Whose National Health Service is it?

And who should run it on our behalf? Some thoughts by ALAN SPENCE

“The transcendental authority of England is its people”. A people’s Health Service demands new beginnings. In the light of bitter opposition to Tory plans for the NHS, isn’t it time to look at a co-operative model as an alternative?

Those who work within the NHS should be able to manage GP surgeries, hospitals, research and educational units – indeed all areas of the health and care system within an employee-managed network based on co-operation.

Co-operation, of course, already exists in the operating theatre, where a team works with dedicated co-ordination as part of a normal work process. And it’s to be found in other areas of the NHS.

But the trouble begins when its members step outside this co-ordinating framework to become, respectively, members of the ruling, middle or working class.

Surgeons rule their team of doctors as did boyars of old Russia. At various stages of expertise, doctors are dependent on the goodwill of the “Mister” and seek a favourable nod from the next consultant in order to improve skills and gain a higher rate of pay and position for those in his/her team. As for non-medics, they take their chances with their own managers. But here wages and conditions are more directly obtained via union/ NHS negotiations.

Nor does the power of the “Mister” end with determining the fate of junior doctors. It stretches far wider – to “chummy” relations with members of the boards of governers, Carlton Club meetings, stately homes and ties through marriage, or public school. Such factors help to determine the way that the NHS proceeds on its pastoral care of the needy in our society.

This unique structure came about as a result of Nye Bevan’s necessary compromise, made to win support for getting a universal and all embracing health system as a going concern.

If it is thought that the mighty changes introduced into healing the sick by Nye Bevan trimmed their power, let them think again. It elevated them to a new and commanding height in the British economy, culture and society.

Put a leading surgeon in charge of a reform within the NHS and the outcome is geared to shifting the chairs around to provide a more comfortable position for a capitalist government to claim that changes that worsen middle and working people’s welfare are changes for the better.

THE GUILLEBAND REPORT:
Following the victory of Bevan’s view that a National Health system paid from taxation was superior to health provision from private insurance companies came the Guilleband Report of 1956. This had been set up by an alarmed Conservative government, certain that the NHS was ruinously expensive and a threat to financial stability. It decided that a Commission would confirm this threat, and allow them to disband this collectivist, heretical body before it did more damage to capitalistic individualism.

Conservative disappointment was huge when it reported that contrary to media scare stories, the NHS was not a strain on resources – and, indeed items previously dropped from the free provision introduced in 1948 (free prescriptions, dental and ophthalmic services) could be re-introduced without straining resources.

Guilleband’s other discovery was that the NHS’s percentage of the GDP was hardly different from that in pre-war Britain – some three per cent.

The reason? Before the war, those working on low wages could obtain sick and other benefits from National Insurance. But wives and children were excluded, as were employees on higher salaries. As a result, a galaxy of private insurance companies gained weekly payments to cover the cost of sickness, death, etc., with many GPs running a collecting system to pay for the treatment of wives and children.

Shortly after the NHS and other social benefits were launched, most health insurance companies dried up. Only a few survived, catering mainly for the rich. The majority of citizens followed the consensus that there was no point in paying twice for something that was provided for out of general taxation.

And the ragged assembly of government asylums, local authority maternity, fever, cottage and voluntary hospitals were brought together along with GPs’ surgeries (held in shops, spare rooms or wherever). They were assembled into a more logical structure to meet the needs of the population. The NHS began to become a landmark institution, respected for its coverage of all – including visitors from abroad who needed medical attention whilst they were here. It was particularly respected for its GP coverage and for arranging for hospital check-ups or admittance, which collectively covered the whole of the country – even isolated islands and hamlets.

A DIFFERENT DOGMA:

But there was still an inherent dogma amongst Treasury officials and their political heads that only a ruling class drawn from an aristocracy or well-heeled business professionals had the know-how to run the country. But somehow this aberration had slipped in.

It was true that many industries had been nationalised by the 1945 Labour Government. But these were commercial bodies, clapped out after the war and without investment in new technology. These needed Government cash to fatten them up to become competitive again. Conservative opposition was at the time largely cosmetic, designed to keep the class struggle burning in the breasts of their local activists.

Whilst the workforce in the newly nationalised industries may have had ideas that it allowed them to share control of management, the 1945 Government soon scotched that notion, and the existing management carried on almost as before.

Meanwhile, with every family in contact with their local GPs, the NHS became as integral to people’s lives as the local grocers’ shop. One supplied food, the other health – the difference being that one required payment for goods whilst the other came free.

AND A NEW ETHIC:

Changes in organisation, and the steady, if slow, improvement in hospital provision and employees’ working conditions, with shorter hours, better pay, holidays, pensions. etc., added to the moral uplift of serving the sick and needy.

The medics’ Hippocratic Oath to “do no harm” began to pervade the entire fabric of NHS service. An exceptional example of this was the response by junior doctors in the mid-1960s to like-minded Canadian colleagues locked in struggle in the province of Saskatchewan. Local GPs were boycotting attempts by the Co-operative Commonwealth Federation government in the province to bring in a health care system similar to the UK’s NHS. Doctors from Britain moved into the province and helped to ensure that the new system wasn’t stillborn. The CCF government won, and now Canada’s health care system is much closer to ours than that in the USA.

By the 1960s/’70s, “Butskellism” had produced a balance in Parliament and elsewhere which allowed consensus management to emerge within the NHS. It found its best expression in the joint teams formed to work with NHS Estates on the design and building of new hospitals, making up for the loss caused by Treasury niggardliness. More facilities for training doctors, nurses and other staff were also provided.

However, by this time it was clear that the NHS was falling behind Europe. Not in the coverage of all its population, in which

Britain had a clear lead, but in the provision of health infrastructure and facilities – modern hospitals, convalescent homes and other after-acute-care treatment.

