The Gravesend by-election by Eye Witness (1948)

From the January 1948 issue of the Socialist Standard

The Labour victory in this hotly-contested by-election—we were told at almost every meeting that the eyes of the world were on Gravesend— must have been a surprise to the Tories. They believed that the discontent of the masses with their living conditions would assure them of victory; but two things the Tories forgot: first, that the worker’s have a memory which they sometimes use and secondly, that the Labour Party are at least their equal at pulling stunts out of the bag.

The main issue of the election was “Which party can better administer Capitalism, the Labour Party or the Conservatives?” Througout the campaign, the question of Socialism—the abolition of private ownership of the means of life and the consequent ending of wage-labour and capital—was mentioned by neither Party.

It is true, of course, that Sir Richard Acland, the Labour candidate, mentioned the word “Socialism,” and when reaching rhetorical heights claimed that the mines and the Bank of England were “ours,” but he never once referred to the fact that the previous private owners were given State-bonds in exchange for their company shares, and that, in consequence, they are still drawing their profits in the form of interest.

For Acland, as for other Lahour Party members, Socialism means the nationalisation of the key industries. Thus he was able to argue that “Socialism” would enable the village shop-keeper and the small, businesses to operate as they do now. He did not point out to his audiences that Socialism is a system of society fundamentally different from Capitalism; that, whereas under Capitalism goods are produced to be exchanged (sold) at a profit, they will, under Socialism, be produced solely for use. He did NOT point out that Socialism means the end of all exchange, including the exchange of the workers’ labour-power for wages.

It is not surprising, therefore, that there was in this election nothing fundamentally different between the policy of the Labour Party and the Tories. Even Anthony Eden did not speak in opposition to nationalisation—what he did say was that “before further nationalisation is tried, we should first see how the nationalised industries work.”

The bulk of the Tory attack was concentrated on the administrative blunders of the Labour Party, the lack of “leadership and foresight” by the government. Acland’s reply was that the Labour Parly had done a better job of administration after this war than the Tories did after the last.

On the question of controls the difference between the Parties was more apparent than real. The Labour Party stood for the retention of controls ; the Tories for ending those which are “irritable without being really useful,” but for retaining those judged necessary.

As stated in the first paragraph, the Tories perhaps underestimated the importance of the workers’ memories. At every Labour Party meeting the unemployment figures between the wars were hammered home and blame for them rivetted on the Conservatives. It was amusing to hear how the Labour Party speakers blamed world conditions for the present shortages of foodstuffs reaching the workers’ tables, but ignored these same world conditions as the main cause of unemployment between the wars. They even proudly claimed to he responsible for the present-day relatively low unemployment figures. They boosted the export drive, but they did not tell their audiences what is going to happen when the export drives, so madly indulged in now by Britain, America, Canada, etc., etc., have glutted the world’s markets and when, in consequence, goods produced cannot he sold. That time is fast approaching.

The Labour Party flattered the electors by telling them that they were intelligent people and able to use their reason in deciding which party to support. And yet they did not shrink from making the biggest emotional appeal either party attempted. With about 3,000 present at a meeting, lights were put out and a miners’ choir, complete with helmets and little lights shining, entered the hall from the rear, walking in single file and singing as they came. The applause was tremendous, as it was after each hymn and song rendered by the choir in the darkened hall. Sympathy of other workers for the miners had been won and, in the speeches which followed, the audience was told that every Tory vote would be a smack in the face for those miners. As an emotional appeal this was terrific and worth many votes to the Labour Party. The Tory stunt of carrying around a potato, dressed in Conservative colours, was puny in comparison.

Lastly it need hardly he said that the Communist Party had its finger in the pie. They said, in a leaflet, that if the Tories got back the queues at the labour exchange would be 1,000 times worse than before the war. And we have only 45,000,000 population in Britain ! They’ve been so busy changing policies and organising stunts of one kind and another that they cannot be expected to remember that unemployment reached anything from one to two millions before the war. In brief, the Communists came out strongly in favour of the Labour candidate.

Readers will see, therefore, that the main issues of the much discussed Gravesend By-Election were concerned with the administration of Capitalism. Time will show that Capitalism, notwithstanding the Party in power, means endless poverty for the masses.

