Sign of the times: mitigations in place on Zoom event to foil party spies
The ‘Labour Left 4 Socialism’ coalition – a group of left organisations including the FBU, Labour Representation Committee, Jewish Voice for Labour, Labour Black Socialists, Labour Women Leading, Welsh Labour Grassroots and Scotland’s Campaign for Socialism – has launched a manifesto setting out an agenda of ‘unified defiance on major issues affecting all sectors of the Labour movement’.
The group is also backing calls for delegates at party conference in Brighton later this month to reject Keir Starmer’s ally David Evans as general secretary – a danger to Starmer’s plans that has led to a concerted purge of conference delegates as the party’s right tries to stave off the threat.
The risk of the LL4S event being used as an excuse to purge delegates and members has also shaped the format for the event, which will be hosted on Zoom as a webinar rather than a normal meeting, to keep the identities of participants private from potential party snoopers – apart from speakers – with those interested in attending able to register under any name.
Skwawkbox strongly recommends that any conference delegates attending the event use this opportunity to protect their identity. The chance of a successful vote to reject Evans, who has enacted a war on left and particularly Jewish left Labour members under Keir Starmer’s regime, is slim – but it is not zero and every left delegate at the conference next week increases its chances.
Speakers at the online launch tomorrow will include Andrew Scattergood of the FBU on workers’ rights, LBS’s Ekua Bayunu on the fight against racism, Chris Saltmarsh (Labour for a Green New Deal) on the climate crisis and FBU general secretary Matt Wrack on Public Services.
The excellent Barry Gardiner MP will also speak about the campaign for his Private Members Bill to outlaw fire and rehire, which has its second reading in parliament on Sept 22. The event will be chaired, in a personal capacity, by Howard Beckett, left activist and an Assistant General Secretary of Unite.
LL4S intends to establish a standing committee representing supporting organisations, to plan a series of working conferences to debate and organise resistance based on the manifesto outlined below. Work is under way for an initial conference on November 27.
Beckett said:
This is the start of something for the whole of our movement, the result of months of work by members of left groups and unions working together to confront attacks from the Tory government and also from Labour’s right wing.
With the ferocious ratcheting up of suspensions and expulsions in recent weeks, it’s clear that delegates to Labour Party conference in Brighton next week need to follow the lead of Unite the Union and vote down Evans as party general secretary.
The right have got away with a full-scale assault on the left of the party, to rid it of socialism, to become a party of the establishment, because the left has not been united. Now we are putting down a marker that we are united and we are not going anywhere. We are calling on all socialists in the party to come together around common goals and join us in setting in motion the process of left mobilisation.
Register for the webinar, which runs tomorrow from 11.00 – 13.00hrs, here.
Below is the LL4S manifesto:
LABOUR LEFT FOR SOCIALISM – BUILDING THE RESISTANCE: MANIFESTO
Workers’ rights
The sustained attack on workers’ rights, using the excuse of austerity and now the pandemic, is about furthering the wealth of the elite. Labour must call for urgent legislation to ban fire & rehire; zero hour contracts; age pay discrimination; bogus self-employed status and more. As fewer workers have benefited from the protection of Trade Union collective bargaining, so wealth inequalities have grown. Labour must outlaw attempts to exclude trade unionists from employment and commit to the abolition of all anti trade union laws. We fight against racism, sexism and all forms of discrimination in the workplace. Labour must support the New Workers Deal, promote the rights of trade unions to bargain across sectors as well as in the workplace, and oppose deregulation within Freeports. We stand in solidarity with those taking action over pay, conditions and jobs.
Climate crisis
Labour needs to robustly challenge the Tories on the climate change crisis which poses an urgent and existential threat to humanity. Global temperatures are increasing, sea levels are rising and extreme weather events (floods, fires, droughts etc) are rapidly becoming more frequent. We need a global, just transition.
The developed countries, responsible both for the overwhelming majority of historic carbon emissions and the current highest per capita emissions, are failing to act to keep temperature rises below 1.5°C. A catastrophe is unfolding, which can only be stopped if huge resources are deployed now to green the global economy.
