Letter: Not peas in a pod (1996)

Letter to the Editors from the October 1996 issue of the Socialist Standard

Not peas in a pod

Dear Editors,

I am very disappointed with Graham Taylor’s interpretation (August Letters) of my letter to the July issue.

Not once in my letter did I say that I supported the Newbury rallies, and I do not believe it is very comradely either to suggest that I might hold Trotskyite or SWP views.

I am a member of the Socialist Party because I sincerely believe in the abolition of the capitalist system. The other views I expressed in my letter are quite clear, that I think some Socialists appear to make a fetish out of not demonstrating or showing solidarity with other workers. Socialists are people, individuals, not so many peas out of the same pod.

Heather Ball, 

Norwich

Letter: Opportunistic exercises (1996)

Letter to the Editors from the August 1996 issue of the Socialist Standard

Opportunistic exercises

Dear Editors,

I found Heather Ball's comments (Letters. June Socialist Standard) somewhat surprising.

A socialist who compromises socialist principles is a notion that makes me feel very uncomfortable.

The question of strikes and the SPGB has been discussed often enough in the party’s history. and there is general agreement on the position individual members should take.

The comment ". . . being a Socialist means being a part of the struggle but without illusions” seems to be misplaced; I would expect to see it in a Trotskyite paper.

Does Heather Ball regard the Newbury rallies or strikes as being action against capitalism? The last paragraph of her letter seems to imply that this is the case, when in fact they arc feeble, defensive measures against aspects of capitalism, and where the majority of people are supporters of capitalism.

The SPGB has always made a point of putting the socialist case at demonstrations, not taking part in them. We leave such opportunistic exercises to the SWP.

Graham C. Taylor, 

Brabrand, Denmark

Letter: Part of the struggle (1996)

Letter to the Editors from the June 1996 issue of the Socialist Standard

Dear Editors,

To me Colin Skelly in his letter to the April edition of the Socialist Standard reveals an almost religious zeal in his description of his efforts to resist the "temptation" to join a rally protesting about the proposed Newbury Bypass. I wonder, does he think he may have been in some way tainted by reformism had he succumbed to this "temptation”?

Surely, we are all involved in the class struggle (I know I am and have been for most of my life) whether we like it or not. Under this senseless and barbaric system of society we all have to compromise our principles every day of our lives and in fact those of us who still have a job may sometimes be faced with the prospect of industrial action. So tell me, Colin, would you avoid the "temptation” to strike along with your fellow workers for higher pay or better conditions? Would you honestly remain alone in the factory or office muttering "reformism" to yourself?

If we spent all our lives trying to avoid being involved in achieving “small, meaningless actions" then we truly risk becoming an elite and we also miss the opportunity of experiencing solidarity and comradeship with other workers. But what we most miss out on is the chance to tell other people about what we believe and why we think reformist action will not solve the problem.

To me being a Socialist means being a part of the struggle but without any illusions. If we do choose on occasion to unite with others against capitalism then we learn and grow as people. The end of capitalism is surely not some deadline that we must all sit down and wait for! Do you really believe that, Colin? Somehow that notion makes me feel very uncomfortable.

Heather Ball, 

Norwich, Norfolk

These Foolish Things: Wage Slave (1996)

The Scavenger column from the April 1996 issue of the Socialist Standard

Wage Slave

“I went to my bank three days before Christmas expecting that about £170 had been paid into my account, but I found only a fiver had been put in . . . "The man (who does not wish to be named) claims he told the agency of the long-standing engagement (to attend his pub soccer team’s Christmas party).

When he failed to report for work, ASC invoked clause eight of the contract: “Should you fail to turn up for any assignment without giving reasonable notice . . . your remuneration will be reduced to £1 per day for any work carried out previously and not yet paid, irrespective of hours worked” (Guardian, 1 February).

Demonstrating power

Education and Employment Minister Eric Forth told the Commons that some of the [Newbury bypass] protesters had been refused benefits because their demonstrations meant they were not available for work. Daily Mail. 18 January.

Poverty

Nearly 1,000 families lost their homes each week last year, according to figures published yesterday by the Council of Mortgage lenders which showed repossessions rising again. Repossessions increased to 49,410 in 1995 from 49,210 in 1994—ending a four-year decline since they peaked at 75,540 in 1991. Guardian, 1 February.

