Report on Left Unity Meetings in East London/Hackney (complete report)

 

Hackney Left Unity at work

Hackney Left Unity at work

Pete Green reports on two Left Unity meetings in East London and Hackney

The East London/Hackney group has now had two meetings as well as a Saturday afternoon trip to the Rio cinema for a showing of The Spirit of 45 to which quite a few people came. 23 people came to the first meeting in Bethnal Green from all over East London and 13 to the second in Stoke Newington which was billed as a planning meeting with all but one from Hackney (and only five who had been at the first meeting). Altogether I estimate that over 30 different contacts on our lists have come either to the meetings or to the Rio and we now have over 70 on the email list including  around 30 new people who signed up after the film showing.

The first meeting agreed to remain a unified group for the time being. The main reason  was that most people were from Hackney with only a few each from Tower Hamlets, Newham and Redbridge so having a Hackney only group would have left the others feeling quite small. But given the rate at which new people are signing up to the email list we are optimistic that we can soon split into separate groups for each borough. We are now planning a larger meeting for May 15 to which we intend to invite all those on the list along with people from local campaign groups and other sympathisers we know (but there was some debate over whether we should make it an open public meeting, or an invitation only event , and that question  still has to be resolved at another planning meeting scheduled for May 2 which will also elect delegates to the national meeting on May 11).

The group meetings have been very diverse with respect to age, gender, and background – but as several people have commented  not so far very representative of the many ethnic minority communities in this part of London.  There are a few people like myself, recently retired with 40+ years of political and trade union activity, and rather more I’m pleased to say who are new to organised politics apart from engagement with campaigns such as defending the NHS, the Occupy Movement and  UK Uncut. There are some who belong to other political groups or networks (Socialist Resistance, Workers Power and the new International Socialist Network and even one person still in the Green Party) but the majority have no such identification. One person is a Greek activist living in Dalston who is also a member of Syriza and we have agreed to have a Syriza speaker at our meeting on May 15. Almost all however, seem to agree that we want a new  party with individual membership not a coalition of existing groups. We also agreed to participate in  and help build the proposed East London People’s Assembly scheduled for June 1 although some felt there is a danger that the big People’s Assembly on June 22 will have too many people at a top table telling us why we need to get Labour back into government.

As one person stressed at the end of the Stoke Newington meeting  she has signed up to a discussion about forming a new party, not to join one. Like many she feels that there are important principles which need to be affirmed (accountability,  inclusivity, participation and transparency are recurrent themes) and issues which need to be clarified through democratic debate involving as many different people as possible. At both meetings we have sat in a circle (or rectangle) and chairs/facilitators have sought to involve everyone in the discussion starting with brief statements about who we are (or were) and what each of us want from a new type of party. Those who are younger and new to political parties but with experience of the Occupy movement or other campaigns have already questioned the way in which meetings are run in established parties. One person recommended looking at www.seedsforchange.org.uk for guidance on how to conduct meetings. For people like myself used to more formal trade union meetings this is salutary although it might take a while for us to adapt to the handwaving  gestures of assent favoured by some. Where we all agree is that we want it to be both democratic and fun!

At our second meeting there was a discussion about the Ken Loach film. On this there was a revealing divergence. Many found it very informative and some spoke of how little they knew about the period and the 1945 Labour government. But some also suggested that the last part of the film, the saga of defeats in the Thatcher years and what’s happened since,  was a bit depressing and they felt a bit deflated by the discussion  (organised by the Socialist Party operating under the TUSC banner) in the cinema afterwards which emphasised how bad things have got. Others saw it as a wake-up call to try to resist any more austerity and privatisation of the NHS and as  a reminder of what was possible when there was a mass movement from below demanding change.  Nobody however appeared to be under any illusion that this would happen easily or quickly or that the next Labour Government would be much different to the last one.

I will end on a personal note: if this movement/party is to be healthy and grow  we have to bring together those different cultures and generations: from the old left and the trade union movement and from the Occupy movement and UK uncut; from the 1968/early 1970s  generation now retiring from full-time work and those in their 20s struggling to find permanent employment and with the prospect of working until they are 70 or older; the slightly cynical and jaded ex-members of parties like Labour and the SWP and those who are completely new to party politics  but brimming with energy and new ideas about organising. That on the evidence of the East London group and reports from elsewhere is what we are capable of achieving and that can shift the whole balance of forces on the left in Britain.


