Reported in Hansard (1949)

From the August 1949 issue of the Socialist Standard

The Slums, like Poverty, are still with us.

Mr. Gibson (Labour, Kennington): ". . . There is no excuse whatever for the slightest complacency, for much remains to be done; in addition, there are slums which need to be pulled down; some of us have already made a start on slum clearance. I always thought that I knew something about slum conditions, but last week, when I went into one of the worst slum areas in London, I was appalled at the conditions existing in one part of Islington. The houses themselves are so sound structurally that medical officers of health are dubious about condemning them, but inside they have been allowed to become festering dens of unhealthy life, with walls falling down, floors cracking, no proper convenience, and no water. There are thousands of houses like these, not only in London but in many other large cities, which must be dealt with. There is, therefore, no call for anyone to imagine that there is not still a great deal to be done in the building of new houses.”

(Housing Debate, 4/7/49.)

* * *

Day to Day Struggle—Matches Front.

Mr. W. Gallagher (Communist, East Fife): “ . . . In this particular matter of matches, as a pipe smoker and as one who uses a very considerable amount of matches, I ask the Economic Secretary to discuss the matter again with the Chancellor and see whether they cannot find some other way of assisting the manufacturers to meet the costs of production rather than by way of making an increase of this kind. I ask him very sincerely to withdraw this proposal.”

(Finance Bill, Proposal to raise price of matches by halfpenny a box. 22/6/49.)

* * *

Members of Nationalised Boards.

Parliamentary Secretary to Ministry of Civil Aviation (Mr. Lindgren): “… All those who have any responsibility for airline operation are in favour of this Bill; not only that, they ask for it to be given legislative effect at the earliest possible moment. The boards of B.O.A.C. and B.S.A.A. are in favour of the Bill, and those boards are composed of business men—men who prior to coming into association with civil air transport were and in some cases still are associated with successful private enterprise …”

(Airways Corporation Bill, Second Reading, 29/6/49.)

* * *

A Man in an Absolute Muddle

Mr. J. Scollan (Labour, West Renfrew): ". . . The Chancellor of the Exchequer has told us about the dollar crisis. What was the panacea that he had to offer for the problem facing us? Was it not the same as was offered in the 1930’s during the depression: reduce costs and increase production? Did not wages go down in the 1930’s? Had not we a lock-out in 1926 for the miners? Were not the miners locked out for weeks on end, until prices were brought down? Did that bring prosperity? It brought misery, poverty and degradation. I am surprised to hear some of the arguments today. What are the Government going to do to see that we can meet France and other countries in fair competition? It does not seem to occur to anyone that we recently decided upon a European bloc and unity. Now we are deciding to go into competition with the very people with whom we were to be united. We are hoping that instead of unemployment being in Scotland, it will be in France. That is the cure. I say to the Secretary of State for Scotland that if Scotland were a free and independent country—I am not pleading Nationalism— it could stand on its own economy in the world blizzard that is likely to hit us.”

(Debate on Scotland [Industry], 7/7/49.)

* * *

A Bouquet for American Capitalism—from a Labourite

Mr. J. Carmichael (Labour, Glasgow, Bridgeton): “. . . My only trouble is the attempt on the part of some people to complain about the interference of American capitalism. Does anybody doubt the fact that whatever Government would have been in, there would have been need of American aid? Our complaint all along has been that America might have been more liberal in her aid, recognising the great economic sacrifices made by this country during the war. They were compelled to intervene. I do not complain about American financial intervention. I welcome it, because today in Scotland we have less unemployment than we had in the bad old days.”

(Debate on Scotland [Industry], 7/7/49.)

* * *

Plain Words from a Tory

Major G. Lloyd (Conservative, East Renfrew): “. . . The solution is to be found in a steady courageous determination to bring down costs of production, to make it easier in a buyers’ market for our industrialists, traders and men of commerce to sell the goods, as a result of which alone they can employ the people . . . People can only be employed if our industrialists can sell goods. If they cannot do that, they cannot employ the people. There is no politics in it. It is a matter of plain economic common-sense.”

(Debate on Scotland [Industry], 7/7/49.)

* * *

A Labour Leader talks Capitalist Economics

Mr. A. Woodburn (Secretary .of State for Scotland): “. . . However, one thing is certain, that the buyers’ market which has obtained since the war is ending. Just as we may have to go without some imports, so other countries may have to do without what we would like to send them. We may have to make both effort and sacrifice to stimulate trade by quality, price and delivery. If then, we are to keep vital trade going, our efforts must be directed to producing goods which the world wants at the prices at which other people are able or ready to pay. We cannot live without imports. This country must trade, or die.”

(Debate on Scotland [Industry], 7/7/49.)

Stan Hampson

Here and There: The Church in Spain (1937)

The Here and There column from the August 1937 issue of the Socialist Standard

The Church in Spain

Among a series of excellent articles on Spain in the Manchester Guardian one deals with the function of the Catholic Church in Spain and its attitude towards the Civil War. The correspondent, who spent a year in Spain, says: —

The burnings were often carried out by the villagers without any instructions from outside— indeed, they were often as spontaneous and, seemingly, as natural throughout Spain as the seizure of land was in the South of Spain. . . .

But, generally speaking, the war on the churches seems to have been a popular, spontaneous movement. And even when a gang arrived from outside the villagers, would, as a rule, stand round passively and look on while petrol was poured on the altar and set alight and the priest was dragged from his hiding- place.

In a country where the majority of the people have been, and still are, Catholics this indifference to the fate of the clergy needs some explaining. Read on: —

A Materialist Church.

Genuinely Christian priests have been killed. Much fine art has been destroyed and some of the finest music in the world been silenced. But the problem of the Church in Spain has another aspect. It was a Church more permeated by materialism than any other in Europe. It was largely—though by no means entirely—a commercial enterprise. It was the biggest landowner in a country of big landowners. It had a vast, and sometimes even a commanding, share in various industrial and commercial interests. A Church that identifies itself too closely with a temporal order is in danger of sharing the destiny of that order. And if a Church throws its weight on the side either of revolution or of counter-revolution, it will survive with the one or perish with the other.

The Spanish clergy has used Catholic teaching to influence Spanish workers to assist in maintaining the landowning and capitalist interests of the Spanish Church. They have failed and millions of Spanish Catholics are now the bitter enemies of the Catholic Church. The Jesuit boast that Catholic teaching until the age of seven years immunises the mind for life from heretical influences is a patent myth. The dominating influence in class struggles is class interest. The class interest of the Spanish workers, or what appears to them to be their class interest, dominates the influence of religious superstition. In many thousands of cases the open struggle with the Catholic Church will be sufficient to destroy its influence entirely. The position surprises many people with exaggerated ideas about the power of religion. The attitude of the Spanish worker to the Catholic Church is no less a logical expression of material interest than the attitude of the angry Spanish peasant who hung the image of St. Anthony upside down in a well after a failure of his crops. (An instance quoted by the Guardian correspondent, which can be paralleled by many stories from countries where there is a large Catholic peasantry.)

The Catholic Church is lined up with the landowning class behind Franco in a desperate fight to retain its ownership and feudal privileges. That is its chief interest in the struggle; and its resources are at the disposal of Franco. Many churches have become arsenals and many priests have discarded the cassock for the rifle. It is a ruthless and bitter class struggle in which life and property inevitably are destroyed.

If Catholic priests were murdered by angry Spanish peasants they have the reactionary and callous attitude of the Catholic Church to thank.

Whatever the outcome of the immediate struggle in Spain the hypocrisy and charlatanry of the Catholic Church there has dealt a blow to its moral influence which will not be rebuilt so easily as the walls of its churches.

Civilising Spain

The Irish Brigade, raised by General O’ Duffy to fight on behalf of Franco in Spain, has returned to Ireland without having done much fighting. The Manchester Guardian (June 23rd, 1937) quotes from the Irish Times and the Irish Press an account by the volunteers of what they saw in Spain.

We saw General Franco’s army executing “Reds” each morning in massed groups. They machine-gunned the condemned people, beginning at their ankles and directing the fire up along their bodies. The “ Reds,” in their last moments, lifted their clenched fists in the Communist salute, snouting “Viva Madrid !” This was in Caceres. It was in this town that the brigade spent most of their time.

That “great gentleman” and Catholic, Franco, will find a place in history with those murderers of the Paris Communards, the French ruling class. 

Marx—by Mr. Woodburn

Mr. Arthur Woodburn, secretary of the Scottish Labour Party, N.C.L.C. lecturer, and exponent of finance and economics, arch-squarer of the circles in Labour Party policy, says in the June Plebs: —

When individuals deny the obvious and proved fact that the Labour Party is a Socialist Party there is no point in arguing with them. . . . No one can join the Labour Party without proclaiming himself a Socialist.