Economics in Wonderland

Financial crisis is such a regular occurrence at Eurotunnel that it is hard to remember the company being in any other state . . . There is no reason Sir Alastair Morton and his crew should want a full financial reconstruction since it would mean recognising the underlying economic reality: that Eurotunnel equity has no value at all. Part of the function of a board of directors is to sustain at least some hope of some value for shareholders, even if this is at some indefinite point in the future. Charade this may be, but bankers have some interest in going along with it. They are already guaranteed every penny of money the project generates over and above its operating costs. . . .

Just trust the Market

Commercially, price wars are nearly always pointless . . . in petrol retailing it is questionable whether even the motorist gains . . . the petrol price war will create petrol deserts in large parts of rural and inner-city Britain as Esso. BP, Shell and the supermarkets battle it out and small retailers close. Independent, 18 January.

A pound of flesh

Gavin [Morrey], who quit work 18 months ago with chronic shoulder injuries, contacted the bank [Barclays] because he was unable to pay his £124-a-month mortgage. He gets just £80 a week disability allowance and his wife. Sue, earns £134 a week on a production line. The couple, who are supporting their 16-year-old student son Grant, were asked to list their weekly outgoings . . . [the Bank’s letter) read: “We appreciate sight of your income and expenditure details which give some indication of your financial position. We would have thought that sufficient economics could be made in respect of food and personal expenses to enable you to fulfil your contractual commitments” (News of the World, 31 December).

The Scavenger

Letters: Newbury — Let's bypass reformism (1996)

Letters to the Editors from the April 1996 issue of the Socialist Standard

Newbury — Let's bypass reformism

Dear Editors,

Last February I was tempted to attend a rally protesting about the proposed Newbury Bypass. This is a government road scheme brought about by local and regional business pressure for a quicker transport route via Newbury because the present route is having a negative effect on profits. Local business believes that a bypass around Newbury would reduce traffic and congestion, which at present is quite substantial and would thus increase their efficiency and profits.

It happens that I am sickened by this proposal. The new bypass will have a large and damaging effect on the environment. The road will pass through a government-designated Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty and many other protected areas containing unique wildlife. Twelve unique archaeological sites will also be destroyed.

I didn’t attend this rally despite the temptation to stand with my fellow workers to try and stop this destructive scheme. I am not prepared to try and achieve small meaningless victories against the capitalists. Environmental factors will always come second to profits under capitalism and this is the essential problem.

At best the protests about the Newbury bypass may change its route or, if they are very lucky, may stop the scheme all together. But next week month or year where will the reformist protesters be? At another road protest, development protest, and law (e.g. Criminal Justice Bill) rally or possibly helping the thousands of homeless or maybe even helping the millions of people starving in the world? The list could go on forever because reforms will never eradicate capitalism’s inherent problems.

It saddened me that so much solidarity and so much organisation and commitment was being shown by workers for such a small and limited target. Just imagine if such activity was aimed at establishing socialism. The working class couldn’t help but sit up and listen to what we were saying despite media lies and other efforts by the capitalist class. One socialist is worth a million reformist rallies because the "left” can hold as many rallies as they like and make little difference to the ugly face of capitalism whilst one socialist is a clear step towards a society where such protests will not be necessary. In socialism there will be no conflict between profits and the environment and no conflict between the needs of people and profit because there won’t be production for profit.

Let's forget about reforms and work towards taking what is ours because only then will environmental destruction and all the rest of capitalism’s disasters stop occurring.

Forget about dulling the pains of the symptoms, let’s unite to cure the disease of capitalism.

Colin Skelly, 

              South Ascot, Berks

It doesn’t have to be like this

Dear Editors,

We have a choice. But who are we? We are the working class, a majority suffering from the manipulation and intimidation of a privileged minority. Why do we let them get away with it? We have a choice!

They keep on telling us with their own devious brainwashing techniques, through schooling, university education methods and other more sophisticated types of propaganda, how to be good little citizens in this ever-changing world of technology.

How nice it would be if all the tales of leisure and pleasure were true; alas, for the majority of us. the reality could not be more harsh, despairing or demoralising.

I relate my own personal experience as a victim of the society which we all inhabit.

I have recently parted company with my employer of some six years, to find myself depending on state handouts to support my wife, two children, mortgage etc. A story familiar, no doubt, to many thousands of families. My income more than halved.

