What's left for the Labour Party?

We went  to the civic reception on Thursday to celebrate the election of the new Mayor.I(t was a decorous affair with the Tory Councillors quietly on their best behaviour and the Labour Councillor,well quiet.

In the press they are boasting that they will hold the Tories to account, and they have announced a shadow cabinet that will 'hold the Tories to account'

Given the fact that decisions taken at cabinet are not open for discussion with the opposition and are presented to full council as decisions already taken, the best the opposition-shadow cabinet member or humble backbencher can do is to question the report.

To appoint a 'shadow cabinet' largely of first time councillors is as futile a gesture as you can make, they've had there five minutes of fame by making thr announcement.The future is quiet obscurity for five years.

But then the Labour party locally and nationally are all about playing the games by the rules that exist-for Christ's sake there was more conflict in Cromwell's parliament than ever there is now.

it's easy to see how the Parliamentary Labour Party can fall into the torpor of being part of the establishment.

The bunch of young SNP members have clearly annoyed the Labour Party,that pompous arse Gerald kaufman called them 'goons' because they did such naughty things as took photographs in the chamber,clapped and made mockery of the 'oath of allegiance

For fuck's sake!

Simon Burns, another pompous arse lectured the SNP members on how to behave in the chamber, and told them not to clap but to say 'hear,hear' or 'rubbish'.

He was horrified when they clapped him

i suppose the most disappointing aspect of that whole charade was the behaviour of Dennis Skinner.Once a powerful voice on the left now reduced to a 'national treasure' a tame parliamentarian prouder of the traditions of the House than his radical past.

There was a time when Skinner would have welcomed the young anti-austerity Scots to join him on the front bench and strengthen the voices against the establishment,against the policies of austerity,against the growing inequalities and against the slimy racialism that is seeming to pervade the political discourse.

But the old 'Beast of Bolsover' is more concerned about where he plants his arse than his principles!

And that sort of sums up the Labour Party May 2015.

The choice for leader seems to be between Andy Burnham,a former minister,Yvette Cooper another former minister and Liz Kendall,another former minister and a reincarnation of all that was wrong with the Labour Party.She is a supporter of Free Schools, defence spending,helping big business and kicking the unions.Peter Mandelson in high heels!

Of the whole sorry parade of potential leaders the only one I have any time for is Tom Watson who is running for the Deputy leadership.

But we all know what is going to happen, Burnham will win and in an effort to 'balance the ticket' some snivelling Blairite will emerge as the deputy.

Business as usual in the people's party.

Yet there is an opportunity for the first time in my lifetime for a real progressive alliance to be built inside and outside parliament to mobilise in the way that the SNP did in Scotland,to create a progressive agenda that could bring about real change.

Just think of a bloc in Westminster the SNP,Plaid,the Green party,and whar socialists are left in the Labour Party.Why it might even attract some real left leaning Liberals( I know that is unlikely given they are utterly useless,clones of Lord Adonis0 and outside parliament the trade union movement that is getting more than a little fed up,the extra parliamentary groups,Left Unity (that hopeful grouping inspired by Ken Loach's film 'Spirit of 45') and others willing to bury sectarian differences.

Remember Shelley's line:

"Rise like lions,fresh from slumber

in unvanquishable number,

We are many, they are few"

The world does not belong to the aspirational middle class-it's still ours!   

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A lot has happened since my last post

A lot has gone on since I last bothered to write my blog.It has largely been to do with the fact that I spent ten days in Northampton General hospital, my colon has become a semi-colon and I've been 'recuperating', or rather doing as little as possible and playing the wounded faun for as long as possible.

Why I've even had a chairlist installed to save me walking up and down the stairs.Sadly I've been sussed out and it goes in the next few days!

however my enforced idleness gave me a chance to think what is really important in this country of ours, and if I hear another bloody Labour politician bleat once more about the 'aspirational middle class' I will do serious damage to any aspirant labour politician that comes within my grasp,aas well as serious damage to the nearest bottle of single malt I can reach.

It seems to me that the most important example of aspirational politics was that achieved by my parents generation.

They had lived through the depression of the 1930's and all the horrors of unemployment,means tests,deprivation,poor health care and poor diet,lousy housing and premature death.They had seen poverty at first hand.

