SPGB Meetings (1982)

Party News from the September 1982 issue of the Socialist Standard

Blogger's Note:

On the subject of Robert Barltrop and the Cockney language (see the West London branch meeting), Barltrop and Jim Wolveridge wrote a book entitled The Muvver Tongue, which was published by the Journeyman Press in 1980. Barltrop was considered a bit of an expert on the subject.

Here's footage of him speaking on the subject back in 1988. (He appears 2 minutes 43 seconds in.)

SPGB Meetings (1953)

Party News from the September 1953 issue of the Socialist Standard

Party News Briefs (1953)

Party News from the October 1953 issue of the Socialist Standard

Provincial Propaganda Tour. Full details of this summer’s tour will be given in next month’s issue. Some of the details are available, but it will be more comprehensive to give all the information together.

Croydon Branch. Details of meetings throughout the next two months are shown elsewhere in this issue. In case readers do not obtain next month's copy in time, it is a good idea to note all the meetings for reference.

St Pancras Tows Hall. Please make a note of the meeting being held on Sunday, 4th October, and bring along as many friends as possible. The subject is interesting, the hall large and comfortable—so make every effort to support the Party.

Conway Hall. Bloomsbury Branch are holding a public meeting on Friday, 16th October—details elsewhere in this issue. 

                                                                                                                                 Phyllis Howard

SPGB Meetings (1953)

Party News from the October 1953 issue of the Socialist Standard

Blogger's Note:

During his first spell in the SPGB, Robert Barlrop's pen-name/party name was 'R. Coster'. 

'R. Coster' was speaking on the Kinsey Report at Head Office on the 25th October, 1953. The front page article in this month's Standard was by 'Coster'/Barltrop on the Kinsey Report.

Party News Briefs (1947)

Party News from the November 1947 issue of the Socialist Standard

The Autumn Delegate Meeting was held at the Trade Union Club, London, and not at the Conway Hall as originally arranged. The change was caused by factors beyond the control of the party. The question of increasing the number of pamphlets published by the party was discussed at length by delegates, and the whole of the party’s literature came under review. Methods of increasing sales were also discussed. The other organised activities of the party were dealt with under their various headings. These items included propaganda, publicity, internal education, finances, contact with companion parties, abroad, etc. There was a good attendance of delegates from London and the provinces who gave an excellent illustration of socialist democracy in action.

Edinburgh Group (Secretary—D. Lamond) have been running outdoor meetings at the Mound throughout the summer, and have planned to recommence indoor study and discussion meetings in the Melbourne Hall, Edinburgh every Sunday from the beginning of October, at 6.30 p.m. They are looking forward to some Glasgow speakers coming over, and there appear to be good prospects of an Edinburgh branch being formed soon. The Melbourne Hall is at George IV Bridge.

Kingston-on-Thames Branch have arranged a debate with the Trotskyists at the Co-operative Hall, Hampton Wick, for November 19th (Wednesday) at 8 p.m. The General Secretary is representing the party, but we have not yet been given the name of our opponents’ speaker. A number of Kingston members went to Brighton on Sunday, 21st, and arranged with the comrades living there to hold a meeting on the front. The beach authorities called in the police to stop the meeting after a very successful start had been made and a large, and rapidly increasing audience, gathered together. Another meeting was held later in the day at “The Level” with moderate success. The Kingston members, had an enjoyable day and the Brighton comrades were enthused by the effort. Friends and members living in the Brighton district who are interested in the formation of a group in or near Brighton can communicate with W. Craske, Green Road, Wivelsfield Green, Sussex.

Islington Branch held two very encouraging indoor meetings during the recent by-election in their area. The Central Library was filled on Sunday, September 21st, and the West Library provided a very interested audience on September 23rd. There were good collections and literature sales at both meetings.

Paddington Branch are firing away consistently with propaganda in their area. There were two indoor meetings in September, one at the Paddington Town Hall, and the other at Harvist Road School, Kensal Rise, N.W. Both were excellently attended and the speakers had to deal with keen questions and discussion. The branch mean to continue with meetings in the Willesden area with a view to laying the foundations for a branch there. Paddington now have their own amplifier which they use on a car for publicity purposes. They are convinced that this method is more effective than posters. There have been weekly outdoor meetings at the “Prince of Wales,” Harrow Road, but the police are shutting our meetings down early because of the rowdy meetings run by other organisations at the same place. The branch also report small, but good, outdoor propaganda meetings at Pennard Road, Shepherd’s Bush, which they describe as a political wilderness. These meetings have been run in conjunction with Ealing branch.

Croydon Branch has now been formed with the sanction of the Executive Committee. Many months of activity as a discussion group has thus borne fruit.

The Metropolitan Theatre, Edgware Road, London, is being booked for a concerted propaganda effort by Paddington branch and the central Propaganda Committee on Sunday, December 7th. Confirmation of the booking has not been received at the time of writing, but no difficulties are anticipated. Paddington branch are putting everything they have into the preparations for the meeting, and intend to engage in wide loud-speaker advertising, posters, handbills, etc. Will members and sympathisers please leave this day free so that this Sunday evening meeting will have the success it deserves.

Hackney Branch’s first meeting in the winter indoor campaign at the Bethnal Green Central Library justified the branch’s initiative in arranging the series. An attentive audience listened to the party’s views on “The Jewish Question”—a particularly appropriate subject as a large meeting of an anti-semitic political organisation was being held at the same time on a street corner a few yards away.