9 comments

9 responses to “Report on Left Unity Meetings in East London/Hackney (complete report)”

  1. sarah scott says:

    anything happening near Canning Town, Beckton, East ham?

  2. jo czernuszka says:

    email me next meeting will come along …i live in hackney

  3. Tom says:

    The website recommended at the end of this post advocates consensus as perferable to what we have inside the trade union movement. That won’t work if our project is a socialist one. We live in a society divided by antagonistic classes. Many of those drawn to Left Unity don’t want to change that; others clearly do. Consensus between them is a non-starter. The first-past-the-post electoral system means that Left Unity has a real fight on its hands. Those who want to draw a veil over the exploitative capital/wage labour relationship are given time in the broadcast media: Tories, Lib Dems, Labour, UKIP, Greens, SNP, etc. Add to the first-past-the-post system and broadcast media censorship and the socialist left has no option but to be extremely radical. Consensus is a barrier to that. Consensus means lowest common denominator politics. Socialists prefer majority decisions as the way of settling our differences. We will all lose votes. Accepting that earns us the right to continued participation in the project. And what does Peter mean by saying there is general agreement about individual membership? Will groups be hounded out of Left Unity, a la Neil Kinnock’s party within a party sectarianism? Will there by no room for tendencies as there was the case inside the RSDLP? That would not be a good idea. It would split the vote with TUSC. Furthermore, new tendencies would form, around Socialist Resistance, Workers Power, supporters of the SWP, SP and others would would join as underground entryists. Others with no prior commitment would form ad hoc factions, and some of these would harden into fully fledged groups. Which of them would be permitted to exist? What about trade unions, such as the RMT, PCS, FBU, and others? Would they all be told we would prefer them to continue to subsidize Ed Miliband’s war against the trade unions? Or does Peter think they should simply be denied the right to subsidize any MP, or candidate for MP, MSP, MEP, councilor etc?

  4. jonno says:

    Seeds of Change is a great resource, they have done some great work developing democratic processes etc and I hope LU work closely with them..

  5. Tom says:

    I don’t know anything about Seeds for Change. However, I can’t find any commitment to the overthrow of capitalist society. That is significant. The kind of organisation needed to overthrow capitalism is hardly identical to those that want to take the profit system as a fact of life. The capitalist state is centralized. Not sure if Pete Green is the Pete Green who was one of the SWP’s senior economists for many years, but if he is then once upon a time he valued centralism, which makes consensus a problem. Also, there is all the difference in the world between the kinds of organisation needed in cross-party united fronts which will bring together all the sects, members of the Labour Party, Greens, SNP, and non-aligned trade union activists on the one hand and a political party that intends to win significant numbers of votes, and win seats asap. Many good ideas that work for united fronts won’t necessarily work for a political party, and certainly not for one committed to a socialist alternative to capitalist austerity.

  6. ed1975 says:

    I look forward to meeting you all on the 2nd. In response to Tom it seems to me that the view held by most people involved with Left Unity so far is that it should be one member one vote. I think people from other organisations should be very weolcome but that organisations don’t have special privileges or voting rights.

    I see no reason for trade unions not to donate money and support Left unity without voting rights if we stand for what they stand for.

    I think there are going to be huge differences in opinion on all sorts of issues. What attracts me to this project is that we have alot of common ground on which we can fight shoulder to shoulder. We don’t need to hammer out every tiny detail. I’m never going to sit through another meeting about which football team socialists should support in the World Cup.

    The left have been taking a savage beating for thirty years now. We need to be open to new ideas and the experiences of others outside our various “traditions” (where we have them). No one section of the left has a monopoly on failure.

    Where activists, reformists, revolutionaries etc can unite is around the need to fight back and build grass roots support for campaigns locally and nationally. That can lead to both electoral support and support for more radical action. I’m bored of arguing about the best exit off the motorway when we’re about to be crushed by a steam roller.