The irony is that with less money now than I have ever had in the last 16 years of selling my mental and physical skills to the highest bidder, not forgetting the necessity to purchase essentials like food to eat. clothes to keep warm, the feet remains that I have never—throughout my working life—experienced such feelings of overwhelming satisfaction, and pleasure which I derive from simple things in life (as we know it), like being able to go to a library, taking a stroll in the park, enjoying the local wildlife, all at no direct expense. The true value of some of the most breathtaking scenery in this otherwise spoiled, war-torn world is awesome.

I have just left behind sixteen miserable years of being stuck in a fume-filled factory churning out poxy pop group fly-posters, laboriously and repetitively standing in front of a manual hand-operated printing table, sometimes for up to fourteen hours a day, in order to achieve a decent wage to be able to "afford” essential commodities and appliances like cookers, washing machines, fridges, etc. or other less necessary items like portable CD players, and that other all-mod-con, the glorious television, on which programmes of interest are few and far between. I used to waste many an hour glued to the likes of Dale Winton, churning out his usual "camp” (or should it be crap) style of innuendo and obscenity. all in the name of entertainment.

The more I think and wonder at the complexity of the world-wide capitalist system which the majority of us have to endure, and the minority have on their side, the more I ask myself, why? Why do we continue to restrict ourselves to its unforgiving grasp?

It doesn’t have to be like this. We have the power, the resources, the technology and the communication skills to free ourselves from its relentless torture, but only we the working class can do it The master class will not volunteer to do it for us. They depend on our skills, our labour. Let us not be denied the true fruits of these labours. Throw down your shackles, fellow workers, rid this world of the ongoing bloodbath that we see. night after night on our TV screens.

P.E. 

Scotland

Objection to military service project

Dear Editors,

I am at present preparing a project on changing attitudes in Britain to objection to military service. In particular the project would deal with objection to military service on political grounds. It would inevitably have to deal with the Socialist Party’s unique stance in this matter.

The project will contain original material not available elsewhere. It would be most helpful if any readers would be willing to give me access to any letters, diaries, recollections, or other material relating to experiences of objectors to military service whether in peace or in wartime. Please write to me at the address below. Also if anyone is willing to talk to me about their experiences would they please contact me by letter in the first instance.

Please write to: Gwynn Thomas, c/o History Common Room, University of Essex, Wivenhoe Park, Colchester, Essex, C04 3SQ.

A policy of equalizing misery?

Dear Editors,

It is often stated by your writers’ commentary and your manifesto that one cannot criticize Marxism because it has never been practiced in the manner in which it was originally conceived. Putting aside the fact that such a statement is nothing more than a lame and covert attempt to shut off debate regarding the disadvantages of Marxism and socialism, I am writing to ask how you can justify your theory and what you would probably call the quasi-socialist or perhaps pseudo-socialist systems we have seen disintegrate since the fall of 1989. To be more precise, how do you explain the former USSR’s disintegration and the embracing of capitalism by formerly socialist regions, i.e. East Asia and S.E. Asia, Latin America and Eastern Europe?

Consider this: in 1965, two-thirds of the world was decidedly socialist Today, three-quarters of the world is decidedly capitalist Capitalism has never self-destructed; nor does it appear to be on such a path as your theoretical doctrine always predicted. Instead, socialism, artificially supported by temporary subsidies, miserably collapsed from within.

Why is Sweden, as you reported in your summer of 1994 issues, approaching a level of debt equivalent to 120 percent of GDP? It certainly is not military spending. Indeed, it is the state's spending on social welfare policies which have bankrupted the one-time model welfare state in spite of the most confiscatory tax policies in Europe. Sweden has realised the hard way that it can no longer afford to provide a personal nurse for every wheelchair-bound citizen.

How do you explain the incredibly massive undertaking of Thatcherite privitization policies going on in France and Germany where 40 percent of the population used to work for the public sector? The answer seems to ring loud and clear everywhere; state-subsidised automotive, aerospace, telecom, banking and pharmaceutical industries could not break even, much less make a profit.

Economic growth is the greatest social priority. It allows for a level of self-reliance and prosperity which has empirically proven impossible in a socialist fraud of self-perpetuating transfer payments. The socialist experiment in confiscation and redistribution was criminal in its marginal tax rates of 98 percent on the last pound earned. How is anyone supposed to provide for himself if he can only keep 2p after 98p is confiscated by the government? Have you ever worked for a poor man?