Ealing Branch have two big items in their programme for November. On Monday, November 10th, they are responsible for a debate at the Kensington Town Hall where our A. Turner will oppose Mr. A. Raven Thompson of an organisation called the Union of British Freedom. This party has views which are very much the same as those put forward by a number of other organisations which have been attempting to get in to the political limelight lately by holding large (and generally noisy) outdoor meetings in various parts of London. However much we disagree with the policies of our opponents we are always prepared to subject them to socialist analysis in public, and in doing this we do the only thing that can prevent the spread of false and dangerous ideas in the ranks of the working-class. The second Ealing branch effort is at Baling Town Hall, Ealing Broadway, on Wednesday, November 26th, where C. May and the General Secretary will be speaking. The branch are putting a considerable amount of work into both of these meetings, and expect success.

Clifford Groves, 

General Secretary.

SPGB Meetings (1953)

Party News from the August 1953 issue of the Socialist Standard

SPGB Meetings (1953)

Party News from the July 1953 issue of the Socialist Standard

SPGB Meetings (1953)

Party News from the June 1953 issue of the Socialist Standard

SPGB Meetings (1949)

Party News from the November 1949 issue of the Socialist Standard

SPGB Meetings (1949)

Party News from the October 1949 issue of the Socialist Standard

Obituaries: T. H. Turpin and A. Slane (1971)

Obituaries from the August 1971 issue of the Socialist Standard

We regret to report the death of two Central Branch Members. Comrade T. H. Turpin of Frinton had been associated with the Party for many years and was originally a member of the old Tottenham Branch. He lived on the East Coast of recent years and always welcomed party members. He was 86 years of age when he died.

Comrade A. Slane had also known the Party for many years, although he did not join until 1950. He lived near Canterbury and for many years was a regular attender at Party Conferences. Recently due to his age, he was 85 when he died, he was unable to travel to London but he retained keen interest in Party affairs.

Letter: SPGB is self-righteous (1981)

Letter to the Editors from the January 1981 issue of the Socialist Standard

Dear Editors,

I have now been reading the Socialist Standard for a year. If it has not “converted” me to socialism, that is because I had already come, independently, to the views of the SPGB before starting to take the paper. I am wondering, however, whether it would have done so had I been only half way committed, and am reluctantly none too sure that it would. Indeed, I have an unhappy feeling, which has been growing on me during recent months and which I’ve been doing my best to ignore, that it might have done the very opposite.

Please don’t misunderstand me: the logic of all you say is impeccable. Its rightness, to me, remains the ultimate rightness. What I find very hard to live with is the tone of the paper. It comes across (yes, all right, to ME it comes across: the view must be subjective) as both smug in its isolationism and sneering towards those outside.

I say “isolationism” because having worked out one’s own fully socialist philosophy of life I think it becomes all too easy, in effect, to wash one’s hands of all the ongoing problems created by capitalism, which have to be coped with HERE AND NOW, and simply declare, as a blanket statement, that “only socialism is the answer” — which it is! I am not disagreeing. Neither am I advocating that we all start playing campaign politics. But still, the ongoing problems exist, and if you’re out of work, for instance, you want to work NOW, even on “their” terms, you don’t need the Standard sneering at the fact that there you are, wearing out your shoe leather with a million others, begging poor fool for the right to be exploited, while what you OUGHT to be doing is seeing the light and fighting the socialist battle. Likewise, it’s all very well adopting this lofty attitude that anti-nuclear marches aren’t going to stop wars, and almost certainly aren’t going to stop the proliferation of nuclear weapons, either — they aren’t: agreed. But still I don’t think that’s the way to put the message across to ordinary people who haven’t yet come to socialism and in the meantime are justifiably shit-scared of being blown to smithereens. For one thing, unfortunately, socialism is for tomorrow, whilst unemployment and nuclear weapons are with us today; and while the Right to Work marches and the Anti-Nuclear campaigns may indeed be ultimately futile they nevertheless serve an immediate purpose — yelling at authority, voicing one’s anger - which I suspect, alas, that the unveiling of the true meaning of socialism probably wouldn’t, at least for the majority.

Certainly that ought not to stop the message being put across wherever and however possible. I just don’t feel that the attitude adopted by the Standard is likely to achieve that. There is a note of . . . unctuousness? Self-righteousness? An awful air of “we enlightened few standing on our pinnacle” whilst all the rest of the deluded idiots rush to and fro like demented chickens in the capitalist hen coop. I’m perfectly sure that this is not intended, and maybe you’ll say that your harshest strictures are intended only for those who lead (and ought to be presumed to have thought things out rather better) than for those who follow; but since it’s the masses who follow, and the masses who must be convinced if socialism is to succeed . . . I just don’t think people like to feel they’re being GOT at.