It is, perhaps, too much to expect an Oracle to argue, but does he need to? Surely an "obvious and proved fact” should speak for itself? The “obvious and proved fact” that prominent members of the Labour Party have openly repudiated being Socialists and that the Labour Party is a Socialist Party does, however, appear to require explanation. Would you oblige, Mr. Woodburn? And would you also mention where evidence can be found for the statement that Marx agreed that 

It was quite conceivable that the capitalists would be bought out if they were paid very well if (as an exception, and England at that time was an exception) circumstances so developed that the capitalist would be obliged to submit and proceed in a cultured and organised manner towards Socialism on terms of compensation, 

and where

Elsewhere Marx said that "Under certain conditions the workers will not by any means refuse to buy out the bourgeoisie.”

There may be “not much point in arguing,” but, really, Mr. Woodburn, we would like to know.


The "New Leader” and “ The Socialist Standard"

In an article, “A Communist Leader and the Right to Strike,” which appeared in the July The Socialist Standard, it was stated that: “No reference has appeared, or—to be pedantically correct—has been noticed,” in Labour and Communist newspapers to the Bedwas Agreement signed by Mr. Arthur Horner. We learn now that such reference had been made. John Alpin, industrial editor of the New Leader, writes to say that it carried a critical analysis of the agreement and that a reply to that analysis by a member of the South Wales Miners’ Federation was dealt with point by point. Rather disagreeably, he says that he “would have assumed that the S.P.G.B. . . . would have read the columns of the New Leader each week.” We make the correction suggested by Mr. Alpin, if such it can be called, gladly. The number of weekly and monthly journals published by working-class organisations is numerous, and when writing is a voluntary task and journals unobtainable through the usual channels it is quite easy to miss an issue of any particular journal. The New Leader could help to avoid the recurrence of such “errors.” We suggest it put us on its exchange list. We put this suggestion to several journals, including the New Leader, a few years ago. Many agreed, even where the price is much higher than The Socialist Standard and publication more frequent: the New Leader declined. Perhaps, Mr. Alpin, you would do something to adjust the matter?

The Indian Workers and their Exploiters

Congress, India’s Nationalist Party, has climbed down from its earlier attitude of refusing to form governments in the six Provinces where it obtained majorities in the recent elections. In the resolution embodying the decision to form Governments, the draft of which, according to the Daily Herald, is attributed to Gandhi, it is said: —

The proper description of the existing relationship between the British Government and the people of India is that of exploiter and exploited, and hence they have a different outlook upon almost everything of vital importance.

Having admitted that exploiters and exploited must have a different outlook, Mr. Gandhi ignores the obvious, that exploited Indians can have no harmony of outlook with the Nationalist exploiters of their own race. To say, as he has said, that the Indian princes, landowners and capitalists can be persuaded to be “trustees” for the Indian masses, dodges the issue. The British capitalists would claim “trusteeship” for millions of Colonial masses throughout the world with nothing more to support it than the pious hypocrisy which cloaks their real interests. The practice of capitalism does not reveal the capitalist class to be any less the robbers because the class they exploit happen to speak the same language. The Indian workers have yet a painful road to travel before they acquire the understanding necessary for their emancipation. 

More Russian Puzzles

The Russian Government’s purge of "Trotskyites,” “diversionists,” ”wreckers” and “spies” continues, apparently, unabated. As must obviously happen, no amount of bias or coloured phraseology can obscure the contradictions which obtrude through the evidence against the “traitors."

The Moscow correspondent of the Daily Herald (June 29th, T 937) gives the number executed for spying in the Far Eastern Province of Khabarovsk as 133 to the end of April, and quotes the Russian newspaper Izvestia, that “the spies were able to persuade railway workers’ to sell them uniforms." The reason why workers, who, according to Russian and Communist claims, are well paid, should want to sell their uniforms, is left to the imagination of the reader who is keen enough to notice the contradiction.

Another report from the same correspondent (July 3rd, 1937) states that a notorious spy, who had been run to earth, succeeded in organising "a gang of ex-priests, monks, kulaks and discontented young people'' (Our italics.) Perhaps a Communist friend could explain that “discontent" of young people.

Many of the “honourable Communists" who helped to draft the Constitution have since become victims of the purge, including Tukhachensky, Gamarnik, Uborevich, Yakir and Chervyakoff, who are dead, and Goloded and Postysheff, who are disgraced.

The Moscow correspondent of the Daily Telegraph (June 29th, 1937) refers to the purge among industrial leaders whose production figures have fallen, and quotes from Pravda an attack on the woman Communist President of the Red Cross and Red Crescent Society, who. it is alleged, spent £600 on clothes suitable for her to wear to meet foreigners, when sent on an official trip abroad. The reward of Socialist competition?

Yet another report comments on the arrest of a “Trotskyist bandit,” Doletski, head of the Tass News Agency, which supplies the bulk of all news to Soviet papers. He is ”accused of having suppressed news about wreckers in industry and having over-emphasised news of successes." (Daily Herald, July 8th, 1937.)

Suppression of news inimical to its interests is inevitable where there is political dictatorship and a host of minor dictators in their own particular spheres. No regime claiming to represent working-class interests, which has a sound basis, need repress news or criticism. Socialist principles have nothing to lose and everything to gain from free and open discussion. Under dictatorship even the mildest criticism of the regime, or opposition on questions of policy, must result in intrigue against the Government and take insurrectionary forms.

Where there is dictatorship by a person or a clique, who decide what is right for the majority, it is inevitable that discontent and inequality arise. When discontent becomes widespread a scramble takes place to place culpability on the shoulders of others. Socialist interests can only thrive under the free and open conditions of democracy. 

Harry Waite

50 Years Ago: The Margate Labour Party Conference (2003)

The 50 Years Ago column from the November 2003 issue of the Socialist Standard

Natíonalisation was the issue at Margate. It is the issue at all Labour conferences. It’s difficult to see how it can be otherwise; for Nationalisation apart what else is there left to discuss within the Labour Party? Housing! Education! The Health Services! These are not the things which separate the Labour Party from the Tories and oft times the Labour Party from itself. Only Nationalisation can do that.

True the Tories have nationalised in the past and might conceivably do so again if circumstances warranted. But for them Nationalisation measures have been a means to an end. The Labour Party for political purposes have made it an end in itself, although the Margate conference saw a full scale strategical withdrawal from that position.

Mr. Woodburn, M.P., made a clumsy attempt to cover the withdrawal by telling the conference that Natíonalisation was not Socialism. Mr. Woodburn may know that but the history of his party is writ large in the monumental confusion created by it in failing to make any real distinction between them. The speeches and writings of Labour leaders over the years bear damning testimony to this confusion. He also added, Nationalisation is merely a means to an end and not necessarily the best means. Whatever implications one likes to draw from that remark the fact is that the Labour Party in the past has viewed Nationalisation as an end; a social goal, a political ideal. Its 1918 Manifesto, Labour and the New Social Order, proclaimed as its aim the continued extension of nationalisation acts to ever widening spheres of industry. And until recent years the Labour Party never substantially departed from it. Hitherto the Labour Party regarded its policy of Nationalisation as one of principle not expediency.

The militant convictions of the Webbs and old Fabians who contributed considerably to the Nationalisation policy of the Labour Party are lacking among present day Labour leaders. Two terms of Labour administration have dispelled from the minds of the administrators any notion of the talismanic powers of Nationalisation. The Webbs are dead in more senses than one.

[From article by E.W., Socialist Standard, November 1953.]

Compromise leads to Catastrophe (1944)

From the April 1944 issue of the Socialist Standard

Nothing that has occurred in working-class history has weakened our view that the most important task to-day is that of making Socialists. We cannot have Socialism until a majority of the workers are Socialists, also as Socialist knowledge animates large numbers of the workers, so will recede the possibility of dictatorship and war. The alternative task to propagating Socialism is that of advocating reformist policies and getting support from workers on the basis of those reforms. Having obtained support, the reformist parties have the task of administering capitalism, a task which immediately brings them into conflict with working-class interests, however sincere their efforts. The Labour Governments of 1924 and 1929 discovered this, but they “heeded not the warning,” and in 1940 some of their leaders joined the Government at the invitation of the ruling class. Inevitably disputes have arisen over reforms, and during many recent debates Labour M.P.s have criticised the seemingly complacent or compromising attitude of these leaders. Mr. Morrison, for example, was described as a “backstair, Tammany-Hall politician” during the debate on Workmen’s Compensation.