The Treasury and Exchequer’s response to criticism was to point to Government spending which was on a par with other countries – implying that our problem was one of staff productivity.

A BREAK IN THE CONSENSUS:

The philosophy of consensus and its practice of mutual working within the NHS broke down as a result of Barbara Castle’s attempt when Health Minister in the mid-1970s to introduce a new programme to bring less privileged areas of the Health Service up to a higher standard via a Resources Working Party. This meant taking out of the system the bed spaces used by consultants for their private patients.

Even in times of need, consultants had kept beds empty to meet anticipated private patient demand. In 1975 rank and file staff revolted and refused to service these beds at the new Charing Cross Hospital at Hammersmith. Barbara Castle recognised the cause of the problem, and used it to support getting pay beds out of the system.

Temporarily the strikers won, but the outraged private sector phalanx who were using NHS facilities for treating cash paying patients, or those from BUPA and other insurance companies, mobilised to defeat Castle. Callaghan, who had replaced Harold Wilson as Prime Minister, capitulated to the consultants. They could now place private patients wherever in NHS hospitals. And Barbara Castle was sacked.

THATCHER ON THE ATTACK:

Carlton Club type debates involving privatising consultants, Thatcher-minded politicians and BUPA prepared the ground for Thatcher’s campaign to Americanise Britain’s National Health Service – ignoring advice from Norman Fowler (her longest serving Health Secretary) to leave well alone. The system was working, and covered the entire population.

Thatcher followed simple grocer shop economics. She saw every pound not in her father’s till but spent by local authorities and governments on public welfare as an infringement of the principle that just as her father paid for all living expenses and welfare benefits out of the labour and enterprise of running his shop, so should every customer pay for their welfare out of their wages. This soon became lifted to a code of conduct which attributed all deficiencies in society to money spent on social welfare. If this expenditure ceased then all would be well with Britain – and soon with the world, when we joined the Thatcher/Reagan axis.

This was elevated to become a core strategy for privatising the NHS. It took the form of introducing managers from commercial companies, to break the “chummy” culture and end the improved consensus-working of NHS staff. This would be replaced by units of managers on fixed term contracts and quantitative goals to meet.

Financially, there was a need to increase the NHS budget because of technical improvements and a growing population with an increasing life expectancy. And as people aged, their demands on hospital beds increased. Thatcher’s answer was to transfer the problem to local authorities under the rubric of “Care in the Community”, without providing or ring fencing the necessary money.

Then a whole barrage of financial instruments were introduced into hospital budgeting to cover claims that hospitals were inefficiently run or too costly to manage. During the 1990s Inland Revenue valuers were instructed to add an additional six per cent to the rateable value of NHS buildings. They also had to assess land at market valuations based on maximum values.

Adding the Private Finance Initiative to all the Thatcher-style financial juggling, and then factoring in the costs of the paperwork for running an internal market between each section of the NHS, and the result were about £20 billion – almost a fifth of the annual cost of the NHS.

NEW LABOUR – AND CAMERON’S HEALTH & SOCIAL CARE BILL:

New Labour carried on with this process of privatising the NHS from its election in 1997 to its defeat by Cameron’s Conservatives in 2010. Now they, through the Health and Social Care Bill, which is now completing its passage through Parliament, are the final stages of breaking up the integrated health system into fragments suitable for capitalist concerns to acquire and operate as profit making enterprises.

Among the policies being put forward in the Bill is that of letting loose the “bug” of greed amongst GPs in former partnership arrangements., who will now find themselves part of business enterprises with the salaries of individual doctors in a particular surgery now going as a lump sum to a “principle” who will allocate as he/she sees fit to junior doctors, and then pocket the remainder.

Within this new “profit” environment GPs (who will be transferred from small practices into large consortiums) will have the strain of competing amongst themselves for position, as well as competing against other consortia fighting for patients to meet “bottom line” situations controlled by entrepreneurial managers and CEOs.

GOODBYE TO YOUR NEIGHBOURHOOD GP:

The new structure will be going into place within the first phase of closing down Primary Care Trusts. A third of the NHS budget will be handed over to the new commissions which will control GPs, and this is scheduled to be completed by mid 2012. Preparations will be undertaken to have all GPs in their allotted consortiums by April 2013. Thus the neighbourhood GP service – the bedrock which collectively links patients with the common benefits of a unified National Health Service – comes to an end.

RESCUE PLAN:

To rescue the NHS from the privateers, we will have to pick up on the programme attempted by Aneurin Bevan and which Barbara Castle also took on board – ie, to end private beds in NHS hospitals, provide neighbourhood health centres (modelled on that launched in Peckham), and create a new Resources Working Party to provide a levelling up of all NHS facilities, thus transforming an “only go when you are sick” approach into a “keep healthy and cure sickness” service.

Thus, there should be:

• No financial juggling, such as Public Sector Dividend, or six per cent valuation upgrade
• No valuing of land at market rent levels but at permitted planning use
• No “engineering” of pensions to place a false burden on NHS books
• No private beds within the NHS – and no facilities for private practice by NHS staff.

There should be provision for:

• Recovery hospitals for patients discharged from acute or specialist hospitals but not yet fit for home nursing.
• Convalescent homes for patients requiring recuperative treatment.
• Neighbourhood nursing homes for long-term sickness.
• Care housing and homes, and day centres as appropriate to needs.
• The transfer to the National Debt of all Private Finance Initiative costs.

A review of the Peckham Experiment and its philosophy.

“Peckhams” have in-house facilities, such as swimming pool, gymnasium, sports facilities and wellbeing – as neighbourhood community centres which link people as neighbours, families, children, etc.