Yours in socialism,

Jean Ure 

Croydon, Surrey

Reply

Discussion about the type of journal the Socialist Party of Great Britain should produce is determined by three principal factors. Firstly, we are a political party publication which exists solely to express the established policy of our membership. What we say is governed by our Declaration of Principles and by democratically agreed party decisions. This makes us unique as a journal: we have no editorial right (or decree) to say things that the membership of the SPGB does not stand for; we have a duty to accurately represent our party’s position on numerous theoretical and practical questions; all those involved in the production of the Standard are subject to democratic criticism or removal from office at any time. This may all sound very restricting but, in fact, it represents the only alternative to the anarchic “individualism” of the Fleet Street press — where the rule of the shareholders constitutes “editorial objectivity” — and the undemocratic control of the party press by the “intellectual vanguard” which prevails in leftist circles. Anyone outside the SPGB who accepts our political principles, but objects to our propaganda methods, should be inside the party using the democratic channels available to push the journal in the direction in which they think it should be going. Secondly, the scope of our publication is limited by both finance and manpower. Ideally two, three or four party journals could be published, each catering for different tastes. But we haven’t got the money (the Standard is run at a loss and we are frequently forced to appeal for funds to keep it going) and we just don’t have the manpower (writers, illustrators, lay-out people, sellers, dispatchers) to make more than one journal viable. Bear in mind that the Standard is entirely produced by voluntary effort. This leads to the third factor: that in producing the Standard we have to balance it so that it will be readable for totally new readers, those who have read it a few times but have not yet joined, and members. To leave out any of these categories of readers would be to ignore a section of our readership. At our last Annual Conference it was democratically decided that the primary aim of the Standard must be to explain our priorities to new readers.

Jean Ure criticises the Standard for what she regards as smugness, self-righteousness and isolationism. Clearly these are seen to be failings. But if for “smug” we substitute “politically confident”, for “self-righteousness” we substitute “a record of being consistently correct” and for “isolationism” we substitute “principled opposition to all anti-working class ideas”, perhaps we would seem less at fault. We are politically confident, though not because we are smugly self-satisfied but because, unlike the defenders of capitalism, we have a political theory capable of showing the working class their potential strength. We do have a record of consistent correctness which is proof of the usefulness of our theory. When we say that we alone have been able to interpret and predict the confused affairs of the capitalist system, we are not intending to be self-righteous, but to invite others to adopt our way of analysing social development. We are hostile to all diversion in the class struggle, including CND and the Right to Work Campaign, and feel that it is our duty to criticise the “campaign politics” of the Left. For, as Jean Ure accepts, these campaigns will not change the nature of the system and participation in them will not alter workers’ political awareness. So, any tones of political pride that occasionally appear in our columns are only the side-effects of having a political position worth bragging about.

The assertion that “socialism is for tomorrow, whilst unemployment and nuclear weapons are with us today sounds like the beginning of a defeatist justification of the “do something now rather than wait for socialism” argument. We in the SPGB do not accept it. We contend that the problems that are with us now are only the consequences of majority consent for capitalism. The idea that the here-and-now problem can be eradicated without removing the here-and-now system is basically false. Only socialism can put an end to unemployment and war and any suggestion that socialism is for the distant future is entirely repudiated by socialists. It is because we want to get rid of them now that we are in the SPGB. But — and this is the big qualification which reformists find unpalatable — we can’t achieve our aims without a social revolution which requires the conscious support of a majority of the working class. Those who can’t wait for the majority to be convinced — or, to be quite accurate, those who won’t help to convince the majority — may well sneer at the principled consistency of the SPGB but they can offer no short-cuts to the working class.

We do not blame workers for not being socialists. If we did, then we would deserve the criticism of Jean Ure. Clearly, the working class is prevented from “seeing the light” (as Ms Ure puts it) partly by all of the manipulative ideological forces of capital — the press, the schools the churches, the political parties. It is our job to counter these powerful forces with the convincing voice of rationality and point out that socialism is the only answer. Jean Ure says that it is “all too easy” to say that; so “easy” that millions of workers have not said it because they do not know it, and unless we continue to say it, loud and clear, they never will know it.

So what is your advice to the SPGB, Jean Ure? Do we stop saying that only socialism is the answer, which you freely admit that it is? Do you advise us to support those who campaign for nuclear disarmament within the profit system when you willingly agree that it will not “stop wars and certainly (isn’t) going to stop the proliferation of nuclear weapons”? Do you think that we should encourage people to “yell at authority” in movements which you tell us are “ultimately futile” Do we, in other words, go in for the politics of deceiving our fellow workers that what we know to be a waste of time is energy well spent, for the sake of gaining popularity? Or do we tell them what we must now tell you: that the only place for socialists is a party which stands for socialism and nothing but.

Editors

Blogger's Note:

Jean Ure ended up joining the SPGB, and was a member of the Croydon Branch of the SPGB for a couple of years. In her working life she is an incredibly successful children's author.

Party News Briefs (1948)