That generation also saw the rise of fascism in Europe and watched the ruling class cosy up to thefascists,why even the King who abdicated 'for the woman he loved' liked visiting Herr Hitler to be beguiled by the rhetoric of the master race.

Our parents generation more than any other had aspirations-not for big houses or fast cars or consumer goods coming out of every orifice.

They wanted jobs with security,decent housing,a pension, an education for their kids and a health service thatr worked for everyone.

They wanted a civilised for everyone, an altruistic society that had no losers.

Interestingly quite by accident the war radicalised many millions of men and women.

The ruling class had learnt one thing from WW1-that a bored and frustrated conscript army could create mischief bigtime.They were aware that armed soldiers could seriously fuck up a corrupt society.They had the lesson of Russia in 1917 and the Workers and Soldiers Soviets to remind them.

So in order to prevent boredom and disaffection setting in the barracks and the army camps they encouraged the creation of the Army Education Corps to engage the troops in 'purposeful activity.

I have no idea what they thought they were supposed to do-a bit of basket weaving,English folk dancing,pressing wild flowers?

My old man told me what went on.The tutors were frequently left wing teachers and lecturers and they initiated discussion groups with the men and women in the NAAFI, and they discussed the issues of the day.

They talked about the sort of world that they wanted after the war, they speculated on how things would be different, they examined the Beveridge Report that talked about a world without unemployment,povery,fear of want-they talked the language of aspiration and it was the language of socialism.

The L:abour party really couldn't lose in 1945.It's hard to beliecve now that there were even those in the leadership of the Labour party then who wanted to continue with the coalition with Churchill.

And there were those in the press who found it impossible to understand why soldiers threw out Churchill so decisively.

But then Churchill was part of the 'ancient regime' and the people of this country wanted hope not more of the same, they aspired  for something better,not more austerity and more poverty.

In 1945 the aspirational working class, and indeed much of the middle class wanted a comprehensive health service 'from cradle to grave' a housing programme that built decent homes for people,a public transport system and  those parts of the economy that were wealth creating in public ownership.

Whenever I think of that shopping list of aspirations I think of Brecht's poem:

"We don't want the patch,we want the whole overcoat"  

The SNP won convincingly in Scotland because they offered hope for a better future,not tinkering around the edges and a set of aspirational values for all the people-not simply the 'squeezed middle'.

I hope the next few months will see the coming together of a Progressive Alliance in these islands, the SNP,Plaid,The Greens, Left Unity and all the other progressive forces we can muster.I hope that the Trade Union movement can see where the future lies and I hope above hope that those sections of the Labour Party,who have been betrayed time without end will see for themselves what a hollowed out vessel their party has become.

For almost 40 years it was my party too,but frankly it is not fit for purpose, and any party that still contains Jim Murphy'even as tea boy,has no future.   

What's worth defending?

As we move quite quickly into the election period it is quite depressing to see that all that seems to be on offer to the people of this country is austerity of one sort or another.
Heading the list is of course the austerity package on offer from the coalition partners.More and then even more of the same.The budget that we've just had was a dreary bit of repackaging of tired old threats with a penny or two off beer prices and a promise of one hundred quid or so in tax cuts in a year or so.
If the Tory budget was uninspiring then the alternative budget presented by the Lib-Dems to a virtual empty chamber just about summed everything up.A Mickey Mouse empty yellow box which when opened was really fully of emptiness-a fitting finale to the fall and fall of the Lib-Dems as a political force in the land.
Thwe best thing that can happen to them is decent oblivion,I hope the SNP make the dreadful Danny Alexander history!
And then came the Labour Party budget.It was once again austerity at a slower rate.The opportunity to offer a vision of a different Britain,one that has no nuclear pretensions,one that doesn't worry about cutting the paper defecit,one that isn't going to continue the reactionary education policies.
And above all a budget that promises to really help rebuild the NHS, not prattle on about economy savings and 'priorities' in health care which really means another bouts of Titanic deckchair shifting.

