Gary Heather (Islington North) (download Gary’s statement), Gordon Nardell (Dulwich & West Norwood) (download Gordon’s statement), Shani Gray (Islington North – Young Labour)

North East: Veronica Killen (Hexham), Matthew Teale (City of Durham), Andrew Campbell (Jarrow – Young Labour)

North West: Mohammed Azam (Oldham West & Royton), Wendy Dwyer (Hyndburn), Paul France (Bury North), Christine Muspratt (Wirral South), Becky Hodgson (Lancaster & Fleetwood – Young Labour).

Scotland: Ann Henderson (Edinburgh South) and Gordon McKay (North Ayrshire & Arran)

South East: Heather Elliott (Maidenhead – Young Labour), David Morrison (Chichester), Murray Rowlands (Surrey Heath)

South West: Vicky Black (West Dorset), David Stokes (Bournemouth East), Ann Philips, Gus Baker (Bristol West – Young Labour) plus one to be confirmed.

Wales: Nick Davies (Swansea West), Gail Giles (Newport West), Annabelle Harle (Cardiff West), Darren Williams (Cardiff West)

West Midlands: Mick Archer, Ben Symak (Birmingham Northfield – Young Labour) plus others to be confirmed.

Yorkshire & Humber: David Levene (York Central – Young Labour),  George McManus (Leeds North East), Alex Sobel (Leeds North East)

John McDonnell: I’m withdrawing from Labour leadership race

9th June 2010

Dear Comrades

I am writing to let you know that I have withdrawn from the Labour Party leadership race this morning.

I stood for the Labour leadership as the candidate of the Left and trade union movement so that there could be a proper debate about Labour’s future in which all the wings of the party were fully represented. It is now clear that I am unlikely to secure enough nominations and so I am withdrawing in the hope that we can at least secure a woman on the ballot paper.

We came into this campaign knowing that it would be really difficult to obtain sufficient nominations but we knew we had to try. The support we received from rank and file party members and from trade unionists was just overwhelming but we still could not overcome the barrier of gaining sufficient support from Labour MPs.

I appealed to the party leadership to lower the qualifying bar to allow all the candidates on the ballot paper. It was perfectly possible within the existing rules for this to be done. Reducing the bar to 5% would have allowed all the declared candidates to get on the ballot paper and the Party to have a full and open debate about its future direction. The party hierarchy refused and instead threw its weight behind one candidate.

I know that many Labour activists and trade unionists will be disappointed.

I want to thank you for all your hard work in lobbying and campaigning to secure sufficient nominations to get me on the ballot paper. You could not have worked harder.

I am urging everyone to continue the fight for democracy within the party so that in future elections rank and file members will be represented by the candidate of their choice.

We must also now throw our energies into the campaign to resist the cuts that the Coalition government is launching against our community. Providing leadership in this struggle is critically important in this coming period. We will be convening rallies and demonstrations and linking up with trade union action to resist the cuts. Let’s rise to this challenge.

Yours in solidarity,

John McDonnell MP

End the blockade of Gaza says John McDonnell

1st June 2010

Labour Leadership Candidate, John McDonnell, has called upon the other Labour leadership contenders to support a joint statement condemning the Israeli attack on the aid flotilla and to call for the immediate lifting of the blockade of Gaza.

John said

“After this brutal act of aggression by Israeli forces I am asking all the Labour leadership candidates to support a joint statement condemning the Israeli attack and calling for the blockade on Gaza to be lifted immediately.

“At this critical time it is vitally important that the Labour Party is seen to be united in its condemnation of this brutal assault and in supporting the people of Gaza secure the aid and humanitarian assistance they desperately need by ensuring the blockade is lifted.”

The LRC will also be taking part in the demonstration on 5th June in London - assemble 1:30pm at 10 Downing Street

Read Jeremy Corbyn MP’s article in the Morning Star

Grassroots organisations call on MPs to allow full Leader contest

26th May 2010

Letter to The Guardian from Labour grassroots organisations calling on MPs “to co-ordinate their nominations and give all members and affiliates the broadest possible choice in the fullest debate representing all shades of opinion within our party and among our supporters”.

Dear Editor,

The electoral college process for electing Labour’s leader and deputy leader strikes a balance between MPs, members and trade unions. However, this and the previous leadership election have shown there are problems with the nomination process to get candidates on the ballot for all sections of the party to vote on.

Labour is a coalition of individual members, trade unions and other affiliated socialist societies. At its best it represents a broad church of opinion on the left. We welcome the extension of the nomination period, which now gives MPs the opportunity to consult with their local parties, trade unions and communities. However, we believe that with six candidates in the race the 12.5% threshold – meaning candidates must secure the backing of 33 MPs – is too onerous.

In future we believe there should be a procedure to give sections of the party (members and trade unions as well as MPs) the opportunity to nominate candidates. For this contest we call on MPs to nominate to give all parts of the party a choice. We believe that MPs should ensure that all six declared candidates receive sufficient nominations to be on the ballot paper. In this way MPs can be the protectors of democracy.

We are asking Labour MPs to co-ordinate their nominations and give all members and affiliates the broadest possible choice in the fullest debate representing all shades of opinion within our party and among our supporters.

Andrew Fisher (Labour Representation Committee), Neal Lawson (Compass), Peter Kenyon (Save the Labour Party), Sunder Katwala, Alex Smith (LabourList)

Trade Unions back John for Labour Party Leader

23rd May 2010

The Labour Party affiliated BFAWU trade union has written to all Labour MPs urging them to nominate John McDonnell. In a letter to MPs, Joe Marino (General Secretary) and Ronnie Draper (President) write:

“BFAWU recognises the unquestionable and unwavering work that John McDonnell has done for the British trade union movement.