Party News from the April 1948 issue of the Socialist Standard

The Annual Conference will be over by the time that this edition of the "Socialist Standard’’ is on sale and a report of what took place will appear in our next issue. Last month we gave some details of items which will be dealt with by the delegates, and here are a few more things which are on the agenda. Our Central branch (covering members who cannot attend branches) numbered 162 at the end of the year. Although the members of this branch are handicapped by their isolation a number of them are very active in their areas. During the last few years good branches have been formed by pockets of Central branch members living near to each other. Our Central Organiser reports to the Conference that many branches of the party are increasing their activities, but that a large amount of work falls on a comparatively small number of members. Nevertheless on the whole the condition of most branches seems to be healthier than for some time past. The supply of articles by members for publication in the “Socialist Standard” was considerably better in the last half of 1947 than it was in 1946, and because of this the Editorial Committee were able to give more of their time to working on pamphlets. The number of "Socialist Standards” printed was 6,000 per month up to October, 1947, but owing to unsold copies during the winter months the quantity was reduced to 5,600 for October and November, and 5,400 for December. The party’s Literature Secretary in his report to the delegates points out that copies of "Socialist Comment” (the journal of our companion party in Australia) can now be obtained from Head Office. This paper offers members an excellent opportunity of learning about the local problems of our Australian comrades. Our literature was advertised right through the year in various organs of the press, bringing in a number of new subscribers to the "Socialist Standard” together with some enquiries from abroad. We have also continued to press the B.B.C. for time on the “air” but so far without result. The work of our Overseas Secretary’s department during 1947 increased enormously, and the results of this increased activity are slowly becoming manifest. These results so far consist of closer contacts with groups and parties abroad, interest in our literature in different parts of the world and the growth of an organisation within the party capable of dealing with any socialist development overseas. The delegates will have in front of them details of the activities of all the companion parties abroad. The Overseas Secretary has also tried to get in contact with small groups who have broken away from self-styled working-class parties in Italy, Holland and France, but so far he has nothing of interest to report under this heading. The "Socialist Standard” is now being sent to a large number of groups and workers in various parts of the world, including libraries in Hamburg and Moscow. We have now built up a team of translators and also a panel of linguists who are prepared to represent the party abroad when required. The resolution sent in by branches upon which delegates will vote in accordance with their branch mandates cover a wide field, dealing with the party's propaganda, literature, etc., but the most lively discussions will probably be on the various “Items for discussion" which appear on the agenda. Delegates are not tied down by their branches on these items in the same way as they are on the resolutions, but it is their duty to report back to their branches on the various points of view expressed. Altogether there is every indication that the Conference will have been stimulating, interesting and beneficial to party welfare.

A New Pamphlet reproducing from the “S.S.” from 1918 onwards articles on Russia containing material of permanent value is now ready for the printer. This is not intended to meet the need for an original pamphlet dealing with Russia from our standpoint. The Editorial Committee has other pamphlets in mind for publication when the financial situation becomes easier. We are still waiting for you to make that situation easier. It is a very serious matter and we cannot over emphasise the need for funds.

Glasgow Branch has suffered severely lately owing to the death of members. John Adrian died in February suddenly under very tragic circumstances. He had been making plans for his usual visit to the Annual Conference, an event which he always looked forward to. John joined the party in 1936 and became a very valuable member. He was not a public propagandist, but a very serious student with a thorough grounding in socialist theory. He organised classes on economics and was a source of inspiration to all members. He had all the essential attributes of the revolutionary worker. Fifteen members attended his funeral at which a party member gave a fitting address. The branch has also lost R. D. Robertson who died in February after a long illness. He was a young member who joined us in 1942. He was an earnest and unassuming lad with a keen and intelligent interest in the work of the party.

The branch have been temporarily inconvenienced as a result of being served a notice to quit their excellent shop premises by May 28th—or to buy them at £700 (an impossible sum). This has faced Glasgow comrades with the difficult task of seeking new premises in the city by that date. The shop with its spacious window for displaying pamphlets, and announcing meetings, proved itself a most useful asset during its several years of branch occupancy.

Indoor meetings are continuing, but with the present mild weather and longer light evenings a start on outdoor propaganda is being made this month; probable venues are Queens Park Gate and Brunswick Street. Again a challenge to the C.P. to debate has been issued, this time through their Penilee branch, who await their central committee’s, sanction. It is expected, however, that the C.P.’s usual political cowardice about debating with S.P.G.B. representatives will add but another refusal to efforts to get them on the public platform. Recently the branch organiser travelled 50 miles on invitation to Kelty, to address a meeting composed mainly of miners. The S.P. case was well received.

The Croydon Bye-Election gave our branch there an opportunity of extending its propaganda work. Indoor and outdoor meetings were run, and while the audiences were on the small side we managed to get the ear of a number of workers in the constituency who were not swept away by the reformist barrage of the candidates.

Kensington Town Hall houses another of our debates on April 12th. The Society of Individualists are putting up Collin Brook (editor of "Truth”) against us. Our man is the General Secretary. The straight subject of "Socialism versus Capitalism” has been agreed upon.

“The Socialist Standard” now costs more to produce than we get for it at Head Office. This is due to higher wages of printers and the higher cost of paper. The resulting loss each month increases our financial difficulties.

"The Communist Manifesto" centenary commemoration meeting at the Conway Hall on March 1st brought a very good crowd together. As is usual at our meetings we finished up with plenty of time given to the audience for questions and discussion. The collection was £17 and about £7 worth of literature was sold.

Clifford Groves,

General Secretary.

Party News Briefs (1948)