Our friend in the Us is facing a heart operation, he needs one,but because of the absurd private medical system it will cost him over $100,000 to have the operation he needs now.
If he waits till he's 65 Obama care will kick in and the operation will be a mere$6,000!
This is a guy who has worked hard all his life paid his taxes and been a good responsible citizen.
Not surprisingly Farage,the back of an envelope populist wants some sort of health care system like America,based on private insurance.
I'd better declare an interest at this point.I'm going into hospital in a few days for a serious operatiion.The diagnosis is a bit grim but the prognosis is good.I have a thoughtful local GP who knows what to look for and a brilliant team of nurses and spercialist consultants who have the whole adventure planned to the smallest detail.
I am confident of the quality of our NHS.
I don;t want my country to sit at the top nuclear table,swapping yarns and threatening countries with 'shock and awe'.I don't want my country to be known as the 'deputy dawgs' of world policing.
I want my country to be like wee Cuba.Not an especially well off nation (Thanks to the US boycott) but a nation that pro-rata sent more doctors and nurses to combat Ebola in West Africa.

I want to be a citizen of a country that has the highest levels of international humanitarian aid possible.
I want to be proud ,not of the number of sabres we can rattle,but the number we can turn into ploughshares.
I want to vote for a party that can offer hope,not just to the people of this country,but to the people of the world.

So who do I vote for on May 7th?

In Greece there is hope, in Britain-yaddah yaddah!

To every socialist the events in Greece over the last few days must offer us all hope, that somehow,somewhere.sometime things can break out with the tragedy of greater inequality,the horror that is the never ending racism and the abandonment of any hope for a civilised future for mankind.
In the year of Magna Carta's anniversary I am always reminded of Tony hancock's line:
"Magna Carta, did she die in vain?"
and as a product of the Enlightenment I look around in shock and awe as the values that drove men and women to ditch superstition and ignorance for progressive values and a hopeful future.
I was reminded quite starkly when thinking about the debate about the return of Grammar Schools.I wnt to one and I find it difficult to understand the desire for an egalitarian society with the curious habit of seperating young sheep from young goats at the magical age of 11.
Yet strangely enough my school was founded by a Lloyds underwriter(not the most obviously promising start you might think) but a man who was a friend of JS Mill and an man of the enlightenment.When William Ellis founded his first school for poor boys in North London his only stipulation was that economics and geography should be taught,and no religion!
The school turned out generations of thoughtful radical thinkers, as well as a few hooligans and even the odd world class cricketer.
Tragically the best efforts of a radical  and progressive education foundered on the 1944 Education Act.I have great respect for that important and fateful education that gave universal free education to all,except for one tragic inclusion.
The silly arses in government insisted in including a clause that required all schools to have a daily act of corporate worship.
Its true in my case I avoided much of that old tosh by pretending to be Jewish and thereby with a bunch of secular Jewish lads we have an extra 20 minutes of bridge practice every day.
Others were not so fortunate and the abomination that is religious indoctrination continues.I have no objection to teaching comparative religion as part of the process of history.
But as the revealing of sacred truths-nah!
So back to Greece, the first act of the new government was to dispense with the religious oath of office entoned by a clutch of beared Orthodox priests and have a secular oath of office.
An encouraging start.Then they went on within the first few hours of rstoring the minimum wage,re-employing the cleaners at the Ministry of Finance and starting to tackle the dreadful state of impvershment that the previous governments had left that country in. unemployment at 25%,,youth unemployment at 50% and living standards cut to 60% of what things were before the bankers blew it!
Commentators have observed that Greece is in danger of sliding into third world status.Well chums, with homelessness,a health care crisis,food shortages and collapsing infrastructure I'd say they were pretty well there!
Added to that the country that is so keen to say no and impose swinging debt repayment conditions of the people of Greece(not you note the bankers of Greece) is none other that the Federal Republic of Geermany.Lucky for them wasn't it that after WW2 the western powers agreed in London that repayments were not due from Germany, after all they remembered what happened after WW1 and they felt that a Germany free from excessive debt would be a good bulwark against communism!
Lucky old Germany.
Shame the Greeks, and indeed the Greek Communists who fought a brave and determined resistanmce to the Nazi occupation ended up on the winning side.
So Syriza offers hope to the world, welcomed by the people of Spain, the people of Italy and the people of France.
Solidarity will grow and while they might get some things wrong the main thrust of the movement is a progressive anti austerity battle.One that we should all be cheering on!
Oh but are we? Of course there are some naysayers on the far left who will never be satisfied until the corpse of dear old Leon is brought back from Mexico with a few new stone tablets of eternal truth.
But as President Hollande meets with the new leadership, and even some eurocrats are thinking maybe we need to accomodate the new Greek government, what is our heroic leadership of Britain's main social democratic political party doing and saying?
Well Mr Miliband(for it is he) has pledged to continue austerity in this country regardless of what the people of Britain want and need.
On the same day that he made his important pledge to do nothing sqaued it was reported that Lod Mandelson avoided tax on £400,000 by 'borrowing' from his company(sole prop. P.Mandelson) and that other pillar of New Labour,T.Blair has taken £500,000 of public money to support him in being an ex-prime minister!
Am I surprised/ Not really after all the labour Party is a fraternal party of the dire Pasok in Greece,who wew in and out of government in Greece for the last couple of decades and are riddled with corruption,incompetence, greed and treachery towards the people of Greece.
I am remined of the old Albanian saying:
"The dogs may bark but the  caravan still goes by."