“We also welcome his determination that working people must not be made for a crisis that is not of their making, and his opposition to the Con-Dem cuts agenda that will devastate our communities.

“Therefore we are calling upon all Labour MPs and members of the Bakers Union Parliamentary Group in particular to nominate John McDonnell in the interests of party democracy, regardless of the final candidate they may choose to support.”

Download the LRC flyer: why we back John McDonnell for Leader
/ Download the model resolution and get it passed in your union branch or CLP
Separately, the non-affiliated union RMT has also come out backing John. Bob Crow, General Secretary, said:

“John McDonnell leads the RMT group in parliament and no MP has done more to fight against attacks on jobs, public services and workers rights. John is a tireless worker on behalf of trade unionists and the communities that will be there in the front line of the ConDem attack and he is the perfect alternative to the assorted candidates from Continuity New Labour.

“John McDonnell has a reservoir of support that extends way beyond the ranks of the Labour Party membership, it would be an absolute travesty if he was kept out of the race for the leadership and would send out a signal that the Labour Party machine has learnt absolutely nothing.

“On the big issues; defending public services, opposing privatisation, repealing the anti-trade union laws, bringing our troops home and supporting workers rights, John stands shoulder to shoulder with RMT and the trade union and socialist movement. He deserves our full support.”

Download the LRC flyer: why we back John McDonnell for Leader
/ Download the model resolution and get it passed in your union branch or CLP

Prior to these unions expressing their backing, Unison United Left - the broad left organisation within Unison - has also voted to support John McDonnell’s leadership, which was launched with a speech to the PCS conference on Wednesday 19th May and which received a standing ovation.

Join the ‘Trade Unionists for nominations for John McDonnell’ Facebook page.

Download the LRC flyer: why we back John McDonnell for Leader
/ Download the model resolution and get it passed in your union branch or CLP

Back Susan Press and Christine Shawcroft for the NEC

22nd May 2010

Our November 2009 AGM voted for Susan Press and Christine Shawcroft to be the LRC candidates for the members’ section of the Labour Party NEC - as part of the Centre-Left Grassroots Alliance slate. Now the time has come for you to secure nominations for both Susan and Christine from your CLP.

Susan is LRC vice chair, a town councillor and member of Calder Valley CLP; while Christine is a sitting NEC member and based in Nottingham South CLP. Download their statements here, and let us know if you get them nominated at your CLP by emailing us at (JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address)

Back John McDonnell for Leader - what you can do

21st May 2010

There are several things you can do NOW to help get John McDonnell on the ballot paper and ensure that as Labour Party members and trade unionists we have the choice to vote for a campaigning socialist as Labour leader:

• Please lobby your Labour MP to nominate John McDonnell
• If you don’t have a Labour MP, then why not lobby a Labour MP sponsored by your union or an MP who you’ve campaigned for
• Pass a resolution in your Labour Party branch or at your GC calling on MPs to nominate John McDonnell
• Pass a resolution in your trade union branch calling on your union to back John McDonnell
• Write to newspapers, magazine and on blogs and let people know why you’re backing John
• Join the John4Leader Facebook page

Download the flyer on why we back John McDonnell for Leader, to help you to build support

Thanks to your campaigning, we now have until 9th June to get the nominations for John McDonnell, but we need to build the pressure in every part of our movement

Let others hear what John has to say:

• Watch John McDonnell announce he is standing for Labour Party leader as he addresses PCS conference on Wednesday 19th May.
• Listen to John on BBC Radio 4’s Any Questions on Friday 21st May.

John on immigration in PCS conference speech:

Let me say this very, very clearly: I welcome people coming into this country, I welcome them. I stand proud of the United Kingdom and its role in offering asylum to those people desperately in need of asylum.

I’m the grandson of an Irish migrant. We contribute to the economy of this country. We’ve built it, we‘ve constructed it, we’ve populated its public services. We make a major contribution. And where there are divisions it is not because of migration it is because of the shortage of houses, because of the shortage of jobs as a result of a mismanaged economy.

At the end of the day… we need to be explaining to people that within fifty years we will have open borders across the world, you cannot build a fortress Europe or a fortress Britain and we should start preparing for that. And that does mean assistance to the developing world so that people aren’t forced out of their countries as a result of poverty. It does mean ending the arms trade where we contribute to the wars in the developing world

Hundreds of activists sign letter to support John McDonnell for Leader

21st May 2010

Hundreds of activists have signed a letter in the Guardian today to support John McDonnell for Leader. Leading signatories include Tony Benn, three MSPs, members of union executives, dozens of local councillors, and hundreds of ordinary party members.

The full list can be read at http://john4leader.wordpress.com/ and reads:

As a range of Labour party members, councillors, NEC members, trade unionists, activists, community workers and campaigners, we are asking Labour MPs to nominate John McDonnell in order to allow a genuine debate about the future direction of our party.

We are concerned that a contest between candidates with broadly the same views will fail to deliver the wide-ranging policy debate Labour urgently needs following our defeat at the polls.

We welcome John McDonnell’s commitment to a leadership debate based on the policies, not the personalities. We note John McDonnell’s long-standing support for workers’ rights, a peaceful foreign policy, publicly owned services, progressive taxation, an emergency council housing programme, a living wage, and civil liberties. We also welcome his determination that working people must not be made to pay for a crisis that is not of their making, and his opposition to the Con-Dem cuts agenda that will devastate our communities. We want these policies to be given a platform in the leadership campaign.

That is why we ask MPs to nominate John McDonnell, regardless of how they will subsequently vote, in order to allow an inspirational, comradely debate about the future direction of our party and our country.

LRC National Committee backs John McDonnell for Leader

16th May 2010

On Saturday, following the After the Election ... Join the Resistance! meeting, the LRC National Committee voted to back John McDonnell MP for Labour leader. Although John McDonnell has not declared his candidacy, the LRC urges him to stand as the best representative of socialist values within the Party.