C.A.

50 Years Ago: The Gravesend By-Election by Eye-Witness (1998)

The 50 Years Ago column from the January 1998 issue of the Socialist Standard

The Labour victory in this hotly-contested by-election—we were told at almost every meeting that the eyes of the world were on Gravesend—must have been a surprise to the Tories. They believed that the discontent of the masses with their living conditions would assure them of victory; but two things the Tories forgot: first, that the workers have a memory which they sometimes use and secondly, that the Labour Party are at least their equal at pulling stunts out of the bag.

The main issue of the election was "Which party can better administer Capitalism, the Labour Party or the Conservatives?” Throughout the campaign, the question of Socialism—the abolition of private ownership of the means of life and the consequent ending of wage-labour and capital—was mentioned by neither party (...)

The Labour Party flattered the electors by telling them that they were intelligent people and able to use their reason in deciding which party to support. And yet they did not shrink from making the biggest emotional appeal either party attempted. With about 3,000 present at a meeting, lights were put out and a miners' choir, complete with helmets and little lights shining, entered the hall from the rear, walking in single file and singing as they came.The applause was tremendous, as it was after each hymn and song rendered by the choir in the darkened hall. Sympathy of other workers for the miners had been won and, in the speeches which followed, the audience was told that every Tory vote would be a smack in the face for those miners. As an emotional appeal this was terrific and worth many votes to the Labour Party. The Tory stunt of carrying around a potato, dressed in Conservative colours, was puny in comparison.

(From an article by C.A., Socialist Standard, January 1948)

The Interesting Case of Sir Richard Acland, M. P. (1941)

From the January 1941 issue of the Socialist Standard

In the October issue of the Socialist Standard,  some remarks were made about Sir Richard Acland’s views, based on a letter written by him to the News-Chronicle. In a subsequent letter to the Socialist Standard Sir R. Acland suggested that instead of criticising his brief letter to the News-Chronicle we should consider the full statement contained in his book, “Unser Kampf” (“ Our Struggle ”—Penguin Edition, 6d.).

The argument of “Unser Kampf” is that the war against Germany will be long and costly unless the military weapon is backed up by propaganda that will appeal to the German people. It is of no use, he says, to threaten the dismemberment of Germany as this would rally the German workers round Hitler. As he proposes instead that we should proclaim “common ownership” as our “new order” it may appear that he has reached the Socialist standpoint. When, however, the book is examined it is found that though the author imagines he has broken with capitalism, his alternative, far from being the revolutionary one he believes it to be, is a naive, impossible scheme for imposing radical reforms on the capitalist world.

Sir R. Acland can see some of the features of capitalism, the inequality of incomes, the restrictions on production, the monopolies, unemployment, etc., but he gives no sign of understanding that the monetary system, the production of goods for sale, the system of wage-labour, the existence of property incomes through exploitation, and the competition for world markets are all part and parcel of capitalism : he does not see that if the capitalist private property basis is abolished and common ownership is introduced all the rest go too. If Sir R. Acland can contemplate “common ownership” without this necessary consequence of it, the reason is that he does not really mean common ownership. His scheme is that industry (in the first place banks, insurance companies, railways,, mines, steel, and a few other industries, p. 145) shall be taken over by the State and that the owners shall receive compensation on a graded basis providing a maximum annual income of £3,000 a year (p. 100). This would be for the life of the shareholder, but with the alternative of a somewhat smaller income which shall continue for the life of his children too. This payment of compensation he justifies on the ground that it would be both unwise and unfair to leave the former owners “to fend for themselves in the labour market like anyone else” (p. 98). This is a curious argument. Sir R. Acland does not appear fully to realise that property incomes, including these compensation incomes, can only exist through the exploitation of the workers who produce the wealth. And if this “ new order ” really offers to the whole population a satisfactory life, why should it be “unfair” to the capitalist that they should enjoy its blessings too?

What is still more revealing is that Sir R. Acland believes that “common ownership ” exists in Russia (p. 76). He says nothing of the vast inequalities of income in that country but claims that “no one in Russia sits back and draws income in respect of the ownership of property ” (p. 91). He does not seem to have heard of the enormous National Debt in Russia running to thousands of millions of roubles, through which investors can sit back and draw investment income. Or perhaps he would argue that this is not income “in respect of the ownership of property”? Yet it is not essentially different from investments in State loans in other countries where the capitalist State has industrial undertakings under its control.

