J. A. Dawson and the Socialist Party of Australia: A reply to Thesis Eleven (1986)

From the Winter 1986-7 issue of the World Socialist

The first issue of Thesis Eleven, published in 1980 by a group of academics from Monash University, Victoria, carried an article by Steven Wright on "Left Communism in Australia: J.A. Dawson and the 'Southern Advocate for Workers Councils'". Since Dawson was for a period a member of the Socialist Party of Australia (now called the World Socialist Party of Australia after the original name was usurped by a break-away from the Australian Communist Party in the 1960s) and since Wright used this as a pretext to criticise our principles and policy, a member of the World Socialist Party who was acquainted from first-hand experience with the historical events discussed by Wright sent in an earlier version of the following article as a reply. As it was not accepted for publication we must assume that the editors of Thesis Eleven are merely interested in interpreting the world in the course of academic discussions amongst themselves.

"You rightly consider yourself as a herald of uncompromising fight and clear opposition to capitalism, enabled to do that by clear understanding of capitalism and Marxian science". The writer of these words was Anton Pannekoek, who had been a prominent theoretician of the Second International and was later a leading exponent of Workers Council Communism as a system of society based on workers' control of industry. Pannekoek's words were addressed to Jim Dawson, an active political propagandist in Australia during the first half of this century.

In an article in Thesis Eleven, a publication announcing itself as "a new journal working at the crossroads of socialism and scholarship", the editors made way for an article on Dawson by Steven Wright. One of Wright's major objects in dogging Dawson's political peregrinations was to attack the Socialist Party of Australia and its companion party, the Socialist Party of Great Britain.

Wright steps off on the Dawson trail, saying:

The beginning of the second half of the 1940s, in the wake of the military defeat of fascism, marked a time of resurgence of working class struggle in Europe and America, a wave whose crest the left seemed to be riding everywhere, much to the consternation of both Washington and Moscow. This was the time of victorious Labor governments in Australia, of the Australian Communist Party's peak in membership, of Labour MPs standing in their seats in the House of Commons to defiantly sing 'The Red Flag', and of partisans, Soviet tanks and 'Socialist Unity' parties in Eastern Europe.

Whatever significance this "resurgence" had for the working class, it was certainly no indication of increased actual socialist understanding on the part of the workers.

The rise to power of Labor governments was no new phenomenon in Australian political history and the sordid records of such governments in the second half of the 1940s was merely a repeat of past history, the second half of the 1940s was merely a repeat of past history. The "Australian Communist Party's peak in membership" was merely a reflex of the influx of numerous fellow travellers who had been attracted to the CP after the belated entry of Russia into World War II. Together, the Labor Party and the Communist Party had hopped on the Tour de Triomphe of the Red Army on the Eastern Front While triumphantly proclaiming the "defeat of Fascism" (German variety) the Labor Party pledged support for the Red Fascists — Stalin and Co. The degrading and hypocritical spectacle of British Labour MPs singing the Red Flag in the House of Commons was a miserable vote-catching stunt.

As we claimed at the time, the mushrooming "socialist" and "communist" parties were all part of the Soviet con-game, directed towards trapping unwitting workers into the ranks of Soviet supporters. The only significant feature of the Wright-styled "resurgence" was the willingness of the politically ignorant workers to fall for the political bunk pedalled by self-appointed leaders who were impatiently preening themselves for the romantic roles which they visualised they were to play in what they regarded as the impending world revolution.

What really happened in Russia 

It was merely history repeating itself — a replica of the aftermath of the first world war, with the rise to power of the Bolsheviks, when the self-appointed workers' leaders of the day were lining up for the favours of the Kremlin. Numerous outfits, lefts, rights, centre, and others, sought handouts from the Kremlin coffers, including trips to Moscow with all mod-cons, while battening on the credulity of those they regarded as sheep to be led. Ample proof of this to be found in the belated admissions of these "ambassadors" to Moscow, some of whom were later relegated to "lower mass work" and resigned, while others were unceremoniously kicked out because they offended the local commissars.

One of the few organisations which understood what was really happening in Russia was the Socialist Party of Great Britain and its companion parties in the rest of the world, including the Socialist Party of Australia (which had been founded in Melbourne on 22 January 1924). Unlike our critics and adversaries, we did not wait for fifty years after the Russian Revolution to realise that it was impossible to establish socialism in the immature social, economic and industrial state of Russia. We based our analysis of the situation in accordance with the scientific theories of Karl Marx. Subsequent developments in Russia, China and their satellites vindicated our position.

Still, we can't keep that Wright man down. He pops up again with the old jargon:

October 1917 changed that irrevocably. The new star in the East rendered obsolete the time-honoured charts by which revolutionaries had previously navigated the path to socialism . . . The SPGB was simply left behind From being one among many small socialist sects in Britain, the SPGB found itself standing haughtily out in the cold, watching the rest of the far left fight amongst themselves for official recognition from the Communist International.

The Socialist Party of Great Britain was not left "out in the cold"; it had never been in the hot romantic furnace of the Moscow pseudo-revolutionaries. Nor had it been involved in the frantic fight for recognition by the Kremlin. Hence it did not have to suffer the frustrations of those who saw their former comrades liquidated by the very bureaucratic dictatorship they had, in their stupidity, helped to create.

Furthering flaunting his bias against the Socialist Party, Wright asserts:

. . . the Socialist Party of Great Britain sometimes gave the distinct impression of wishing that the October Revolution had never taken place.

By this he has in mind our strongly-held view that the Russian Revolution helped put the clock back as far as the development of the socialist movement in the West was concerned. But far from wishing that the revolution had never taken place, we said that a capitalist revolution was inevitable in Russia because the material conditions were not there on which to establish a socialist revolution.

Notwithstanding the ridiculous apologetics from Lenin and his supporters, we were proved to be correct when Lenin, with the backing of the bureaucracy, introduced the New Economic Policy. Announcing NEP, Lenin admitted that it was "a step back to capitalism". Actually, except in name the dictatorship had never been in any way socialist

Other superficial changes in nomenclature were introduced in place of the long-recognised definitions used by Marx. These have been recognised and are too widely known to be set out here, but we might mention two: the substitution of "surplus product" in lieu of "surplus value" and the deliberate falsification of one of Marx's most well-known aphorisms "from each according to their ability, to each according to their needs" into "from each according to their ability, to each according to their work" (our emphasis). In this falsified version it became the key for the Soviet classification which cleared the way for piecework, "socialist competition", subotniks and the Stakhanovites who were used to con their fellow workers in the speed-up gangs. Then there came the "Heroes of the Soviet Republic" who, like the Chief Commissars and the military leaders, carried more decorations on their chests than could be found on a Christmas cake.

All these measures have vindicated our attitude, but Wright castigates the Socialist Parties for telling the truth about the lamentable history of the Russian dictatorship and those who supported or apologised for it.

The Dawson enigma

One of those who had been associated with these disappointing ventures was Jim Dawson, the subject of Wright's political and industrial biography.

On Dawson's own testimony he had been through numerous organisations before seeking salvation for a while in the Socialist Party of Australia. Starting off in Britain he was taken in by the "Clarion Socialism" of Blatchford; then he turned to the Single Tax theories of Henry George. Returning to Australia he voted and propagated for the Australian Labor Party. On the outbreak of World War I, he opposed it in accordance with his Christian ethics which he was taught as a child.

After hearing their speakers he joined the Industrial Workers of the World. By mistake he enlisted in the Detroit IWW Club and became hostile to the real IWW. Later, he found his way into the Socialist Labor Party, explaining to Paul Mattick, a well-known US radical, that his reason for doing so was "on account of their 'Plan' — the average worker 'wants' something in the nature of a blue-print".