The motion passed 22-0 by the National Committee read:

“The LRC endorses John McDonnell as the best candidate in the forthcoming Leadership election”.

We call on MPs to nominate John McDonnell to ensure that this time members and affiliated trade unionists get a proper choice for the next Labour Party leader. We urge LRC members and others to start lobbying Labour MPs to nominate and to pass motions in their CLPs and trade union branches to nominate John McDonnell for Labour leader.

We urge people who have left the Party to rejoin in order to vote for John. It has been confirmed that new members will be eligible to vote in the Labour leadership election.

After the Election . . . Join the Resistance! - Sat 15 May

14th May 2010

The LRC’s post-election meeting this Saturday, After the Election . . . Join the Resistance!, co-sponsored by CLPD, Convention of the Left, CWU, Labour Briefing, NUJ, Save the Labour Party, Right to Work and the Socialist Campaign to Stop the Tories and Fascists.

The meeting will be a discussion forum: lead off speeches and then as much time for discussion as possible – there’s many important issues for the left to discuss arising from the election, pressure from the markets, the new coalition government, and the vacancy at the top of the Labour Party.

Download the meeting flyer and the timetable for the day.

John McDonnell MP, LRC Chair, said:

“The role of the labour and trade union movement now is to build a broad anti-cuts coalition, to mobilise to protect our community against the coming attack on public services, wages and conditions, pensions and welfare benefits and to create links with the campaigns that are being waged across Europe and elsewhere in the world.

“We need to get back to our local communities to prepare for the defence of every service that comes under attack, every classroom teacher about to be laid off, every clinic or hospital facing closure and any group of people about to lose their state benefits.”

Read John McDonnell’s comments in full in his Morning Star article Fightback Starts Now

LRC on the London May Day march

1st May 2010

There was a large LRC contingent on the London May Day March and Rally. We carried the banner on the route of the march from Clerkenwell Green to Trafalgar Square and handed out copies of A Peoples Agenda, and flyers for the After the Election . . . Join the Resistance! meeting on Saturday 15th May.

We even bumped into and old friend who marched with us for a while!

INTERVIEW: Kevin Hind

27th April 2010

Kevin Hind, Labour PPC for Bury St Edmunds answers our questions and needs your help!

What three policies would you like to see in the next Labour Party manifesto?

1. Public Services not Private Profit: An end to PFIs and PPPs; progressive renationalisation of utilities and public transport; replacement of profit-making financial institutions with not-for-profit companies such as mutuals, credit unions and co-operatives.
2. Workers’ rights: A re-balancing of employment law in favour of workers; a charter of workers’ rights enforceable by law; extension of trade union recognition; application of the adult national minimum wage for all workers.
3. Education for the many not the few: A fully comprehensive education system with schools providing academic and vocational subjects in equal value; abolition of SATs and league tables; ending charitable status for private education and bringing private schools into the state sector; abolition of university tuition fees and restoration of maintenance grants.

What issues will you be campaigning on in Parliament if elected?
A People’s Parliament: A written constitution; whichever voting system I am convinced gives effect to greater democratic legitimacy; complete abolition of the Royal Prerogative and curtailment of executive control over Parliament; an elected second chamber with scrutiny and amendment powers only; removal of the ‘MP Filter’ between constituents and the Parliamentary Ombudsman; a wider Freedom of Information Act.

A socialist Foreign Policy:Establishment of a minister for conflict resolution; nuclear disarmament and non-renewal of Trident; reducing arms sales and expansion of conflict prevention; becoming a more ‘critical friend’ of the US; promotion of a social Europe that advances workplace and welfare rights. 

What do you think has been Labour’s greatest achievement and its greatest mistake in Government?
Greatest Achievements: The National Health Service, the Open University and the National Minimum Wage. 
Greatest Mistake: Supporting wars in Afghanistan and Iraq; not standing up effectively against global capitalism and neo-liberalism. 

What are the major local issues in Bury St Edmunds?
Closure of middle schools by Tory-led Suffolk County Council and the poor quality of local public transport. 

How can activists help you to win in Bury St Edmunds?
Canvassing, leafleting and generally getting the Labour vote to come out - there is a strong perception that a vote for Labour in the constituency is a wasted vote because Suffolk is such a Tory stronghold. However, Labour reduced the Tory majority to just 368 votes in 1997 when we also controlled the local council.

General Election Campaign: 2 weeks to go

23rd April 2010

With only two weeks to go until the General Election, it is more essential than ever that we get out on the streets canvassing for the return of socialist MPs. With a hung Parliament looking increasingly likely, it is all the more important to maximise the number of Labour left MPs we return.

We want to return our Chair John McDonnell MP with the biggest majority possible. John’s campaign needs all the support you can give it in these last two weeks. Mass Sunday canvass starts at 10.30 am from the Constituency Office in Pump Lane, Hayes, Middlesex, UB3 3NB (see map). There is also daily canvassing with teams going out at 10.30am, 2pm and 6pm. Any queries: Campaign HQ: 020 8573 3535

We are supporting around 30 candidates in total, click on a name to find out how you can help them – or make an online donation to the LRC General Election Fund

Candidates we’re backing: Diane Abbott (Hackney North & Stoke Newington), Ronnie Campbell (Blyth Valley), Martin Caton (Gower), Mark Chiverton (Isle of Wight), Katy Clark (North Ayrshire & Arran), Jeremy Corbyn (Islington North), John Cryer (Leyton & Wanstead), David Drew (Stroud), Sarah Evans (North West Hampshire), Paul Flynn (Newport West), Nia Griffith (Llanelli), David Hamilton (Midlothian), Gary Heather (Tunbridge Wells), David Heyes (Ashton-under-Lyne), Kevin Hind (Bury St Edmunds), Kelvin Hopkins (Luton North), Donna Hutton (Clwyd West), Ian Lavery (Wansbeck), John McDonnell (Hayes & Harlington), Michael Meacher (Oldham West & Royton), Austin Mitchell (Great Grimsby), John Morgan (Rutland & Melton), Katrina Murray (Dundee East), Gordon Prentice (Pendle), Linda Riordan (Halifax), Phil Sawford (Kettering), Lee Skevington (Yeovil), Dennis Skinner (Bolsover), Mike Wood (Batley & Spen)

Most candidates can let you have some phone canvassing to do if you can’t make it to their constituency.