Mr. Woodburn, Labour M.P., is seldom amongst the critics. His articles appear in “Forward” defending the Labour Party chiefly on the grounds that they are engaging in the practical politics of to-day and they are obtaining some improvements for workers; and if some of the concessions are smaller than Mr. Woodburn would like them to be, he still supports them because of “quarter of a loaf being better than none.” So is the proverbial crumb. A dispute in “Forward” finished with Mr. Woodburn chiding those whom he calls “the romantic school of Socialists,” who “people the world with villains called capitalists and heroic martyrs called workers.” Actually, and we are indebted to Mr. Woodburn for reviving this profound truth, “there are good and bad in all classes” (“Forward,” October 9, 1943). We are not following him into the ethics of the social classes: we are faced with a serious problem. How can the working-class establish Socialism ? Let us first glance at the economic division in society.

The people in the world are divided into two classes : the capitalist class, who own the means of producing wealth, and who live on the surplus value derived from this ownership; and the working class, who are compelled, in order to live, to sell their energies to the owners for wages. Between these classes there is a class struggle which manifests itself both on the industrial and political fields. Politically it is a struggle over the ownership of the means of wealth production. This is a revolutionary struggle. When Woodburn commends the work of Bevin, Morrison and “others under Clem Attlee” for “creating new methods of running social life” as though these new methods were a development towards Socialism, and infers (without definitely saying so) that the alternative to these activities is catastrophic change, he is merely supporting popular misconceptions of Socialism and revolution. He states : “Socialism is not a catastrophic change from capitalism, but a development out of and on the basis of capitalism. Capitalism is indeed the mother of Socialism. . . . Socialism is approaching us every day in economic development.” (“Forward,” October 9, 1943). In the same issue he commends working with those who are Liberals and Tories—we are not to spurn them because of their label as “our aim is to make Socialists not enemies of our opponents.”

The Labour leaders are not in the Cabinet to establish Socialism; they were allowed in to help in the work of prosecuting the war. Their help in the task of conscripting workers is invaluable to the capitalists; Conservative ministers would have been unable to put into operation so easily such measures as the Essential Work Order and other restrictive orders. These are new methods of coercing the worker, methods of tieing him to his job—in short, they are new methods of running capitalism. They have brought a degree of security to the worker—convict security. Mr. Woodburn, of course, knows that. Where are the Socialist measures or achievements of the Labour leaders? There have been various reforms, approved by a Cabinet predominantly Conservative, such as the Catering Bill and the Pensions Bill and other measures which will alleviate some distress. They are reforms considered to be necessary for the smooth running of capitalism. They have effected no general improvement in working-class life; the capitalism that we knew in 1939, with its slums, poverty, miserable pensions and doles, still persists.

Merely to state that Socialism is approaching, without any clue as to the nature of the change to Socialism, except that it is not catastrophic, is valueless; it conveys nothing to the reader. Two of the necessary conditions for Socialism are a socially-operated, highly-developed industrial system and a working-class capable of controlling and running the system. In this sense, in every country in the world, including Nazi Germany, we are approaching Socialism, but the change to Socialism requires something more than that. It requires a working-class that understands and desires Socialism, and organises politically for the conquest of political power in order to establish Socialism. Having gained political power, they will effect a change in the basis of society from private to common ownership of the means of producing wealth. This is not catastrophic, but it is not simply a progressive economic development from capitalism; it is a revolutionary change in the basis of society.

Past experience has shown that the danger of catastrophe arises from collaborating with the representatives of the ruling class. Bewildered by the broken promises of the Labour parties and their changes in policy, workers have been swept into support of reactionary movements. In 1931, after two and a half years of Labour Government, millions of workers registered their opposition to what they falsely imagined to be Socialism, and voted into power a Government that openly advocated severe wage-cuts and economies. In Germany the Social Democrats had held power or participated in coalition governments for 15 years. In 1933 the Nazis and their allies were voted into power; the reformist efforts of the Social Democrats had the effect of making Nazis. The considered opinion of a small group of German workers, who in 1933 secretly published a book, “Neu Beginnen,” is worth recording: —

“The disappointment of the workers in their own organisations is the fundamental cause of their indifference and inactivity in face of the Fascist advance and even of the partial sympathy which they show towards it.” (Page 36, “Socialism’s New Start,” N.C.L.C. Translation.)

Compromise and reforms had brought, not Socialism, but “National Socialism.” Working with the German counterparts to our Liberals and Tories had not made them Socialists, it had not even brought lasting support from their own members. Bitter experience had shown these workers the truth, that “repeated and disgraceful failures of these parties (the Socialist Labour organisations),” had led to indifference and even opposition to Socialist ideas. These failures were inevitable—capitalism cannot be run in the interest of the workers—but the opposition to Socialist ideas is not inevitable.

The contrasts of wealth and poverty impress workers and make them ready to discuss and accept the Socialist solution. We claim that in order to make them Socialists it is necessary to show most clearly the difference between reforms of capitalism and revolution. History has shown that our claim is true. Workers ignore the class struggle at their peril; no compromise should be their guide in the difficult situations that war and peace have yet to bring.

L. J.

A Labour Leader Who Misreads the Signs of the Times (1942)

From the November 1942 issue of the Socialist Standard

Periodically we are informed by those who occupy high places and enjoy high incomes that we cannot expect any further sacrifices from the rich; that they have been literally mulct of their vast incomes and reduced almost to poverty. In fact to have an income of over £4,000 a year, after paying tax, is now really unique and unusual; some of us thought that before the war. It is implied by them, that this shows that an equalitarian society is gradually evolving out of present society and that there will be no need to dispossess the capitalists as they, forced by the exigencies of war, are doing it for us.

An enlightening addition to this idea was in the “Forward” of May 16th, Mr. A. Woodburn, M.P., makes the following statement: —

“I mention these matters because I have been impressed recently at meeting with the almost doleful type of propaganda. One would think that there was no story of progress and accomplishment to tell.

When we think that in 1847 Marx’s Communist Manifesto put forward a “revolutionary programme” which in some cases is now entirely achieved and in other cases partly achieved, we begin to realise what has happened in the last century.

We have achieved a “heavily progressive income tax” (up to 19s. 1d. out of every £1 for the very rich) ; “the obligation of all to labour has come with a vengeance.”

How anyone can imagine that the first item is a sign of gain for Socialism passes all understanding. The tax, however heavy, is not a measure directed against the private property institution. It leaves intact the great fortunes and estates of the capitalist class. However much they pay in tax for the time being, it still remains a basic feature of society that they derive their incomes from their ownership of the means of living. Clearly as it leaves the basis of society untouched, it is not a gain for Socialism, neither is it revolutionary.

There were many seemingly drastic changes advocated at that time (1847), including the Chartist struggle and the Trade Union fight for legal recognition. The practical achievement of these aims is not comparable to the tremendous economic change that Socialism implies.

As a counter to Mr. Woodburn, let us look at society as it is. It still rests on the basis of capitalist private ownership. A small section of society own the lands, factories and machines for producing wealth, and are able by this ownership to live without working. The workers who possess nothing but their energy are forced to sell themselves piecemeal to the capitalists for wages. Each day they produce goods of all descriptions which belong to their masters, who desire neither to consume these goods nor keep them, only to sell them. Failure to sell generally means that the workers are thrown on the streets to search for alternative employment. At this point we can see the ultimate value of the “obligation to labour” that Woodburn proudly exhibits as a gain.

It is true that in a Socialist society all able-bodied people would be expected to do their share of the necessary work of society, but this has no relation to the present enforced labour laws. Because war on such a gigantic scale can be won only by the concentrated effort of the whole of society, the Industrial Reserve Army of nearly 2,000,000 has been absorbed in the production of useful armaments. There is no guarantee that they will have work at the end of the war. The “Economist” (2/5/42) briefly summarised toe Unemployment Insurance Committee’s report for 1941 and contained the following :

“Since no measures have been announced for the prevention of an unpredictable increase in unemployment after the war, there is at present no basis for calculating the expenditure which the fund may be liable to meet.”

The “Economist” suggested that by planned demobilisation” it should be possible “to maintain employment far more successfully than after the last war.” Even were this true it ignores the fact that many representatives of the ruling class have shown that they do not want state control or interference and that what they want is the free play of economic forces. Mr. Harcourt Johnstone stated at Bristol last year—

“We shall have to increase our export trade by £50,000,000 a year. . . . That will involve a tremendous effort. Competition will have been increased in many directions. … It is no part of the Government’s policy to promote an artificially high level of costs in this country as against our export competitors.” (“Daily Herald,” November 24th, 1941.)

In this struggle for markets the need for cheap production will be greater than ever, and more machinery will be installed of a labour-saving nature, thus cheapening goods produced but throwing many workers on the labour market. There will not be any labour laws then forcing all to work; in fact, we may again read of miners sent to prison for working mines that do not belong to them (“Barnsley Chronicle,” September 14th, 1935). We shall probably count the unemployed in millions again and our masters will count their wealth in millions.