Party News from the March 1948 issue of the Socialist Standard

Our 44th Annual Conference is being held at the Conway Hall, Red Lion Square, London, W.C.1, on Good Friday, Saturday and Sunday the 26th, 27th and 28th March, commencing at 11 o’clock on each morning. All of the proceedings are open to any member of the working-class who wishes to come along. We have no private sessions like nearly all other organisations who ask the working-class to support them. The last paragraph of the ‘‘Communist Manifesto” states that “Communists scorn to hide their views and aims” and we preserve this democratic principle intact. The main work of the conference will be to review the results of 1947 and prepare our programme for the future. The report of the 44th Executive Committee will be in the hands of branches about four weeks before the conference, and delegates will come mandated with their branches’ instructions. Here are some features from the report. Our membership at the end of 1947 was 979, an increase of 58 during the year. The total number of propaganda meetings reported during the year was 835, of which there were 678 outdoor meetings, 135 indoor meetings, 8 debates and 14 addresses to other organisations. The number of outdoor meetings is the highest of which we have records. Even these figures are not comprehensive, as a number of branches have failed to report all of their meetings to Head Office. It has been a difficult year financially. During the war years we built up a fairly substantial balance, but this has been absorbed by widened activity. Now we have to finance our activities as we go, and our expenditure (particularly on party publications) cannot be curtailed without reducing the scope of our work. This is the last thing we wish to do. A number of branches, are supporting an amendment to party rules which will raise member’s weekly subscriptions from 3d. to 6d. If this amendment is carried the branches supporting it think that it will go some way to ease our financial burdens. One effect of financial restrictions has been that the Executive Committee have had to postpone action in filling the vacant positions of full-time organisers. Two new branches at Kingston-on-Thames and Croydon were formed during the year, and the Dagenham and Romford branch was dissolved. The sales of the Socialist Standard fell off towards the end of the year, and the delegates may well consider ways and means of building up the circulation. Pamphlet sales will undoubtedly shoot up now that the ‘‘Racial Problem” is on sale and our own edition of the "Communist Manifesto” is practically ready from the printers. The first session of our Tutorial Class was a great success, and promises to play a big part in providing the party with a competent body of tutors for future educational classes. As well as the conference there will be our usual dance and reunion on the Saturday evening, and the Mass Rally on the Sunday evening—both at the Conway Hall.

The Publicity Committee is planning some attractive advertisements for the pamphlet on “The Racial Problem.” The E.C. allocates regular sums to this committee to be spent on advertising, but advertising is expensive, and the money in any case has to come out of the General Fund. So please step up your donations so that wider and ever wider circles may get to know of the Party and its policy.

Hackney Branch have sent in some interesting correspondence they had had with various “notabilities” they have approached with a view to public debate. Some letters they receive are long, and some short, but they all add up to the same thing. These “friends” of the working-class won’t have it! Their reluctance to face our speakers is matched only by their eagerness to get into the limelight under what they consider to be favourable conditions. Michael Foot, M.P., is “absolutely full u ” for the next few months (according to Hackney they have had this same reply from him for over two years). Donald Soper, M.A., of Kingsway Hall and Tower Hill finds that his ‘‘diary is fully booked right away through into 1949.” P. Piratin, M.P., regrets being unable to accept our invitation (no reasons given, let’s guess). Richard Acland, M.P., says that he has met members of our organisation and he has to state quite objectively that our processes of thought and of reasoning are so utterly other than his own that he has never believed that there is any effective point of contact between him and us. For this reason he believes that a debate would be an entire waste of our time and his. Mr. Acland seems to have forgotten the audience for whose benefit debates are really organised. Why not, Mr. Acland, let them judge the validity of your processes of thought and reasoning? Or are you just finding a roundabout way of saying that you don’t fancy your chances up against an S.P.G.B.’er in debate?

Radio Luxembourg costs £70 for a 15 minutes broadcast. Some members and sympathisers think a lot of this form of propaganda, but we shall need a lot more money before we can even consider it.

The Assistant Treasurer elected as a result of the second ballot is Kathleen Curzon of Paddington branch.

An E.C. by-election is in process and ballot papers have been issued to all branch secretaries. The nominations received are F. C. Adams (Palmers Green). G. Clark (Islington), H. Collins (Croydon), R. Coster (Leyton), J. P. Edmonds and H. Russell (Lewisham), G. Kerr (West Ham), and J. Read and S. Ross (Hackney). There is one vacancy on the Executive Committee.

Clifford Groves,

General Secretary.

SPGB Meetings (1981)

Party News from the July 1981 issue of the Socialist Standard

Which Way to Socialism: Militant Tendency or SPGB? (1982)

Party News from the April 1982 issue of the Socialist Standard

This debate took place at Ruskin House, Croydon, on 24 February. Bill Sheppard represented the Militant Tendency and Steve Coleman the Socialist Party of Great Britain. Pressure of space has prevented us publishing the debate in full but we welcome comments on this shortened account.

SPGB: According to the press, my opponent is a militant. This is very good. It is important that we should be militant about our political principles. According to the media, my opponent is a Marxist. I have read Marx and I agree with his analysis of capitalism. I agree with Marx that capitalism is based on the legalised exploitation of the wealth producers by those who own and control the means of wealth production and distribution. I agree with Marx that the state only exists to protect the power and privilege of the exploiting class. I agree with Marx when he urged workers to abolish the wages system and establish a classless, moneyless society.

The newspapers tell me that my opponent is nothing less than a social revolutionary who wants to destroy civilisation as the Daily Express has always known it. Well, so do socialists. We want to destroy the “civilisation” of the H-Bomb. We want to destroy a “civilisation” where millions die of starvation while food rots. We want to destroy the “civilisation” which compels the mass of humanity to accept wage slavery. So if the media is accurate—if my opponent and his friends are a bunch of militant, Marxist, social revolutionaries who are committed to getting rid of capitalism and establishing socialism—then my opponent is not my opponent but my friend.

But when we ask where to join this new revolutionary crusade, my opponent points me in the direction of a broad church called the Labour Party and says, “There it is. This is where the revolution’s starting . . .” At election time he will be canvassing for the Labour Party—he will be recruiting workers to join it. More than that: my opponent will be feeding workers with the illusion that by supporting the Labour Party they are contributing to the establishment of socialism. The SPGB argues that if you are a socialist you must oppose all anti-socialist parties; that the policies which the Militant Tendency wants Labour to adopt are inimical to the class interest of the workers; that the place for socialists is in a party which is united by a scientific analysis of capitalism and an obtainable vision of socialism.