A SEA-CHANGE NEEDED:

Implementing all these suggestions requires a sea-change in English politics, which would embrace its patient population in its entirety.

Patients should elect a neighbourhood forum to provide patient intervention teams, to ensure that their neighbourhood GPs continue to provide street or village coverage. Forums from neighbourhoods should be elected to ensure that Primary Care Trusts continue and co-ordinate NHS facilities within their area. Where these have been disbanded, these neighbourhood forums should establish “shadow trusts”, to intervene to ensure the continuation of area health provision.

Crucial to the success of patients organised in such forums will be the support of NHS staff. These should move from being subservient employees of CEOs engaged in the privatisation of the service at the diktat of a Conservative Prime Minister to the establishment of a directly democratic structure in which each employee has an equal say and vote – a co-operative form of employee self-management.

THE SANCTION OF THE PEOPLE:

To bring about such changes we also need to gain the sanction of England’s people.

In 1948 93.1 per cent of the population registered as patients under the NHS. As the transcendental authority of England is its people (above a Parliament of divided political parties), a referendum should be held in each Parliamentary constituency to gain the approval of such a programme. This should then be put to a free vote in Parliament.

Thus voters, as patients, as neighbours and as people, could express their verdict.

ALAN SPENCE

http://www.keepournhspublic.com/index.php

LABOUR IN LIVERPOOL:

Reflections on the party conference, by former South West region MEP GLYN FORD

The last time that Labour met in Liverpool was eighty six years ago, in 1925. This was in the wake of the defeat of the first ever Labour government, hounded from office in November 1924 by “red scares” and the Daily Mail’s brandishing of the infamous forged “Ziniovev Letter”purporting to show that the Communist Party in Britain was being told by its Soviet masters to prepare for an imminent uprising. Within five years, in 1929, Labour was back in power.

This time around it will not automatically be that swift a return.

In Liverpool, the most eloquent statements of this were made in the Exhibition Hall, rather than from the podium or platform. While many delegates spoke as if Labour’s bounce back to power at the next election was assured, the same was not true of Labour’s corporate collaborators from our years in power. They were largely absent without leave, taking the view that Labour was here to stay in opposition. Certainly Tory gerrymandering with fixed term parliaments and the shaving down of a bloated House of Commons by a scanty fifty MPs to maximise their electoral advantage, makes the task that much harder in May 2015. But making it all worse is the “blame game”, media bias and the malaise infecting traditional social democratic parties across the European Union.

DOGGED BY CLAIMS:

Labour is constantly dogged by the ConDem alliance’s claims that the current crisis is the fault of Labour – stating simultaneously that it’s the global crisis that’s getting in the way of a British recovery. Now, we have to take some responsibility. Labour failed to tackle the greedy bankers, bent coppers and feral press. We didn’t tighten up banking regulation after the Tories’ big bang, ignored evidence of police corruption and kowtowed to Murdoch. Yet none of these would have helped avoid the toxic crisis in the US or the problems with the Irish, Greek or Italian economies.

Second, the very idea of a coalition seems to have stood the BBC’s idea of “balance” on its head. It’s no longer Government and Opposition, but rather Con versus Lib as the two coalition partners have their say centre stage with Labour having a mere walk-on part after those two have finished. Worse, when Labour does get a word in edgeways, it’s not our current spokesman who appears but one of yesterday’s men, and women, often now washed up in the Lords from the flood that swept Labour away.

DECLINE OF THE LEFT:

Third, our problem is one at the heart of western-style democracies. Socialists and Social Democrats less than a generation ago were in government in the majority of EU member states. Not so today. But what about Denmark, made much of in Liverpool? I’m delighted that the Danish Socialists are in power, but we need to be honest with ourselves. They had their worst result in ninety years and actually lost seats. They are in power because of the success of two small left partners and a radical liberal party who are sustaining them in coalition.

So what’s the message, and where do we go from here? More of the same and mere triangulation won’t work. New Labour with all its faults served us well. But in the end it brought us down. Nor will the electorate buy Labour as “Tory-lite”, a party whose cuts will be just that much smaller and made with genuine sadness rather than hidden joy. People know that times will continue to be tough, but they want a different vision of society from that of Cameron and Clegg.

GLIMMER OF HOPE:

The best glimmer of hope in Liverpool came from Ed Miliband’s speech. It was the first social democratic leader’s speech since 1992. It was not perfectly structured or delivered, but it began the process of putting into place a new framework of thinking for Labour. Ed derided rigged markets, asset strippers and vested interests, promising to become the voice of the hard-working majority, the squeezed middle and the crushed bottom. As he said in his devastating attack on the Tory leader, “only David Cameron could believe that you make ordinary families work harder by making them poorer and you make the rich work harder by making them richer.”

There is a long way to go, but Liverpool set Labour off in the right direction. If we can build on this over the next eighteen months to two years, we can attract back those who left us in 2010, keep those who remained with us and attract back those who had given up on politics in favour of abstention, or been seduced by the siren voices of the mad, bad and sad – UKIP and the BNP – and the regional and political sectarians.

East Germany & the Fall of Communism – reply to the responders

by C. Spiby

My article on East Germany and the failure of communism drew some interesting responses. Here I intend to reply to some of the points raised, including Diana Gash’s communication which can be found on our letters page.

Of course, in an essay of such wide-reaching scope as the nature of modern socialism, it is difficult, if not impossible to give much depth. Some points had to be made fleetingly as not to offend the dreaded word-count.

The thrust of the article was to ask the question of whether this was the time to rehabilitate the legacy of the great socialist tradition from the legacy or tyranny perpetrated by the likes of Pol Pot, Mao and Stalin. This being a vehicle to reflect on the past as a means to inform the present.