Because we state these facts, does this mean that our propaganda is doleful or pessimistic. No, it means that we realise that the economic laws running through society, not a few abstract “revolutionary” measures will determine what kind of a world will emerge following this conflict. Failing Socialism it will be a world where the capitalist class will be still in control; where the struggle for markets, jobs and an existence will be even more fierce than the days of 1930 to 1939. It cannot be altered by a few ameliorative laws passed in Parliament. They can modify or remedy a few glaring anomalies, but so far as the general trend of events arc concerned the “great” statesmen are helpless. The political somersaults since the beginning of this war show only too clearly how incapable our masters are of discerning the future, even from day to day.

We cannot do that either, but we can and have shown that so long as wealth is produced for profit, certain evils must exist. We have shown that reforms cannot alter the basis of society, but merely remedy some defects of capitalism; they have failed to deal with any major evil such as unemployment, poverty, slums, crises and wars. These were with us 150 years ago, and are still with us to-day. All the reforms and planning that is suggested will not alter that. The “Economist” (May 16th, 1942) neatly put it—

“The point is not that capitalism has collapsed or failed to deliver the goods, as all sorts of planners have wrongly argued. It is rather that, for all its technical successes, unemployment, malnutrition and poverty have remained in evidence.”

This is the candid admission of an authoritative capitalist journal, a realisation that capitalism can produce wealth in great quantities but leaves untouched the widespread distress amongst the population. Wealth is produced fairly easily, but often is destroyed because the markets are incapable of absorbing such quantities. Millions live in want, suffer from malnutrition, exist in unhealthy hovels, despite the massive wealth producing machinery of the present day, because in this society the object is not to produce solely for use but for profit.

However progress is being made in the gradual enlightenment of members of our class, and in the growing political knowledge of the worker. Capitalism will throw up such obvious contradictions that the limited nature of their present-day aims will strike the workers as a strange contrast to the task that they will have to tackle, the establishment of Socialism. This is our message to the workers; study the Socialist case, understand why we stand for social revolution and not reform. Knowing these things you will realise that only through the workers possessing Socialist understanding and gaining political control can Socialism be established and human progress guaranteed.

D. J.

30 Years of Scottish Bombast (1953)

From the July-August 1953 issue of The Western Socialist

The political scene in Britain (particularly Scotland) to-day, provides, in some important respects, a striking contrast to that of 30 years ago. To describe and analyse the intervening years would be an inquiry into decay and decline; a study in bilge and bombast; a picture, sad in itself, of promise without performance.

It would indeed be a journey through a period littered dismally with the bones and residue of movements which got their sustenance from the energies and hopes of many thousands of working people.

To-day, in Glasgow, and the industrial belt of which it is the centre, one meets many men and women, now despairing cynics, who were, thirty years ago, enthusiastic, selfless workers in the various movements.

Then, thirty odd years ago, as now, war-time conditions were slowly changing into normal capitalist conditions of “peace”: rationing was giving place to the accustomed sway of the purse, and a greater variety of goods were appearing in shop windows to tease and tantalize working-class housewives. Another obvious feature in common, a natural aftermath of the long war years of unbridled violence and deceit, is an increase in crimes of violence, rape and fraud. And, of course, what is delightfully described as “delinquent youth.” In other words, the behaviour of young men and women, growing up in their most malleable years in a world of organized, colossal murder; whose playgrounds were air-raid shelters and bombed buildings; who accepted as natural the “blackout” with all its inevitable framework.

The drift away from organized religion is ever more marked today and it could perhaps be said that highly organized gambling — particularly the “football pools” — with their billion-to-one chance of winning £75,000, have ousted religion from its former supremacy as a social dope and bulwark of capitalism.

“Tomorrow? Why, tomorrow I may be myself with £75,000” is a faith more potent, and supplanting than of the Sacred Articles and Beatitudes.

A striking commentary on Capitalism is the fact that the gambling industry fast rivals others in order of importance. And that in this retreat of theology, its hired and paid (evidently underpaid) laborers are quisling to the football pools, as scrutiny of the prize winners lists sometimes reveals.

Here in Glasgow, 30 years ago, events had earned the area the totally unjustified title of the “Red Clyde.” The Communist Party had recently been formed out of a host of individuals and movements conspicuous by their sound and fury, and by their lack of Socialist understanding — “Armed insurrection,” “Direct Action,” “Minority movements,” “Collapse of Capitalism,” “Anti-Parliamentarianism,” were some of the slogans shouted by many a man now seated comfortably in Parliament. Some indeed now Peers of the Realm.

The Labor and Independent Parties — then part of the same organization had their stronghold here on Clydeside and in the landslide of 1924 when a record number of I.L.P. and Labor Members of Parliament were elected, scores of thousands of elated workers assembled in the centre of the city to see the conquerors off to London to capture the bastions of Imperial Britain. It seemed to many excited workers that the world was theirs and the late James Maxton M.P., confirmed this impression by declaring “The working class is now the ruling class, so why should they go in rags?” Everywhere in the area. Labor and I.L.P. orators were pushing their themes of Nationalization. Everywhere, there were meetings, demonstrations, United Movements, “New Worlds,” “New Perspectives.” “Revolutionary situations” were perpetually conjured into verbal being.

Joining in the unholy chorus, the Communist Party added its own nostrums of “Direct Action” and “Soviet Power.”

Elements of DeLeonism contributed their proportionate share with their Industrial Unionism and wild talk of “taking and holding the means of Life.”

The Glasgow Branch of the SPGB had just been formed by a literal handful of men. Amidst trouble, difficulties, most of them unemployed, meeting in hovels in which they lived, in the jungle of wind and bombast surrounding them, they presented the case for Socialism. A case which at first, largely met with sneers and ridicule. and on many an occasion, with violent measures being taken against the couple of speakers. Today, what is the general political and industrial position in contrast to that of then?

In the industrial field, the open allegiance of the prominent Trade Union officials to not only Labor Government but the present Tory one exceeds anything of 30 years ago. Indeed, Trade Unions threats to become mere adjuncts of Governments and the employing class instead of what their pioneers intended them to be—organs of working class struggle. Insolent admonitions to work harder and forego wage-claims abound from every quarter of the Trade Union movement. “More production for the export markets” is now an official Trade Union slogan. Here and there, of course, the pinch of the cost of living and the increased tempo of production force workers to take action but, in the main, such episodes meet with, not only the disapproval of the Government, but with the opposition of the official Trade Union movement.

At Conference after Conference, spokesmen ruminate on problems of national self-sufficiency, of capital investment, of the problems of British Capitalism in the markets of the world; on anything and everything except working-class interests.

At the Scottish Trade Union Congress held in Rothesay in April of this year, a Mr. T. O’Brien, M.P. who is chairman of the British T.U.C. delivered himself of the following piece of unvarnished nonsense:

  "There were workers who thought of efficiency as something to do with the boss, but nothing to do with themselves. I say this to all of them — if they persist in such attitudes for long, then all they will have to live on will be their illusions. And illusions are a poor currency in World Markets. We are right in a period when we can’t afford inefficiency in management or low productivity in the workshops. Whether industry is privately or publicly controlled or owned it is everybody's job to help the nation to earn its living. These are not class issues. They are the plain unvarnished economic facts." Daily Express, April 13, 1953.

An even more penetrating and squalid insight into the functions of the Labor Party and its allies — the official Trade Union Movement — during the so-called boom years, was given by the last Labor Chancellor of the Exchequer in his Budget speech reported by the National Press on April 10, 1951:

  "During the past few years of labor scarcity and sellers’ market, workers had been in a position of unexampled strength of bargaining power. Had they considered only their own immediate interests they could have pressed their advantage home."

Little wonder the more sober-minded Capitalist press greeted somewhat ruefully the narrow victory of Churchill and his Tories in Oct., 1951. Apprehensive forecasts of subsequent widespread industrial disorder were speedily proven wrong. Trade Union leaders like O’Brien, Deakin, Lowther and others were not slow in assuring the new Government of their support. So that, shortly after, Mr. Churchill could gurgle happily the famous understatement, “four-fifths of both parties were agreed on four-fifths of their programs. ”

In Scottish Labor Party circles this process goes on apace, so that a Mr. G. McAllister writing in a Labor Party paper the Glasgow “Forward” could opine that while Churchill stood for 10 per cent Socialism in the national economy, Mr. Morrison, the second in command of the Labor Party, stood for 15 per cent and that the new bogey man of Wall Street — Mr. Aneurin Bevan — stood for somewhat more!

The same “Forward” had an article recently by a prominent Labor M.P., Mr. Arthur Woodburn on “What do we mean by Socialism” wherein with a nonchalance worthy of the Stalinists, he threw overboard the theories of half-a-century .— “Planning and not Nationalization is the cornerstone of Socialism.” In the usual run of reformist politicians, not a word of apology does he express for a lifetime of sedulously identifying Socialism with Nationalization, the aspirations and energies of humble workers, lending their support to the Labor Party, do not appear in his balance sheet.