Once again divesting himself of his previous political and industrial garments, he adopted the garb of the Australian Socialist Party. At that time the ASP had joined the scramble for recognition by the Kremlin during the early years of the Russian dictatorship. However, they were out-manoeuvred by what became the Australian handmaid of Moscow, the Australian Communist Party. This comprised disgruntled ALP members, One Big Union advocates, ex-IWW remnants and other non-socialist opportunists, all led by Jock Garden, secretary of the Sydney Trades and Labor Council.

Referring to these events in 1946, Dawson said:

The Russian Revolution of 1917 burst upon us like an atomic bomb. We went crazy about it. I wrote it up in lengthy articles in the International Socialist (Sydney organ of the ASP) and like most zealots distorted the facts to fit in with our theoretical yearnings (our emphasis).

Dawson then made another switch. He returned to the Detroit IWW, which by then had become the Workers International Industrial Union, and edited its journal the OBU Herald. Later he discarded this outfit accusing it of "sectarianism", a term adopted by the Australian Workers Union which at that time was considered to be the biggest union body-snatcher in Australia because it stood over members of other unions forcing its victims to pay levies to the Labor Party irrespective of what their political leanings were. It was a case of "no ALP levy coupon, no job".

Bad health kept him out of active participation for a time. In the early years of World War II, he set up his Workers' Literature Bureau, stating his reasons for this was to offset the flood of Stalinism by spreading the views of the Socialist Party of Great Britain. At this point Wright finds another excuse for his unsupported attacks on the SPGB, beginning with the caption "Principles First — The Small Party of Good Boys" and continuing:

Of all the schools of revolutionary thought toward which Jim Dawson was drawn in the 1940s, the Socialist Party of Great Britain was undoubtedly the most peripheral. Despite boasting a higher membership than previously by the end of the decade, the SPGB commanded a smaller audience within the labour movement than on the eve of the Russian Revolution thirty years before.

Seeing that the so-called labour movement was always hostile to the Socialist Party, what significance is there in this subtle charge? Fluctuations are common in most organisations, political or industrial. But when Wright uses numbers as a criterion of truth or sincerity he thereby adopts the sneer of the large political parties throughout the world which contain hugh majorities of unenlightened adherents.

By this time Wright is beginning to analyse the Dawson enigma, asking "what had led Dawson to join the Socialist Party of Australia in the first place?". According to Wright,

What attracted Dawson most to the Socialist Party was its vision of a 'genuine' socialism free from such Stalinist distortions, a society 'based upon the common ownership and democratic control' of the means of production and distribution.

Dawson himself had already provided this answer. Having read about the SPGB attitude towards Russia, he found himself in agreement with it Quoting an article from the Western Socialist (official organ of the Workers — later World — Socialist Party of the US) which had pointed out that "the wage system still prevails in Russia", Dawson said:

the exploitation being no different there than in any capitalist society. That is sufficient for us. The existence of a wage system indicated clearly that neither socialism or communism prevails. The wages system, no matter what form it takes, indicates that capitalism exists.

Wright himself then quotes an article written by the present writer that appeared in the Socialist Comment (official organ of the Socialist Party of Australia) at that time:

If the people of Russia own and control the instruments for producing and distributing wealth, why do they pay themselves wages to buy back from themselves the things which already belong to them?

Having acquired this knowledge from the SPGB's Object and Principles Dawson discarded it. Claiming that the Socialist Party of Australia was loath to fulfil the role he expected from it he decided to shoulder the job himself and set up his own propaganda concern. After his wide experience in almost every organisation available to him, Dawson could never understand why a socialist party, based on Marxist principles, could not compromise those principles.

In effect Dawson sought to seduce an impoverished party with his personal wealth. But the Socialist Party of Australia always safeguarded its socialist integrity by refusing to accept donations with strings attached. We had seen too many so-called socialist parties slither down the opportunist path after their wealthy self-seeking patrons demanded the conditions tied in with their apparent benevolence. SPA finances were — and are — controlled democratically by the party, that is by the members themselves.

Dawson could never understand that; it didn't suit him. It does help, however, to understand his disappointment at being denied his paternalistic and condescending offer to become a socialist sugar daddy. It also throws light on this pique at our refusal to cooperate with him after he left the party. Wright seems to have missed these points.

See the blogger's note at the end of the article.

Socialist activity in Melbourne

Trying to further explain Dawson's peregrinations, Wright takes another slam at the Socialist Party of Great Britain, accusing it of championing "a 'pure' parliamentary road to Socialism" that was anathema to the "outside left". Revealing no understanding of the Socialist Party attitude towards the machinery of government he says:

. . . the SPA and SPGB called upon workers to vote into government representatives 'whose sole business will be to abolish capitalism and introduce socialism' . . . What this meant practically was that, apart from at election times, the Socialist Parties refused to dirty their hands with the real world, concentrating instead on weekly classes designed to clarify the participants' grasp of the Socialist program, or public debates where every opportunity was taken to 'prove the case for socialism' through the forcefulness of the argument, and where necessary humiliation of the opponent.

In other words, Wright claims that educating workers in socialist theory is not participating in the real world.

When we contested elections, as socialists we told the workers that if they didn't want socialism we didn't want their vote. At elections where we had no candidate we urged socialists to write "Socialism" across their ballot paper. For the Victoria State election of 1945 Dawson wanted to abandon this position and give support to a non-socialist candidate.

The candidate in question, Jim Coull, who had at one time been a member of the Socialist Party of Australia, was standing as a "communist-socialist" candidate. An official of the Liquor Trades Union he, along with the rest of his Communist and Labor supporters had jumped on the "people's war" (as the war became for them after the German invasion of Russia in 1941) bandwagon and had been rushing around the country boosting war bonds. Incidentally, as the government had exempted union officials from military service, these latter fought the war at their firesides, urging workers to defeat the Nazis and that when "we" had done that "there would be a brand new world" for mugs. Coull had become one of Dawson's darlings and Dawson gave him every support during the election.

Wright says that Coull "performed impressively" in receiving 3514 votes. But he does not mention (perhaps he never knew) that an SPA candidate standing in the same constituency before the war, in 1934, had polled 12,173 votes [see the blogger's note at the end of the article] and against a much stronger opponent in the person of Jack Holloway, head of the Melbourne Trades Hall Council who had defeated the Prime Minister, Stanley Bruce, at the previous election. And during the election the "communist comrades" dubbed us "social fascists".

Now, let us look closer at the picture: Coull lost his deposit, we polled more than the "half-pie communist" whose showing Wright calls "impressive". What price numbers after that? Most irrelevant, one might say.

Over the years the Melbourne branch of the Socialist Party of Australia had been conducting open-air meetings on street corners in Elsternwick, Port Melbourne, South Melbourne, Albert Park (we just about founded the Red Square there), Brunswick, Newport and Williamstown. On Sundays we held meetings on the Yarra Bank, lectures in the city on Sunday evenings, classes on economics, industrial history and other kindred subjects, speakers classes, all based on teaching workers Marxist history and philosophy.

We never claimed to be supermen and the work fell on a limited number of workers. Some were class leaders, others lecturers, some good at debating, and there was a regular number of the Jimmy Higgins type who sold the literature, arranged meetings, carried the platform, and all contributed to the work of the party to the best of their ability.

All our meetings, business and propaganda, were open to the public — we had no secrets, no air of conspiracy and, chief of all, there were no leaders. When people know what they want and where they are going, they don't need leaders. To get socialism, the working class must understand what it is all about. The activity of the Socialist Party of Australia was directed towards this end. Can Wright suggest any other way?

