For a Labour victory and a Tory defeat

Left Unity welcomes the Labour Manifesto. We welcome its vision of a society which works for the many, not the few. It presents a significant advance in a number of areas over previous Labour policy, attempting to reverse key concessions that Labour has made to neo-liberalism over many years – most notably the privatisation agenda introduced by Thatcher and taken forward by Tony Blair.

We also recognise its limitations, particularly with regard to free movement, defence policy and restoration of workers’ rights removed during the Thatcher period. Nevertheless, an election victory for the Corbyn-led Labour Party would be a significant advance for Britain, and unity to defeat the Tories is crucial. In support of this position, Left Unity is not standing candidates at this general election.

Left Unity Principal Speaker, Joseph Healy, said:

“Labour’s manifesto is a transformative one offering real hope, especially to the young, about a different and fairer Britain. Tackling tax evasion and putting funding into the NHS and desperately needed social housing is a real step forward. An ethical foreign policy is also a real positive development as is the nationalisation of the rail and water services. However, the acceptance of the Brexit agenda in being prepared to jettison free movement, one of the real benefits of EU membership both for students and workers, is a backward step. The failure of a real challenge to the madness of Trident replacement, and strong support for NATO and its 2% GDP demand, is also deeply disappointing. So a very positive manifesto in many respects, but one containing policies which concede too much to the positions of the populist right.”

Left Unity National Secretary, Felicity Dowling, said:

“We welcome the impassioned and brave opposition to the Conservatives’ cruel, destructive and destabilising policies, as shown in Labour’s Manifesto.We welcome the promised end to many vicious welfare cuts and policies which victimise those with disabilities; we welcome promises of better funding for the NHS; we welcome the end of tuition fees.It’s not our Manifesto but it’s a fundamentally different approach from that of the Conservatives or New Labour.Left Unity maintains its commitment to free movement of people and the rights of migrants; to a million council homes; to an end to Trident and the threat of nuclear war.

We maintain internationalist and anti-capitalist policies.

We call for the end to child poverty. We utterly oppose local government austerity policies.

Nevertheless, we have significant common ground with the Corbyn-led Labour Party, and we will work our hardest to turn the tide against the Conservative Party and to secure its defeat.”

17 May 2017

4 comments

4 responses to “For a Labour victory and a Tory defeat”

david spencer says:

May 18, 2017 at 8:16 pm

Agree, must get Labour in, then rebuild the party from its roots, with genuine socialists.
A socialist government here will fire the imagination of our european comrades.
They can achieve the same.
We can help them.
This could be the start of a global movement.
A socialist planned, global, economic system.
An end to destructive, war mongering capitalism,
and its disasterous environmental effects.
A planet at peace, of international friendship and cooperation.
An enlightening, secure future for our children.
mike down says:

May 30, 2017 at 2:17 am

I have been a sv member in Norway. Schengen borders (lack of) in Norway…allowed A B-Breivik to import the fertilizers for his bomb .
I welcome immigrants and asylum seekers , but we NEED Borders .
I voted FOR Brexit and look we got rid of both Cameron and the Blairites . The brexit negots will bring down TMay . We might even have a hung Parliament on 8thJune and have to have another GenElect
before Yule . The election(-s) will be won by the new young voters .
Please refer to D Abbotts speech from Oct 2012 as SHealthSecr about
the MHAct 1983 . Labour can win this election by opposing the Tory
pledge to repeal the MHA1983 >with real proposals on Mental Health.
ps D Trump is sjalu of Mitt Romney!!!
david tandey says:

June 6, 2017 at 10:24 am

Labour is not offering real Socialism but it is a step in the right or rather Left direction and it is vital to get rid of the Tory Wreckers. Theresa May said…..”.Enough is enough”…….Yes she said it for us but we need to get rid of them once and for all if we are to move forward into the 21st Century and establish real Socialism across the Globe.
Clive says:

June 6, 2017 at 11:01 am

I did not join Left Unity in order to support Len McCluskey’s warmongering Labour Party. After Labour loses this election, as they undoubtedly will, we will need to work to build Left Unity into a popular left-wing alternative to Labour, campaigning for world peace and abolition of wage-slavery (not “fight-for-the-right-to-work” to kill people for capitalist profit). We should aim to put up candidates in future elections to stand against Labour, with a better manifesto than the current Labour manifesto (which the right-wing Labour MPs have no intention of ever implementing, anyway).

The Labour Party cannot be reformed “from within”. The current saga of the Corbyn, alleged, “party leadership” only proves this, once again. Nor can Labour be reformed from “simultaneously without and within”, as Hilary Wainwright and Red Pepper have suggested.

The Labour machine cannot be reformed at all. Trying to do so is a long-lost cause. We should have known this, at least, since the time of the failed Tony Benn deputy leadership contest. It is time (long overdue) to start opposing Labour, from the left.

All attempts to reform Labour ‘from within’ only result, instead, in the right-wing Labour Party infiltrating, co-opting, and corrupting organisations who were originally intended to be independent of Labour (such as SERA and CND) and turning them into propaganda fronts for Labour, whilst preventing them from campaigning for their original aims.