  7. Ben McCall says:

    Tom: “Will groups be hounded out of Left Unity, a la Neil Kinnock’s party within a party sectarianism? ” I am no fan of Kinnock and have never been in the Labour Party (although Derek Hatton did once say to my dad “John, why don’t you get him in the Young Socialists?” What an engaging fella he is, knows exactly how to communicate at the youth).

    However, am from Liverpool and experienced – as a young left-wing activist – the dire stupidity of Militant and fellow travellers. They were the sectarians, not others in Labour, who out of a mistaken naivety of a Broad Left, let them destroy a potentially united struggle against Thatcherism.

    As I have said in another post: where did their glorious stand against the Tories leave Liverpool and its lovely radical people? In the crap. Where are Hatton and a good many other Millos now? Physically – somewhere else. Politically – bankrupt. Unfortunately some people have to stay in Liverpool and try to overcome a generation of disillusion with anything that calls itself ‘left’ as a result of this – a bit like over here in South Yorkshire, where people have to overcome the imploding sectarianism and barren legacy of Scargill & Co.

    If the ‘tendencies’ and factions Tom advocates were principled, open and behaved in a non-sectarian manner that added to the broader organisation they were part of and didn’t undermined it, that would be worth considering. As it is, our experience tells us that it does the opposite: they poison and destroy. As such, hopefully we will decide they have no place in LU.

    Tom, your description of what would happen if LU does not allow this is sad beyond measure. You need help mate, please go and get some and then come back to LU refreshed and open to think anew about how to build a left organisation that transcends the futile and pathetically ineffective behaviour of the past and present. If anyone does “join as underground entryists”, they deserve the reception they will get as soon as their sectarian behaviour gives them away; but come on, Tom, can’t we ever escape the sad past and agree to build a new and better left – that will actually draw people in and not end up scaring them off?

  8. david le peuple says:

    Tom’s view that we should rely on majority voting for settling our differences is the “same old same old”, which may have worked in the past but clearly has failed to move the left forward since the 1970s.

    It can end up as the very worse machine politics where fighting for a position in a party becomes primary for some groups. Everything gets internalised and in-fighting ensues, wider issues outside of the party get ignored and eventually ends up in implosion and splits. Due to obtaining power outside is slim people seek to obtain it inside the party.

    When I was working at a national level in the old CPGB in the 1980s this was exactly what happened. I am sure that others on the left have had similar experiences.

    My concern is that Left unity is trying to bring together a more diverse set of left wing views than there were in the old CPGB. Additionally, there are interested organised groups and parties well versed in the process of gaining position and perhaps think it important to get in to capitalise on the 8000 who have signed the appeal. I do not want the enthusiasm and energy that is being created dissipated by groups seeking position and control.

    Consensus decision making helps to unify where we can all agree around common aims and goals. We should have an open, transparent, inclusive and participatory organisation based on this. Majority voting can drive people away.

    Representatives should represent the consensual views of their group and not their own or tendencies viewpoint. This means no more majority voting on positions and people and the result going to the tendency with most “bums on seats”. I do sincerely hope that the representatives that are being sent by your local group to the 11th May meeting, are going to represent all your groups views and not just the ones decided by the majority.

    That does not mean that there shouldn’t be different tendencies, factions. platforms etc. these should be encouraged and out in the open and in plain sight. In fact Synaspismos, the largest grouping inside Syriza actively encourage it.The synthesising of different strands into a common aim will only help and strengthen and unify us.

    So in the spirit of consensual decision making we can have both a consensual approach with open factions. If some factions/groupings want to stand aside on agreed consensual positions that will be their choice. If they want to continually block then they need to seriously consider whether they want to be part of Left Unity and leave. Either way allowing the rest of us to get on building a new movement.

    We must be able to work together in an open way; trusting each other so we can create a new movement that we all agree is desperately needed.

  9. roseanna says:

    Please can you add me to your email list.
    I hope that there can be a useful synergy between newcomers to political groups and those with a lot of experience which can weigh heavily and needs good analysis to stop it being a drag on progress


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