The formerly mighty I.L.P. now shrunk almost to nothingness, still maintains a precarious existence. Boasting sometimes of how it differs from the stinking organization which preyed, vulture-like, upon the workers for so many years, it reveals the same old lousy story of reform. With its divisions of Pacifism, Quakerism, Catholicism, Secularism, jostling side by side with a counterfeit Marxism, it presents the same old mixture of confusion and futility. And even more productive of sardonic comment is the ease and facility with which prominent members of the I.L.P. can leave the I.L.P. for the more comfortable and secure Labor Party.

It would, perhaps, be illuminating to digress temporarily in order to examine briefly a prime and significant example of this phenomenon.

In the noisy days of 1923-24 onwards, Gorbals, a constituency in Glasgow of world renown (or notoriety) was represented, on behalf of the I.L.P., by a Mr. G. Buchanan. His seat embraced the most squalid slums in Europe, possibly the world. Rows and rows of the most terrifying, rat-infested slums. Lice-ridden, the habitat of millions of bugs, with a population of the most diverse in Scotland, where Scottish, Irish, Jewish (from all parts of Europe) and Indian workers lived literally on top of one another, it had, and sadly still has, the greatest infantile mortality in Europe. An area where criminals were bred, where gangsters and bullies were ten-a-penny and yet withal thousands of men and women retain their dignity and integrity.

In short, a working-class constituency, par excellence.

Mr. Buchanan, who held the seat for twenty years with one of the biggest majorities in Britain, and on the basis of “decent homes,” “high wages” and all the other vote catching nostrums, decided blandly around 1945 to leave, in between elections, naturally, the I.L.P. for the Labor Party.

Regardless of the blazing fact that his constituents were still in in the company of lice and vermin, still in the same old filthy slums, with their infants still dying in greater numbers than anywhere else, he transferred his allegiance. Although the men and women who had supported him all through the years were still exploited, oppressed and insulted, exacerbated by years of bereavement, sacrifice and hardship in the years of war, and although he had won the seat in 1935 in the teeth of Labor Party opposition which seemed to indicate their preference for the I.L.P. Without even going through the motions of consulting his electors, he joined the Labor Party. Since then he has fared much better than the workers of Gorbals. He is now Chairman of the National Assistance Board, which, after a Means Test, relieves the poor and needy (over 2 million cases in 1952). The remuneration of the Chairman of the Board is £5,000 per year. He, McGovern, Carmichael, F. Brockway and many others left the I.L.P. and joined the Labor Party when the writing appeared on the wall for the I.LP.

For the first 30 months of the Labor Government elected in July 1945, the Communist Party supported the Government. This support, of course, was directly in line with Soviet foreign policy, best seen in all its naked callousness by the statement of the late demi-god Stalin in Crimea 1945: “The alliance between the Soviet Union, the United States and Great Britain, is based not on casual and transient motives, but on vitally important and long-standing interests.” This also led the Communist Party to oppose every strike during this period. For example, the strike of the Grimethorpe miners in Sept., 1947, was denounced by the Party as a “stab in the back of the working class.” Their General Secretary, Mr. Pollitt, who had in his pamphlet “Questions and Answers,” 1946, so obsequiously re-echoed Mr. Stalin’s Crimean declaration, however, in December 1947, in his report to his members was compelled to abandon as unreal, his own and his semi-divine leaders prognostication by stating:

  “Because of the United States and British policy of refusing to co-operate with the Soviet Union, the differences have deepened to the point where today there are two world camps. It is necessary that important changes be made in C.P. policy.”

Thereupon, the C.P. attacked the Labor Government until its defeat in 1951, The attack, naturally, was mainly in the area of foreign affairs. In recent months the C.P. has reached the depths of nationalistic slime in its anti-American policy. Defenders of native culture against Wall Street; on guard against Yankee music, literature and films; assailants even of the “crew” hair-cut and the “drape” suit; disdainful of the crepe soled shoes, coat shirts and ties of America, they present a sordid spectacle.

Starting from the stellar heights of “Go home Yank” in which they suggested in a front page article of the “Daily Worker” that an inebriated G. I. who had allegedly misappropriated a crucifix from “an old Saxon Church,” should get life imprisonment; rising to dizzy cosmic heights of a knight-like solicitude and concern for the sexual virtue of the innocent, unspoilt British womanhood beset by threats and wiles, by the dollars, nylons and other merchandise of the PX of the licentious American soldiery, they have descended to the noisome depths of “Let Britain Arise" 1952, in which Mr. H. Pollitt proposes as a serious measure: “That no foreign worker shall be employed while a British worker is unemployed or on short-time." In other words: “Workers of the world — divide — you have nothing to gain but your jobs.’’ Or: “Did your mother come from Ireland? or Italy? or Spain? or America?"

Arguing “that if we have to have a Coronation, let’s make it a British one — untainted by the products of Broadway or Hollywood," agitating for a lowering of the cost of production of labor-power, squealing about the need for “East-West Trades,’’ defending every tortuous twist of Kremlin policy from Vishinsky’s “No” to Molotov’s “Yes,’’ bleating about Scottish, Irish and Welsh Home Rule; moaning about the “sell out of Britain to Wall Street,’’ the C.P. of Great Britain is in truth, indeed, an object of contempt in the eyes of workers with even a spark of working-class principles.

The small Trotskyist party, the R.C.P. were compelled to “liquidate” when their counterparts, the C.P. became slightly critical of the Labor Government. Its self-appointed leadership is now in the comfortable bosom of the Labor Party. All its noise and its innumerable and uncomprehensible theses, its fury and bombast, now muted to a safer and more respectable key.

The Scottish Nationalists, with no real roots in the working class, still shout the funny slogan of “Scotland for the Scots.” Some of their misguided followers, infuriated by the choice of the title of Queen Elizabeth II, and quite obviously motivated by an over literal interpretation of Thurber’s “Secret of Walter Mitty,” and encouraged by the indignation of the regal title expressed by Scots, Tory and Labor M.P.s are engaging in the pleasant pastime of sticking home-made bombs in mail-boxes bearing the obnoxious slogan “ER II.” In the West of Scotland there is a very small but vociferous crew of Anarchists. People who take the discordant views of Jesus Christ, Proudhon, Stirner, Bakunine, Tolstoy, Kropotkin and the Syndicalists, yes and even the I. W. W., in one indigestible swallow and confront the workers with the confusing result.

That is the dark side of the picture.

On the other side, we have, first of all, the Socialist Party of Great Britain, plugging away at the serious, un-melodramatic job of spreading the Socialist idea. The two branches in Glasgow, although faced yet with great difficulties, meet with nothing like the hostility encountered by the pioneers of 30 odd years ago. The myth of Socialist Russia is not nearly as widespread. Nationalization as a panacea has lost its vogue. The stupid theories of armed insurrection and the like, are virtually extinct. Perhaps the most hopeful sign of the times is that the younger workers, in discussion, seem to value more serious argument than the shouting of windy slogans. It rather seems, too, that the day of the reformist party is past. And as more and more of the working class recognize the already open identity between Sir Winston Churchill and Major Attlee, they must turn their attention to the Socialists.

Therefore, the Socialists in Scotland, like Socialists the world over, are confident of the working class ultimately accepting the view that the world and all that is in or on it, should belong to all.

It is a hard task, but one well worth the doing.

Tony Mulheron

Glasgow Branch, SPGB

The Basis of Socialist Organisation. (1931)

From the December 1931 issue of the Socialist Standard

A Lesson of the Election

The one thing that most clearly marks off the Socialist Party of Great Britain from the other organisations which claim an interest in Socialism, is our view that the only possible basis for a Socialist Party is an understanding of socialist principles. When the founders of the S.P.G.B. decided on our present Declaration of Principles as the minimum condition of' membership, they had already had long experience of alternative forms of organisation. They had seen the disastrous results of bringing together people without socialist knowledge who were attracted merely by one or other of a long list of political and social reforms. Such an organisation cannot be more advanced than its members, and therefore cannot take action for the furtherance of Socialism. Indeed, it can take action at all only with the greatest difficulty, for it rarely happens that all the members are agreed upon any one of the reform demands. Every attempt to be definite provokes internal friction or secession movements. The electoral success of such a party is its aim and also its undoing. For with office comes the demand from the members that steps be taken to fulfil all the promises. Of course they cannot be fulfilled; capitalism stands in the way. The elation of victory gives place quickly to angry criticism of the men or the programme. So every such party meets its fate sooner or later at the hands of the workers who gave it life and strength. The last election, coming after more than two years of Labour Government, shows us the internal contradictions of the Labour Party, working out to their necessary conclusion. Those who still cling to the belief that an organisation of non-socialists, brought together upon a programme of reforms, can work for Socialism should ponder over the Labour Party’s collapse.