He envisages that under his scheme there will be “for at least the first century or two ” better pay for “ better work or more skilful or responsible work ” (p.110). In other words, like the Bolsheviks. Sir R. Acland wants the retention of a privileged group. He fails to offer any justification for this, and does not consider the kind of methods that would have to be used to force an enlightened working class to accept it. Does he imagine that the low-paid hewers of wood and drawers of water in Bolshevik Russia willingly consent to the arrangement by which the Party men, technicians, administrative officials, writers and artists, and other favoured groups receive incomes dozens of times larger than their own miserable wage? If he wants to enforce the same system he will need the same forcible methods to compel its acceptance. He does not state a reasoned case for wanting this inequality to be perpetuated.

“Common ownership” as used by Sir R. Acland is a term that he also finds it possible to associate with Nazi Germany. He thinks it likely that the German army leaders and the Nazi Party leaders may “deprive the German owners of their swollen profits and of their grip on industry” (p.90). Then “there would,” he says, “ be common ownership in the hands of the Nazi Party." Well may the workers say that if "common ownership” means what exists in Russia, and what is possible under the Nazis, they do not want it.

One curious omission from the book is any denunciation of the State capitalist concerns that exist already in this country. Is Sir R. Acland unaware that the workers in the Post Office and in the London Passenger Transport Board are treated in essentially the same way as workers in any other capitalist concern? Yet when he is denouncing capitalist monopoly (p. 45) and gives a lengthy list of instances, he does not mention these. On the other hand, he writes approvingly of the Post Office (p. 105), and has no criticism of Labour Party plans for State capitalism except their speed of application.

For the conduct of international affairs Sir R. Acland wants an international armed force (p. 135). He does not get down to the vital question how, under conditions as they will actually exist after the war, of a continuing fierce struggle for markets and capitalist groups are to be persuaded or forced to for the control of strategic points, etc., the interested accept any international control unless it falls in with their interests. On his own showing the adoption of what for him is “common ownership” will not solve the problem of war, since he accuses “common ownership” Russia of aggression against the Finns "as damnable” as the German invasion of Poland (p. 148). He even accepts the possibility that Russia may enter on a “ Napoleonic stage ” of attempted world conquest and expansion (p. 85).

In short, as Socialists, we can only say that the solution for all the problems that Sir R. Acland takes in his field lies in Socialism, i.e., a system of society based on common ownership in the real meaning of the term. This cannot be achieved by some swift campaign to get the population to accept “the new morality” (p. 144) and change the Government (p. 139), but only by the steady, thorough winning over of the working class internationally to Socialism.

In order to remove any misunderstanding it must be pointed out in conclusion that Sir R. Acland is quite wrong in his acceptance of the view that “the Russian doctrine” is “ Marxism ” (p. 91).

It will be interesting to see where Sir R. Acland's well intentioned and courageous, though misdirected, investigations of capitalism will lead him. At present he is a Liberal whose conceptions are likely to be as unacceptable to the Liberal Party as they are to Socialists. The Labour Party will not like his independence and the Communists denounce his criticisms of the Russian onslaught on Finland 

Edgar Hardcastle

Party News Briefs (1948)

Party News from the March 1948 issue of the Socialist Standard

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

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

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

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

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

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

Clifford Groves,

General Secretary.

Sir Richard Acland in a Muddle (1940)

From the November 1940 issue of the Socialist Standard

Sir Richard Acland, M.P., is a Liberal who advocates what he believes to be radical and practical reforms of the capitalist system. All the same he has not got very far in his understanding of capitalism. In a letter to the News Chronicle (November 1st, 1940) he argues that this country’s property institutions must be changed drastically in order to win the propaganda war against Dr. Goebbels.

  What I submit we have got to do is to answer the Nazi taunt of “Pluto-democracy.” While more than 50 per cent. of our property is owned by less than 1 per cent, of the population and while the effective control over our economic policy is in the hands of an even smaller number of people, there is far too much truth behind this taunt for comfort, and whatever we may say, the Nazis will have a powerful weapon with which to turn small men and workers everywhere against us.