I argued that yes it was and moreover that – for British communists and socialists alike – the place to realise the socialist agenda was in the Labour Party.

And to do so now, possibly more than ever in at least my lifetime.  I was criticised, rightly, for not making this absolutely clear. So let me re-state it.

The Labour Party is now at a crossroads; if we do not make it our own now, then I for one feel the cause of modern British socialism is lost for at least a generation. A new leader, following a huge electoral defeat which has favoured vile right-wing agenda in the ConDem Government. These are all the ingredients necessary to urge a new generation of left-wing resurgence.

I am not for one moment suggesting that the Labour Party is to be hi-jacked as a communist party. But I have personally resigned from the Communist Party of Britain precisely to help re-boot Labour from within, rather than build the movement outside it (as the CPB’s own programme advises). Both positions are valid. But less so, I feel, is that of the separatists.

We can argue over the right path to socialism until we are red in the face. But only a mass movement will truly take the first steps in government. Although I was accused of ‘timid conclusions’ – I think this denies the struggle of the journey ahead of us.

I showed that the narrative offered by the works I cited (books and movies) is that Marxism will always bring about a totalitarian state. But this is not true – the whole of socialism is built on Marx, and I argued that while Marx can only foresee a socialist revolution through violent change, other paths show that this need not be the case.

I was criticised on drawing on the example of faith leaders. True, as an atheist, this is a trite thing to do, but here I hoped to show the innate nature of socialism. Perhaps I would have better used Robert Axelrod’s 1984 scientific work ‘The Evolution of Co-operation’.

My survey of the GDR was limited to about 3 books and 3 films. Most came out negatively, but the interesting point in the responses is that no-one rushed to defend even the defensible elements of East German life. Rather, the criticisms were aimed at my intended target – the nature of the debate for today’s society in Western Europe. Diana seemed at once enthused and concerned, also recognising the new zeitgeist for socialism – this is the dialectic in action.

But she remains concerned about Labour’s recent past. Rightly so. I have not voted Labour since the war on Iraq. I would have struggled anyway on issues like foundation hospitals, PFI, PPP and forcing mothers back to work rather than supporting their decision to stay at home, were that their choice. These policies, however, were New Labour. With Ed rather than David, we have the opportunity to bring the Party back to the left
both by contrast to this hugely unjust Tory government and the fact of the Unions’ backing of Ed as the new leader. With no programme yet, this is OUR chance. And also, I have been impressed with Bruce Hogan. On the Wye side Hamish Sanderson considers himself a socialist. And councillors like Armand Watts for Bulwark talk my language. Then there are good local citizens like Di Martin who have stood and won as councillors for Labour driven by the causes socialists would recognise as theirs. This is the chance to re-seed the foundations, while the right attacks our most precious wins such as the NHS; this is the home for our best defence.

My brief reference to the likes of the SP and SWP was a crude ruse to dismiss their input into the laying of those foundations in this new breed of Labour. That is not to devalue the role these groups have in local campaigns and in the debate on socialism, but their influence is – clearly – on
the outside of where the real challenge lies for the mass movement.

If, like me, you really believe in socialism, then join us.

This could be our last chance to claim the Party back for ourselves. You could stay in the SP, SWP or – as I was – in the CPB. But these parties will not ever win a seat in Parliament and therefore cannot truly hope to reflect the wishes of the mass of working people. Yes, we might feel uncomfortable in taking a place alongside people who supported New Labour, but look beyond them and we see others who feel the way we do like, say, John McDonald, and we only have to remind ourselves that the LP was the home of Tony Benn to see that the Labour Party is still the rightful place for socialists.

The answer may not appeal to the radicals. But for those of us who have trod the line of radical politics for so long, coming to real party of the mass movement IS in itself radical.

The debate about communism’s rehabilitation is due. But it is for nought if the people are not with us. The GDR offers examples of warnings and evidence of where things went right like social cohesion. But that debate is only a debate. The point is to change the world.

The Lib Dems will be nowhere in the next General Election. Their members need to join the Labour Party (re-join in some cases) to realise their dream of a social democracy. Their rightful place is in a democracy that puts social values first. And anyone who cannot see that modern British socialism doesn’t seek to achieve a similar goal is out on their own. Only a united front of socialist-driven Parliamentary power will be able to  hold the Tories and big business to account. Forget New Labour – it is up to us to ensure that social welfare drives the party not the end of boom and bust, the slaves of a shallow affluence which has left our Party dwindling and our country morally bereft. I mean, could you ever previously imagine a discussion, policies even on competition in the NHS?

That’s why you can either join the fight. Or talk about it while being defeated – at best –in the odd skirmish on the periphery.

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POST-ELECTION EDITORIAL COMMITTEE COMMENT

The Election: did we really vote for what we got?

Drama, suspense, and a twist at the end. The election had everything that even the most hardened political pundit could wish for. The only trouble for the media commentators was that there were so many changes in the plot line along the way that they kept tripping up as they tried to keep up with events. It was even more convoluted than a Forest of Dean road map.

Before the election campaign even started, Cameron was confident of sweeping all before him. Brown’s government seemed to be totally discredited, and, hey, the Tories had gained the backing of Murdoch and his media empire. What could go wrong? The Labour vote would surely disintegrate. And as for the Liberal Democrats, they posed no problem.

Then came those party leaders’ debates on television, and suddenly Nick Clegg’s star seemed to take off like a rocket on bonfire night. Indeed, some opinion polls were breathlessly suggesting that he could beat Labour into third place. Of course, when it came to the crunch, Labour’s vote held up surprisingly well in its heartland constituencies (though, sadly, not in our neck of the woods). The Liberal Democrats’ total tally of seats actually declined – and Cameron failed to get his overall majority. Ironically, the ball was now in Clegg’s court. It was up to him to decide who would form the next Government.