"Forward," the Scottish I.L.P. journal, in its issues dated November 7th, 14th and 21st, published articles from a large number of Labour candidates in Scottish constituencies telling why they lost seats and votes. The collection is a very powerful justification for the position of the S.P.G.B. Below we give some brief extracts:—

Mr. Thomas Johnson (West Stirlingshire) : “We lost, inter alia, because about 15 per cent, of our abnormal vote in 1929 transferred itself to our opponents.”

Mr. T. Henderson (Tradeston) gives as one of the reasons for his defeat, “warring elements within the movement.”

Mr. Michael Marcus (Dundee) says: “Recent events prove conclusively that our first task is to convert certain socialists to Socialism.” He records that panic at the thought of a Labour victory seized even the poorest workers who had not so much as a few pounds in the Savings Bank.

Mr. James C. Welsh (Coatbridge) tells that the unemployed and their wives voted against him, although, as he complains bitterly, “ I think I can claim that nowhere have the unemployed had better services given them.”

Mr. D. N. Mackay (Inverness-shire) confesses that the electors voted for the National candidate because they still regarded MacDonald and Snowden as “typical Labourists ” and “their views were accepted as final.” But what a confession to make! To admit that the party supporters had been recruited simply on the name's of its former leaders.

Mr. John Winning (Kelvingrove) says that working-class voters, employed and unemployed, after two years of Labour Government, flocked to the poll "to protect their few pennies in the Savings Bank and Post Office from confiscation by a Labour Government ”: not only the old and decrepit, but also "the young and vigorous." He finds it a chastening thought, and wonders what is wrong with the Labour Party’s "socialist” propaganda.

Mr. R. Gibson (N. Edinburgh) found that the unemployed voted Tory because they were promised jobs, and, it seems, were more impressed by this than by the Labour promise to look after their unemployment pay. It is a saddening discovery for reformers that the workers positively dislike their particular brand of reforms. Mr. Gibson had the support of the local Liberals, and paints a touching picture of a "Liberal woman . . . pleading with a Communist to vote Labour.”

Mr. J. S. Clarke (Maryhill) says "Prominent members of the I.L.P., including the Glasgow organiser, not only abstained from voting for the Labour candidate, but conducted a virulent campaign against him.” Mr. Clarke is one of those who in the past have told us that we ought to get together with the great united Labour Party. But even if we wanted to, how could we now that it is "united” into several furiously battling fragments?

Mr. J. Pollock (Kilmarnock) attributes defeat to the Labour supporters having been won over to tariffs, and to the deadly blow administered to the local Labour Party in 1929 when the Labour Head Office forced a particularly anti-working class Labour candidate on the division.

Mr. A. Woodburn (Leith) says that in his constituency the workers felt that they had had just about enough of Labour Government "and it was time to see what another Government would do.” That is confirmation of our own often expressed view of the results of Labour Government.

Mr. J. Sullivan (Bothwell) lost his seat because he had quarrelled with the other reform party, the Communists, and they ran a candidate against him.

Mr. G. Mathers (W. Edinburgh) relates that certain of his own dissatisfied supporters, instead of helping him, came to his meetings "trying to concoct trick questions.” He saw with surprise that the unemployed, the teachers, and others who were affected by the National Government’s economy plans, nevertheless voted "Nationalist.”

In South Ayrshire, Mr. James Brown suffered from the effects of his own party’s propaganda. The Labour Party, having decided to be Free Traders, were promising to keep prices down, so the farmers and fishermen—who wanted high prices, not low ones—voted against the Labour Party,, which was expecting to get their votes.

Dissatisfaction With Labour Government.

Mr. F. Martin (E. Aberdeenshire) gives the following reasons for the shrinkage of the Labour vote :—

  The general scare; support for Ramsay MacDonald, which caused a certain number of Socialists to vote for the Conservative, and which also induced many abstentions; dissatisfaction with the record of Labour in office.

The chief Tory asset was, in Mr. Martin’s view, the prospect of tariffs.

In Galloway, Mr. H. McNeill was beaten by a combination of factors. There was a Mosley candidate preaching "scientific capitalism” (and seemingly some voters thought this must be better than capitalism badly run by the Labour Party). Numbers of Co-operators voted Tory "to save the pound, and at the same time their divi” from their Labour friends.

In Motherwell, which the Communists used to declare had a solid Communist majority (although they won it on the usual Lib.-Lab. reform programme), the Rev. James Barr was up against a Liberal who is chairman of the local football club, and therefore popular. Then, it appears, the electorate failed to realise that a National victory meant protectionist capitalism instead of free trade capitalism, and “they paid no heed to the warning of the 'Manchester Guardian.’ ” The Liberal candidate won other votes by declaring that the rich are having a bad time; he "gave out grossly inaccurate figures as to additional burdens imposed on surtax payers.” And finally he tried to take away Catholic voters from the Protestant Rev. J. Barr.

May we offer to this Labour candidate what would seem to be a simple but certain road to victory next time? Let him become chairman of a football club, declare himself a Protectionist-Free-Trader and a Catholic-Protestant, and train all his supporters to read the Liberal "Manchester Guardian.” Then, no doubt, we shall soon have Socialism!! The chief obstacle from the Rev. Barr's point of view is that, if he discovers a vote-catching stunt, his opponents will use it too.

Mr. J. Gibson (S. Lanark) was defeated because, among other things, the workers did not like what they saw of Labour Government. He says :—

   The Labour Government did not help us. It had attempted to operate capitalism only to find itself faced with a crisis that demanded Socialist action.

Mr. Gibson does hot explain how, having been elected to operate capitalism, they could have taken socialist action even if they know what it is and wished to do so. It was only the disgust of the voters that prevented Mr. Gibson from being returned like the others “to operate capitalism." That was what he was offering to do.

“They Had No Savings."

In Berwick and Haddington, Mr. G. Sinkinson had a different experience from some of his colleagues elsewhere. He found that the miners solidly resisted the panic about Savings Banks, “for the very simple reason that they had ho savings." Mr. Sinkinson does not explain what the Labour Government had been doing for over two years that the miners should have been thus pauperised.

Mr. J. Rankin (Pollok) describes the “huge Labour majorities of 1929 melting like snow upon the desert's dusty face." The fall in the Labour vote was due to the following: “The ongoings in the Labour Cabinet during the crisis." At every meeting he was asked, “Did your own Cabinet not agree to nine-tenths of the cuts you are now opposing?" He describes the election as being “simply a vote of confidence in MacDonald"; and like others who for years and years had been telling the voters to trust blindly in MacDonald, Mr. Rankin was caught in his own trap.

Miss Jennie Lee, in N. Lanark, failed to get the votes of electors in a new district, and suffered from “the general disappointment caused by the spirit in which the Labour Government had applied itself to its tasks." It will be recalled that Miss Lee, when she was elected in 1929 on a programme of reforms which did not so much as mention Socialism-, claimed her election as a “socialist " victory. Of course, neither her victory then nor her defeat now had anything to do with Socialism.

In West Lothian Mr. Shinwell expected the shale oil workers and miners to be disappointed with the results of Labour Government whose “reforms" had, in fact, worsened their conditions. He saw the miners voting for a royalty owner, and Catholic workers voting for a Protestant Orangeman.

In Shettleston the Labour man was beaten by Mr. McGovern, who fought with the backing of the I.L.P. and its leaders (and the Catholic Press). The I.L.P. parent trying to kill its own overgrown child, the Labour Party!

In Bute and N. Ayr, Mr. A. Sloan attributed his defeat, partly at least, to the spectacle of the Labour Government putting its programme into operation.

  Frankly, I must say that the action or in- action of the late Labour Government had quite a lot to do with it. There was resentment in the minds of the workers that they had been badly let down by the Labour Government.

The Labour Government's "Means Test."

With regard to accusations against the Labour Cabinet that they had agreed to the economies, he says :—

   I have yet to see, hear, or read any reasoned reply to the accusation. I also struck the first fruits of the Anomalies Act. . . It is a means test of far reaching effect imposed by the Labour Government.(Italics his.)

Mr. Sloan gives it as his view that the Labour Government, if judged simply on its merits, would have had an even worse defeat at the polls. Only the unpopular National Government economies saved the Labour candidates some loss of votes.

In East Renfrewshire, Bailie Strain had to fight the “fighting marquis of Clydesdale," a popular sporting man, and also the I.L.P. The branch of the I.L.P. not only decided to take no part in the election, but refused to lend or hire out its hall for Labour meetings, this being done as “a protest against the actions of the Parliamentary Labour Party."