Marxists stand in opposition to capitalism, a system of minority power where the productive machinery is possessed by a minority class: 10 per cent of the British population own more than half the accumulated wealth. Under capitalism the vast majority of people own no major stake in the productive machinery—they only own their mental and physical energies which they must sell to capitalists. The working class is in a position of compulsory exploitation, and are only permitted to produce wealth if it can be sold on the market. And it will only be sold on the market if it is profitable for the capitalists. In other words, wealth is produced under capitalism for profit and not for use. If there is no profit there are devastating consequences: food is dumped in the sea while people starve; cars are left standing in fields; homes remain unoccupied; workers are actually paid not to produce wealth.

If you claim to be a Marxist—as my opponent does—you see that these problems are all a necessary part of the system. Unemployment is not caused by wicked Tory governments or Labour leaders who are not carrying out Left wing policies. Marxists seek to end the system, not to re-arrange the furniture within it. The Labour Party is not, and never has been, a Marxist party. At the beginning of the century it decided to work within capitalism and pick up whatever crumbs were available.

The Labour Party has spent the last three quarters of a century showing workers what can be done within capitalism. It has used troops to smash strikes, initiated the production of the Atom bomb, passed racist immigration legislation, acted as recruiting sergeant in two world wars. It can do all of these things and more because it is a party which decided from the beginning that it must work within the narrow limitations of the profit system. At the beginning of the century there were socialists who rejected this narrow, “possibilist” strategy of the Labour Party. They were the militants, the Marxists, the social revolutionaries; they were the men and women who formed the SPGB and its Companion parties in other countries.

But my opponent wants it both ways. He wants to be in the Labour Party. He wants to be part of this great movement which has grown popular by basing itself upon workers’ lack of political understanding . . . but at the same time he wants the Labour Party to act like a Socialist party. It is a nonsensical strategy. The manipulators who imagine that you can spring socialism on to the working class by surprise-that all you have to do is manoeuvre a few Trotskyists into key posts in the Labour bureaucracy and the workers will reward you with their votes—are learning a hard lesson: you cannot have socialism without socialists.

Militant Tendency has the same political problem as Ramsey MacDonald and Lenin (whom they much admire): they do not believe that workers are capable of becoming conscious socialists. They do not accept the Marxist principle that “the emancipation of the working class must be the work of the working class itself”. They think that we need leaders. They think that we need a Leninist vanguard-a workers’ state presided over by a bureaucracy. This always leads to state capitalist dictatorship.

Socialists do not have contempt for the working class. Our message is quite clear: abandon the broad church; reject the high priests of the Labour Party and their self-appointed vanguards; dismiss the archaic dogma of reformism. When workers understand socialism they will consciously and democratically organise their own emancipation.

MILITANT TENDENCY: No socialist —certainly no supporter of the Militant—would deny for a second that a socialist order is a world order that knows no national boundaries and in which commodity production has been superseded by a system of free access to material wealth produced popularly and communally. That was the programme of Marx and it is the programme of the Militant Tendency.

However, it is an essential point that you don’t get a mass movement to establish a socialist society simply by counter-posing—in a necessarily vague and abstract way—the political economy of capitalism to the possibilities inherent in a world socialist order. It is necessary to win workers to a “transitional programme”. It is necessary to fight for such a policy in the mass organisations of the movement. And these organisations aren’t all that we’d like them to be. You have to accept them because they reflect the existing level of consciousness of the working class.

The Labour Party was created by the trade unions. It’s also necessary for Marxists to intervene in the bread and butter issues of the working class . . .  It’s necessary to be involved in the way that the class struggle plays itself out on a day-to-day basis, because it’s precisely out of that struggle that socialist consciousness will develop. Up and down the country you’ll find Militant supporters at the forefront of the struggle to defend jobs, to defend the social services against the vicious cut-backs that we’ve seen at the present time.

The point of the transitional approach is to be active in the Labour Party and call upon a Labour Government to implement Clause Four of the Labour Party constitution which calls for the common ownership of the means of production, distribution and exchange. Any attempt to implement Clause Four will be met by the utmost fierce resistance of the capitalist class themselves. They will use economic sabotage and furthermore they’ll try to use the House of Lords, the Monarchy and, in the last resort, they’ll try to use the army—as Chile so recently showed—to crush any attempt by a socialist government to introduce a socialist order.

For Militant, the struggle in parliament is an essential part of the struggle, but the immediate need is to establish a workers’ state. The SPGB has no concept of a workers’ state at all. But a workers’ state is simply where the revolutionary majority still has a need for a certain amount of coercion, a certain amount of repression, in order to defend the gains of the revolution against the counter — revolutionary forces. To imagine that they will simply disappear is totally naive.

The SPGB mistakenly believes that all countries are following the classic path of the establishment of “bourgeois democracy”. In the developing countries the working class, with the support of the peasantry, have to carry out the historic tasks which were once the preserves of the bourgeois in Britain, Germany and France. The role of the Bolsheviks was to carry out this mission. It’s absolutely ludicrous to characterise Eastern Europe and the developments in China and Cuba and other nations in Africa as state capitalist regimes. They should be characterised as degenerate workers’ states. State planning of production on an international basis must be the immediate aim. What nationalism shows is how rotten ripe the world is for genuine socialism.

DISCUSSION PERIOD

QUESTION: Does the SPGB propose to achieve social change by using the means which are available within the system?