We were always willing to meet our opponents but we could not meet them all; we regret that we could not accommodate Wright's choice of opponent, namely Dawson. Wright demands more. He complains that we allowed only accredited speakers to address our audiences or in debate. We had no mere spouters. We selected representatives who knew and understood the socialist position on many subjects. Our representatives had to be well-versed in their subjects. We could not depute a novice to tackle skilled anti-socialist opponents, including MPs, leading Communist Party speakers, Labor politicians and university professors.

But Wright says that we disdained to get our hands dirty in a world known only to him. What sheer effrontery!

Knowledge is power

Why Wright should constantly criticise the Socialist Party of Australia on its policy of insisting on Marxian education, it is hard to understand. One striking feature of the pseudo-communist and socialist organisations is their muddled politics. This is reflected in the lack of understanding in their rank and file of the import of the policies put forward by the upper echelon.

Constant pandering to ignorant political prejudice to obtain support from any quarter can never bring success to any real socialist party. Nor will it ever, in the long run, bring support to those who practise it. Sooner or later some of their members will wake up. In any case, as all such parties are aspiring to run the capitalist system, it is always the capitalists who win. All the non-socialist parties are reformist and their reforms can never bring success to the cause of socialism. Whatever the result, it is always the worker supporters who suffer the backlash. The more sincere the well-meaning members of these parties are, the more they suffer for the sins of their treacherous "leaders".

Wright himself seems to be infected with the old IWW slogans "Put the Boss in Overalls", "Smash the Ballot Box with an Axe", "Sabotage", etc, to which the boss class responded with the all-powerful reply "Put the Lot in Jail", much to the chagrin of the well-intentioned but misguided followers in the rank and file. The majority of the IWW officials in Australia, together with their rank and file followers, finished up in the Labor Party or in one of the various so-called communist parties. Many of the rank and file suffered for the whims of their inconsistent leaders.

When he criticises the Socialist Parties for their insistence on socialist understanding on the part of ordinary workers Wright decries the one important safeguard against their being misled by "leaders". He twits when we say "Knowledge is Power". When we use this phrase we equate it with socialist understanding. And an understanding of the capitalist system and how to get rid of it is the greatest power that the working class can possess. As Marx said, "Knowledge, too, is a force". And the knowledge of the need for socialism is the greatest force the working class can acquire in their struggle to abolish capitalism.

Bill Clarke (Australia)

Blogger's Note:

". . . that an SPA candidate standing in the same constituency before the war, in 1934, had polled 12,173 votes"

It has to be pointed out here that the Socialist Party of Australia candidate, W. J. Clarke, did not receive 12, 173 votes at the 1934 election. He polled a [still impressive] 3,872 votes at that election. 

In the above article, the votes of The Socialist Party of Australia  and that of the United Australia Party candidate have been switched around. The correct result is recorded on the wiki page for the Melbourne Ports parliamentary constituency, and the correct result is also recorded in this article from the April 1935 issue of the Socialist Standard.  I can only surmise that this misinformation in the article was a genuine mistake by a man in his 80s, who had misremembered the result of the election contest in 1934.

Bill Clarke's obituary appeared in the September 1988 issue of the Socialist Standard issue of the Socialist Standard. It's worth reading. He was a remarkable man.

Under the Southern Cross. A Letter from Australia. (1931)

From the March 1931 issue of the Socialist Standard

To those workers in the Old World who obtain their ideas of life under the Southern Cross from school primers and entertaining magazine articles written by Capitalistic globe-trotters, Australia is depicted as a land of wealth and wonder, a semi-tropical and tropical paradise, a land of opportunity for all. Mention of Australia to many in the Old Country begets romantic visions of verdant pasture lands, vast goldfields, gigantic sheep and cattle stations, and a golden sun forever setting on a happy and prosperous population. Lured by attractive stories peddled by professional tale-tellers in Australia House and other Immigration Bureaux, thousands of workers have sought to escape the sordidness of Old World Capitalism in the New World “down under.”

In the early days of the pioneers certain opportunities existed in this country for the strong, energetic individuals who were prepared to battle with Nature and win the wealth from the soil and the mineral deposits. But times have changed, and the blighting hand of capitalism has obliterated some of the prettiest beauty spots and established in their place modern cities, containing all the incongruities of civilization. Murky channels have replaced sparkling streams; drab wharves and factories, warehouses and railway sidings have superseded grassy slopes and shady trees which once bordered the banks of the rivers. In place of the primitive system of society there has developed, as in the older countries, the complex system of capitalist society, with all its institutions.

How have the workers of Australia fared under these changing conditions? A brief survey will enable overseas workers to understand the conditions of the workers in this “land of opportunities.”

Wages Falling.

During recent years there has been a definite downward trend in the wages and standard of living of the workers here. In 1928 the Waterside Workers had their wages reduced, and conditions which had been strenuously fought for in the past were wiped out by the stroke of the pen of an Arbitration Court judge. Later the Timber Workers had to resist an attack on their wages and conditions of employment. Reductions running as high as 26s. per week, were imposed, and after a bitter struggle, during which many were jailed and more were batoned and bashed by the police for interfering with blacklegs, the Timber Workers were forced to capitulate. The miners of New South Wales were next attacked, and although they stood out solidly for fifteen months, during which time some of their number were shot dead by the armed thugs of the Capitalist class, they had finally to accept a 12½ per cent. reduction in wages. The irony of the defeat was that they had to surrender after they had helped to return the Labour Party to power, which party had made all sorts of promises to the miners during the election campaign. In almost every other branch of industry wages have been reduced and conditions worsened. To-day there are approximately 200,000 unemployed workers in Australia. So much for the conditions of the workers in the country which perpetually boasts of its incomparable standard of living.

The Australian Labour Party.

Time and again this Party has sat on the Government benches, and at the present time we have a Labour Government in the Federal House, and one in New South Wales, Victoria, and South Australia.

Under the Hogan Labour administration in Victoria, members of the Waterside Workers’ Federation were shot at and one killed, in 1928. Unemployed workers have been batoned and jailed. The wages of public servants, railwaymen, and others in Government employ have been reduced by order of the Government. Wholesale scabbery has been sanctified, and trade unions have been smashed under the regime of the Labour “stalwarts.”

Similar activities have been engaged in by the Labour Government of South Australia. Almost the first thing that the Lang Labour Government in New South Wales did on its taking over last month was to baton the unemployed, to whom Mr. Lang and his henchmen had promised the millennium. Mr. Lang recently purchased a most beautiful yacht, and some unkind critic suggested that he intends to use it as a means of escaping the sordid results of his own administration.

The Federal Labour Government is in a terrible dilemma. Having stated that they could run the system in the interests of all sections of the community, they now find that Capitalism can be administered in one way only, viz., in the interest of the Capitalist class. Every act they pass, and every move they make accentuates the position. Faced with the greatest depression in years, they have embarked upon an economy campaign which is resulting in thousands of workers being thrown out of their jobs. Their star contortionist, Mr. Theodore, has been tripped by a Royal Commission, which found him guilty of grave offences against the Capitalist class. This gentleman now knows that while the Master class does not mind what a Labour Politician takes from the workers, that class will not stand any interference with their own property. Owing to the finding of the Royal Commission, Mr. Theodore had to stand down from his position as Federal Treasurer, and most of his old friends now look askance at him. While the workers’ wages are being reduced, the Labour Prime Minister, “Jim” Scullin, is touring Europe attending to the affairs of the Australian Capitalist class.

The Communist Party.