In advance of the UN COP26 conference the Tories absurdly claim that Britain is a world leader. Labour must nail this nonsense. The Tory government has no serious plan to meet the climate targets it has announced; it is subsidising fossil fuels, supporting continued oil and gas exploration in the North Sea, and has cut Green Home Grants
The TUC is calling for the immediate investment of £85 billion for a Green New Deal, to cut the substantial majority of carbon emissions by 2030 and create 1.2 million green jobs. Labour is currently calling for less than half that. Labour needs to build on our 2017 and 2019 manifestos and the Socialist Green New Deal policy agreed at the 2019 Annual Conference.
The urgency of this task makes it essential that Labour campaigns, in office and out, for immediate action alongside the unions in mobilising society for a just transition. We must vigorously attack the dangerous complacency of the Tory government and expose its dishonest claims.
Free Speech and democracy
Free speech and the right to question leaders, ideas, rules and laws are fundamental democratic rights that are increasingly under attack. From the imprisonment of Assange, to the Police Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill and the threats to academic freedom by defunding universities who do not adopt the IHRA, to Prevent, immigration controls and Windrush, our rights are being curtailed as never before.
Freedom of lawful speech is a pillar of democracy. It is a protected right under Article 10 of the Human Rights Act. Labour must commit internally and externally to protecting lawful free speech (including in its disciplinary procedures), stop and reverse the proscription of groups who do not stand candidates against the Labour Party and oppose any “conflation of antisemitism with legitimate advocacy for Palestinian rights”, as the Palestine Solidarity Campaign put it in a recent statement.
War and internationalism
As socialists and internationalists, we stand in solidarity with people against oppression everywhere. We stand in solidarity with those under attack from imperialism and suffering internal repression. An ethical Labour foreign policy must champion these principles across the globe by promoting peace, conflict resolution and nuclear disarmament at its heart.
Anti-racism
The Tories intent, aided by the right-wing media, is to normalise a racist society. It is revealed in their legislation, attacking the GRT community, demonising Muslims, opposing BLM, criminalising refugees, doubling down on creating a Hostile Environment. But Labour is failing to expose this. Labour should stand up against all forms of racism, Islamophobia and antisemitism. It should stop being silent in the face of Tory racism and instead vigorously oppose it. Labour must commit to promoting an agenda of equality and respect by campaigning to ensure a diverse selection of candidates is supported into leadership positions; by improving our understanding of class, race, gender, disability and LGBTQ issues in our socialist practice and confronting racism in the Party as well as wider society, specifically including anti-Black racism.
Public services
A democratic social state that serves the people must have at its core public ownership of our essential public services, transport and utilities, the availability of social housing, including the state provision of a complete National Health Service to all. This means cancelling private service contracts and returning to in-house provision, and reclaiming the freehold of hospital property.
Decades of rip-off profiteering has destroyed the public services we need. Local Authority services must be brought in house and resourced to meet needs. We must urgently engage in a nationally co-ordinated programme of council house building to tackle the housing crisis. Since 2014, accessible NHS services have been withdrawn before our eyes by a corporate American profit scheme with cross-party support -“ICSs”- that incentivises cuts to care. Labour must heed its own 2017-19 conferences, opposing ICSs outright and their exemption from competition law, committing to a fully nationalised NHS, with Social Care under public ownership and control, and to reward front line workers with a minimum wage of £15 per hr.
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That’s the way 2 do it‼️‼️‼️
What is it with these GLORIOUS FRIDAYS on a roll
🌟🎖✨🌟🎖✨🌟🎖
Barry Gardiner?
Goldbach exactly?…He might be a snooper,but Andrew scattergood FBU is a man on a mission and as started to repair the damage caused by lansman in momentum.Andrew knows the potential for momentum with a superb group of activists and organisation second to none.They are very lucky to have him and the FBU.
If you don’t agree with everything you read in the Guardian then you cannot be a true Socialist & a member of their group? Real ‘Woke’ culture in action. It appears that the Palestinian Solidarity Campaign are also part of this group & now I must leave because I believe that BLM is racist. There was a pecking order on Saturday’s demo against the arms fair in Liverpool with Jeremy Corbyn refusing to share a platform with Chris Williamson who told me that he wasn’t allowed to speak, but an actress & a BLM member were. I am truly no longer a leftie as identity politics leaves me cold making Tony Blair right, ‘the class struggle is over’..