Two observations may be made on this. One is that Socialists have always had an unanswerable case against capitalism, and it has nothing to do with what Goebbels may have to say about it. The second is that Sir Richard Acland seems to have fallen for that piece of Nazi propaganda which represents Germany as a State which is run on principles other than those of “pluto- democracy.” There is not an atom of truth in it. Behind the screen of State control those ungentle grafters, the Nazi leaders and their capitalist big-business backers are running Germany for their own ends on the usual exploiting lines.

It may be said, however, that at least Sir R. Acland does want to see inequalities of ownership in Great Britain done away with, but when we read further in his letter we realise that he is only continuing the Lloyd George propaganda of 30 years ago, and the result will be the same. He asks that after the war the men who manage our giant resources “must be in some way or other chosen by all of us to work in the interests of all of us, and must not be chosen in any way by the owners of invested capital to work in the interests of the owners of invested capital.” 

Sir R. Acland probably does not see the fatal flaw in his pious proposal. He proposes that there shall still be “owners of invested capital,” i.e., people who live on property-incomes, but asks that the property from which they get their property-incomes shall not be worked in their interests! Just as a defender of slavery might have urged that slavery should not be abolished, but should be run in the interests of all! Let it be noted, therefore, that the interest of the workers is to get rid of the private ownership and control of the means of production and distribution. Short of that, and the introduction of Socialism, the more “pluto-democracy” changes the more it will be the same.

Edgar Hardcastle

Common Wealth will not Debate (1944)

Party News from the November 1944 issue of the Socialist Standard

From time to time members of Common Wealth, Sir Richard Acland's party, invite the S.P.G.B. to debate with their party. When these invitations have been taken up with Common Wealth headquarters, the repeated result has been that a debate is refused. Many reasons are given for this refusal—they are busy getting ready for the election; they aren't keen on debates; they don't agree that their literature indicates that they stand for State capitalism; the "wages system" is a “matter of detail" and apparently not worth debating; they are anxious that all should get together, from Liberals to Common Wealth and Communists, in order to abolish the House of Lords, which, they hold, is a “first step" to Socialism—all of which boils down to one thing: Common Wealth, at least if its Chairman, Mr. R. W. G. Mackay, has the last word on their behalf, is not prepared to enter into debate about its programme and policy.

Will members of Common Wealth who want a debate with the S.P.G.B. note this, and direct their challenges to their own headquarters, not to the S.P.G.B.

Editorial: Where Common Wealth Stands (1944)

Editorial from the April 1944 issue of the Socialist Standard

Sir Richard Acland's Common Wealth is a party of small membership, substantial funds, big ideas and monumental confusion. Formed in July, 1942, it had a membership at the end of that year of 5,000 (1943 Conference Report, page 18), though by April, 1943, it claimed nearly 10,000. Its income from subscriptions and donations in its first nine months was £7,000, of which only about half Was in amounts of under £50. Two individuals. Sir R. Acland and Mr. Alan Good, a wealthy Midlands business man, guaranteed between them £1,000 a month for two years (page 6). For 1943 the Party budgeted for an expenditure of £22,000, and plans to put up candidates in 120 constituencies (News Chronicle, February 16th, 1944). The latest move was to call a meeting of Labour, Liberal, I.L.P. and Independent M.P.s and others with the intention of starting a "Socialist Unity Campaign," which was to bring together members of the Labour Party, Common Wealth, I.L.P., Communist Party and Liberals in the "Radical Action" group to secure a Parliamentary majority at the next general election (Manchester Guardian, March 8th, 1944.) The meeting, according to the Daily Telegraph (March 9th) failed to bring any Labour M.P.s, though the I.L.P. was there in strength, including its M.P.s, its General Secretary, Mr. J. McNair, and Mr. F. A. Ridley. It can hardly be called a success. A cleavage developed between Acland, who is all out for winning the war, and some of the I.L.P. contingent, who adopt a more or less anti-war attitude. It is typical of Common Wealth's attitude of being all things to all men that it should imagine this strange mixture, including loyal Liberals, could be interested in "Socialist" unity. The same confusion is apparent in all its activities. It makes a special point of its religious inspiration and at the Skipton by-election, where its candidate was successful, a voter informed the News Chronicle (January 11th, 1944) that she supported Common Wealth because “ it was the only political party which emphasised the Christian point of view"—yet "Question and Answer" one of its publications, insists that it is open to Christians, Jews, Hindus, Moslems, and Atheists (page 59), and one of its first rebuffs was an announcement that it was to be boycotted by Catholics on the ground that "it has rejected Christianity" (Daily Herald, August 8th, 1942). In view of the infamies committed by politicians of all the capitalist parties, who almost invariably claim to be religious and acting in accordance with religious teachings, this emphasis on religion is hardly a recommendation. Moreover, Sir R. Acland has himself unwittingly exposed how little it means. In a letter to the Times (October 15th, 1943) he claimed for his party that "it is probably more concerned . . . with the inter-relations between religion and politics than any political organisation since the Labour Party as it was in the days of Keir Hardie." If a religious outlook is as Sir R. Acland seems to think, a guarantee that a party will prove a fit instrument for the achievement of Socialism, why did it not prove to be so for the Labour Party? And why is Common Wealth so critical of the present Labour Party, the child of the party of Keir Hardie's day?