This confusing gathering of self-styled revolutionaries presents the sorriest spectacle in Australian politics. For years it supported the anti-working class activities of the Labour Party, on the grounds that the workers would learn by experience. After denouncing’ the Labour Party as a reform party, it decided to run its own candidates in the last New South Wales elections. Putting forward about fifty-two candidates, they went to the electors on a Communist Reform Platform. Among their reforms were to be. found the following :—

• Work or maintenance for the unemployed.
• Equal pay to women and youth for equal work.
• The unrestricted right to organize and strike.
• Abolition of all wage taxes and all in come taxes on incomes under £400.
• Agricultural labourers and all poor and middle farmers to receive the basic industrial wage.
• Special grants of money for strike funds and for the relief of strikers and their dependents.
• In office, the Communists will attempt to disarm police and Capitalists, and organize an armed workers’ militia.
• Wage mass drives in defence of the Soviet Union, Hands off India campaigns, in defence of the Chinese Revolution.
• Repudiation of all War Debts, etc.

(C.P. Election Manifesto, N.S.W. elections, November, 1930.)

There you have the “revolutionary” aims of the self-styled “vanguard of the working class.” Attached to the Communist Party are dozens of other still-born children of the Russian Revolution. There is the Militant Minority Movement, the Young Communist Movement, the. I.C.W. P.A., the Friends of the Soviet Union, the Rank and File Movement, et alia. A meeting of the Communist Party is held, and there we find all the leading emancipationists. A visit to the M.M.M., and here we find the same faces with different official names. A walk into the I.C.W.P.A. meeting, and here they are again ! A peep into the meeting of the F.O.S.U., and once again we see the old familiar faces. The workers are slogged with slogans, confused with a myriad forms of organization, and misled by a million different ruses.

On the Committee of the I.C.W.P.A. are Labour Party politicians, yet the Labour Party jails the men whom the I.C.W.P.A. is attempting to get out. Unlike the pussy in the well, they are put in and pulled out (sometimes) by the same gang.

All the aforementioned Communist groups are out to usher in, like a thief in the night, the “dictatorship of the proletariat.” Anybody who refuses to follow their dictates and declines to have his or her head bashed in by the bobby’s truncheon is labelled a “defeatist” by these fanatical followers of the “new line” from Moscow.

The Socialist Party of Australia.

Our Party is gradually making itself felt amongst the workers. Small in numbers, and hampered by the confusion created by the Labour Party and the Communist Party, we find it difficult to keep afloat in the political maelstrom. Having Socialism for our objective, we do not expect, nor do we receive, any assistance from the Australian Capitalists or the Russian Capitalists. Nevertheless, we continue with our propaganda, holding our meetings and lectures when circumstances permit. Unemployment amongst our members has prevented us from getting out our Official Party Organ. Lack of finance is also a factor in the non-appearance of our paper. Without this latter we are seriously handicapped, but we are optimistic. The development of Capitalism in Australia is quickening, and we are development of Capitalism in Australia is quickening, and we are convinced that, when we are able to place our position fully before the workers, our efforts will not have been in vain. In spite of all the present drawbacks, we look to the future with hopes of success.

As soon as funds will permit and circumstances warrant it, we will run candidates during future elections and, despite the jibes of our opponents that the majority of the workers will never understand Socialism, we pin our hopes on the working class.

W. J. Clarke

(For the Socialist Party of Australia)

Parties of Socialism. (1932)

From the October 1932 issue of the Socialist Standard

The Workers' Socialist Party (U.S.A.)

Readers in U.S.A. are invited to communicate with the Workers' Socialist Party at 132, East 23rd Street, New York City (Room 7), where the Socialist Standard is obtainable.

* * * *

The Socialist Party of Canada

Readers in Canada are invited to communicate with the Socialist Party of Canada at 204, Bannatyne. Avenue, Winnipeg, where the Socialist Standard is obtainable.

* * * *

The Socialist Party of New Zealand

Readers in New Zealand are invited to communicate with the Socialist Party of New Zealand at 8, Whitehall Buildings, Upper Queen Street, Auckland, where the Socialist Standard is obtainable.

* * * *

The Socialist Party of Australia

Readers in Australia are invited to communicate with the S.P. of Australia at Box, 1440 P.O., Elizabeth Street, Melbourne, where the Socialist Standard is obtainable.

Lectures every Sunday night at 8 p.m. 122 Bourke Street, City. All welcome. Questions and discussions.

Progress in Australia. (1928)

Party News from the October 1928 issue of the Socialist Standard

We have just received word from our comrades of the Socialist Party of Australia that the movement is making good progress there.

The headquarters of the Party are in Melbourne, and they are now forming a branch in Sydney. Like ourselves, they are beset with financial troubles owing to the unemployment and poverty of their members and the vast distances between districts. However, in spite of this, they hope soon to have their manifesto out and also a paper of their own published shortly.

We appeal to any of our sympathisers in Australia to get in touch with this new party, also to any of our readers who may know of those in Australia likely to be interested. Let them have all the assistance that can be given in membership and finance, so that they can rapidly build up a strong party for Socialism in Australia.

The wave of real Socialist development is gathering force, and it may not be long before the workers throughout the world will see that, in spite of the selling out of “Labour leaders” and the dragging of the name of Socialism in the mire of Reform and the bog of opportunism, it yet holds a message of hope for the dispossessed when its basic principles are understood and acted upon.

We wish our Australian comrades rapid and solid progress, and promise them any assistance we can give to aid them in their struggle.

Unemployment in Australia. (1928)

From the May 1928 issue of the Socialist Standard

Melbourne.

26/12/27.

A Letter from the Socialist Party of 
Australia.

While Australia is being boomed abroad —by emigration touts—as a paradise for the workers, and thousands are flocking to her shores in search of work, in the capital cities the unemployed are marching the streets, registering at the Government Labour Bureaus, and sending deputations to the State Governments asking for sustenance or work.

All the old fallacies that have done service for the last century are being trotted out by the pen-valets, politicians and other hangers-on of the Capitalist class. Free Trade and protection hold pride of place, although in countries in which either of these fiscal policies is in operation, unemployment still remains a problem.

According to Steads Review, June, 1927, the figures submitted by the League of Nations demonstrated that the percentage of unemployed in Australia was greater than any other nation associated with the League.

The following figures were given by Mr. Tunnecliffe, deputy leader of the Victorian Labour Government: That from 6 to 9 per cent. of the workers of the Commonwealth are workless all the time. This represents 136,000 workers.

When the Labour Government came into power in Victoria, it set out valiantly to deal with unemployment, but after six months unemployment is worse than ever. The Premier’s (Mr. Hogan’s) explanation is that the sole cause of the unemployment problem is the adverse trade balance. One million pounds of the imports were clothes, and in this the workers themselves were the guilty parties. For a working man to wear imported clothes is sheer stupidity. 

For “sheer stupidity” this would be hard to beat, for during the year 1925-26 the total factory production for Australia amounted to £400,342,392, while wages were £86,724,683. It should be obvious, even to Mr. Hogan, that if the workers bought Australian goods with all their wages, a surplus of £313,617,710 would remain for the employers to sell. In spite of the inroads upon this by our masters, there still remains a surplus that must be disposed of in the markets of the world. But production the world over has outstripped all markets, hence the glut and world-wide unemployment. 

One of Mr. Hogan’s supporters, Mr. Hayes, has another view. He says that the failure of past (Nationalist) Governments to give consideration to the problem of unemployment was the cause of so many being out of work to-day. Yet in Queensland, where a Labour Government has been in power for twelve years, unemployment has been so bad that it has been found necessary to increase the contributions to the unemployment insurance fund.

A few weeks ago the Nationalists routed the Labour Party in New South Wales, and the workers were told that a time of prosperity was in store for them; since then the police have dispersed the unemployed with batons. Nationalism hold sway in South Australia, where 2,000 railway workers have been put off by the Government to swell the already swollen ranks of the unemployed.