Bailie Strain, who was the Co-operative nominee, found himself up against Cooperative opposition. He says :—

   The Tories undoubtedly took full advantage of the elements, hundreds of motor cars and fine- dressed ladies, among whom were many prominent co-operators, helping to rush the electors to the polls.

Mr. A. Fraser Macintosh, at Montrose Burghs, gives a fine illustration of the dangers of depending upon leaders. His party has always told the workers to trust in MacDonald. So large numbers of Labour supporters continued to do so in this election. You cannot unmake a god in a few weeks. Other Labour supporters had become apathetic and would not vote, because the Labour Government had "let them down.’’ All that Mr. Macintosh and his helpers could do was to say that it was not the Labour Party which had betrayed the workers, but only its leaders. To which, as Mr. Macintosh confesses, the workers replied that you could not separate the leaders from the Party.

   Our little band showed them, but it was of little avail—we did not count, it was the leaders who counted, and they had let them down and would do so again.

The Labour Party cannot have it both ways. If they build a party on its leaders, they must put up with the devastating consequences when the leaders desert.

Reforms Which Hit The Miners.

Mr. J. Westwood (Peebles and S. Midlothian) was up against the opposition of the miners, whose sufferings had been aggravated by one  of the Labour Government’s "reforms.”

   There was also a feeling of bitterness amongst the miners at the inadequacy of the Coal Mines Act to deal with the problem of the mines, made more difficult by the short time worked, low wages received and recent reductions applied to our men in the Scottish coalfields.

There was also strong anti-Labour feeling, because of the Labour Government’s Anomalies Act, withdrawing unemployment pay from married women.

Helen Gault, the I.L.P. candidate for East Perth, lost 4,500 votes as compared with 1929. In that year she was official Labour candidate, and had the benefits of having MacDonald on her platform, and "generous financial assistance” from the trade unions. This time her official Labour Party endorsement was withdrawn, and with it the trade union money. She says  that the greatest factor in causing former voters to desert her was the action of the Labour Government—"My greatest handicap was undoubtedly the record of the Labour Government.” She makes the frank admission that, although she and her helpers knew that the charges against the Labour Government were true, they carefully refrained from admitting it.

The Same Thing Over Again.

The above extracts from "Forward” should serve to show what the workers actually think about the Labour Party, and how little they understand their class position and the socialist case. Here we can see the falseness of the I.L.P. and Labour Party belief that you can lead along non-socialist workers by giving them the "practical benefits” of Labour Government. Labour administration of capitalism antagonises the workers, just as speedily as Tory or Liberal administration. 

An incredible amount of work has been devoted to building up the Labour Party and I.L.P. on a basis of reforms, and when they have their chance of giving effect to their programme, capitalism simply smashes their fiddling schemes out of all recognition. It is obvious that in the election the complex jumble of plans and promises contained in "Labour and the Nation” had little effect on the voters.

They simply voted on what they conceived to be the issue of the moment. The Labour Party had been thrust through the natural unpopularity of being the Government, or had manoeuvred itself, on to the wrong side as regards electoral success. Now they are taking stock and preparing to get back again into office when the National Government also fails to solve the insoluble problems of capitalism. But the Labour leaders are not learning the real lesson of the election. They are not even aware that it has proved once more that the only basis for a Socialist Party is an understanding of Socialism. All they are doing is to mix up another mess of reforms, calculated to capture the largest number of votes.

Edgar Hardcastle

Marx and the Labour Party (1933)

From the February 1933 issue of the Socialist Standard

Mr. Arthur. Woodburn, writing in Forward (September 3rd), tries to meet Socialist criticism of the Labour Party’s programme with the retort that Marx, too, was a reformist. This he does by reproducing the list of measures drafted by Marx and Engels in 1847, and incorporated in the Communist Manifesto. (See Section II.)

Mr. Woodburn leaves out the essential explanation without which his statement is grossly misleading. Marx and Engels were socialists, that is to say, they aimed at dispossessing the capitalist class as a necessary preliminary to establishing a system of society based on common ownership of the means of production and distribution. The first step was that the working class must obtain political supremacy. They must then use this political supremacy to dispossess the capitalists. Marx and Engels put forward, in the light of their reading of existing conditions, certain measures as a beginning of the process of dispossession.

     Of course, in the beginning, this cannot be effected except by means of despotic inroads on the rights of property, and on the conditions of bourgeois, production; by means therefore which appear economically insufficient and untenable, but which, in the course of the movement, outstrip themselves, necessitate further inroads upon the old social order, and are unavoidable as a means of entirely revolutionising the mode of production. These measures will, of course, be different in different countries. Nevertheless, in the most advanced countries the following will be pretty generally applicable.

Now the important thing to notice is that these measures were proposed as the way in which the working class, after conquering political power, would begin the task of dispossessing the capitalists and instituting common ownership. This is something poles apart from the Labour Party’s aim and programme. The Labour programme is something so acceptable to large sections of the capitalists that you can have a Labour Government’s public utility schemes modelled on Conservative schemes, and carried on without material modification by subsequent Conservative Governments. The Labour Party, in fact, does not aim now or ever at dispossessing the capitalists. Mr. Snowden, when Chancellor of the Exchequer in the two Labour Governments, repeatedly insisted that the Labour Party does not believe in making despotic inroads on the rights of property, and the Labour Party still holds that view and confirmed it at the Leicester Conference.

To illustrate this we need only point to two of the measures suggested by Marx and Engels, viz., “abolition of property in land ” and “abolition of all right of inheritance.” Mr. Woodburn knows quite well that the Labour Party has never committed itself to those two proposals. It dare not do so, and thus it has no intention of beginning an attack on private ownership.

In passing, it is worth while recalling what Engels, looking back in 1888, had to say of the 1847 proposals: —

  The practical application of the principles will depend, as the manifesto itself states, everywhere and at all times, on the historical conditions for the time being existing, and, for that reason, no special stress is laid on the revolutionary measures proposed at the end of Section II. That passage would, in many respects, be very differently worded to-day.” (See Preface written in 1888.)

P. S.

The Margate Labour Party Conference (1953)

From the November 1953 issue of the Socialist Standard

Nationalisation was the issue at Margate. It is the issue at all Labour conferences. It is difficult to see how it can be otherwise; for Nationalisation apart what else is there left to discuss within the Labour Party? Housing! Education! The Health Services! These are not the things which separate the Labour Party from the Tories and oft times the Labour Party from itself. Only Nationalisation can do that.

True the Tories have nationalised in the past and might conceivably do so again if circumstances warranted. But for them Nationalisation measures have been a means to an end. The Labour Party for political purposes have made it an end in itself, although the Margate conference saw a full scale strategical withdrawal from that position.

Mr. Woodburn, M.P., made a clumsy attempt to cover the withdrawal by telling the conference that “Nationalisation was not Socialism.” Mr. Woodburn may know that but the history of his party is writ large in the monumental confusion created by it in failing to make any real distinction between them. The speeches and writings of Labour leaders over the years bear damning testimony to this confusion. He also added, “ Nationalisation is merely a means to an end and not necessarily the best means.” Whatever implications one likes to draw from that remark the fact is that the Labour Party in the past has viewed Nationalisation as an end; a social goal, a political ideal. Its 1918 Manifesto, “Labour and the New Social Order,” proclaimed as its aim the continued extension of nationalisation acts to ever widening spheres of industry. And until recent years the Labour Party never substantially departed from it. Hitherto the Labour Party regarded its policy of Nationalisation as one of principle not expediency.

The militant convictions of the Webbs and old Fabians who contributed considerably to the Nationalisation policy of the Labour Party are lacking among present day Labour leaders. Two terms of Labour administration have dispelled from the minds of the “administrators” any notion of the talismanic powers of Nationalisation. The Webbs are dead in more senses than one.

The Nationalisation by the Labour Party in its first term of office of coal, electricity, gas, transport looked impressive to many people. When one realises that these industries have previously been subject to a greater or lesser degree of governmental regulation, the “revolution” appears rather a palace one.

Because there is a natural tendency towards monopolistic growth and practises in Capitalism. Capitalist governments are faced with certain problems. For instance the ownership and control by private monopolies of such things as gas, coal, electric power, transport, etc., are a powerful weapon for exacting toll from the vast majority of capitalist enterprises who are utterly dependent on these things. Moreover private monopolies pursue their interests regardless of the requirements of other capitalist sections. As a result they disturb the balance of capitalist economy by disturbing what is termed the free play of the market and so intensify the anarchy of capitalist production. The State is therefore compelled to intervene in order to curb this monopolistic power. State action along these lines is then both an attempt to protect the various sections of capitalism and to ensure the smoother running of the system from the standpoint of the requirements of Capitalism as a whole. Nationalisation is one way of bringing this about.