Common Wealth will find that the nearer it gets to power (if ever it does), the more its actions will be determined by the economic and class factors imposed by its acceptance of State capitalism. Its religions inspiration will count for nothing, and like many other trimmings, will be dropped or disregarded in the rough and tumble of electoral vote-catching. How little its methods differ from those of the older parties of capitalist reform is indicated by statements made to the News Chronicle (January 11th, 1944) by voters who supported Common Wealth at Skipton. One local councillor gave as his reason, “I am a Gladstonian Liberal with a progressive mind. Common Wealth is the closest approach to what I want." Another voter was concerned with protecting his little business against the combines; a third, a co-operator thought Common Wealth approached her "ideal of Socialism," and a fourth voted "as her husband voted. It is a good thing to get younger people in Parliament—and to have old-age pensions at 30s. a week."

The one outstanding feature of Common Wealth's activities is its opposition to supporters of the political truce, and this is the real reason why it has been able to send what has been dubbed its "travelling circus" roaring successfully into by-election campaigns. The first fine careless rapture of the coalition government has worn off. Labour Party official speakers who had to go to West Derbyshire and support the Tory, Lord Hartington, were plainly ill-at-ease in face of criticism from Labour voters. Common Wealth is capitalising this dissatisfaction. While the electoral truce lasts it can hope to do well, though already its monopoly is being challenged by the Liberal and Communist parties, both of which are veering towards a course which will relieve them of having to support Tories. When the political truce ends and the Labour Party fights on its own against Tory candidates. Common Wealth will have to make the choice either to remain a small independent group or to merge in or ally itself with the Labour Party where it naturally belongs.

What chiefly concerns us, however, is the fantastic claim that Common Wealth is a Socialist organisation.

Those who do not look closely at the programmes and activities of the political parties they support notice that Common Wealth claims to stand for Socialism and "common ownership," as does the S.P.G.B., and they wonder therefore why the S.P.G.B. is opposed to the Common Wealth Party. The explanation is that, in spite of the words it uses, Acland's party does not stand for Socialism or common ownership; it is merely using the words in the same loose way as the Labour Party. Common Wealth has actually taken over its phrases, from the Constitution of the Labour Party, in which appears the declaration that the Labour Party stands for "the common ownership of the means of production, distribution, and exchange." Every Socialist will at once recognise that the inclusion of the word "exchange" in the declared aim, both of the Labour Party and of Common Wealth, is itself an unmistakable proof that they are not aiming at Socialism, under which, of course, there will be no need for the capitalist mechanism of buying and selling. Goods will not be produced for sale or exchange but solely for use. Common Wealth is little more than a "ginger" group trying to stir up the Labour Party and at the same time to attract elements in the Liberal and Tory parties and voters outside all parties. In their own words, "We are not against the Labour Party. We regard as our friends and allies all those within the Labour Party who are seeking to promote a more inspiring leadership." (Common Wealth, Bristol, Publication No. 2.)

Socialists are not at all concerned with the qualities of leadership displayed by .the Labour Party or any other party. Socialists do not need leadership; and leaders cannot lead non-socialists to Socialism.