.
Ah! Would it seem reasonable to conclude from his report that the parasitic cancer of the hierarchy of oppression has already taken hold?
So Chris told you he wasn’t allowed to speak, did he. And has he mentioned it anywhere at any point on social media, because I just checked his twitter account – in which he mentions the demo in several comments – and he doesn’t say a dicky-bird about not being allowed to speak OR that Jeremy refused to share a platform with him. So I suspect you may be lying through your teeth SR, yet AGAIN!
And it is ODD how when you first posted about Chris not speaking at the demo in a post five/six days ago, you didn’t mention that you spoke with Chris at the demo and he told you ‘that he wasn’t allowed to speak’, and here’s what you said:
‘Meanwhile back in Liverpool…. there are more important questions to ask such as why wasn’t Chris Williamson given a platform to speak on the bus….. It would seem that Jeremy is not keen to be associated with his old friend Chris.’
Here’s a direct link to Steve Richard’s initial post:
https://skwawkbox.org/2021/09/12/baseball-capped-police-detailed-to-film-speakers-at-liverpool-anti-weapons-fair-protest/#comment-197623
It is of course totally improbable that SR wouldn’t have mentioned in his initial post that Chris spoke to him and told him he wasn’t allowed to speak, and yet he DIDN’T! And there are OTHER differences between what SR said in his initial post and what he says in the second one! In his initial post he says the following about Jeremy, but gives no explanation for WHY he says it:
‘It would seem that Jeremy is not keen to be associated with his old friend Chris’
But in his above post it has now become:
‘…. Jeremy Corbyn refusing to share a platform with Chris Williamson’
Hmm
Steve Richards’s initial post, you missed out the ‘s & I have no need to lie, I can leave that up to you Comrade.
Says Steve Richards lying through his nasty little fascist teeth.
Yes, I was wondering how you and your fellow shills would decide what is the best way to ‘react’ to me exposing your Big Lie(s), and I guess it occurred to you that to just pretend you hadn’t seen my posts would just lead to me asking you again and again in the coming days and weeks if you’ve seen my posts AND put a link to my initial post. And you would have been right! So the best way to handle it was- much like signpost – was just to turn reality on its head and lie again and, as such, deny that you lied – ie fabricated a bunch of stuff all concocted and contrived to discredit Jeremy and damage his reputation in the minds of readers of skwawkbox. Just like signpost does on a daily basis in practically every single thread.
Anyway, thanks for the additional material, and as with signpost, I’ll remind readers from time to time that the site is infested with shills, whose agenda is to discredit Jeremy Corbyn and the other socialist MPs and ALL things left-wing every-which-way they can think of.
Steve, this is sad really it appears that Corbyn hasn’t learn anything from the sabotage the right of the Party subjected him since he was elected leader.
If true, for Corbyn to refuse to share platform with Chris Williamson is in my view a betrayal, since Williamson got in trouble in the first place with the right wing of the Party for defending Corbyn.
And yet you support the GRT minority where racism is endemic. The Guardian isn’t Socialist it’s Liberal. I don’t agree with identity politics ahead of class struggle but for members of minorities identity politics is of paramount importance.
The class struggle isn’t over but who is and isn’t working class has greatly changed and culture has fragmented so it’s not surprising that identity politics has gained traction. However, that is no reason to pour scorn on it. That’s just pandering to bigots, misogynists and xenophobes.
There’s no need to glorify it, either. That’s just pandering to virtue-signallers, phonies and hypocrites.
Corporate marketing types love it, though!
About Jeremy Corbyn at the Arms Fair demo – I was online for his speech and very little
else but it was announced he had to reschedule and cut down his time there because of
some other event – which they named.
I don’t know about “Jeremy refusing to share a platform Chris W ” – I never saw the latter
but that does not mean he was not there. Did CW share a platform with anyone?