Resources: If anyone would like hard copies of A People’s Agenda for distribution, please (JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) with your name, address, postcode and how many copies you need. You can also download a copy of A People’s Agenda

You can also download the Cuts? There is an Alternative flyer, jointly produced by LEAP and the Convention of the Left

Find out more about the LRC and our General Election campaign by watching our video: The LRC and the 2010 General Election

INTERVIEW: John Morgan

20th April 2010

Labour PPC for Rutland and Melton John Morgan responds to five questions about the sort of policies he wants nationally and locally, and how you can help him to win in Rutland and Melton:

What three policies would you like to see in the 2010 Labour manifesto?

1. More rights at work. Freedom of speech should include the right to put your case on a picket line. Right to strike, including secondary action, without needing the permission of a judge. While I am generally in favour of secret ballots, I am concerned that it does not allow for spontaneous action.
2. Stop privatising and start bringing more industries back into public ownership, including the railways, which could be brought back for free where Train Operating Companies do not fulfil their contracts.
3. A stronger commitment to resisting climate change, with intermediate targets as well as a long term one, and without going over to nuclear power

What issues will you be campaigning on in Parliament if re-elected?
More jobs. More rights at work. Oppose all “workfare” schemes. Oppose privatisation in the health service and the prison service. Save the Minor Injuries Unit at Rutland Memorial Hospital and Accident & Emergency Unit at Melton Hospital

What do you think has been Labour’s greatest achievement and its greatest mistake in Government?
Worst single decision was invading Iraq. Worst long term trend was to continue Tory privatisation.
Best single decision was to introduce the National Minimum Wage. Best long term trend was increased employment.

What are the major local issues in Rutland and Melton?
Save the Accident & Emergency Unit at Melton Hospital and the Minor Injuries Unit at Rutland Memorial Hospital. Save RAF Cottesmore. Oppose Conservative Councils (both Rutland and Melton) destroying small town shopping centres by building big supermarkets that distort the locl market, while putting up parking charges to high levels.

How can activists help you to win in Rutland and Melton?
Come and help. If you cannot come in person, we can get some telephone canvassing for you to do. If you cannot do that, please send us some cash so we can print some more leaflets.

Left MPs win victory on caste discrimination

7th April 2010

Left MPs John McDonnell and Jeremy Corbyn have successfully added a clause to the Equality Bill adding caste discrimination to the section dealing with race discrimination.

John McDonnell, who spearheaded this successful addition, told the Commons:

“The process started with representations received by a number of us from constituents and organisations such as the Dalit Solidarity Network and a series of temples across the country.

“Representations were made to us about some of the horrendous implications of caste discrimination transposed from the Indian subcontinent to this country.”

Jeremy Corbyn said the problem in Britain was a small part of “the massive amount of discrimination that exists throughout the world, whereby 200 million lower-caste individuals are systematically discriminated against.”

In parts of the Indian subcontinent, “they are killed, they live awful lives, do awful jobs and end up fundamentally underachieving.” 

The right to strike

3rd April 2010

LRC Chair John McDonnell MP today has a letter in The Guardian regarding the injunction against the RMT ballot, which derailed the planned national rail strike next week:

The media treatment of RMT and Bob Crow over the last 48 hours over the Network Rail strike ballot has been the worst example of a concerted campaign of media bias against a trade union that we have seen since the 1980s miners’ strike. John Humphrys’s interview of Bob Crow, with his references to ballot-rigging, and the BBC’s subsequent headline of “RMT’s Bob Crow denies ballot rigging”, was that disgusting classic of the old hack lawyer’s tactic of asking the defendant: “When did you stop beating your wife?”

Even the Guardian’s editorial (2 April) ignorantly weighed in with “No union that conducts its ballots properly according to the reasonable requirements of the law … would be in danger of being injuncted.” This reference to “reasonable requirements of the law” is patent rubbish. To hold a ballot the union must construct and supply the employer with a detailed and complex matrix of information setting out which members it is balloting, their job titles, grades, departments and work locations. The employer is under no obligation to co-operate with the union to ensure this is accurate. If there is the slightest inaccuracy, even where it did not affect the result, the ballot is open to being challenged by the employer and quashed by the courts.

There can be no question of the union ballot-rigging or interfering in the balloting process because it is undertaken by an independent scrutineer, usually the Electoral Reform Society, and all ballot papers are sent by post to the homes of the members being balloted, and returned to the ERS for counting. The union at no time handles the ballot papers.

On at least four occasions in the last three years I have tried in parliament on behalf of RMT and other TUC-affiliated unions to amend employment law to require employers to co-operate with unions in the balloting process so these problems can be overcome. Employers’ organisations, the Conservatives and the government have all opposed this reform.

The result is not fewer strikes but a deteriorating industrial relations climate as people become increasingly angry that their democratic wishes are frustrated by one-sided anti-trade-union laws.

John McDonnell MP

LRC launches ‘A People’s Agenda’

28th March 2010

The LRC has launched a pamphlet for the General Election 2010 - A People’s Agenda. The idea of the pamphlet is to generate the real political discussion we want at election time.

