SPGB Meetings (1981)

Party News from the September 1981 issue of the Socialist Standard

SPGB Meetings (1981)

Party News from the August 1981 issue of the Socialist Standard

Obituary: Tom Simpson (1994)

Obituary from the October 1994 issue of the Socialist Standard

Tom's rather sudden death in July deprives the Party of a member of long standing. After joining Hackney Branch in November 1941, Tom heartily involved himself in socialist agitation. He was particularly active during the war years — one of the most testing times for Socialist Party members — and served three months of a twelve-month sentence in Wormwood Scrubs prison for his refusal to undertake military service. Subsequently he became secretary and then treasurer of Hackney Branch until its eventual break-up. In the post-war period Tom moved to Putney and became a member of the South West London Branch until the difficulties of late-night transport forced him to transfer to Central Branch.

His death ended fifty-two years of Party membership. He will be missed not only as a twin brother and close personal friend but as a Party member whose concepts were rooted in the fundamentals of the socialist case.

R. S.

Party News Briefs (1951)

Party News from the December 1951 issue of the Socialist Standard

Reference was made in the November issue regarding the work being done by Party members during the recent General Election. Wherever possible branches made a special effort to get the literature distributed and to hold additional propaganda meetings during the three weeks of the campaign. S.W. London Branch report that on receiving the information from Head Office that 10,000 Socialist Standards and 50,000 Election Manifestos were to be disposed of, a call was sent to the Branch members asking them to take as many additional Standards as possible, also to assist in a door-to-door sales campaign and to attend other, political parties' propaganda meetings to sell our literature.

These ideas were put into effect with the result that a number of meetings were attended where our members put the Socialist point of view, our Election Manifestos were distributed and Socialist Standards sold.

Local trade union branches were canvassed by circular in order that a speaker could put the Socialist Case. Four of these were successful.

The greatest measure of success, however, was obtained in what the Branch believed to be the most effective means of Party propaganda, selling the Socialist Standard from door to door and this was the method used to dispose of the bulk of 37 dozen copies sold during the month.

A lot of new ground, as well as old, was covered during the literature drive and it should be emphasised to Branch members the need for as much of their time, effort and enthusiasm in the future in order to keep up this good work.

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A number of interesting lectures and discussions are bang held by branches, and details of all of the December meetings are advertised on other pages of this issue.

In particular a public meeting is being held at Kensington Town Hall on Monday, December 17th. The local Conservative and Labour Party have been invited to oppose us from our platform.

Please make a special note of the time, date and place of this meeting and come along with friends, sympathisers and opponents.

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Ealing and Paddington Branches are holding socials and dances during December, full details on other pages.

The first of a weekly series of Saturday night socials was held at Head Office (52, Clapham High Street) on November 10th. Nearly 100 members were present, music was provided by four members of Fulham Branch. Apart from being a happy evening the social provided the General Fund with £7 6s. 0d. by means of collection, raffle and canteen. These socials are being held every Saturday evening—please make a note and come along and enjoy yourselves.

The Socialist Standard subscription form is specially included in this issue in order that members and sympathisers do not forget to ensure a regular copy of the Socialist Standard during 1952. If you have already sent in your subscription form, why not treat a friend to a year’s subscription as a gift? It is an excellent way to introduce new readers to the Standard. If you know of sympathisers or friends who occasionally read a copy, why not ask them to be regular readers and get them to send in a subscription form.

At the same time please have a look at the list of pamphlets available and make sure that you have all of them in your possession, if not, all the pamphlets advertised can be obtained from the Literature Committee at Head Office.

Phyllis Howard

GLC Election Manifesto (1970)

From the April 1970 issue of the Socialist Standard

The Socialist Party of Great Britain will again be contesting 14 seats in the Greater London Council Elections on April 9. The full number of candidates will be put forward in the following areas: Camden (3), Ealing (4), Haringey (3) and Lambeth (4)

The Real Issue

There is no need for the food we eat. or the clothes we wear, or the houses we live in, to be restricted by the size of our wage packets. There is no need for the output of factories and farms to be restricted by having to make a profit. The productive resources are sufficient to make it possible to abolish buying and selling and thus money and to go over to free distribution of the things people need.