So far so good; but when the Labour Party is confronted with making good its promise to extend Nationalisation to other spheres of industry it finds itself faced with formidable difficulties. Capitalism now presents to the Labour Party a different aspect than when viewed through the rose-tinted glasses of yesterday's propaganda.

Once the Labour Party used to damn what they termed the present competitive system. Now they have discovered unsuspected virtues in “competition.” Thus Mr. Strauss tells us that the Aircraft industry benefits the country by rivalry and competition in aircraft designs. Any measure of greater centralisation in that industry may have adverse effects, he said. Nationalisation, Mr. Strauss declared, is not so much a way of dealing with the problems of industry but a rather escapist way of avoiding them. And this is the distilled wisdom of years of Labour Party propaganda.

Now it seems to leaders of the Labour Party that Nationalisation can offer no solution for the successful survival of British capitalism in the world's markets. It appears that high quality manufacture, speciality of design and responsiveness and adaptability to market requirements are the basic essentials. In fact the trend of Labour Party opinion seems to suggest that Nationalisation with its mammoth structure and bureaucratic dictation might be an hindrance rather than an aid. One spokesman at Margate illustrated this point by saying that it was the mammoth’s inability to adapt itself to changing conditions that lead to its extinction, its place being taken by the more agile elephant.

While the Labour leaders might propose a new line for the Labour Party’s general acceptance it will not be able to easily dispose of the old one. The policy of state Capitalism, miscalled by the Labour Party, state socialism, has deep rooted attachments for many of the rank and file. Popularised and propagandised by the Labour leaders for nearly fifty years it has acquired an ideological significance not to be easily dismissed. For many workers the old State-capitalist policy of the Labour Party conjured up in their minds visions of a "A New Era” in which the working class would in some way or another come into its own. It will not be easy to divert the energy and enthusiasm this has called forth into other channels. Then of course there is Mr. Bevan. And Mr. Bevan is still Mr. Bevan. For that reason the appeal of Mr. Greenwood for the Labour Party to close its ranks and stop internal dissension will not we think deter Mr. Bevan from his private ambitions. He will continue to keep the pot of Nationalisation boiling by the advocacy to use his own phrase—"Socialism through the old hard agony of Public Ownership and control.”

This of course will embarrass other Labour leaders because it will be difficult for them to admit that they no longer believe in such things. Because the Labour Party’s claim for political support rests on the fact they represent themselves in the light of a progressive party as distinct from the Tories, they must aspire to the semblance even if not the reality of having a social goal not envisaged by their political rivals.

In the past the old policy of State Capitalism served them well in this respect The difficulty will now be to find a substitute goal which will be as effective. One thing appears certain, however, that is whatever their political calculations and figuring might be. Nationalisation will be for the Labour leaders a recurring decimal.

One other thing is also certain that is for the workers the golden promise of a Labour summer is and will remain unfulfilled. It is the long hard winter of capitalism which lies ahead.

Ted Wilmott

The "Friends" of Scottish Workers (1945)

From the April 1945 issue of the Socialist Standard

Since the working class was granted the vote there has never been a shortage of busy-bodies who—hand-on-heart, have declared their ardent sympathy and interest in workers' problems.

When elected, of course, the workers become the "constituency" and each M.P. "looks after his constituency" and looks ahead to the next election. W. Gallacher, A. Woodburn, D. Kirkwood and other Parliamentary luminaries are engaged at the moment—amid other equally laudable pursuits—in pressing the post-war claims of Prestwick Aerodrome. All three are campaigning for the "Forth Road Transport Bridge and have endorsed Hector McNeil, Labour M.P.'s efforts to modernize the Clyde so that the largest ships can be docked at Greenock and Glasgow"

Other Scottish M.P.'s—with an eye on their constituency—are eloquently expatiating on Scottish needs and problems. The "Daily Express," February 15th, gave considerable space to a report of a Parliamentary debate on a Town and Country Planning (Scotland) Bill. Thos. Johnston—the mover the bill said: "In the Tradeston division of Glasgow, for example, there are 127 houses or more than 700 persons to the acre." He said: "The measure won't bring a new Jerusalem to Scotland, but would assist local authorities to deal with problems." In short, a confession of impotence unuusal in its frankness. In the came report there is a gem of a phrase coined by Campbell Stephen, I.L.P., M.P.:— "We in Scotland have had a raw deal. Our association with England has not given us an opportunity to deal with housing and industry." Characteristically, however, W. Gallacher, M.P., capped the lot with "Effete Sassenachs were incapable of dealing with the planning problems which confronted them in Scotland and in consequence the Sturdy Scot had been bound hand and foot and dragged behind them in this miserable bill." He then went on to talk about the class war, which, he said, had done a thousand times more damage that the War.

Have the Scottish workers any doubts that Gallacher, Woodburn, Campbell-Stephen and Co., are really interested in working class affairs? Could they have?

Those of them who have, however vaguely, identified Socialism with an international outlook will be bewildered at Gallacher's talk of "effete" Englishmen and "Sturdy" Scots, particularly in view of his later and inexplicable reference to a class war.

They will think of "effete" "Scots," who bide here in Scotland for the "Glorious 12th" and "sturdy" Englishmen who "carry hods" here all the year round.

Supporters of the "Socialist" I.L.P. should feel uneasy about Campbell Stephen's "Our association—hasn't given us an opportunity."—They will, or should wonder who "Our and us" means and conclude that if it was Scottish workers—that is was Capitalism rather than association with England that had been and still is the source of working class problems.

The England, Irish, Welsh and American capitalists with investments in Scottish aviation, building, shipping and transport will applaud the efforts of the Scottish Communist, Labour and I.L.P. M.P.'s.

Kirkwood has already earned the title of "M.P. for John Brown's" among Clydeside workers: now it will be Woodburn "M.P. for Scottish Airways," McNeil "M.P. for Clyde Trust" and Gallacher "M.P. for Arrols and Wimpey's."

What all this has to do with the interests of the working class in Scotland no one knows. Perhaps the M.P.'s could tell us?

It certainly does not require genius or a microscope to perceive that Scotland, like every other country, has a population which is divided into a majority who are non-owning workers and a minority who are non-working owners. And that after centuries of joint development with England that all means of producing wealth are owned and controlled by large concerns whose shareholders are spread throughout Britain and the rest of the world.

Just as certainly it does not need extraordinary intelligence to know that workers in specifically "Scottish" concerns merely receive in wages enough to continue working—barely enough, as for workers everywhere.

The Scottish workers don't have to attend a University to know that the ruling class of Scotland since the days of the Highland "clearances" referred to by Marx in biting terms in "Capital" (Vol. 1), are any less brutal and avaricious than their English counterparts. Or do they?

Thos. Johnston's burning indictments of the Scottish ruling class make curious reading nowadays when he is Secretary of State for Scotland and seems to be on terms of easy familiarity with the present scions. The same remark applies to old copies of the "Forward" during his period of editorship.

There is a story told by John S. Clarke regarding Lenin's estimate of Gallacher in which he described Gallacher as a "_____ fool"; a story which Gallacher repudiated indignantly and inexplicably as "an insult to Lenin." Whether the story is true or otherwise is unimportant but at least reflects a view of Gallacher, increasingly common, among workers with memories and intelligence.

The ability of the Gallachers, Johnstons, Maxtons, Kirkwoods in getting away with their anti working class nonsense and buffoonery rests on the—as yet, political ignorance of the Scottish workers.

Their political and social interests—like their fellows everywhere—are opposed to those of their masters and does not lie in schemes which will enable their employers to wring yet more surplus value from their skill and energy.

The political power that enables the privileged class to retain their social privilege is vested in control of the machinery which has its centre in Westminster.

This fact enables the Scottish, English and Welsh working class to co-ordinate their task of intelligently wresting this supremely vital control of political machinery from the hands of their class enemies—the masters; a co-ordination which has a fit and ready instrument in the Socialist Party of Great Britain.

The duty of the Scottish workers—like the workers the world over—is to-day—not tomorrow—to attempt an understanding of the basic nature of their problems and having done so, to organise in the Socialist Party democratically to take over power to establish Socialism.

Capitalism in Scotland, in England, America, Germany, Russia, in every country in the world produces the same set of problems to workers—poverty, unemployment, insecurity, war, and so on.

These problems arise with sublime impartiality as to forms of government, climate and previous political history, they arise in democracies and dictatorships in the two hemispheres and in big and wee countries.

The Socialist analysis and solution is international in scope and outlook and the only way in which the Scottish workers can assist their fellows in India and Greece as elsewhere is to study, understand and organise for Socialism. As they do so, the boloney of the Labour, I.L.P. and Communist M.P.'s will become clearly apparent. "Our" problems are the problems arising from the capitalist nature of Society which is now world-wide and the solution for "us"—World Socialism in which wealth will be produced, controlled and enjoyed by all.

Thomas Anthony.