As LRC Chair John McDonnell MP, writes in the Introduction:

“As we go into the 2010 General Election, it is clear that much of the electorate feels it has no choice - with all the three major parties offering the same prescription for the UK: there will be cuts to your local services and to your pay - and quite possibly your job too.”

“This document sets out some broad ideas for the society we want. But we want your ideas and responses to”. (JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address).

Download a copy of A People’s Agenda

LRC vice chair Susan Press said:

“Alistair Darling’s only answer to the present crisis is cuts in public spending which will be “deeper and tougher” than Margaret Thatcher’s. The programme outlined in A People’s Agenda shows clearly that there is a socialist alternative to New Labour’s policies, which could transform our society. It’s time the many who are suffering because of the recession stopped paying for the few who continue to reap big bonuses at our expense.”

Download a copy of A People’s Agenda

Andrew Fisher, LRC joint secretary, said:

“Despite the consensus among the main three parties on public service cuts, privatisation, and the war in Afghanistan, there remains overwhelming public opposition to policies on offer at the 2010 General Election.

“This short pamphlet was commissioned to ensure an alternative agenda is put before voters at the election.”

Download a copy of A People’s Agenda

If you would like some hard copies of A People’s Agenda sent to you for distribution in your local area, please email us at (JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) telling us your name, address, postcode and how many copies you need. You may also want to consider making a donation to cover postage costs.

What others say:

Sarah Evans, Labour PPC for North West Hampshire:

“It outlines, perfectly, all the reasons that I joined the Labour Party; I believe it will provide encouragement to many people to rejoin the fight to bring about a future, truly fair for all.”

Campaign victory on Third Runway!

26th March 2010

Campaigners have won a High Court battle over plans for a third runway at Heathrow Airport. The court ruled that the public consultation process used was invalid as it was based on out-of-date figures.

John McDonnell MP said:

“This judgment is a victory. It means that whichever party is in government they will not now be able to force through Heathrow expansion.”

But this victory does not mean the campaign is over, there are still things you can do:

• Write to the Prime Minister, who still hasn’t got the message, and tell him to scrap the third runway - you can also (JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address)
• Join Airplot and become a beneficial owner (for free!) of a plot of land on the site of the proposed third runway
• Most importantly, get out campaigning for John McDonnell MP, every Sunday, 10:30am in Hayes



Back the RMT campaign against Network Rail cuts

25th March 2010

RMT and TSSA members have voted for strike action for four days from 6th April against cuts by Network Rail.

Network Rail has announced that they will cut 1,500 workers responsible for inspecting and repairing the track, signals and overhead lines. Hundreds of workers have contacted a confidential email line to say lives could be put at risk by reducing track safety inspections, delaying the repair of faulty level crossings, and reducing safety checks on railway signals.

Bob Crow, RMT General Secretary, said:

“These issues aren’t about extra money… this is about the safety of the railway network”

What you can do:

• Ask your MP to sign EDM 80 ‘Network Rail and Safety’ tabled by Linda Riordan MP
• Email Network Rail Chief Executive Iain Coucher ((JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address)) and tell him to stop the cuts
• Visit the RMT website for more information

Watch the video, including interviews with Bob Crow and John McDonnell MP to find out more



Strong support for PCS on Budget Day

24th March 2010

There was strong support for the PCS strike on Budget Day, most importantly from PCS members themselves, but great solidarity from other unions, LRC candidates and MPs, and LRC members.

Special mention also has to go to Carwyn Jones, Labour First Minister of the governing Labour-Plaid coalition in the Welsh Assembly - where no Labour or Plaid AMs crossed picket lines, effectively shutting down the Assembly. Carwyn said:


“Speaking as far as the Labour Party is concerned, its something that is ingrained in party thinking, that you don’t cross a picket line”

- the PLP might want to reflect on that point . . .

John McDonnell MP, LRC Chair (who refused to cross picket lines at Parliament), said:

“There is a real depth of anger amongst civil servants at the way the Government has torn up their basic contracts. If the Government was only willing to seek arbitration this dispute could be resolved.”

Bob Crow, RMT General Secretary, said:

“RMT fully supports the PCS in their campaign and as another union involved in a dispute over attacks on jobs, safety and working conditions on Network Rail we appreciate the importance of the maximum trade union solidarity that can be mobilised in the face of the growing threats to our members.

“While this weeks revelations show that the political class and the boss class are up to their necks in buying influence in sleazy meetings in posh hotels we will exert our influence where our movement always has - out on the streets and on our picket lines.”

Sarah Evans, Labour PPC for North West Hampshire, who joined PCS pickets in Andover, said:

“I am proud to support public service workers fighting to defend their terms and conditions.

“Public service workers often earn barely more than the minimum wage. I have pledged my support to do all I can to defend our public services and think that working people should not be made to pay for the recession brought about by the unregulated greed of bankers,”

Elaine Smith MSP said:

“This industrial action is not about fat cats with inflated bonuses taking a well deserved hit, but hard working people whose endeavour and commitment helps to keep this country running.  They are workers whom many people rely on daily and whose terms and conditions cannot simply be undermined those who think cuts are a simple solution to a much more complex problem.

“I would like to emphasise my full support for the striking workers, and call on the government to listen to the PCS suggestions about alternative ways of making savings without doing so at the expense of ordinary hard working public servants”

Watch the 19th March campaign video
See the PCS website for more details



INTERVIEW: Gary Heather

24th March 2010

LRC National Committee member and Labour PPC for Tunbridge Wells Gary Heather responds to our questions:

What three policies would you like to see in the 2010 Labour manifesto?
More affordable council housing; excellent education for all, not for just a few; a Tobin tax on currency speculation, used to address poverty at home and abroad.