This May I will have to vote?

This May I will have to vote, and for the first time in almost fifty years I have a problem.
When I was a student it was relatively easy, I was registered to vote in three places, In Hackney,in Whithorn and in Brighton.I could vote for Monty Goldman, the Communist candidate in London, George Thompson the SNP candidate in Scotland, or Dennis Hobden, the Labour candidate in Brighton.
It was really a no-brainer, Hobden was a left wing postman with a chance of winning Brighton kemptown for the first time.So my minuscule wee vote helped secure a Labour MP for the first time in Brighton-I really felt I had made a difference.
Since that election I have always voted Labour,sometimes even for myself.The only time I have not voted Labour was last time when I voted for Tony Clarke,and in truth he was real Labour as opposed to the ersatz vervison the Regional Labour Party foisted on the Northampton South constituency.
Incidentally after that election Mr Loakes vowed to return and fight to win once again....Mr Who?
In truth I really haven't a problem.
And if I had any doubts then the comments of Bliar convinced me- his absurd assertion that Miliband is too left wing shows very clearly the way the wind is blowing.Added to that the inane comments of the Rochdale MP who believes that Labour is too left wing, dominated by the unions and njeeds to support business(interestingly his idea of supporting business is to run a company that collapsed owing over £200,000-a good role model there!) and finally the awful knob that is Jim Murphy,the leader of Labour in Scotland.
Well with a triumvirate like that busily putting the boot into 'Red Ed' can there be any doubt where my vote will go this May?

Well for starters I cannot vote for any party that thinks the awful mess that is Afghanistan is some sort of victory.
Will Hutton wrote a very perceptive piece in the Observer:
"Britain has just suffered a humiliating defeat,the worst in more than half a century and,arguably,ranking with the worst in modern times.The truth is inescapable,we are no longer a great economic,technological or military power."  
He points out that none of the objectives that three Prime Minister and six Defence Secretaries set out to achieve.The situation is as bad, in fact probably worse than when the action started,opium harvests are at record levels, the Taliban are back in control of vast areas,the sock puppet government is corrupt and venal, and millions of pounds worth of equipment have be left,either destroyed or as gifts to the insurgents.
And after spending upwards of £40 billion the real price is 453 young men and women dead!
Nobody doubts their bravery and courage, but that they should die because of the vanity project of   a labour Prime Minister is beyond belief.
And why did it all happen/
Because Blair and Brown and Cameron and Clegg and all the rest of the jackasses-and that includes the obnoxious Farage really believed that they were 'fighting a war against terror'.
But then that was the Bush response to 9/11- a war against terrror! Now you can fight armies in the field, you may even have a little success with combatting a guerilla army(mind you the Americans came to grief in Vietnam)-but a war against terror?
It's a bit like fighting a war -oh yes,their phrase- against 'lone wolves'
If you believe that fighting in a romote desert in Southern Afghanistan will make the streets safer inNorthampton,then you must also believe in the tooth fairy and Mickey Mouse.