SPGB: You cannot get social change in the interest of the majority of the people unless the majority of the people want it. If the state is not used by the working class it is going to be used against the working class. So a socialist majority must gain control of the state machine. The socialist majority will elect delegates to do what the workers want, not leaders to act on our behalf.

QUESTION: The Generals, judges and other defenders of capitalism are all drawn from a small net of public school people. Powerful Tories will not be loyal to a democratic socialist majority. A new state is needed to replace the capitalist state. The Militant tendency is not elitist, but the SPGB is because it will only allow socialists to join. SPGB is never present on mass demonstrations. The capitalist press does not attack the SPGB, but it does attack the Militant Tendency. Therefore, Militant represents a real threat to capitalism.

SPGB: The ruling class cannot rule without the acquiescence of the working class. Marx wrote in The Communist Manifesto that the socialist revolution will be unlike all previous revolutions because it will be a revolution of the majority. It is true that SPGB does not support demonstrations demanding capitalist reform. Unlike Militant, we do not kid workers that the system can be humanised. The capitalist press might attack the Militant Tendency, but what does this prove? Since when has the capitalist press even been correct about its political analysis?

QUESTION: How does a socialist revolution come about through using the State? Or do they advocate the destruction of the State?

MILITANT: The working class constitutes a minority in most of the globe. We cannot wait for a unified capitalist order to be established. Every workers’ revolution has shown that workers must establish Soviets that they must establish their own state. Thousands of workers have died in Chile, Spain, in the liberation movements in Africa and Latin America, fighting against the military police state. No, the state cannot be used.

SPGB: The fact is that the mass of the people are in the working class. We run society from top to bottom; workers produce all the wealth. It is the working class which possesses the power to determine the future. Any attempt to establish socialism which left power in the hands of a parliament committed to the running of capitalism and armed forces committed to the defence of capitalism would be bound to fail. The present system survives because of minority power. Any conception of revolution or social change which is based on working class followers placing their faith in an enlightened vanguard is fundamentally anti-socialist. Where access to the state does not exist, workers must establish political democracy. The SPGB wants socialism without leaders or followers. We don’t need shepherds because we’re not sheep.

QUESTION: How many of the candidates of both parties in the next election will be women?

MILITANT: None.

SPGB: It depends on how many women are available and able to do it. The SPGB is not interested in the sex of the candidate, but their political principles.

QUESTION: This discussion has been too intellectual and too bookish. The average worker in a trade union would not understand what we are talking about. The trouble with the SPGB is that it concentrates on theory. Everyone present should read Marx’s Communist Manifesto which states that socialists should be involved in the class struggle, leading the way. The SPGB spends time talking about socialism to foreign workers in Hyde Park. At an anti-cuts demonstration in Hyde Park a few years ago—under the Callaghan government—an SPGB speaker said that the demonstration was a complete waste of time. The biggest barrier to socialism is the current leadership of the labour movement. If you oppose all leadership it means that you refuse to struggle against the leadership of Callaghan, Healey and Murray. If you don’t work for a socialist leadership you turn your back on socialism.

SPGB: It is claimed that the average worker cannot understand a debate which he and everyone else here has understood. He says that we are too bookish and then in his next breath he recommends us to read a book by Marx. It is elitism to imagine that workers cannot understand what we can understand. The SPGB relates theory to experience in all our propaganda: we talk about and analyse capitalism and socialism. Yes, the SPGB does say that anti-cuts demonstrations are a waste of time. But, unlike the Militant Tendency, the SPGB did not tell workers to vote for that Labour government which introduced those cuts. Unlike Militant, the SPGB did not urge workers to re-elect a Callaghan government in 1979. Socialists will not participate in struggles to appoint new leaders because we are not followers.

SUMMING UP

MILITANT: I learnt many of the ideas of Marx from the SPGB, but when I went along to a strike in Manchester and told the convenor to abolish the wages system he told me that that was what his boss was trying to do—abolish his wages. The very fact that people have to sign a piece of paper to get into the SPGB illustrates that it is an elitist party. How elitist it is to sneer at anti-cuts demonstrators for voting Labour. It is out of these contradictions that working class consciousness will come. All leaders of the labour movement should be immediately recalled if they do not carry out the wishes of the workers. The election of Scargill as President of the NUM was an important part of the class struggle. When workers see the limitations of Scargill and Benn a seizure of power will be possible.

SPGB: This debate is not about tactics, but about where we are heading. The SPGB has a clear analysis of capitalism and our case against what exists is based on a clear idea of the future socialist system. Militant admires Lenin, but Lenin’s idea of a new system was state capitalism. He wrote that if state capitalism could be established in Russia, socialism would not be far off.

Because Militant puts forward unprincipled, undemocratic tactics it has to defend all kinds of absurdities, such as state capitalist regimes and Labour governments. The way ahead does not depend on the Labour Party or the Militant Tendency. It does not depend on the SPGB either. The difference is that the Militant Tendency claims that it must provide the revolutionary leadership; the SPGB says that it all depends on the ideas of the working class which must emancipate itself.

Obituary: Alf Atkinson (1998)

Obituary from the February 1998 issue of the Socialist Standard

Comrade Alf Atkinson died aged 80 at his home in Shrewsbury on 21 December last year. Most members will remember Alf from the period he served on the EC and as the Party's General Secretary. But in fact most of Alf's political activities took place in the Manchester area after the Second World War.