WHERE DO WE GO FROM HERE?

Like all good cliff hangers, we were kept waiting whilst negotiations went on behind closed doors – and we all know the outcome. In retrospect, Clegg had already muffed his chances to do a deal with Labour. Whatever spin one puts on it, we now have a Tory Government by default – with a smattering of Lib Dems as junior partners. And we must all face up to the consequences.

The election in itself failed to re-draw the political map, but its aftermath has serious implications for both the Labour and Liberal Democrat parties. With the resignation of Gordon Brown, Labour now has to decide who will be its new leader – and in which direction it will be led.

As for the Liberal Democrats, have they now backed themselves into a corner? Only time will tell, but as we see it Clegg and his fellow Lib Dems in government will have to give public support to decisions made by a Tory-dominated Cabinet even if some of these stick in their throats. Already the axe is poised on public spending – and all that the Liberal Democrats have gained is a few seats in government – and the promise of a referendum on voting reform!

It is unlikely that this will go down well with the more progressive elements within the Liberal Democrat Party – or many of those who voted for them. In the Forest of Dean, for example, the Lib Dems increased their vote – but how many of those who backed them this time round will repeat the exercise next time?

Much, of course, depends on how long this present Government hangs on to power – and how much influence the Tory right wing has on its policies.  As for the Labour Party, it now has to decide which direction to take in opposition. First, it must elect a new leader. The pack of cards is already being shuffled as candidates for the post throw their hats into the ring. Party members and supporters will know the result in September.

As we see it, however, the “New Labour” experiment has run its course – and not before time. The attempt to impose a finance-based economy, where the demands of the City were always put first, has now run into the buffers. The Labour Party and its leadership must surely re-examine its role and throw overboard much of the excess baggage it’s collected since 1997.

Already, David Miliband (one of the first to declare his interest) has declared that there is no going back to “New Labour”. Instead, he says, he’s interested in “Next Labour”. But does that merely mean a bit of re-branding, maybe a re-paint job and a few cosmetic changes – or a real change of direction?

Labour urgently needs to re-connect with its roots. It can no longer afford to take its supporters for granted. And this means, amongst other things, an overhaul of party structure.

Under Blair, party democracy was undermined, and the membership was regarded as necessary but all too often as a tiresome inconvenience. Thousands, of course, responded by resigning or lapsing their membership.

One example of the changes that need to be made is that to Labour’s annual conference. Once it was an exercise in party democracy – often lively, occasionally acrimonious, but an occasion for delegates to debate real issues that they felt strongly about. Then during the Blair years it was transformed into a showcase for the “achievements” of the party leadership (all for the benefit of the media), in which healthy debate was stifled.

A return to healthy party democracy is surely a prerequisite to any other changes that the leadership may have in store.

Modern Times- the Dinosaur column

So… who’s for a hung Parliament?

It was an odd old election, wasn’t it? Nationally, many of our politicians must have felt they were stuck on a roller coaster. At the start of the campaign Cameron must have felt that the poisoned chalice (not to mention the keys to Number Ten) was well within his grasp. Then along came Clegg, threatening to break the mould of British politics. It never happened, of course. Finally came the count which resulted in no clear majority for anyone. And unless any readers have been hibernating, we all know what happened next.

During the campaign, the Tory press had warned us against voting for a “hung Parliament”. Instead, they declared, we should all vote for that nice Mr. Cameron. who would roll up his shirt sleeves and get things done. But when it came to the crunch, not enough voters fancied Cameron to give him the clear mandate he really really wanted.

I have news for the Daily Mail, the Sun, and the rest of the ratpack. People didn’t vote for a “hung Parliament”. It wasn’t on the ballot paper. Instead they voted for the party or candidate they preferred – and in most cases, that wasn’t the Tories, even though that’s what we got..

But sadly here in Gloucestershire enough of them did vote Conservative to cause us to lose both Stroud and Gloucester. I was particularly sorry to see the defeat of David Drew in Stroud. He had been a good MP, to the left of the party leadership and a friend of the Clarion. But with a wafer thin majority, he was a victim of the national swing.

It was also a disappointing result for Labour in the Forest. . Bruce Hogan, too, was caught in the national trend and saw his vote decline. But here’s to the next time, eh?

For me, after a hard night watching the results roll in, my one real moment of happiness was the election of Caroline Lucas for the Green Party in Brighton Pavilion. This might not break any moulds, but let’s hope it marks a breakthrough.

Relations in Canada?

Nick Clegg, the leader of the Liberal Democrats and now part of Cameron’s Tory-Lib cabinet, has a distant relative in Canadian politics, it seems. The Toronto-based Globe and Mail has been looking at his family tree, and has discovered that he is a cousin of Michael Ignatieff – the leader of the Canadian Liberal Party.

Their family tree goes back to Czarist Russia, where a joint grandfather several generations removed was a Minister in the government. But he fell out of favour, the country had a revolution, and the family left its ancestral home to settle elsewhere.

The name Michael Ignatieff may ring a bell or two to some folk in this country. He spent some years in the UK and wrote a weekly column for the Observer newspaper, as well as having his own arts programme on BBC TV. But since returning to his native Canada, he hasn’t been doing so well. The Liberal Party that he leads is currently trailing badly in the opinion polls – and there’s no likelihood of a coalition with the Tories over there!

The spirit of Warren James

June 6 is Warren James’ Day – the day when his spirit of resistance will be remembered up at Hopewell Colliery.