The world's resources are not used to provide this plenty today because, being privately owned or taking the form of state and municipal capitalism, they are restricted by the limitations of production for sale at a profit. Modern industrial techniques cannot be used to serve human interests until the earth, and all that is in and on it, has become the common property of the whole of mankind.

It is this — capitalism and its restrictions or Socialism and its abundance — that we say is the issue in this, as in all elections, the Socialist Party of Great Britain is putting forward candidates here and in three other London boroughs in order to challenge the other parties, all of which (including Labour and the so-called Communists) stand for keeping class privilege and the profit motive. The Socialist Party alone stands for Socialism.

A World Society

Socialism will be a world community without frontiers. Based on the common ownership and democratic control of the means of production. Articles will be produced, not for sale or profit, but solely for people to use. Within this framework we can clear up once and for all the problems that are built-in to capitalism — the problems of housing, education, transport, health, pollution. racism and the others the orthodox parties and politicians are for ever promising to solve. We can create a world of plenty where, as free men and women, we can co-operate to produce an abundance of wealth to which we can have free access according to our needs.

We make no apology for raising the issue of World Socialism in this, a local election. What bodies like the Greater London Council can do is restricted by the workings of world capitalism. It is the economic rivalry between capitalist states (including state capitalist Russia and China) that determines how much national, and therefore local, governments spend on social reforms. It is partly because goods made in Britain have not sold so profitably on the world market that plans to build more houses and hospitals, to improve road and rail transport, and to reduce overcrowding in schools have had to be cut back in recent years.

Your Responsibility

The only barrier to the immediate establishment of Socialism is that most of you, for various reasons, would not accept that it is really practical and prefer to keep capitalism in being in the vain hope that it can be made to serve human interests.

Trying to reform capitalism in this way has proved time and again to be futile. Capitalism is a class society that can work only for those who live off rent, interest and profit. Capitalism simply cannot be made to work in the interest of the other class in society (there is no middle class), those who have to work for an employer in order to live — the working class properly called. It is to you. our fellow wage and salary workers, that this statement is addressed since it is you who in the end are responsible for the continuance of capitalism and its problems.

Even though the politicians and their parties share the responsibility for keeping capitalism in being, it is no use your blaming their failures on dishonesty or incompetence since it is capitalism itself that sets the limits to what they can do. The national and local governments you elect have to work to a set of priorities which lay down, as we have shown, that profit must come before human need. We suggest you stand aside from the petty squabbles of rival leaders (which is about all conventional politics amount to) and realise that if this world is to be improved it can only be by the actions of ordinary people like yourselves. First, however, you must understand what Socialism means and how it can be established.

The Way to Socialism

When a majority of you are equipped with socialist understanding, you can use your votes to win control of political power so that class property rights can be ended and the means of production belong to the community as a whole.

Those of us who are convinced Socialists and have already joined The Socialist Party of Great Britain will naturally be voting for the Socialist candidates. If you agree with us. we invite you too to register your vote for Socialism. At the same time you would be protesting against capitalism and its parties. Also, since there is of course much more to establishing Socialism than just voting for it, please get in touch with us. We urgently need your help in convincing more and more of our fellow workers of the need to organise for World Socialism, the society of abundance.

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We plan to distribute up to 80,000 copies of this address. If you want to help fold and hand out these please contact the secretary of the local branches: Westminster, Ealing, Haringey or South West London.

The Socialist candidates are:

CAMDEN: L. Cox. M. Davies. E. Grant.

EALING: W. Buchanan, P. George, W. Rose, D. Sawyer.

HARINGEY: A. Buick, J. Carter. A. Waite.

LAMBETH: J. Garnham, V. Phillips. M. Sansum, F. Simkins.