It also seems to me useless for you to criticize New Labour. The Labour Party of the 70s was so held hostage to its now dead textbook and theory of Marxism that it blindly saw the market as an obstacle to success what with comments such as. “The company stinks and the Management stinks..." Now, however, the market is partly embraced by Labour as a partner, not a barrier, to success. Labour’s Keynesian approach to economics and public policy was thus thrown in the dustbin of history with the economic failures of the 70s. When your political culture fortunately changed, so did the vocabulary and context of the debate. This system of transfer payments can somehow sustain any country has been proven false over and over again in every country study you can possibly examine.

Socialism was relegated to the dustheap of history with the death of the British planned economy some twenty years ago. The ordinary citizen was shafted by socialism’s collectivist nightmare. something which was admired only by an élite few of intellectuals. What will you be saying and writing when 95 or 100 percent of the world is decidedly capitalist? Please answer these questions because the apparent reality is that your terribly theoretical mode of thinking will simply prove itself even more anachronistic and more irrelevant than it already is. The idea that capitalism would self-destruct and one would progress from capitalism to socialism was part of the self-licking ice lolly that you call your manifesto. As such, you are a minority within a minority which would like to be in the majority and the mainstream. but that has been an elusive “Mission Impossible". 

Craig Thomson,

Falls Church, 

Vermont USA.

Reply:

You may be a regular reader of the Socialist Standard but you clearly haven't taken much in. We never regarded Russia as being socialist—in fact we said right from the start that what the Bolsheviks were developing was a form of capitalism. State capitalism, to be precise. Nor have we ever advocated what you call "a Keynesian system of transfer payments" from rich to poor which the Labour Party once said it stood for—we predicted that this, too, would fail as capitalism just cannot be reformed so as to promote the welfare of the useful majority in society.

Ironically, you yourself confirm this last point by your comment on Sweden (which never was socialist either) that it "has realised the hard way that it can no longer afford to provide a personal nurse for every wheelchair-bound citizen”.

You don’t seem to realise the enormity of what you have conceded here. Every person in a wheelchair ought to be able to have the services of a personal nurse if they need one. but you are saying that this is impossible under capitalism. We agree with you, but you and us draw different conclusions. You see this as an argument for cutting back on welfare services. We see it as an argument for getting rid of capitalism. If capitalism can't afford comprehensive welfare services (which it can’t) then we can’t afford capitalism.

The reason why all the countries of the world are pursuing "Thatcherite" policies of privatisation and welfare cut-backs is. quite simply, to try to raise the rate of profit as a means of getting capitalism out of its current economic crisis.

As you correctly point out, governments are not actually engaged in the production of wealth, so their income has to come from taxing the wealth-creating sector of the economy. This taxation to pay for government spending ultimately falls on profits, but capitalism runs on profits. It is in fact variations in the rate of profit that determine the level of economic activity. A slump means that the rate of profit has fallen, and the only way out of a slump is through a rise in the rate of profit. Governments everywhere in recent years have been trying to do this by cutting back on their spending, so reducing the burden of taxation on profits (not always successfully, it has to be said).

This is the way capitalism works. It has to put making profits before meeting needs. It can work no other way. In this sense Thatcher was right to proclaim that “there is no alternative". Within capitalism there really is no alternative. In a wider context one does of course exist— but it lies outside capitalism, in establishing a society that will allow production to be geared to meeting people’s needs; which can only be on the basis of the common ownership and democratic control of productive resources. After all, how can we direct production towards meeting our needs if we don’t first own and control the means of production?

This is real socialism and has nothing in common with what has existed in Russia. Sweden or under Labour governments. 

Editors

Doing their job (1997)

Book Review from the February 1997 issue of the Socialist Standard

Promising the Earth by Robert Lamb, Routledge.

This is a well-written and very readable book covering the history of Friends Of The Earth (FoE) from its conception (and before) in the 1970s to the present day. It has been produced due to the 25th anniversary of FoE.

The author sees FoE as a highly successful campaigning organisation and claims that the environment has been put on the political agenda by groups such as themselves (the Rio summit being the obvious example). The success of various direct action campaigns are also seen as great victories for the environment.

Maybe they are but FoE and all the other environmentalists suffer from the same delusions. The idea that somehow, with enough campaigning and raising of environmental awareness, an ecologically friendly society will be brought about is rooted in the environmental activists' approach but is based on pure fantasy.

Environmental problems and disasters do not occur because of bad or evil men who don’t care a damn for the world but because of the profit motive rooted in capitalism.