What is the outstanding problem of to-day? It is not the choice between backing the Beveridge plan and backing the Churchill supporters' promise of "something better than Beveridge"; nor is it the choice between capitalism run by competitive private groups and capitalism run by private monopolies or under State control—this despite Mr. Herbert Morrison's shrewd view that “ for some time after the war Britain will be working out a form of partnership between the State and big business" (Sunday Express, March 5th, 1944). The vital question for the working class is one of ownership. Sir William Beveridge—who is not in favour of ending the state of affairs he mentions—-has admitted that “nearly 80 per cent, of the private wealth of the country was owned by 7 per cent of the people " (Times, November 30th,. 1948). This is the workers' real problem. Shall this capitalist ownership of the means of production and distribution be ended, and replaced by ownership and democratic control by the whole community, with its necessary accompaniment—the ending of all incomes from property and the ending of the wages system, or shall capitalism continue. This is the issue between Socialists on the one side and all who are prepared to carry on capitalism, whether in the form of private monopolies or in the form of State capitalism. Common Wealth, behind its muddled ideas and fancy schemes, is not aiming at Socialism. Like the Labour Party (which it chides for lukewarmness about its own programme), Common Wealth aims merely at nationalisation or State capitalism.

There is no room for doubt about where Common Wealth stands on this issue. Their "Manifesto" demands "the nationalisation of the mines and of the biggest arms factories at once " (page 9), and ultimately wants the land, the banks, fuel and poorer, transport, etc., "wholly transferred to common ownership." There is to be "reasonable compensation on a sliding scale to existing owners, starting with 100 per cent, compensation to the smallest owners, and falling to some quite small percentage in the case of the largest" (page 8).

Socialists would ask why the talk of compensation? Are capitalists to be compensated for relinquishing the right to exploit the workers? And if so, how can they be compensated except by allowing them to continue the exploitation-— as, indeed, Common Wealth proposes. How will these schemes of State capitalism solve the workers' problem', and how can banks, which are nothing but instruments of capitalist industry and trade, be "commonly, owned"? What function could they serve under Socialism? The pamphlet continues :—-

Under common' ownership, as in the Soviet Union to-day, the functions of money are: To allocate to individuals groups and industries within the community their appropriate total share in the goods and services of the community. . . .

Here we have Sir B. Acland's Party's real aim, of promoting State capitalism on the basis of a structure of vast and growing inequality (" as in the Soviet Union to-day "), between the fortunate managerial groups and others with their great incomes and investments in State bonds, and the unfortunate hewers of wood and drawers of water on the poverty line, all under the smooth sounding principle of allocating to each "their appropriate total share."

Have we not nationalisation already here, in the Post Office, and near-nationalisation in the Public Utility Corporations? And do not those responsible proclaim that each individual, from the bus-driver to the £12,500 head of London Passenger Transport, and from the low-paid and often unpensioned thousands in tho Post Office up to the £3,000 a year Director-General, all get "their appropriate share"? Yet the fact remains that the "appropriate" share at the top of nationalised concerns, here and in Russia, can be thirty, fifty or more times the amount paid to the workers at the bottom. Well might the Chairman of the Union of Post Office Workers say, "Post Office workers knew that at present there was very little difference between their conditions in a nationalised industry and those of workers outside" (Daily Herald, May 4th, 1943).

Common Wealth is merely carrying on in the long tradition of those who blindly or wilfully confuse the capitalist problem of nationalising the control of certain industries and services, in the interest of capitalist efficiency, with the workers' problem of ending capitalist ownership. A Tory Government in 1868 nationalised the Telegraphs. A Tory Government began and a Liberal Government completed Telephone nationalisation between 1905 and 1912. Liberals set up the Port of London Authority in 1908, and Tories established the Metropolitan Water Board in 1902, and the Central Electricity Board in 1926. Mr. Herbert Morrison began the move to establish the London Passenger Transport Board in 1931, and it was completed under the National Government in 1933. A move in the opposite direction was the handing over of Post Office Beam Wireless and Government cables to the Cable-Wireless merger. It was begun in 1924, and actually the last formal step was completed after the advent of the Labour Government in 1929. None of this has any bearing on the Socialist problem of ending capitalism and establishing Socialism; but because of the prevailing confusion of ideas, Mr. Herbert Morrison could naturally tell the boys at Malvern School that "more Socialism was done by the Conservative Party, which opposed it, than by the Labour Party, which was in favour of it" (Times, February 12th, 1944). Common Wealth is stepping in to do what it thinks the Labour Party is neglecting. Meanwhile the real problem remains untouched, and Common Wealth is not going to do anything about it.