On the day I’ll also be remembering an old friend, Roger Benham, who lived in Yorkley with his wife Gill. Back in 1996, when the rights of Forest folk were last under threat, Roger suggested to me that we should evoke the memory of Warren James in our opposition to the proposed carve-up of the Forest. “Perhaps an advert in his name, in the local papers,” he said.

It was only a casual suggestion, and as it happened, no advert appeared, but thanks to the spirit and determination of local folk, the sell-off of the Forest was abandoned. And Roger was there, on the mass rally at New Fancy and also the demonstration mounted by freeminers and their supporters up at Cannop. I’m sure that the spirit of Warren James was there, too.

Sadly, Roger is no longer with us, but I’m sure many local folk must still remember him with affection. I know that I do.

JOHN TURNER: Local Communist & cyclist

There are many who will remember John Turner. Their memories will be varied – for John was always a man of many parts. A man who took pride in his work as a carpet fitter. A father and family man. A man who loved to travel with his family. A political activist, and a friend who always had a tale to tell.

I remember him as the cycling Socialist. For John his membership of the Clarion Cycling Club was part of the fabric of his political activity – and his close-knit family.

Indeed, it was cycling that brought John and his wife Grace together. They met when he called into a cafe in Chiswick where Grace was working, he spotted her Clarion Cycling Club badge – and they got talking. That was in 1937. Soon they were sharing a tandem together, and in 1938 they got married.

As the family grew, a sidecar was added for the children… until they were able to ride their own bicycles. Their cycling trips took them far afield. John was a Londoner, though Grace came from the Forest of Dean, and they would regularly ride down to the Forest for holidays. After the war, the Dean became their home, and finally they settled in Lydney.

John’s political activity in London included engagement in the anti-fascist campaign, when Mosley’s blackshirts were active spreading their message of hate in the East End of London. The 1930s were a decade of political ferment, and Grace’s family had taken part in the Battle of Cable Street when members of the British Union of Fascists were prevented from marching through the East End in October 1936. John soon became involved, and went on to join the Communist Party.

Ironically, his work as a carpet fitter for the firm of Arding & Hobbes in Clapham led him to meet the fascist leader, Oswald Mosley. John was given the job of laying carpets at Mosley’s home. He was, John said, “an arrogant man” – a view which was no doubt shared by many others!

When it came to his work, John was always a perfectionist. He would often repeat a maxim which he said guided him – “Good, better, best – Never let it rest, till your good is better and your better best!” I’m sure that it was a philosophy that he tried to apply to many areas of his life.

Another interest that involved him was his affection for trams. This wasn’t simply nostalgia. He saw trams as a greener, more egalitarian form of transport. He never owned a car, but was very proud of his part in helping to restore an old open-top LCC tramcar to working order, and was delighted when trams returned to Croydon, south London.

I got to know John in his later years, after he and Grace had settled in Lydney. He had joined the Lydney branch Labour Party and was also active in the pensioners’ movement as well as the University of the Third Age (U3A). He and Grace continued their cycling as long as their health allowed, and his political commitment never wavered (though John suffered a certain sense of disengagement following the collapse of the Soviet Bloc). Whilst he was able he would join marches for pensioners’ rights, and attended the annual rally at Tolpuddle. And he and Grace were firm supporters of the Clarion.

John died on October 16, at the age of 93. He had seen poverty and hardship in his early years, had become politically involved as he grew older, and taken up a range of interests which, taken together, made him the person we all remember with affection.

When ‘X’ Marks the Spot

Election time is here again! It’s time once more to face the hustings. As politicians of all shades and colours pound the trail to win our votes, the campaign to decide who’s going to be in the hot seat over the next few years is well under way.

I must confess that over the past forty years I have voted Labour on each and every occasion. But once, as a much younger dinosaur, I did cast my vote for a Plaid Cymru candidate. Well, I was living in a Welsh constituency at the time. But for many of us dinosaurs, voting labour is a habit that’s very hard to break.

There have been times when the choice hasn’t been easy – and I’ve even felt a certain sympathy with the old anarchist slogan, ‘whoever you vote for, the Government always gets in’. But we gained the vote after a long, hard struggle against those who believed that the likes of the working class or women (along with those certified lunatics or criminals) were far too irresponsible to have a say in deciding who should be elected. The vote was a hard won privilege, and should be used, not abused.

telling it how it isn’t

As I write this, the election bumf has been slow coming through the letter box, but no doubt it will increase in volume as the local campaign gets going. But one early piece of electoral propaganda to come my way was a copy of ‘Focus’, the Liberal Democrat’s occasional news sheet.

Whenever it’s time for us to vote, the Lib-Dems come up with somewhat spurious figures to show that only they can possibly win the election against the sitting incumbent. They’re at it again. On the basis of a couple of selective Council by-election results, they’ve set out to ‘prove’ that they’re on their way to victory.

FLYING LOW WITH BRITISH AIRWAYS

Faced with new demands and new pressures, it’s not surprising that cabin crew working for British Airways had reached the end of their tether. But they received no sympathy from the airline’s Chief Executive, Willy Walsh.

When they voted overwhelmingly for strike action, all they got from him was a stream of vituperation and insults aimed at their union, Unite – who he accused of “trying to break the company”. Why, Willie, would Unite try to break a company that provided employment for its members? Come on, let’s try to be logical about this.

It seems to me that Mr Walsh wanted confrontation. Perhaps he should try a sideways move to BA’s cut price counterpart, Ryanair. But no, I forgot Ryanair already has a blustering, anti-union boss.

I try not to fly myself, unless I have to – but remind me to add British Airways to the short list of airlines to be avoided.

TACKLING CLOSING TIME

With pubs going down like ninepins it’s not surprising that many of those who like to go out for a quiet drink with their mates are feeling unhappy when their local close its doors for the last time. After all, it’s a social thing, isn’t it?