There are many who think the present conditions are transitory, and that with the further development of Australia they will improve; but they are doomed to disappointment. Capitalism here is developing hothouse fashion. The Flinder’s Lane wholesalers, whose name a few years ago was synonymous with solidity, to-day find themselves in a financial quicksand through the development of the departmental stores. The establishment of large industrial concerns from England and America is making for the most scientific methods of production, with the consequent crushing out of the small and inefficient factories and the reduction of those employed.

But the most glaring instance of the displacement of labour by machinery is in the farming industry. The cry of those who formerly had an easy solution for unemployment by advising the workless to go to the country instead of hanging round the cities, has a fitting answer in the following) figures from The Age, 23/2/27:

“ In 1915-16, 213,719 individual farmers employed 259,409 persons, farming 28,883,364 acres, which produced crops valued at £75,475,427. In 1924-25 the number of individual farmers had decreased to 207,046, a reduction of 6,673, and the number of employees had fallen to 219,917, or 39,492 fewer than in 1915-16.

“ The acreage farmed 1924-26, however, was 33,156,308, an increase of 4,272,944 on the acreage of nine years previously, and the value of the produce was £107,096,393, which was £31,620,966 more than the value of the crops in 1915-16.”

Since then the Production Bulletin No. 20 gives the number of displaced farm hands, 1924-25 to 1925-26, as 15,255.

The Age proceeds: 

“ . . . and, as this machinery has been invented to meet the special requirements of Australian farmers, it is enabling them to produce more with a gradually decreasing volume of paid labour . . . Factories are making for the farmers machinery . . . To the employees in these factories farmers sell their produce in the best market in the world. Prosperity is interdependent; prosperity is mutually shared.”

This effusion is put forth as if it were a truth so rare that it would be sacrilege to doubt it. The Age conveniently forgets about the 39,492 farm workers while it talks about prosperity for the implement workers. But is the implement worker in as enviable a position as The Age would have us believe. The implement making industry is already being carried on “with a gradually decreasing volume of paid labour,” as the following figures from the Commonwealth Year Book will prove :—

From 1915 to 1924-25, percentage of increase of employees was 53.49 per cent., while in the same period the total production rose by 152.67 per cent., and the year 1923- 24 to 1924-25 saw the enormous increase of £149,701 with a reduction of 49 employees.

Thus we see the object of Capitalism is to increase the output with a constantly diminishing number of employees. Such a condition of affairs may be satisfactory for those who own the means of wealth production, but to the wage slave it means misery and ruin. And all the noise of the workers, employed or unemployed, the protests, the shouting, “We want work,” the street processions, the deputations to Slipper-tongue, the Premier, who will either turn them away with soft words or the policemen’s club, will not alter the economic laws of Capitalism.

While the working class is content to support Capitalism, it is getting the only possible result. There is only one course, and that—to understand that the gigantic means of production, which the workers operate to turn out wealth in abundance, must become the common property of society, to be used in the interest of the whole of society instead of in the interest of the Capitalist class as at present.

J. S.

Party News Briefs (1954)

Party News from the April 1954 issue of the Socialist Standard

Conference, 1954. The Annual Conference is being held as usual at Conway Hall, Red Lion Square, London, during the Easter week-end, Friday, Saturday and Sunday, April 16th, 17th and 18th. Proceedings commence each morning at 11 a.m. Several interesting items are on the Agenda and members are urged to, attend promptly so that work can run smoothly and leave ample time for discussion. The Central Branch Secretary will be present and will welcome Branch members and needless to say will be happy to collect dues.

Social and Dance. This will be held in the Conway Hall on the Saturday, tickets (3s.) will be available from Branch Secretaries. A good band has been engaged and the Central Organiser and Social Committee are doing their best to ensure a good evening—it is up to members and friends to arrive early and enjoy themselves.

Australia. A Central Branch member has returned from a visit to Melbourne and was very grateful for the hospitality he received from the S.PA Secretary, Comrade C. Saunders and his wife. He would particularly like to thank them for the farewell party they gave him. He is certain that if any members should be in that part of the World, they would receive a “hearty welcome, advice and assistance from both Mr. and Mrs. Saunders.” Two sympathisers, one a school teacher and the other a scientist were introduced to the Saunders' and were proposing to join the Party.

Denison House meetings have been successfully run by Paddington Branch during the winter months and it is hoped to give a full report on the series after the final meeting is held on April 4th.

Phyllis Howard

Notice To All Members

MAY DAY

Literature arrangements, Sunday, May 2nd.

There will be two distribution points at which literature can be obtained and returned at the times stated below.

Charing Cross Underground Station,

Villiers Street entrance: 12.30 p.m — 2.30 p.m. 

Connaught Place off Edgware Road.

100 yards from Marble Arch: 2 p.m.—5.30 p.m.

Members who collect literature from Charing Cross may return their sales at Connaught Place, should they decide to sell along the Procession route.

The Trades Council procession leaves the Embankment at 2 p.m. and reaches Hyde Park at approximately 3.30 p.m.

Members are urged to co-operate and give all the assistance they can.

Our Hyde Park meeting will commence at approximately 3.45 p.m. and finish at 6 p.m.

The Conway Hall meeting will commence at 7 p.m. sharp and terminate at 9.30 p.m. sharp.

These activities seed your full support.

Central Organiser.

The Socialist Parties of New Zealand and Australia (1942)

Party News from the April 1942 issue of the Socialist Standard 

War-time restrictions in New Zealand make it impossible for our companion party in that dominion to conduct its normal propaganda activity for Socialism.

The operation of the “Public Safety Emergency Regulations” imposes so many conditions under which a public meeting may be held, as to virtually ban this medium of propaganda to small working class organisations such as the Socialist Party of New Zealand. It is likewise with regard to the publication of literature.

In view of the above circumstances, it is surprising gratifying to the S.P.G.B. to learn that the S.P. of N.Z. is not only maintaining its organisation firmly in being, but is making every endeavour by means of classes and study groups to develop speakers and writers who will play their part in the inevitable expansion of the Party in the post-war years.

The most recent letters from the Wellington and Auckland branches reveal that the Party is in good shape; literature sales, particularly those of the Socialist Standard and The Western Socialist continue to increase, and the demand for S.P.G.B. pamphlets exceeds the supplies which we are able to send to them.

S.P. of Australia

Restrictions on the holding of public meetings, etc., in Australia, do not appear to be as severe as those obtaining in New Zealand. Nevertheless; the Socialist Party of Australia is finding the task of propagating Socialism far from easy. This is due to a variety of reasons, the main ones being that most members of the working class there are apathetic to the Socialist message, and retain a blind faith in Labourism, and the Labour Government. Long working hours resulting from the intensification of the “war effort” leave others with but little time for the study of Socialism.

Despite these unfavourable conditions, the S.P. of A. is maintaining its organisation in much the same way as the S.P, of N.Z. Information reaching us from Melbourne and Sydney reveals that branches are meeting regularly, and that they avail themselves of every opportunity to strengthen and extend the Party’s influence.

The Socialist Standard has many readers in Australasia. Those who desire to assist the growth of the Socialist movement in the Southern Hemisphere are urged to contact our companion parties. The addresses of the headquarters of each party may be found elsewhere in this journal.

H. G. Holt,

Overseas Secretary, S.P.G.B. 

March, 1942.

Obituary: Charlie Lawrence (2009)

Obituary from the February 2009 issue of the Socialist Standard 

We report with sadness the death of Charlie Lawrence in Australia on 12th January at the age of 89. Charlie was born in England but as a young boy emigrated to Western Australia with his family in the 1920s where they ran a dairy farm. This was part of the Group Settlements project on virgin land. It was hard work but he loved the life there but the depression of the 1930s saw the family in financial trouble and they returned to England.