Twyford Down wasn’t about the government's disdain for the environment but due to them doing what is effectively their job in capitalist society; serving the interests of those who own the means of production. Congestion on the M3 was holding back profit. The violence used against the protesters shows just what value capitalism puts on diversity of thought if it stands in the way of profit. Environmental campaigners are okay as long as direct action doesn’t touch the bulging wallets of the capitalist; "middle England”, usually courted embarrassingly unscrupulously by Britain's political parties are then quite in line for a baton round the head courtesy, of the police.

Twyford Down, however, has been seen by FoE as a success in terms of unification of groups with environmental objectives and to some extent the media.

The Twyford Down protest did not succeed in getting the road stopped, and the list of other unsuccessful direct actions campaigns is almost endless. Yet FoE claims to make a difference in terms of awareness and altering government approach to sustainable and pro-environment policies. Is this so?

Even if it is. within capitalism it is fighting a losing battle. A success, for example, against the expansion of the nuclear programme (1980, after FoE revealed secret government negotiations) is offset by innumerable environmental problems elsewhere.

If campaigners find a loophole in the Law it is rapidly closed; after all they are playing the game to the capitalists' rules.

If laws protecting the environment are produced, as they have been in the last few decades. they are often unworkable (as the Basel ban will prove to be) or so loosely applied as to be meaningless.

Promising The Earth, unsurprisingly, concentrates on the positive aspects of FoE and its development. It runs through their various campaigns; from their launch and campaigns against Schweppes in 1971 (arguing for returnable bottles) through numerous other campaigns to the recent Newbury by-pass protest and House Energy Conservation Act in 1995. It also deals with internal struggles and difficulties within the green movement and far from paints an entirely rosy picture of the movement as a whole. The author, though, clearly sees FoE and its sister groups as the force for change into an eco- friendly society.

While the non-violent direct action policies of FoE and others may achieve limited success against government policies and lobbying for legislation, at the end of the day they will never be able to combat the motive of profit which is the root cause of the problems they wish to ameliorate and are destined to struggle endlessly against the tide of capitalism.

Colin Skelly

Class, Micropolitics & Solidarity (1996)

From the October 1996 issue of the Socialist Standard

Socialists recognise that workers who are involved in reform campaigns are, at least, trying to gain some control over their lives.

What do we find if we examine, quickly, the present state of class struggle in this little corner of world capitalism known as Britain?

Looking first at what we might call the traditional areas of organised conflict, trade union activity, there has been something of a flurry of activity over the last couple of months with tube strikes and postal strikes particularly in the news. This has fairly predictably led to the government threatening more repression and further curbs on union powers, to the point of considering an outright ban on strikes in "essential services", though such a ban may be rendered impossible by the difficulty of defining what is or is not an essential service.

These disputes drag on as management, more used these days to little overt resistance from workers, continue to try to impose their will on hostile workforces. Simultaneously, the unions are stung to greater efforts of resistance not only by the hostile interference of both the Tory government and the Labour so-called opposition.

Of course, these remain relatively minor disputes and the reactions of the two major parties represent the efforts of the capitalist state to stamp out what it thinks are the dying embers of workers' resistance. It is possible that such efforts by the state might actually cause sparks to ignite further flare-ups of open conflict; what's certainly the case is that they can never succeed in entirely extinguishing class struggle because the capitalist system itself continually produces both fuel and ignition.

What of other manifestations of conflict? What of the so-called "micropolitical" struggles—Newbury, Wexports, the "land is ours" campaign and the like?

As far as the major parties are concerned, the future has been abandoned. Mainstream politics, with Labour and the Tories drawing so close together, has nothing to offer but more of the same, world without end—unless of course things simply get worse. This political sclerosis and ideological entropy means that all the political energy has migrated elsewhere, out of parliamentarianism and into either charities or loosely-organised protest actions, both areas being primarily defensive.

There are many people including many of those involved in such struggles, who will question the relevance of class to these protests and actions. They are, after all, specifically "micropolitical", single-issue campaigns, concerned it would seem, purely and simply with specific, very localised outcomes.

Newbury bypass protesters, for example, would probably consider the notion that their campaign to stop a road from being built (and save a rare snail) had a class aspect as absurd. But then, why should we assume that a struggle must necessarily be self-conscious? The class struggle is, in fact, an inevitable feature of the capitalist system, whether those involved are conscious of it or not, being the result of irreducible conflicts of material interest under capitalism.