What issues will you be campaigning on in Parliament if re-elected?
All the above; economic equality of opportunity – in employment, housing, education and health; repeal of the anti-union laws; a trade union freedom bill.

What do you think has been Labour’s greatest achievement and its greatest mistake in Government?
Achievement: The Northern Ireland peace process. 
Mistake: Not taxing the rich more and clamping down on tax avoidance sooner, so as to be able to reduce poverty more.

What are the major local issues in Tunbridge Wells?
Insufficient affordable housing; road congestion, parking and public transport; inequality of opportunity, with pockets of poverty and deprivation; the council’s failure to develop derelict property.

How can activists help you to win in Tunbridge Wells?
Call me on 07918 170 901 or email (JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) to help my campaign.



Solidarity with PCS: Support strike on Budget Day!

24th March 2010

Over 250,000 members of the PCS union will be taking further strike action on Budget Day 2010, Wednesday 24th March. This follows two days of action on 8th and 9th March to defend the Civil Service Compensation Scheme (CSCS).

The government is trying to make it easier and cheaper for whoever forms the next government to cut civil and public servants. The result would be poorer services delivered to the public and hardworking civil and public servants losing out.

With all the main political parties planning deep spending cuts, the union fears that the cuts to the scheme will lead to tens of thousands of job losses on the cheap.

What you can do:

*Join the demos in Westminster or Manchester or Liverpool or the rest of the country.
*Get down to your local picket line on Wednesday 24th March to show your support
*Lobby your MP in support of PCS members
*Ask your MP to sign EDM 251 ‘Civil Service Compensation Scheme’ tabled by Katy Clark MP
*Invite a PCS speaker to your trade union branch, trades council or CLP meeting. Email (JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address)

John McDonnell MP, LRC Chair, said:

“The Government has severely under-estimated the strength of feeling among civil servants and the anger that’s built up and led to this dispute.

“It is critical now that the Government returns to the negotiation table to avoid further disruption. This dispute could be resolved easily with flexibility from the Government.”

Katy Clark MP said:

“I think it is quite amazing that this is happening at a time when all the main political parties are calling for job losses.

“These are rights and entitlements which have been fought for over many years and if they’re lost now they won’t be got back easily.

“I think, quite understandably, civil servants are very angry about what is basically a cut in their wage packet.”

David Drew MP said:

“This is an outrageous intervention by Government relying on misinformation and spite rather than a fair policy on how we treat some of the lower paid members of the Civil Service who have given their life to public duty.”

Watch Mark Serwotka interviewed about the strike.
Watch: RMT TV video - solidarity with striking PCS civil servants
For more information see the PCS website.



INTERVIEW: Michael Meacher

23rd March 2010

Michael Meacher, Labour MP for Oldham West & Royton, answers our questions. Along with other LRC supported candidates, Michael also refused to cross PCS picket lines into Parliament on Budget Day.

What three policies would you like to see in the 2010 Labour manifesto?

1. The recession should be tackled not with cuts in essential public spending, but by massive public investment in house-building, infrastructure and the de-carbonisation of the economy.
2. A clean break must be made with market fundamentalism – deregulation and privatisation. Public provision should be expanded – in health care, education, housing, pensions, energy and transport.  Royal Mail must remain wholly in the public sector.
3. In the face of huge and unacceptable growth of inequality, a big redistribution programme must swing resources away from the rich to provide sizeable increases in pensions, the minimum wage, the lowest benefit levels, and to fund job creation and improved public services.  Union rights must be restored – it is in economic crisis that workers are most in need of that protection.
What issues will you be campaigning on in Parliament if re-elected?
1. a new alternative economic strategy following the death of neo-liberalism
2. effective policies to deal with climate change
3. the implementation of parliamentary reforms so that the executive is properly held to account by parliament

What do you think has been Labour’s greatest achievement and its greatest mistake in Government?
Labour’s greatest achievement: the national minimum wage (albeit at much too low a level) and big increases in spending on health and education; and Labour’s greatest mistake: allying with George Bush and waging war on Iraq

What are the major local issues in Oldham?
public housing shortage, with a terrible lack of new builds and now to be exacerbated by the proposed transfer of housing stock, and extreme incompetence by the Lib Dem controlled council which has recently spent £5m on legal costs.

How can activists help you to win?
Offers to help with leafleting, canvassing etc always welcome – ring Peter Dean, the Agent, on 0161 626 5779 or 0161 628 9874



Reinstate Alberto Durango – Protest 19 Mar

19th March 2010

The LRC is supporting the campaign to reinstate sacked cleaners’ rep Alberto Durango at UBS. The 19th March saw an international day of action against Swiss bank UBS, who via its contractor Lancaster has imposed an effective 10.75% pay cut on its cleaners in the City of London, while sacking shop steward Alberto Durango.

The protests were called in solidarity with the cleaners’ demands for stable working conditions, the sacking of the contractor and the reinstatement of Alberto Durango. Demos were held in London, Zurich, Edinburgh, Manchester, New York, Buenos Aires and Stockholm.

LRC joint Secretary Andrew Fisher spoke at the Rally outside UBS on Friday 19th March and offered solidarity from the LRC, while paying tribute to trade union activist and cleaners campaigner Alberto Durango.

Pass the draft motion in support of Alberto Durango and against UBS.
Watch the video of the demo




INTERVIEW: Katy Clark

17th March 2010

Katy Clark tell us her priorities locally and nationally ahead of the 2010 General Election:

What three policies would you like to see in the 2010 Labour manifesto?

• A significant increase in the basic state pension
• A commitment to get rid of Trident
• The end of privatisation of public services and decent levels of funding for public services

What issues will you be campaigning on in Parliament if re-elected?
Defending public services, extending employment rights, improving equal pay law, redistribution of wealth and power. 