One or two incidental features of its programme deserve notice. While all in favour of nationalisation, the party is warily avoiding having to defend actual operation by Government departments; thus following Mr. Herbert Morrison's lead. Common Wealth does not propose handing over industry “to the present civil service. Let the managers and technicians who are actually doing the job have a free hand to go all-out for production and efficiency" (C. W., Bristol, Publication No. 2). Letting managers and technicians have a free hand recalls the anti-democratic propaganda of those who want industry controlled by a new group of dictatorial "experts," It does not sound much like the "democracy in industry" that Sir B. Acland holds out as a bait to trade unionist voters. Nor is it much altered by the supposedly enticing carrot of Production Councils promised in the Common Wealth Manifesto (page 6);—

Production Councils for war purposes, even working within the limits allowed by private ownership, have shown how workers could share responsibility for the running of factories and industries with technicians and production management.

Workers know very well that behind the camouflage of joint councils, Whitley Committees and so on, effective control still rests with the capitalist owners or the capitalist State. Common Wealth, however, can see that while it offers "security and equality" to the low-paid workers, it can make a separate appeal to the managerial and technical group of the working class by promising them more authority and of course larger incomes. (Despite "equality for all citizens" on page 2, on page 6 is the promise of "higher wages and salaries to men who do skilled and responsible jobs.") Whereas it took the Bolshevists some years to drop Lenin's plea for equal pay for all workers from top to bottom. Common Wealth is managing to combine the promise and the repudiation of equality in the same pamphlet. It need only be repeated, to remove possible confusion, that Socialism involves the abolition of the wages system in its entirety— another proof that Common Wealth does not understand or aim at Socialism.

We shall be surprised if Common Wealth survives the ending of the political truce. We doubt if either the capitalist class or the non-socialist workers will have any use for this new conglomeration of old reforms preached by new reformers. We are, however, quite safe in prophesying that, whether Common Wealth eventually gets crushed between the millstones of Tory and Labour, or whether it survives to reach office, it will not solve the problem of the workers, and it has already—by its confusion-mongering—helped to postpone the day when the workers will understand and demand Socialism.

Caught in the Act: Two Of A Kind (1991)

The Caught in the Act Column from the January 1991 issue of the Socialist Standard

Two Of A Kind

John Major had to move swiftly to correct any impression that he meant, or even intended, what he had said when he announced that he would spearhead a drive to a classless society. He did this in a way which was intended to please as many people as possible - which is perhaps how he will try to do the job of prime minister. Denis Thatcher was elevated from one of the common herd to a baronet which, for those who are unfamiliar with the ridiculous mummery and protocol of class society, is a hereditary title created in 1611 by James I. At that time the royal idea was to raise some money to pay for the upkeep of an army in Ulster, almost anyone whose income from land ownership was large enough and who could prove that his family had been warring for the past two generations could offer to buy one of the titles. Then they could put the word “Sir" before their name and the word "Bart" after it. Which was nice for them; Denis is said to be very pleased that he is now allowed to do this and so are all the snobs and toadies who don't object to being social doormats as long as the shoes which are wiped on them contain aristocratic feet.