Party News Briefs (1954)

Party News from the March 1954 issue of the Socialist Standard

Last October a member suggested to S.W. London branch that a “Sale of Work" should be held to raise the funds a little. The branch agreed immediately; a small committee was set up, and December 19th was arranged as the date for the sale. All London branches were circularised, as were some thirty members who had already indicated that they were prepared to collaborate, inviting them, not only to the sale, but to donate some article of whatever shape, size or description. In the end, although many of the articles were obviously not "home made," a good, varied collection was offered for sale, for which the donors are heartily thanked. Some of them were apparently turning teetotal: there were three sets of drinking glasses and two bottles of mead. The sale commenced at 3 p.m., and within 10 minutes there was £2 in the kitty. Thereafter trade was not quite so brisk, but there was £7 in the till by 5 p.m., and when the remainder of the goods were sold during a social in the evening the total had reached, with the aid of a raffle, £19 5s. 10d.

Some of the children present in the afternoon were too young to appreciate the "Sale of Work," but proved good customers in the canteen.

A further sale will no doubt be organised. Craftsmen to work!

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A further reminder of Conference, April 15th, 16th and 17th at Conway Hall. Social and dance is being held on the Saturday (16th) and delegates requiring accommodation are urged to contact, through their branches, the Central Organiser.

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The third of the series of meetings organised by Paddington Branch is being held at Denison House on Sunday, March 7th, at 7 p.m. The fourth and final meeting is being held on Sunday, 4th April. The two earlier meetings have been successful and the Branch urges Members to bring friends and sympathisers along to ensure the success of the final meetings.

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It is not too late to send your annual subscription for the Socialist Standard—5s. 6d. post free per annum.

Phyllis Howard

Obituary: David Boyd (1979)

Obituary from the May 1979 issue of the Socialist Standard

The death occurred in February of Comrade David Boyd, just three weeks short of his celebrating forty years as a party member. His son has provided the following obituary:

David Boyd was born in 1903 in Larne, Northern Ireland. Grandfather was a foreman at the local aluminium works and although a devout Presbyterian he supported Irish Home Rule—an unfashionable if not dangerous viewpoint. His was apparently the only copy of the Daily News to arrive each day on the ferry boat from Stranraer (the republican minority presumably taking more subversive journals). Dad remembered when the windows were tarred over and only my grandfather’s senior position in the local Masonic Lodge preventing real violence and loss of job. Amid the conflict and stupidity of the 1912 Loyalist gun-running, the War and the ‘Troubles’, Dad learned about socialism from a Scottish lodger at their home and from The Ragged Trousered Philanthropists. The Depression came early to Northern Ireland and Dad came to London. He took a variety of jobs and was sacked in about 1930 by the Co-operative Insurance Society for helping to organise a strike of fellow agents. A flirtation with the CP was followed by Orwellian disillusion and a home in the SPGB which he never left. “I thought about things’’, he told us “that’s why I am a socialist". Dad's ashes will rest in the local cemetery looking towards Mugsborough.

Activity and news from the constituencies (1997)

Party News from the April 1997 issue of the Socialist Standard

Jarrow and Easington

North East Branch is to contest two seats at the coming General Election—Jarrow and Easington, where the socialist candidates are, respectively, John Bissett and Steve Colborn. In recent months members have held public meetings, set up literature stalls, carried out mail drops and embarked upon an intensive letter-writing campaign to the local press.

On the streets we have had much verbal support and many we have spoken to agree with our ideas. One thing is certain—when the Socialist Party contests the Jarrow and Easington seats, few serious voters will be unfamiliar with our name or our standpoint.

All said, there is much work to be done in both parliamentary constituencies as both are traditional Labour Party strongholds with large majorities. Furthermore, both constituencies have suffered much in recent years through Tory cut-backs and many voters will be looking forward to the election in the hope that a Labour victory will mean life improvement.

Socialists, however, are aware that no matter which of the mainstream parties wins, it will not alter the fact that we live in a world racked by poverty and insecurity and subject always to the worst exigencies of the profit system. The establishment of world socialism remains the only secure future for humanity.