During the war Charlie worked for a time in ‘directed labour’ but decided this was not for him after being too close to bombing raids near where he was working. He took this so personally that he decided to go ‘on the run’, rather than face military service or more directed labour.

It was while he was working at Woking Power Station in 1939 that Charlie met the Socialist Party in the person of a member, George Nuttall, who was the works fitter there. George talked about the party’s case for socialism and its analysis of capitalism. Charlie joined the party in 1944 as a member of the old Paddington Branch and attended meetings and lectures. He always recalled the very big meetings held at the old Metropolitan Theatre in the Edgware Road just after the war.

Charlie was the catalyst for no less than six of his siblings becoming socialists – possibly a record in this Party. One of these siblings was Pieter Lawrence (see obituary May 2007 Socialist Standard). Charlie returned to live in Australia in the 1960s and although not very active in the WSP of Australia, remained a staunch socialist to the end. Sympathy is extended to his family both in Australia and in the UK.

Phyllis Hart

Iraq, imperialism and the anti-war campaign (2005)

From the July 2005 issue of the Socialist Standard

The anti-war campaign agitates for withdrawal of all Australian and US troops from Iraq, but this is not a demand for no war in Iraq (although the campaign organisers seem to think that it is), it is a demand that the existing civil war be allowed to continue without the US and Australia backing one side or the other. The fact that the civil war started because of the US invasion does not change this.

It is wildly unlikely, but just possible, that the US would indeed withdraw. They have done something loosely similar in Vietnam, Somalia and Lebanon. Conceivably, it could happen in Iraq. However, Iraqi oil is an enormously rich prize, and the strategic leverage that it would grant to the US over the EU, China and Japan is an even richer prize.

The US invaded Iraq to gain control of the most cheaply accessible large oilfields in the world. It will withdraw only if the insurgency makes the military costs of controlling Iraq (which increase the effective cost of producing the oil) so great that these costs become an intolerable burden on the US capitalist class as a whole, or if popular resistance in the US and throughout their allies produces the same effect.

Almost certainly, the insurgency would have to get much, much worse or popular resistance massively increase, before that point was reached, because the US does not want the oil of Iraq only for the sake of the profits to be gained from it.

They also want it because having control over the two largest oil producers in OPEC (Saudi Arabia and Iraq) would mean that the US would have something approaching a veto over the industrial development of their three main world rivals; China, Japan and the EU.

The justifications for the invasion are entirely hypocritical, both the pre-invasion claims about the weapons of mass destruction, and the post-invasion ones based on the blood-soaked repressiveness of Saddam Hussein’s regime and the story that “We did it to bring democracy to the Iraqis”. We may begin to take Iraqi democracy and sovereignty seriously when the US government is willing to accept an order from an elected Iraqi government that US forces leave Iraq.

The Ba’athist regime was, indeed, one of the world’s worst tyrannies, but that didn’t bother the US while Iraq was a US ally, during, for example, the Iran-Iraq war. The US has no objection to blood-soaked tyrannies, provided that they are useful (meaning profitable, directly or indirectly) to the US ruling class. The chemical and biological WMD, or the facilities for making them, were originally supplied by the US and Western European governments, at a time when there were certainly terrorist outfits headquartered in Baghdad; Abu Nidal’s, for one. So, the possibility that Iraq would pass WMD to terrorists (a possibility that the US and other Western governments helped create), only became a threat when the US needed an excuse for an invasion.  Andrew Wilkie, who was in a position to know, developed the real point:

  “Superimposed over specifics like oil, however, was a much bigger issue – the US’s determination to safeguard and enhance its global ideological, economic and military hegemony. This is the big one: the grand strategy of the US to reign supreme permanently, as espoused by the so-called ‘neo-conservatives’ and articulated bluntly in September 2002 in The National Security Strategy of the United States of America. In this quest, Iraq was as much a demonstration as a consequence – an almost theatrical performance against a country consequent enough for people to notice, for reasons alarming enough for people to care, on terms lopsided enough to guarantee a crushing demonstration of US military muscle. Or at least that was the idea.”

However, even if the US did withdraw, then almost certainly, Iraq would not be left to its own blood-letting; there would very probably be other invasions, Turkey and Iran being the obvious candidates, Syria and Saudi Arabia other possibilities.

Even if, through some miracle, there was no further foreign interference in Iraq after a US withdrawal, there is no reason for confidence that the civil war would stop anytime soon or even that it would be less bloody in the absence of US and Australian troops. One of the bloodiest civil wars of the twentieth century occurred only a little over ten years ago, without any obvious interference from the West, except for a French intervention to protect the perpetrators of the genocide; we refer, of course, to Rwanda.

That civil war fed directly into what must be the worst war in the world; in the Congo there have been an estimated 3 million dead and it’s still going on. Almost certainly, the riches that can be looted from Iraq, and the strategic advantage that can be gained from that looting, exceed those that can be had by looting from the Congo; which is one reason why the West is not directly involved in the Congo. (Although all the states surrounding Congo, plus Zimbabwe, are) It is also why Iraq will not be left alone; any state that can see an opportunity to interfere, will.

No one, least of all anti-war demonstrators in Australia, should pretend that any of these possibilities are in any way in the interests of the people of Iraq.

Virtually all the left-wing agitation about Australian foreign policy, and US imperial policy, is based on the underlying assumption (or rather, fantasy), that the natural order of capitalism is a world of independent, sovereign, mutually-respectful nations. What is thought to be necessary to achieve this is that the US stop acting as an imperialist thug, and that Australia stop helping them do it. Nice idea, but capitalism just ain’t like that.

It’s a world system of interdependent, not a worldwide collection of independent ones.

If the US declines as an imperialist power, others will take their place, China being an obvious candidate and, given the Chinese government’s record of racist, genocidal colonialism in Tibet, they may even make the US look moderate by comparison. An obvious target for the first major Chinese imperialist adventure is the group of oil-and-natural-gas-rich states between the Chinese Western border and the Caspian Sea.

Capitalist states (of which China is one) are not moral entities, and their ruling classes do not react to attempts at moral persuasion. They perpetually seek profit and react to what could loosely be called profit-and-loss calculations. If profit requires that they dominate other countries (to the extent that they can), so be it.

The consent of the ruled (us!) is essential to the continued functioning of capitalism (in both its state-capitalist and private-capitalist forms). Our consent, or our resistance, is part of our rulers’ profit-and-loss estimates.

We can make this particular imperialist adventure too difficult or too expensive for the rulers of Australia, which is, after all, a junior partner of US capitalism.

The people of the US and the rest of the world, by huge efforts, could make the Iraq occupation too difficult or too expensive, even for the dominant capitalist power. But as long as we, all of us, consent to the capitalist system as a whole, in other words, so long as we resist only this particular imperialist adventure, then there will be more imperialist adventures, by the US and others, more bloodshed, and more terrorist atrocities.

There will also be more poverty, ecological devastation, and more lives spent on mostly-meaningless work and totally meaningless consumerism.

All that the protest organisers can offer, fundamentally, is the prospect of more problems within capitalism, including more wars caused by imperialist adventures, and by rulers using “ethnic tensions” to grab territory, etc., and more protests against those problems and wars. And so on, and on, and on.

There’s got to be a better way, and there is; abolish capitalism. That’s what we are working for.

The only solution is to work for a world system based on common ownership, and moneyless, free access to wealth. Only then can we have genuinely democratic economies, and therefore genuinely democratic societies. We call this socialism. (which has nothing to do with the deeply repressive and now-failed variant of capitalism invented in the former Soviet Union, and adapted in China, Vietnam, etc.)