Bone headed
Although Denis has not actually paid for any troops to be sent to Northern Ireland he has in many other ways rendered faithful service to British capitalism. This is only natural because he is a very rich member of the ruling class; his patient support and reassurance for his wife when she was under criticism for the way her government was operating was not entirely selfless. There is no reason to believe that he had to be economical with any personal principles to do this because, to the delight of Private Eye, he personifies a mass of the crasser prejudices of capitalism. Perhaps that is why he never made - or should that be he was never allowed to make - public statements and confined himself to shadowing his wife a step or two behind her. One typically bone-headed utterance of his which was leaked into the news some years ago was made in private, at the annual dinner of the London Society of Rugby Union Referees. At the time there was a strong campaign in protest at a proposed English rugby tour to South Africa - a country much admired by Denis - who informed his audience, to enthusiastic after-dinner applause, that rugby players should be free to play anywhere and against anyone they chose. He did not actually mean that - the protests were in favour of freedom in sport and against racist restrictions imposed on it by the South African government. What Denis did mean was that a while English rugby team (no one thought that any black players, however good, would be selected) should be free to support apartheid by going to South Africa and ignoring what the racism there did to the Africans and the Coloureds.

This blind tolerance of the intolerable is typical of what Denis represented - the plain, no nonsense regular in the saloon bar of some Home Counties pub who knows that the British people devoted centuries to a selfless mission to civilise an ungrateful world (which is why James I thought up the idea of selling baronetcies) and nothing has been the same since a bunch of subversive do-gooders began to dismantle the British Empire. This sort of theory can be kindly described as innocence; certainly there is no evidence to support it - just as there is none in favour of the idea that to give someone a high-flown title makes them superior - but Denis was never one to be confused by facts if he didn't want to be.

In any case capitalism has been good to him. He inherited some substantial property which blossomed in a succession of takeovers so that his wife could study for the Bar and then go full time into politics without worrying about the children, who were cared for by a nanny and later at boarding school (their son at Harrow). Denis's view on trade unions and the motives for production can be gauged by his reputation for being clever at reading a balance sheet - a talent which would not be much use if he were cast up on a desert island but which impresses the shareholders. When his wife was ejected from Number Ten they could offer to pay £6.5 million for a house in Chelsea with a further large sum for the contents. Contrast this with just one souvenir of his wife's government - the tragic increase in the homeless, in beggars on the city streets and in people sleeping rough. One of her parting comments was that she had " . . . done pretty well out of being Mrs Thatcher".

Well, yes.

An Unstable Baronet 

A baronet of rather different stamp was Richard Acland, who died last month after a life time of political activity which was barren of any apparent insight into its futility.

Acland's title was rather older than Thatcher's; it orginated in the Civil War. his family were well accustomed to their ruling class status and by the lime he came into the title in 1935 he was a Liberal MP. Like a lot of others with a deficient understanding of capitalism he was converted to Keynesianism and later joined the Popular Front. He decided that the war would signal the end of private capitalism and to prepare for this he founded the Common Wealth Party, which won three parliamentary by-elections during the wartime truce between the Labour. Conservative and Liberal parties but was wiped out in the 1945 general election.

Although Common Wealth staggered on. Acland knew that it was yet another movement which had failed to change history and he joined the Labour Party. In 1947 he won a famous victory at Gravesend but then, having fought to become a Labour MP after the party had supported the atomic bombing of two Japanese cities and then set up the British atomic bomb programme, Acland objected to the proposal to make a British H bomb. In 1955 he resigned from parliament with the intention of fighting a dramatic, denunciatory by-election on the issue. But again his ambitions were swamped in a general election - on this occasion the big issue was to confirm Anthony Eden as Churchill's successor and not the malformed confusions of a fringe idealist.

After that Acland sank into his home on the family estate, living off the memories of a voyage around politics which ended nowhere. In 1983, when what was left of Common Wealth wanted to celebrate its 40th anniversary he refused to have anything to do with the party on the grounds that he had no sympathy for their aspirations. It did not seem to occur to him that an apology might be in order, for the turmoil he had stimulated by his empty promises that capitalism could be reformed out of its character and that he had formed a movement which could be trusted to do it.

Two different types? 
Capitalism's politics seethes with organisations like Common Wealth, who trade on working class dissatisfaction with the system. Politics has plenty of people like Acland, who attract brief attention with their baseless theories, write a book or two, pour out their anguished consciences in compelling speeches. Then reality strikes, they disintegrate into a historical footnote and the workers who were misled by them are left to still endure capitalism.

Acland and Thatcher are superficially two different types of baronet. The one gaunt, angular and agonised, the other well fleshed and heartily smug. They would regard each other as mortal enemies but in their work to persuade the working class to keep capitalism in being they were in close alliance.

As for the classless society . . .

Ivan