Of course Blair believed that losing young British lives in some way strengthened the 'special relationship' with the yanks, that showed how we could stand 'shoulder to shoulder' as brave allies.

Not quite how our brave allies saw us.
General Jack Keane, Chief of the US General Staff, speaking in 2013 at Sandhurst after the failures in Basra and Helmand:
"Gentlemen,you let us down,you let us down badly."
Further the US commander in Afghanistan, General Dan McNeill said:
"The British made a mess of things in Helmand."
Truthis there is no special relationship, all we are for the neo-cons in Washingtonm, and all we ever have been, is a floating nuclear base where, if things get hot in Europe, the first missiles will knock out the Trident base in Scotland before they reach the US of A.
As long as we have Trident mooching around the British Isles, with the command in the hands of the pentagon-we have nothing, no special relationship, no heroic alliance,nothing but a juicy target- and that is unlikely to be a missile from Afghanistan or indeed any where else for that matter.
It is just the comfort blanket for the American strategists and some really expensive toys the the military bonehead in the MoD and their political clowns in Westminster.
To add insult to injury each Trident submarine comes in at £25 billion each, and the UK is committed to two of the fucking things, not to mention one and a half aircraft carriers with no aircraft, and aircraft that will be obsolete before they enter service.
So I know who I'm voting for-the party that promises to end the absurd pretention that this small island is an important military power.
In Scotland it would be easy-I'd note SNP, and  here its also very clear-I'll vote Green unless someone in the nacent Labour party can convince me that it's really a left wing party after all and Blair is right!
 :
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Scottish labour listening-nae chance!

So the surprise election in Scotland has produced the surprise result!Jim Murphy has won the leadership of the Scottish labour Party
They have succeeded all expecations and elected a mutton pie with no mutton in it!
They had a chance,albeit a small one of electing a leader in Neil Findlay who had a connection with the traditional working class base in Scotland-9 of the affiliated trade unions wanted Findlay-but naw, the parliamentarians and the diminishing band of party members voted for the Trident loving,trade union hating,austerity embracing,vegetable(sorry vegetarian!)

The seventh leader in 14 years, it seems they change leader almost as frequently as Northampton Labour group on the Borough Council-and pribably with the same effect!

It seems to me that they learned nothing from the referendum.They relied on an unholy alliance of Tories,Lib-Dems and bankers to ensurev a No vote.It seems that they never noticed that their traditional bases of support, Glasgow, the west coast, and Dundee rejected the No campaign, and even worse from Labour's point of view-the young people of Scotland.
What sort of message does the Murphy acendancy send out to the people of Scotland so recently energised by the political debate of the referendum campaign?
Back to politics as usual!
And the new leader-why he isn't even a MSP- he sits in Westminster and will graciously let the people know next year his future plans.
Presumably he hoping that some old doddery Labour MSP will fall off his perch or another will generously give up his seat in Holyrood in exchange for....?
A nice wee peerage!
Murphy is the worst sort of Labour politician,self serving arrogant and about forty years too late.
I joined the Labour Party forty odd years ago, when there was still hope for a change and fight left in the party.There was a hunger for change that grew, not from the comfy benches of Westminster but in the workplaces-where the party still had factory branches and close links with the Trade Unions, and in the local councils where the fight against Tory policies was strongest.
Clay Cross,Liverpool,Lambeth,Glasgow,Sheffield,Greater London
Labour councillors lived and worked in their communities and were elected by their neighbours.the party didn't 'parachute' favoured sons and daughters into 'safe' seats-neither municipal or Westminster (well that's not strictly true, the Regional Organisation often manoeuvred favoured sons and daughters into winnable seats)
But it was still a different party,and there was always hope that something good might emerge.
To think that all that energy and hope would end up in the shape of Murphy and his clones throughout the collapsing structure of the party.
I(ndeed last week Northampton Party lost one of the finest community politicians I have known in my lifetime.Geoff Howes joined Duston labour Party at the age of 16.He was a Castle Ward Councillor for 25 years and never once swerved away from his commitment to the people he represented or the cause he believed in.
He stood up for his party when the going was tough and to admit to being a Labour Party activist was often difficult if not downright impossible.
Geoff led the labour group, was mayor and in 2001 was made an Honorary Freeman of the town.As chair of the finance commirree he scrutined spending with a forensic skill ,he held officers to account, but he also ensured that important voluntary groups like Women's Aid were supported.He instituted three year financial settlements that in many cases ensured survival.
He was expelled in 2009 for a minor infringement, and until his death was kept out of the party he gave his life to.
In the event their tribute was mean spirited and grudging,and that just about sums up the modern Labour Party.