While the immediate aim of those at Newbury may be "simply" to stop the construction of a road for ecological reasons, it should be recognised that this does not in itself mean that important issues of class are excluded from the entire structure of the conflict that is involved. There is a very important question of power at issue here, which is always a vitally important element of class relations. Class and capitalism are inevitably involved, so these issues are not really "micro" at all but actually have global, social and economic implications. 

Whatever else may be involved, the conflict over the Newbury bypass is one in which working-class people are struggling for some degree of democratic control over their environment, which inevitably brings them into conflict with the state and with capitalist big business.

Of course, it needs to be recognised that most struggles such as these are doomed to failure in the long term, and that when they are successful, they will lead only to further struggles ad infinitum, as long as the capitalist system itself continues to exist; as long as, that is, working people don't actually have real democratic control over our own lives. These struggles are (as in trade-unionism) defensive, as they react to impositions and the diktats passed down from the capitalists and their public lieutenants in the state, even though they also express a desire for something more, something better than what there already is. Part of the problem is that this desire is left vague, ethereal, relatively inarticulate, and the energy released by it is frittered away in specific short-term, defensive struggles, often without even recognising connections between them, or with apparently different but ultimately related and overlapping struggles such as those involving unions or tenants groups.

Solidarity

A recent example of an inspired, but ultimately doomed (as those involved will have no doubt realised all along), "micropolitical" action involved four women entering a British Aerospace factory in order to disarm military aircraft bound for Indonesia. These women, from the anti-war group Ploughshares, undertook this action as a protest against Indonesian state terrorism in East Timor, where it is assumed the planes were to be used against the civilian population (or against East Timorese rebels—although, if reports are to believed, that does in fact mean pretty much the entire population).

What is particularly interesting, and heartening, about this event is the strong element of solidarity involved. First of all, and most obviously, there is the solidarity of the women with the East Timorese people against the (Indonesian) state and big business (and not just British Aerospace—Indonesian aggression, and Australian support for it, is driven, surprise surprise, by economics, specifically by the existence of oil in the Timor Sea). Presumably the action was undertaken in order to publicise the situation in East Timor and therefore the women were expecting to be arrested and convicted of "criminal damage"; to that extent they will consider their action to have been relatively successfully.

What will have made it still more successful for them is the fact that they were actually acquitted by a jury on 30 July, despite having admitted their actions, simply arguing that they were ethically justified. This brings us to the second example of solidarity—that of the working people in the jury who decided that the women were indeed justified in their actions.

By the letter of the law, it seems apparent that these four women should surely have been convicted; they had broken the law. But, while we should hold no illusions concerning the jury's motives in acquitting them, i.e., there seems no reason to think that it was specifically done with this in mind, their act of solidarity threw the whole notion of legality into question.

Working-class solidarity can go beyond legality; there is little enough such solidarity around at the moment, and it is understandable, if, for example, threats by the state against union rights make the union movement somewhat nervous, but it must also be recognised that the union leaders seems to have forgotten that such a thing as solidarity is even possible. But it is absolutely vital; whatever the laws says, class solidarity can make the law unworkable anyway.

The laws of the state are made workable only by the active consent of its "subjects", the working class, and can therefore be made unworkable by the withdrawal of that consent. This is an absolutely basic lesson to be drawn from the history of the trade-union movement; if the relatively class-conscious workers hadn't been willing to break the law, and back each other up, in the first place, there would be no unions today. This is a lesson that trade unionists, even more than those involved in "micropolitics" (who seem to have at least some consciousness of it) have to re-learn today so that they can regroup, grow once more as an effective force within capitalism, and defend themselves and the immediate interests of working people more effectively.

That said, there is an air of expectancy among the unions at the moment, an expectancy that flies in the face of all the evidence, that Labour will somehow "put things right" if it wins the next election, that they will "set things straight" for the union movement and the working class. But the Labour Party feels little or no solidarity with working people in struggle, and things will anyway always be twisted for workers under capitalism.

As socialists have reiterated time and time again, workers need to stop putting their faith in reformism; capitalism will never, can never, be reformed in our interest. The real interest of the working class will only be served by the abolition of class altogether, along with capitalism in all its forms and will all its iniquitous effects. But also, until the majority of people come to see this and do it, those workers who are drawn into struggle should also realise that reformist appeals to the laws of the capitalist state are irrelevant and solidarity is supremely important. And who knows? Maybe such recognition of a basic commonality of interest could lead more people to realise that those interests are absolutely opposed to the interests of capitalism itself.

Jonathan Clay