In some areas customers have taken matters into their own hands – and taken over the pub and run it as a king of local’s co-op. One such pioneer of the trend was the Old Crown, Hesketh Newmarket in rural Cumbria.

Now the trend has spread to gritty urban Salford (just down the road from neighbouring Manchester). Here locals were given three weeks’ notice that the Star Inn was to close. They weren’t at all happy, so they clubbed together and raised enough money to take it over. It’s now back in business as a community-owned co-op.

All I can say is CHEERS! I hope that the local ale slips down a treat!

THE UNPALATABLE TRUTH

As unpalatable as it is, it is my opinion that the Tories can only lose the coming General Election: only some cataclysmic embarrassment or folly can surely deny them the helm of the country now. And while that is not entirely impossible, it is unlikely.

Having not voted Labour since they took us into Iraq in 2003, the time has come to reassess my support. Do I cast a losing vote? Do I opt for the Lib Dems in hope they become the main party of opposition and thereby fulfil the meagre hopes I have of it creating some space between them and the Tories, unlike what we had between New Labour and the Conservatives? If we want to remind ourselves of just how bad things are, think of the worst of New Labour and you’ll find that the Tories voted in support of that policy (Iraq) or want even more of the same (PPP, PFI).

As a paid-up member of the Communist Party of Britain I am expected to vote for any CPB candidate standing in my constituency and, where there is none (and there isn’t in the Forest of Dean), then I am to vote Labour on the premise that, despite all the Party’s own rightful criticisms of it, we still stand a better chance of putting pressure on Labour than we ever will with the Tories. I think this is a mature approach. Were Labour even likely to return to power.

Of course neither I am under any delusion that the British communist party (the CPB) will be forming a government any time soon, but it seems the chances for Labour are heading that way too.  Is their directive, then, a waste of my vote?

I fully expect our Conservative MP, Mark Harper, to retain his seat in May, as Parliament itself swings to the blues. I therefore remain undecided as to how best oppose the right-wingers, bearing in mind that New Labour, on the whole and in my opinion, is only slightly to the left of Cameron’s crew. I am also mindful that we need to be careful of the far right using the vacuum of a low turnout to make their own terrible gains.

One option I have never used before is the spoilt vote. I agree with many on the Left (if not the entire spectrum of politics) that a stay-at-home no-show, irrespective of how disenfranchised we are, is an offence to all those in history who fought for suffrage.

The difference today, however, is that while those who fought for suffrage believed in their representatives we do not. Do we for one moment believe that those same champions of democracy would sit idle while our choices saw us disenfranchised? Absolutely not! A high increase in the number of spoilt papers would send a message that i) the people remain unconvinced with what’s on offer and ii) but we remain engaged in politics. After all, it’s our politics because it’s our society, not theirs: politicians need to heed these warnings and return to being the executors of power – our power!

So, if I am convinced (despite recent polls putting the lead to the Tories as slim and the expectation of hung Parliaments) – which I am – that the Conservatives will take power in May, I contest it is to the long-view that we are to look now.

It is my prediction that David Milliband will become Leader of the Labour Party following its imminent trashing at the next General Election.

On the surface he will halt any reference to the New Labour project in all but spirit as he continues the trend in embracing the centre-right, middle class vote above and beyond the grass roots of his own Party. In the face of defeat and low turnout we will be told the Party is learning the lessons of the Blair/Brown years, while at the same time reminding us of their successes (some rightful, others diabolical (Iraq), PPP, foundation trusts etc.) as well as the advent of its longest term in government for Labour in its history.

Only after the second term of the Tories and the second defeat of the next Labour Party will we really have a chance to demonstrate that a refuelled, grassroots Labour Party is our only true hope for the left. If then the Party isn’t for our taking, be that by its mechanisms or our own impotency, then it is unlikely it ever will be. At that juncture our historical ties to it (trade unionism, socialist and social democratic support writ large) need to be thoroughly reassessed. It will be a critical time in labour and political history.

To help us begin that long journey I urge unaffiliated members currently lacking in a Party home join the Labour Representation Committee. We MUST build the movement of the Left back into Labour during the recess of the coming Tory darkness. You can do this with or outside of a union, as a private member as long as you are not currently in a political party other than Labour.

There is much work to be done. If you need a shock as to just how much is to be done then I also urge you to get a copy of the documentary film ‘Taking Liberties’ from your local library or DVD rental service. In only an hour and a half it will remind us how difficult the road will be, but, more importantly, also how essential it is to begin that journey back to a civil democracy now.

Only then can we even hope to demand proper socialism take its rightful place back in our Party.

LRC, c/o PO Box 2378, London, E5 9QU

PRE-ELECTION EDITORIAL COMMITTEE COMMENT

As voters it is becoming increasingly difficult to decide how we should react to the campaign for our vote.

Back in 1997, the Clarion joined in the general celebration when ‘New’ Labour swept to power. At last, we thought, the grey Major years were over. We didn’t support the sweeping changes that had transformed our Labour Party – the abolition of the old ‘Clause Four’ in the Party’s constitution, or the general downgrading of Labour’s traditional aspirations and policies. But, hey, for most of us it was still our Party. Many of our readers had worked hard to steer it towards victory – and, before the election, many of us had joined in the debate as the leadership attempted to redefine and re-brand the Party. Indeed, it was out of this debate that the Clarion itself emerged.

In 1997 it was still too early for that sense of betrayal. That was to come later. Indeed, in the opening months of Labour’s new government, there were decisions that we supported, such as the introduction of a national minimum wage, and the recognition of trade unions at GCHQ. We applauded the announcement of an ‘ethical foreign policy’, by Robin Cook. But maybe that was the honeymoon period. Gradually a feeling of disillusion did set in – reaching a peak when the Blair government took us to war in Iraq in 2003 and well over a million took to the streets of London in protest. By then , any notion of an ethical foreign policy was dead in the water.