What do you think has been Labour’s greatest achievement and its greatest mistake in Government?
Greatest achievement: the NHS and since 1997 the national minimum wage
Greatest mistake: Iraq

What are the major local issues in North Ayrshire & Arran?
Jobs, the economy and economic regeneration

How can activists help you to win in North Ayrshire & Arran?
We need help with canvassing, leafleting, telephone canvassing( can be done from anywhere), data entry, envelope stuffing and help with the constituency office once the election is called. Financial help would also be appreciated – cheques should be sent to my agent Gordon McKay



INTERVIEW: Sarah Evans

17th March 2010

An email interview with Sarah Evans, Labour PPC for North West Hampshire.

What three policies would you like to see in the 2010 Labour manifesto?
A commitment to a massive council house building programme, an end to the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq and a pledge to honour the UN Charter. A commitment to end PFI and to ensure that public services will be delivered in the public sector.

What issues will you be campaigning on in Parliament if elected?
Council-house building, affordable and publicly run public transport, renationalisation of the utilities and ending fuel poverty, tackling climate change and ensuring access for all to a free and publicly funded education.

What do you think has been Labour’s greatest achievement and its greatest mistake in Government?
Labour’s greatest achievement has been the massive spending on health (it’s a shame so much has gone to PFI projects).

Labour’s greatest mistake has been the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, with a senseless waste of life, a senseless waste of billions that could have been spent on public services and has left the world less safe and less secure.

What are the major local issues in North West Hampshire?
North West Hampshire needs more skilled, well paid jobs, public transport and council homes. Much of the area is rural so young and old alike are often isolated in small villages. The combination of a shortage of council homes and very expensive homes in many of the villages results in young people moving away from family and friends in order to find somewhere they can afford to live. The Tory controlled authorities favour building the majority of new homes in Andover, the largest centre of population in the constituency, leaving the villages short of homes. There are very few facilities on many of the estates, leaving young people with little to do. Andover’s birth centre is often threatened with closure, and recently had to close for a few months, due to a shortage of midwives. The opening hours for the minor injuries unit in Andover have also been cut over the years, forcing people to drive nearly 20 miles to a bigger hospital in Winchester.

How can activists help you to win in North West Hampshire?
Activists can help in NW Hampshire by getting involved with the local campaigns – including the campaign to save jobs at Twinings, opposing rail cuts, supporting public-sector workers, delivering leaflets, door knocking, and generally helping to build the labour movement in NW Hampshire. For further details you can (JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address)



INTERVIEW: David Drew

17th March 2010

A quick email interview with David Drew, current MP for Stroud.

What three policies would you like to see in the 2010 Labour manifesto?

1. Renationalisation of the railways
2. Restore Trade Union rights to before Thatcher’s destructive regime
3. Eradication of child and pensioner poverty

What issues will you be campaigning on in Parliament if re-elected?
See above and;

• No return to fox hunting
• Protection of public sector jobs
• The LEAP agenda for the economy, including cracking down on tax havens, etc

What do you think has been Labour’s greatest achievement and its greatest mistake in Government?
Achievement: Starting to deal with the problem of child poverty including Sure Start and investment in education.
Mistake: Iraq and Afghanistan

What are the major local issues in Stroud?
Many and varied:

• Protection of jobs in both manufacturing and the public sector
• Pensions
• Fox hunting
• Planning issues and the countryside

How can activists help you to win in Stroud?
We need bodies out on the street but if not then contacting uncontacted voters, and then there is piles of delivering to do!

Go to the David Drew profile page



Women hunger strikers under threat of deportation

23rd February 2010

Over 22 women are still on hunger strike in Yarl’s Wood Removal Centre. Five are on suicide watch and one has been taken to health care after self-harming. At least eight women have been threatened with removal since the start of the hunger strike on 5 February. Four women were transferred to prison. Three women have managed to stop their removals and others are in the process of doing so with the help of supporters and lawyers. At least five women have been released. Some have been referred to lawyers because they suffered violence and racist abuse from guards or because their detention is illegal.

John McDonnell MP, LRC Chair who has today written to Justice Minister Jack Straw and Immigration Minister Phil Woolas, said:

“That these women have been driven to make the only form of protest left available to them - to risk their own lives in the pursuit of justice and dignity - is a testament to the inhumanity and barbarism of immigration detention.

“We urgently need an investigation into the alarming reports and allegations of mistreatment and clarification at all the women’s well being.

“Hidden away and out of sight thousands of migrants are being imprisoned and degraded - many of whom are victims of torture and abuse. This Government’s appalling treatment of people who have simply moved from one country to another is a disgraceful mark of shame on UK’s human rights record. The true measure of a civilised society is how it treats some of its most vulnerable members.”

John McDonnell has tabled EDM 919 ‘Hunger Strike at Yarl’s Wood Immigration Removal Centre’

You can help:
a) Write to Minister of State Phil Woolas MP (JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) or (JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) to condemn the detention of victims of rape and other torture, of mothers separated from their children and anyone who does not face imminent removal. Such detention flouts international conventions and UK immigration rules.

b) Write to women inside. (JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) if you can write to women who want to receive letters. Remember, the first people killed in the concentration camps were those that got no mail.  Help ensure the guards and the government know that women are not forgotten. 

c) Help find legal representation for women to lodge or appeal an asylum claim.  Most women don’t have lawyers or their lawyers do nothing. Some demand extortionate fees. Most women’s cases are not “straightforward” so many lawyers won’t take them.  Legal aid cuts have reduced the paid time that lawyers can spend on each case.

d) Money to pay for phone calls to keep in touch with lawyers and supporters. We are sending £10 in to a limited number of women to pay for phone costs.