The precondition for this society is a majority who understand and want socialism, and understand and reject capitalism. Nothing less than this can give us socialism. Leaders certainly can’t.

Huge efforts are required. Let’s make sure that they are directed towards getting off the treadmill that is capitalism, not towards trying to turn it into something it can’t be.

World Socialist Party of Australia leaflet.

From The Branches (1960)

Party News from the February 1960 issue of the Socialist Standard

A glance at the meetings column at the front of the Socialist Standard will give a good idea of the propaganda activity of the Party. The Clerkenwell Road (Central Club) meetings are held on Sundays and have been arranged by the Propaganda Committee. As this is a new venue, the Committee especially welcome comrades to give the meetings their regular support. If successful, this hall could be a regular one for the Party to hold meetings, and these become a feature as did the old Trade Union Club meetings which ended with the closing down of the Club.

For members and friends who have easier access to South London, the Film lectures at Head Office, held every Sunday, are another aspect of the Party’s propaganda. It will be seen also that several London branches hold discussions and lectures after branch business.

Woolwich

Woolwich Branch report that they have concluded another year of useful activity. Apart from many discussions on aspects of capitalism and the Party case, branch members have been busy canvassing the Socialist Standard and other Party literature. Visitors are welcome to the Branch meetings, held the second and fourth Friday in each month. (See page 18.) Many good meetings have been held at the local outdoor station, Beresford Square, and with greater support from Branch and other comrades these meetings could play a very successful part in the propaganda work of the Party.

Down Under

A copy of an Air Line magazine has been sent to us and the centre page comprises a drawing depicting the typical Sunday afternoon scene in “The Domain" — Sydney. It states that the “listener may expect to hear almost any cause expounded with passionate conviction.” The reason this is mentioned here is that a large part of the drawing depicts a speaker on a platform, the latter bearing the word “Socialist.” Without doubt the speaker shown in the drawing is none other than Comrade Thorburn, for many years a speaker for the SPGB. He is now a member of the Socialist Party of Australia, carrying on the work for Socialism there that he did when in Britain.

Paddington

Paddington Branch have been running since the Autumn a very successful series of discussions at their regular meeting place, “The Olive Branch.” Russia, living standards, Catholicism, human needs. D. H. Lawrence, the problems of communicating ideas—these among many other topics have stimulated lively debate.The'r branch room is cosy, their members friendly, and the Bar (downstairs!) near enough to provide necessary refreshment. Paddington members’ only real vice is their unpunctuality (note, 8.30 is the starting time), they make up for this by lateness in finishing, and after being turned out by the irate landlord at past 11, they adjourn to a nearby coffee bar and discuss on to midnight. Paddington meets every Wednesday and non-members are especially welcome.

From The West

From Ireland and America too we have had reports of good work and propaganda. It is hoped to have fuller details of the activities in these countries in the March issue, but meanwhile it is heartening to know that the case for Socialism is being so well and widely propagated.

T. S. Hoffman

Comrade T. S. Hoffman died on 13th November, 1959, at the age of 78. joining Bloomsbury Branch in March. 1940, and since then he regularly attended his branch, often walking miles—no matter what the weather—to get there. He was modest in manner and dress and although never publicly prominent, he gladly helped the Party with financial contributions at great sacrifice to himself. A good comrade and a sound Socialist, who served the party well.

Phyllis Howard

Party News Briefs (1958)

Party News from the March 1958 issue of the Socialist Standard

A Date to Remember. The Annual Conference is being held at Conway Hall, Red Lion Square, on Friday, Saturday and Sunday, April 4th, 5th and 6th. Commencing on Friday at 11 a.m., Saturday at 1 p.m., and Sunday, 11 a.m. Each session ending at 6 p.m. Particular note should be made that the Saturday session commences at 1 p.m., this is to enable the Secretary to prepare the previous day’s notes and it has been found that, as many members work on the Saturday morning, the representation is not usually up to full strength. The Annual Dance will be held on Saturday evening and a Rally will be held on Sunday evening. The General Secretary would be glad to know well in advance from Comrades requiring accommodation and also would like members who can accommodate delegates to let him know as soon as possible.

* * *

Propaganda. April is the first month that outdoor meetings start to get under way, and the Propaganda Committee will, as usual, make the best arrangements possible to “circulate” speakers to the various stations. Also Branches will make their local arrangements for meetings, but a very important factor to ensure a good propaganda season is that members make every effort to support as many meetings as possible. It is most encouraging for speakers to know that they have the active support of other comrades at meetings.

* * *

A Sympathiser at our Tower Hill meetings has presented the Party with a portable platform. This is very much appreciated and will certainly greatly assist Party work.

* * *

Companion Parties. The E.C.’s report to conference contains interesting news of the activity of our Companion parties. The W.S.P. (U.S.A.) and S.P.C. have increased their activities—the members say this is due in some measure to the visit of Comrade Gilmac this summer.

* * *

In Canada members are holding regular meetings and are now sending out 1,400 circulars through the post each month in addition to the distribution of the “Western Socialist” and the “Socialist Standard.”

* * *

In Australia the Sydney Group has been very active, particularly in regard to selling literature. The Comrades have ordered a considerable number of pamphlets and Socialist Standards from London and have continued to run a study group and have maintained propaganda meetings in Sydney. Melbourne have continued to hold meetings in spite of the fact that the building they used was demolished during the year. They also have a Central Branch spread over Victoria and New South Wales.

* * *

In New Zealand the sales of literature are being well maintained and are also gaining new subscribers, this, despite the fact that several of their younger members emigrated to Australia during the year.

* * *

The Socialist Party of Ireland. The year has seen a resurgence of activity which culminated in publication of the “Socialist” by the Belfast comrades. This is the first regular Socialist paper to appear in Ireland and it is hoped to continue its publication monthly.

* * *

Sunday Film Lectures at Head Office. The lectures will continue throughout March; details are given elsewhere in this issue, but the last meeting of the season will be on March 30th. (The Sunday before Conference.)

Phyllis Howard

Obituary: Bill Robertson (2012)

Obituary from the May 2012 issue of the Socialist Standard

We are sorry to have to announce that comrade Bill Robertson died in Brighton in March at the age of 84. He first came across the Party through outdoor meetings in Hyde Park and originally joined in 1947. He trained as a wireless operator and in 1960 went to work for the British Forces Broadcasting Network in Singapore. He returned to Britain in 1981 and played an active role in the old Brighton branch but still retained an interest in the Far East. He visited contacts in Kerala and India and spoke at outdoor meetings (we have a recording of him speaking in English with his talk being translated into the local language). In 1984-5 he spent some time in Perth, in Western Australia, transferring to the World Socialist Party of Australia and helping to produce and write for their publication of the time Socialist Comment which enabled him to display his considerable knowledge of Marxian economics. Later he returned to Britain again and settled in his home town of Brighton.

We extend our sympathy to his wife and children.

The Shrike is a Smallish Bird (1969)

From the February 1969 issue of the Socialist Standard

The Shrike, or Butcher-Bird, is a smallish bird of fairly wide distribution throughout the world. Its main colouration is black, white and red. It lives on a varied diet of large insects, small lizards, mammals and birds. Having little holding power in its weak feet these birds impale their living victims upon nearby thorns: then at leisure they tear to pieces their victims in order to feed themselves and their young. So much for a little bit of nature study.