Goodbye Hampstead man-hello anywhere else man!

So the knives are out for Ed Miliband.On Sunday the whole press pack wwere in full throat.how the rebellion has grown from a couple of MP's on Wednesday to 20 Front benchers on Sunday!

Everyone has an opinion, dead or alive, as long as they are members of Parliament or members of the House of Lords-exhumed to cast their opinions,hurl the goat entrails and pronounce the labour Party has no future!

The entertaining scenario,cast by so many commentators is that the party will prosper if as one called him Alan Johnston-'the postman over the water' takes control.

It would appear that the nation has fallen asleep in the tower,awaiting a peck on the cheek from the fragrant ex-postie and all round cheekie chappie and then the project will spring into life and the evil empire will be banished!

Hurrah !

Miliband is being traduced from all sides, from the right as the failed spawn of Satan, from the centre as the ineffectual 'Hampstead' intellectual and from the left of the Parliamentary Labour Party who are in mortal fear of losing their seats.

There is no doubt that Miliband has surrounded himself with a praetorian guard of time serving mediocrities , but truth to tell it would be hard to find anyone in the PLP who was not a time serving mediocrity, hand picked by the party machine to be as far from a socialist party as its possible to be without falling off the edge of  even the social democratic spectrum.

The so called 'left leaning' press have been just as hostile.Leaving aside the traditional voices of modernity and moderation-The Guardian, The Observer and The Independent all of whom have been cheer leading for the postie with no ambition(gentle cough of derision) although fair play to The Observer they did at the end of their gloom lader leader call for Ed to be more radical (fat chance that!)

leading the charge however,in quite a disgraceful way what The New Statesman' and its editor Jason Cowley.

I've beena subscriber to the Ns for more years than I care to think about and there was a time about 15 years ago when it had a cutting edge  and trenchant views.

However it has moved, once a Blair house journal(bad times) to critical of the Blair project(good times) to a wobbly Brownite phase  to where it now sits.

Frankly its the official voice of the fucking Church of England.It appears to be more interested in saving souls for God than discussing anything that smacks of socialist debate.

And that suits the New Labour Party( mark 2) after all when you have no real alternative to austerity and the coalition brand of dumpling politics-better a leap of faith in unseen and unknown forces than an ideology that works in the interests of the peoople.

We are told that its all about image, that Miliband is a bit geeky, that Johnson is a reformed horny handed son of toil and the rest are ,well just the rest!

If you want to see how far the Labour Party has degenerated just look who the machine is touting to lead the Labour Party in Scotland-Jim Murphy, whose intellectual claim to fame and evidence that he can get down with the masses has written a book-on football!

150 years of socialist endevour in Scotland and the best they can come up with  is a tosser who can write a book on football!.A tosser by the way who supports Trident,the Iraq war,further austerity,university tuition fees,even more austerity.He makes Blair look radical!

And if that list of disqualifications isn't enough he's not even a member of the Scottish Parliament-he sits in Westminster!

The mantra is that Ed lacks charisma, he has policies coming out of his ears but he lacks style on the doorstep.

That is utter tosh.

A bunch of sort of promises that appear to unravel hours after he makes them is not a coherent series of policies that will take this country forward.If you want to do a compare and contrast exercise look at the leadership the Nicola Sturgeon is giving to the SNP in SWcotland.In a few weeks that party has grown from about 25,000 to over 90,000.

Thats inspirational, thats energising people, that is creating a framework of social democratic policies that are transformational.

Whilst my homes for Miliband were never high (his late Father would have beebn a better leader) it does seem that he is being traduced not only by the traditional right wing forces, but by those in New Labour who want a scapegoat when it all falls apart next May.

In my view he has nothin to lose by re reading his Dad's writings and going for bust with a radical social democratic programme.

Anything is better than the current shambles.