The All African Women’s Group (AAWG) and Black Women’s Rape Action Project (BWRAP) need help.  With Women Against Rape, we are now working flat out to try to stop women being removed.  For two weeks we have been taking and returning calls to over 20 women a day (calling out from Yarl’s Wood is very expensive).  We are regularly posting updates, and faxing legal and other information in to women. AAWG is unfunded and BWRAP operates on a shoestring budget.  Any help to cover the costs of these expenses will be gratefully received. 

Email: AAWG: (JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address)  BWRAP: (JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address)
Crossroads Women’s Centre
230a Kentish Town Rd
London NW5 2AB
020 7482 2496 / 07980659831

All women have compelling cases to be released because they are: mothers separated from their children; survivors of rape and other torture, detained contrary to Home Office rules; not facing imminent removal.

 



Support Airplot! Stop Heathrow Expansion

16th February 2010

In 2009, activists against the third runway bought a piece of land slap bang in the middle of the proposed third runway site at Heathrow. Now there is a campaign to get 100,000 people to sign up as beneficial owners of ‘Airplot’ - the piece of land owned by those opposed to Heathrow expansion. You can become a beneficial owner for FREE, so sign up today.

John McDonnell MP, LRC Chair and whose constituency includes Heathrow, said:

“We’ve bought the runway from under the Government’s nose and we’re going to stop them expanding Heathrow. We’ll defend this land in the courts and we’ll never let the bulldozers on.
“We can beat climate change, but not by almost doubling the size of the world’s biggest international airport.
“We need your support to stop Heathrow expansion. Sign up to airplot today!”



Lee signs up to CarerWatch pledge

9th February 2010

Lee Skevington, Labour PPC for Yeovil, has signed up to the CarerWatch pledge to End Carer Poverty.



Sarah signs up to CarerWatch pledge

3rd February 2010

Sarah Evans, Labour PPC for North West Hampshire, has signed up to the CarerWatch pledge to End Carer Poverty.



Michael signs up to CarerWatch pledge

2nd February 2010

Michael Meacher has signed up to the CarerWatch pledge to End Carer Poverty.



Support the Week of Action (February 13-20) organised by Hands Off the People of Iran!

31st January 2010

We are asking you to give support to a ‘Week of Action’ that our comrades in Hands Off the People of Iran are organising for Saturday, February 13-Saturday, February 20. (See the LRC website for the Hopi on the event - www.l-r-c.org.uk).

This week of solidarity is timed to coincide with the fall of the Shah’s regime in 1979. It will highlight Hopi’s principled message – no to any imperialist attack on Iran; no to the theocracy!

This message could not be more timely. In Iran over the same period, we expect to see millions of people on the streets to express once again their mounting opposition to the deeply split Islamic Republic regime. It is these people - the Iranian masses - that must deal with the Ahmadinejad regime, not Brown or Obama.

The Week of Action will see solidarity meetings, fundraisers, stalls, teach-ins and benefit gigs right across the country and in Ireland. We are hoping to organise a protest outside the BBC World Service to demand that it gives a voice to the thousands of radicalising workers, women and students in struggle. Its coverage so far has had a worrying tendency to present the crisis as simply battle between two ‘big beasts’ of the regime – a ‘liberal’ Mir-Hossein Moussavi and a ‘hardline’ Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.

Last August, the Labour Representation Committee and Hopi organised a similar solidarity event – a highly successful cricket match and benefit gig that raised over £1,500 for our comrades in Iran. We hope to be able to raise at least as much again – something that should be easily achieved if we put our minds to it and draw in support from as many of our supporting unions, organisations, campaigns and individuals as we can.

The money is absolutely vital to our beleaguered comrades. They organise in the harshest of conditions. Sanctions disrupt their lives, impoverish their families and hamper their ability to organise. Yet, they still they manage to organise.

The bellicose noises coming out of Israeli and the US continue to ratchet up the tension in Iranian society, narrowing the space for the workers’ and progressive movements to organise without being accused of ‘treason’. Yet, still they are brave enough to organise.

Trade union rights are strictly circumscribed and even the basic workers’ rights are viewed with deep suspicion by the brutal theocratic regime. It has a collective memory of the pivotal role of the workers in the 1979 revolution – and an abiding fear that this class could turn society on its head once more if it could again move decisively.

The working people and progressive movements of Iran find the energy and sheer guts to organise. We have to duty to organise alongside them.

We look forward to your support,

John McDonnell MP

For more information, check out the LRC and Hopi websites: www.l-r-c.org.uk and www.hopoi.org



Kevin signs up to CarerWatch pledge

26th January 2010

Kevin Hind, Labour PPC for Bury St Edmunds, has signed up to the CarerWatch pledge to End Carer Poverty.



Priorities in the Labour Party

25th January 2010

The Labour Party is consulting on its manifesto for the General Election this year. You can submit policy ideas to http://www.labourspace.com/thechoice. Please copy any submissions to the LRC at: (JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address).

Last year’s Labour Party annual conference agreed that the elections for the 55 CLP seats on the National Policy Forum would in future be decided by an OMOV ballot of the whole party membership. This was a rule change that the LRC actively supported along with other socialists and progressives in the party. Later in the year nominations will open for these positions. Can comrades start thinking about who the LRC could promote and support in these elections. Please submit names with contact details to: (JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address).

Finally, CLP AGMs are approaching - so please do your best to get elected to branch, constituency or local government positions.  Some CLPs may also be deciding on their annual conference delegates earlier than usual, as parties will be asked to suspend meetings when the General Election is called. And also consider standing in parliamentary or local government candidate selections.

If you need further advice on any of the above issues please contact Gary Heather (Chair, LRC Labour Party Liaison Unit) on: 07918 170 901 or at: (JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address).

LRC members should actively support socialist candidates on the LRC slate in the General Election campaign.