In social life we find something of a parallel. The social shrike is the master class and is also coloured black, white, red, and, in addition, yellow. And its victims? Well during December 1968 one of these, the Melbourne Tramway employees’ union, found itself impaled upon the spike of $1,000 a day fine for every twenty-four hours, or part thereof, of the strike continuation. And bit by bit the union principles, strength and dignity is bitten off while thus impaled. The case upon which we are commenting arises from a dispute over a tram driver who is accused by the Union of scabbing during a stop-work meeting. Male and female conductors refuse to work with him and request that he either be transferred or dismissed. With this request the Tramway Board (another “socialist” institution) refuses to comply. As each conductor thus refuses duty he or she is stood down without pay. Also each one is liable to $100 a day fine for indiscipline. The union, impaled as it is, is quite helpless to organise their undoubtedly superior numbers to aid their individual members subjected to victimisation and isolation.

Here, however, ends the similarity between the Capitalist Shrike and the one of nature. The living victims of nature's Butcher-bird are presumably unwilling to be impaled and then helpless to prevent themselves being torn apart piece meal. Those victims of the Shrike of modern society however, clearly reveal they are willing to allow themselves first to be impaled and then rendered member from member. For in election after election. Federal, State and Council, these workers in their immense superiority of numbers vote for the continuation of the Shrike Victim System—for the capitalist wage labour system. Thus declaring their willingness to continue as the victims of this social drama.

Another difference too, is that the natural Shrike feeds directly off its immediate victims; the social shrike feeds off surplus or unpaid labour of the victim class. This surplus or unpaid labour when suitably transformed into sociably acceptable terms becomes rent, interest, profit, dividends.

Nor is it only the Melbourne Tramways' Union that is impaled upon a $1,000 a day fine for each day of strike action. All Australian Labour unions are similarly threatened and many have experienced this impalement. Some of them so often have been fined this full amount that they are hopelessly indebted to the Commonwealth Government for many thousands of dollars. The Tramway Union itself is financially bankrupt on this account; and this perhaps. is the reason why it is inhibited, apparently disheartened and apathetic. But then of course this goes for all unionism, aggressive or otherwise, which commits itself to maintaining an economic policy where wealth is produced in commodity form, and remains indifferent or antagonistic to the class call of common ownership and democratic control of the means and instruments of wealth production and distribution.

The idea of a wagelcss, moneyless society terrifies the victims, up till now at any rate, as much as it does the Shrike. After all, how would the latter get his living without surplus labour to feast upon? We can understand his resistance to social revolution — even though he must speed it on — the Shrike is conscious of class interests. We also understand the resistance of the victims to this same change and this is due to his ignorance of his class position.

While unaltered the Shrike and its victims in nature continue, the social shrike will continue only as long as its social or class victim permit.

C. Peter Furey.

(Socialist Party of Australia).

Obituary: Ron Stone (2018)

Obituary from the October 2018 issue of the Socialist Standard

We learn from comrades ‘Down Under’ of the death in Western Australia in June of Ron Stone. Originally from Dover in Britain, he was an active supporter of the World Socialist Movement in Australia. His cartoons, mocking politicians and royalty, appeared in the Socialist Comment which the World Socialist Party of Australia published in the 1980s as well as, later, in the Socialist Standard. He was also something of a poet:

Wage Restraint 

It was a crisis day in Parliament.
The House was hushed and still
As a Member rose with a Question:
‘Are we doomed to go downhill?’
‘I am confident of an upturn,’
The P.M. made reply.
‘If workers’ pay is held at bay
We’ll all be home and dry.’
‘How True ! How True!’ cried the workers,
‘Let’s end our silly strike.
We don’t want more money . . .
You can stick it where you like.’

‘Thank Heavens!’ yelled the bosses,
‘There’s faith on the factory floor
And now we have this extra loot
We’ll give it to the poor.’
They picked up all the money
And ran on eager feet
And pressed their surplus profits
On the people in the street.
They moved among the dole queues
And boarded every bus
With tear-filled eyes and heart-felt cries,
‘You need this more than us.’

Soon all the people prospered,
The Devil became a saint
Now that the wicked unions
Had exercised restraint.
The cities were filled with singing
And the sounds of laughter spread
As hand took hand in this golden land . . .
And pigs flew overhead.

News from Australia (1974)

From the September 1974 issue of the Socialist Standard

The fake Labour Government has done nothing to ease the problems of Socialists in Australia. A comrade from the Socialist Party of Australia writes:

We battle along doing what we can to wake up the slaves who—under the Labour government—take an even greater interest in their masters’ problems—balance of trade, inflation etc. for which latter they, like their counterparts in the UK, blame the Unions and everyone on high salaries condemns the basic-wage slaves for demanding higher wages and so keeping the prices rising and further inflating inflation!

One would think that after a hundred years of Marxism there would be a greater understanding of these questions, but it seems that the younger generation do not respond any more than their fathers. Capitalism’s power of recovery and expansion seems to stifle the workers’ capacity to grasp the realities of the situation, so quickly does it pass from one crisis to another—bewildering those who don’t understand and hampering the efforts of the few who do.

Nevertheless the position is far from being hopeless and a developing opposition in Russia and China could easily serve to accelerate activity elsewhere. To enlarge on this would take time not available here.

The events in the Middle East, the happenings in Europe (Common Market) the fatuous vapourings of the Heaths and TU officials, and the “State of the Nixon Nation” provides propaganda points for Socialists and even though many workers feign disinterestedness at heart they must realise that what is happening is only what Socialists have been telling them for years is inevitable under capitalism.

W. J. Clarke

New South Wales.

The Rank and File (1943)

From the December 1943 issue of the Socialist Standard

[The article below is reprinted from "Socialist Comment," May, 1943, published by the Sydney Branch of the Socialist Party of Australia.]

We remember the time when the "militants” used to claim that the rank and file could do no wrong. The rank and file were exhorted to make their voices heard, and not to be the dumb, driven cattle which they had been. They should assert themselves. We were told that trade union officials should be the servants and not the masters of the members.

Many officials were denounced as "social fascists," "defeatists,” "class collaborators,” and "bureaucrats.” To advise the use of the Arbitration Court was treachery and a betrayal of "the masses.” The workers were badly in need of a new "leadership.” (This latter, of course, the "militants” could supply.) The strike was the means whereby our demands were to be made known and enforced. Such were the arguments advanced.

Aspirants to Trade Union official positions waxed eloquent over the virtues of rank-and-file control, their fervour equalling the fanaticism of the founders of a new religion: their creed became Rank-and-File worship.

Time marches on; many of the apostles of rank-and-file control have been suitably rewarded and now the Grand Organ plays a different tune. "Trade Union Bureaucracy” has given place to "Leadership of the Masses”; what was previously condemned as ”Class Collaboration” is now hailed as "National Unity.” Actions once denounced as a "betrayal of the masses” are now proclaimed essential to “Proletarian Discipline.” Any worker who suggests strike action is likely to be denounced by the former "militants” as a "fifth columnist," a "wrecker,” a “saboteur,” or even a "Trotskyist .”

Erstwhile advocates of direct action and rank-and-file control now fawn before politicians and Arbitration Judges; the Arbitration Court has become the "holy of holies” of a new found industrial faith. A fashionable practice among "militants” and some Trade Union officials was the denunciation of the low wages which were held to be inadequate to ensure a decent living standard. The fashion among those people to-day seems to be to regard the workers as a newly rich class squandering their substance on riotous living instead of investing in War Loans. Further, the same "militants,” including the General Secretary of the Communist Party and certain Trade Union officials, unite with other supporters of capitalism in urging working people to support a "Labour” Government which attacks the wages of the workers; the attack upon the pay envelope is disguised as “taxation.”

Don't you think, fellow workers of the rank and file, that it is high time you ended this state of affairs? A study of SOCIALIST literature will help you recognise the folly of placing your trust in "leaders.” Replace blind faith in “leadership” by Working Class Understanding.