You must know that if Jeremy shared a platform that would be the end of Jeremy in
the Labour Party. It only needs a teeny excuse for the Starsi to pounce.
Wonder what odds the bookies are giving on the proscription of this particular organised initiative being Agenda item number one at the next LP NEC meeting?
There seems to be something to work with in the above text. However, from the perspective of doing the business – ie achieving the necessary objective of unity – there exists areas in which further work to be carried out.
This passage stands out:
“conflation of antisemitism with legitimate advocacy for Palestinian rights”, as the Palestine Solidarity Campaign put it in a recent statement.”
Because the principle which this statement is seeking to establish is not limited to that particular issue. There are other issues in which the legitimate advocacy of rights are conflated with specific subjective based allegations, smears and, yes, witch hunts. The point being that consistency of application of that general principle rather than picking and choosing when and where to apply it or not is necessary for any serious attempt at achieving that unity objective.
To that end the text below requires the addition of only a single word:
” a diverse selection of candidates is supported into leadership positions; by improving our understanding of class, race, gender, disability and LGBTQ issues”
To read:
“a diverse selection of candidates is supported into leadership positions; by improving our understanding of class, race, gender, sex,, disability and LGBTQ issues”
Steve Richards the penny hasn’t dropped for Corbyn and a few of the socialist group we could use…..They have no longer any future in the Labour party,but that’s no excuse to throw the most loyal mp Chris Williamson a comrade under the bus for the second time.We still need them though to form another party.And Steve Richards the class struggle isnt over because they wont leave us be “even if we wanted.
Somebody must write a book about this one day and maybe a film to compete with “The life of Brian” also a lesson from the “plain English society” and a dictionary might be useful for us uneducated types.Joe the plumber from. Bowton Lancashire.regards comrades !
Right Wing Labour MPs and members are barbarians. End of.
Now as Left Wing Democratic Socialists – What do we want, and when do we want it, now!
Good the Left in Labour is working together and standing up.
But if could be there last stand and though they may not like it it could then be time for a new Left Wing Democratic Socialist party as an example to other countries.
Diverse working people of the world unite!
It would seem that my integrity is being besmirched by a comrade who has called me a liar. He proves this by pointing out that I didn’t quote Chris Williamson directly in a post just after the protest, although the fact that Chris was not given a platform was mentioned. What proof indeed.that I am’lying through my teeth!’ I also joked with Chris Williamson that we had been denied a photo opportunity for him & Jeremy Corbyn ‘on the bus’ & not under it. I leave it to you who you believe. You may disagree with what I say but………….
At the beginning of the LL4S Zoom meeting today they said that many
organisation (8, 10?) had contributed to the Manifesto so it was inevitable that
the lack of emphasis on certain topics would not have suited everyone.
The Conference might be a turning point so it was essential they got something out
ASAP
I had not read your post of 11,03am today SR when I posted my previous reply –
at 3.46 – so did not know that Chris W was not given any of the platforms at the
Arms Demo.
PS
Why is the BLM racist ?
HolbyFanMw’…..I believe BLM is quintessentially racist in the same way that the ‘Black Power Movement’ & Malcom X was in comparison to the non violent messages of integration of Dr.Martin Luther King; his dream is being corrupted. Integration v Black Power. If the colour of your skin gives you cause for celebration then KKK have reason to celebrate too.. Bob Marley sang ‘Until the colour of a man’s skin is of no more significance than the colour of his eyes, everywhere is war. Beyonce Knowles is wrong.
At the time of the mass civil rights protest movement during the 60s it was a mainly a time of integration; a time when Tamla Motown; Stax & Atlantic Records had Black & White musicians such as Steve Cropper who fought against the injustice of racial apartheid by integrating rather than stating ‘see me see my colour!. It now appears however, that major international capitalist corporations also believe that black is the new black in advertising & skin colour counts, but there was a time when music wasn’t just black or white, it was the best of both. There was some criticism of artists who were not black enough, even Tamla Mowtown was accused of selling out because the music was mainstream & incorporated (white)strings in their productions. See me; see my colour? Any form of apartheid is the problem.