For many, Iraq was a defining moment. But there were other areas where traditional Labour supporters felt betrayed. The use of ‘Private Finance Initiatives’ in the NHS and beyond. Policies on housing and education, and the downgrading of the public sector. But still Labour supporters continued to vote for the Party they’d always supported. They still saw it as their Party – though an increasing number of those less committed merely stayed at home on polling day.

Now, if opinion polls are anything to go by, it’s quite possible that Labour could be defeated in the forthcoming election. The Government has faced a Tory resurgence under Cameron, and the recession has damaged Labour’s ‘you’ve never had it so good’ image. But at this stage in the game, opinion polls remain volatile, and the Tories have slipped on their own banana skins recently, so nothing should be taken for granted. Be that as it may, the question facing the Clarion is, how should we respond when it comes to casting our vote?

As far as we are concerned, voting Conservative is NOT an option. Neither is staying at home on the day. We may feel a sense of powerlessness, but we can and should still use our vote.

Many on the Left may decided to vote for the party that seems most likely to meet their aspirations. In the two Wyedean constituencies – the Forest of Dean and Monmouth – there will be a choice between Labour or Plaid Cymru (in Monmouth), or the Green Party (in the Forest). Or, for some, the Liberal Democrat option might be seen as a preferred alternative. Some may argue voting Plaid or Green in our neck of the woods is a ‘wasted vote’ – but such a claim should have no impact on those who really want to give these parties their support. After all, it’s their democratic right. It’s what political choice should be about.

However, there will be those who will lend their support to the party that is most likely to deny power to the Tories. Both the Forest and Monmouth constituencies previously elected hard working Labour MP’s, but both seats were lost at the last election. There is a strong case for rallying the Labour vote as our one chance to eject the Conservatives from these two seats.

There are, of course, those who will still feel themselves frustrated, even disenfranchised, by the choice on offer. Here, the Clarion believes that a spoiled vote is better than no vote at all. At least it makes a point {and is counted (Web Ed.)}. So if your view is really is ‘a plague on all your parties’, then don’t just boycott the polls. Turn up at the polling station and actively spoil your ballet paper. Make it clear why you choose not to vote for any of the candidates on the ballot paper!

The Clarion is published by a collective, and inevitably represents slightly differing viewpoints. Reader, of course, will make up their own minds!

RECESSION, SCANDAL – AND AFGHANISTAN

For many of us, 2009 was dominated by the continuing recession. Unemployment rose relentlessly, whilst who still had work to go to found that their jobs were becoming more precarious. The housing market almost dried up, and companies that had seemed a familiar part of the landscape either went out of business or struggled to survive.

Meanwhile, those banks whose actions had been a major cause of the economic crisis were bailed out to the tune of billions of pounds – whilst those who were largely responsible for the collapse of market capitalism continued to draw fat salaries and even fatter bonuses.

The past year also revealed the way in which many MPs had manipulated their expenses to line their own pockets. Of course, the worst offenders were only a minority of our elected representatives, but they were a symptom of what happens when “success” in society is measured in terms of money and greed. And their actions helped to drag the reputation of Parliament further into the mire.

AFGHANISTAN:

As a backdrop to it all, the Afghanistan conflict intensified and the number of casualties amongst those serving over there began to escalate. Now more and more people are beginning to ask the questions, what are our troops doing out there? Isn’t it time we brought them home?

Unlike Iraq, our intervention in Afghanistan was authorised by NATO, and was thus more broadly based than Bush’s pathetically named “coalition of the willing” that followed America’s coat tails into Iraq. Those countries that have sent troops into Afghanistan include many who wouldn’t have touched the Iraq invasion with a bargepole – like Canada, Germany, and other European countries.

But, like in the UK, many of them are now questioning their role. Indeed, Canada (whose troops have suffered proportionately greater losses than those from Britain) now plans to pull out in 2011.

So why did we invade Afghanistan? Did we go in to “restore democracy” to the Afghan people? Or was it an exercise to get rid of the Taliban? Or (as Gordon Brown claims) to prevent terrorism spreading like a plague to the UK?

Any claim that we were there to plant democracy in the arid Afghan soil was surely shattered by this year’s elections there. To call it a farce is an understatement. Abuses were so blatant that it could only be seen as a distorted caricature. Votes just vanished by the million, whilst others found themselves transferred to the winning candidate like a rabbit in a conjuror’s hat. And through it all, NATO soldiers were killed and maimed to ensure that it could take place. There is no way that this could be seen as building democracy in Afghanistan.

As for “getting rid of the Taliban”, there are few if any signs that their hold has been weakened by the current offensive. And in what way can anyone claim that our presence in this unhappy country prevents the spread of terrorism? History surely suggests otherwise. Events in Afghanistan merely become a focal point – a rallying cry for those who commit their acts of terrorism elsewhere.

GOING TO THE POLLS:

The coming year may well be a crucial one in Afghanistan. Here in Britain it could also usher in a new government. And this could well effect us all.

It is difficult how people will vote in the coming General Election. The betting is on a Tory victory – which would leave us all facing a very uncertain future under David Cameron. Of course nothing should be taken for granted until the votes have been counted. There is a sense of disillusion with politics and politicians as a whole. Certainly, if the Conservatives do win, it won’t arouse much enthusiasm amongst the electorate as a whole. But the very possibility of a Cameron government should be enough to concentrate our minds!

Indeed, for many, the phrase “out of the frying pan into the fire” may well spring to mind.