Alf joined the Socialist Party in 1946, influenced by his older brother Walter, after both of them had been open-air speakers for the Secular Society. He soon took to the Party's outdoor platform in central Manchester and combined his talents as an outdoor speaker and indoor lecturer with his outstanding abilities as an organiser, working tirelessly for the Party in what were, at times, relatively lean years.

In the late 1960s Alf was instrumental in the reformation of Manchester Branch. The next few years, during which he was branch secretary and organiser, became a particularly successful period for Manchester Branch. In the early 1970s his unstinting work in the North-West led directly to the formation of branches in Bolton, Liverpool and Lancaster. Always generous with support and guidance, his advice was frequently sought by members in the area.

On moving to East Grinstead, his hard work and attendance at meetings continued. He joined Guildford Branch and later helped to form Croydon Branch. Around this time Alf was elected to the Party's Executive Committee and when the post of General Secretary suddenly fell vacant in 1981 he stepped in to take over. He was then re-elected in subsequent years. All of Alf's talents were put to good use and he proved a most effective and popular General Secretary.

His interests in life included astronomy, anthropology and history. He loved poetry and would often recite favourite verses. He was also a keen gardener and wine-maker.

Alf's funeral was held in Shrewsbury, attended by family, friends and comrades. A moving final tribute was given by Comrade Ron Cook. Our sympathies go to his widow, Margaret Hopwood, and children Owen and Adele, all members of the Party.

Alf Atkinson's contribution will spread over many years. His enthusiasm and hard work was reflected in the number of members drawn to the Party and the number of branches that flourished around him. The Socialist Party has lost a dedicated, staunch and active member and a unique human being.

Hughie McLaughlin

Obituary: Margaret Hopwood (2011)

Obituary from the November 2011 issue of the Socialist Standard

Margaret Hopwood (1924–2011)

Manchester Branch are saddened to report the death in Bolton of Margaret Hopwood, the widow of Alf Atkinson, late General Secretary of the Socialist Party.

Margaret joined Manchester Branch in 1945, were she met Alf, having been introduced to socialism by her father Ernie Hopwood, a Socialist Standard subscriber and sympathizer. She remained active in the branch until it folded in 1957 and was involved in the re-forming of branch in 1968, a very active period in Manchester. She was responsible for organizing the 1969 and 1970 Manchester Summer schools, both tremendous successes.

In 1975 she and Alf moved to East Grinstead, a career move for Margaret who became headmistress of a school teaching English as a second language to immigrant children. This gave her an opportunity to work at Head Office, and she was Overseas Contact Secretary and a member of the Library Committee for many years. She was also a founder member of Croydon branch in 1981. Generous and hospitable, she and Alf accommodated Bolton and Lancaster delegates at Conference and Autumn Delegate Meeting for years – more than eight members at once sometimes.

Despite her commitment to socialism, Margaret could be critical at times of the Party and its members. Often, her opening remark was “and what have you done for socialism today, comrade?” She was by far the best Socialist Standard seller I have ever seen; no street corner was safe. On retirement, she and Alf moved to Shrewsbury, attending meetings in Birmingham until Alf’s death in 1998, when she transferred to Manchester Branch again.

Margaret was clever, funny and a true socialist.  She will be missed by her many friends and comrades. Our sympathy goes out to her children, Owen and Adele, both members of the Party, and to her grandchildren.

Joan Morris

Obituary: Comrade Norman Taylor (1954)

Obituary from the November 1954 issue of the Socialist Standard

It is with regret that we have to report the death of our Comrade, Norman Taylor, who died on August 27th after a life of suffering from one of the most pernicious diseases which this detestable system throws up. Despite this our comrade was active in the initiation of the Croydon Group and subsequently the Croydon Branch, which he was secretary of for many years.

We will all, I'm sure, share in expressing our sympathy and condolence with his wife, Comrade Rhoda, who we hope may find some measure of consolation in the fact, that her husband, Comrade Taylor, despite his enormous disabilities, was always on  hand to carry out for and behalf of the Party, which fell within his capacity.

M. A. C.

Obituary: Sandy Easton (2014)

Obituary from the August 2014 issue of the Socialist Standard

We are sorry to have to report the death (aged 60) of our comrade Sandy Easton, for many years a member of the old Islington Branch and before that of the old Croydon branch, then latterly of North London Branch. Raised in Edinburgh where he also attended university, Sandy joined the Party there in 1974 after hearing Socialist Party orators at the Mound. He was very active throughout most of his membership, serving many times on the Party’s Executive Committee and being a former long-standing member of the Media Committee and its predecessors.

Sandy was a dedicated socialist, always interested in the historical detail of theory and diligently committed to the principles of fair process. He was open-minded, much influenced by his huge interests in folk-music (and its meanings) and in radio drama. He was a fine actor in his own right; some members once saw him in a superb performance of Wesker’s ‘Roots’ in which all the parts were played by blind actors. He was also a very accomplished keyboard player and singer too – indeed many attendees at Conference socials over the years will remember his particular penchant for mining disaster songs! We will also remember his incredible ability, as someone who was blind, to navigate his way around London streets and the underground system with minimal help or assistance from others. And there are many who will swear even now that Sandy could tell who’d entered the room by the distinctive sound of their footsteps or other, barely detectable means that indicated their presence.

In a great many ways he embodied the principles for which he stood. It is impossible to think of Sandy without hearing a calm, reflective, knowledgeable socialist voice. For many years he was a telephonist for a bank though in the Party his vocal abilities were often put to even better use as a Party speaker and debater. He was a lovely, gentle and incredibly insightful human being who will be greatly missed.

SC/DAP