If you would like us to hammer this message home to the electorates of Jarrow and Easington and can offer your help or support, no matter how small the contribution we d be delighted to hear from you.

Offers of help to:John Bissett,Phone: 0191 4890253,Tim Kilgallon,Phone: 0191 2528704Harland Wears,Phone: 0191 5170470.

Livingston

The Socialist standard-bearer in this constituency, to the west of Edinburgh, is Matt Culbert. He is standing against the Labour Shadow Foreign Secretary, Robin Cook, and other supporters of the profit system such as the Tories, the Liberals and the Tartan reformists of the SNP.

In a sense this is a follow-up to Edinburgh Branch’s activity during the 1994 Euro-election campaign when the Socialist Party contested the Lothians constituency which includes Livingston as well as Edinburgh itself.

Preparatory activity has involved making contacts and leafleting in Livingston itself which is the biggest town in the constituency whose shopping centre attracts people from the whole of the surrounding area. Local members have also distributed leaflets in West Calder and other ex-mining villages.

Offers of help to:Matt Culbert,53 Falcon Brae, Ladywell,West Lothian, EH54 6UWPhone: 01506 462 359.

Vauxhall

The Vauxhall constituency in Lambeth was chosen as the parliamentary seat that the Socialist Party should contest in the London area, where our candidate is Richard Headicar. The Party's Head Office is based in Lambeth and members can easily gather there to contribute to the campaign.

The election activity was organised by representatives from all the London branches to co-ordinate the work of socialists across the capital. A barbecue was held last summer to help to raise funds, and in the autumn we had two debates; first with Tory Euro-sceptic Sir Teddy Taylor on the European issue, and then against a local Liberal Democrat councillor. Whilst all this was going on we leafleted as much of the constituency as possible to publicise the campaign.

Last November we had the opportunity to contest a local council by-election in the constituency. The Clapham Town ward was vacated and it was our good fortune that Head Office came within its boundaries. It was therefore an excellent chance to gain experience in contesting elections and to introduce ourselves to the Lambeth Returning Officer. Head Office was turned into an attractive base where people could wander in and see our election activity for themselves. Lessons learned from the experience have prepared us well for the General Election.

In the final run-up to the General Election date we plan to have more public meetings and in particular point out the shallowness of Labour’s position—the party that appears most likely to win power. We intend to try to publicise our campaign in the London media as much as possible and to have a regular literature stall in the constituency. Postering, canvassing, and more leafleting are also all on our agenda.

Offers of help to:Gareth Thomas,Phone 0171-622 3811.

Glasgow Kelvin

Our election campaign began last year with thousands of leaflets being delivered to households in parts of this very spread-out constituency. We set up our literature stand on Saturday afternoons during the summer and autumn in the heart of the constituency and displayed posters announcing our intention to contest the General Election.

This year, the campaign resumed with a public meeting entitled “The Challenge of Socialism", and another one to which we will invite the other candidates to state their case is being held this month (see meetings page for details).

Our literature stand will be visiting different parts of the constituency throughout the campaign and hundreds of posters will be displayed. Fortunately, Militant in Scotland will be contesting the election as the “Scottish Socialist Alliance”, so voters in Kelvin (and Livingston) will be spared the sight of ballot papers listing two “Socialist Party” candidates! The Socialist candidate is Vic Vanni.

For further details and offers of help:Tel: 0141 649 9338.

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NOT THE SOCIALIST PARTY

Readers in a number of places outside Scotland may find that there is someone standing in their constituency calling themselves a “Socialist Party” candidate.

As will immediately become clear from reading their election manifesto with its long-list of reform demands, such candidates have nothing to do with us. They have in fact been put up by Militant, a Trotskyist group which has been in decline since being expelled from the Labour Party by Neil Kinnock and which is trying to relaunch itself under our name.

They don’t even stand for Socialism, but for nationalising everything and all of us becoming employed by the state, i.e. state capitalism.

Those in these constituencies who want socialism should not (of course) vote for these false “Socialist Party” candidates but should, as usual, write the word “SOCIALISM” across their ballot paper.