Nobody talks about Falkirk any more...

It would appear that the Labour Party has fallen out of love with the crime of the century that was the Unite ballot rigging in Falkirk.
remember only a few short weeks ago at the nadir of Ed Mililband's fortunes when they discovered the magic ingredient to improve his poll ratings.
A scandal involving a big bullying trade union and what appeared to be the 'old' machine politics of a bygone age.
Brave Ed took on the union bullies, the constituency was suspended,two members were suspended,the polis were called in and Ed announced with much trumpeting and chest beating that the old relationship was finished and that from now on the Labour Party would have a different relationship with the Trade Unions, and no longer could the unions affiliate and give the party huge wedges of dosh .
Every trade union member had to be a paid up union member.
Hurrah for Ed, the Kinnock of our age!No more nasty union barons,no more nasty lefties,a wholly clean and transparent party funded by loyal rank and file and the odd Lord Sainsbury.
Hurrah!

But then falkirk has gone quiet.The Police quite wisely slung out any idea of a prosecution,indeed under different circumstances the complainants might have been done for wasting police time.
Worse than that, the secret report that has remained secret and largely unreported did reveal that the only offence committed by members being signed up without their knowledge was done in a pub by a member totally unconnected to Unite.
A slightly less fulsome hurrah!
So whilst I expect the suspended members are still suspended,unlike our own dear Lee Barron who has quietly been unsuspended in Northampton after the bollocks over the PCC election, and it would appear Falkirk is yet another word never used in polite labour circles.

But the fall out is just starting.Yesterday it was reported that the once traditionally loyal GMB Union (for whom the fragrant Sally Keeble once worked with she was a journeyman arriveiste ) has announced that from January it will reduce its membership affiliation by over a million pounds.
And remember the GMB, the third largest union has always been the most loyal of loyal unions !
Of course the usual apologists were all over the airwaves:
"Not a problem,most of our Party's income is from individual members..." and "it's all that Paul Kenny's fault,how dare he hold the party to ransom..."

Well if the party is relying on the members widow's mites it may have a bit of a problem,especially as membership is in decline-wonder how many members are left in Northampton?Where once there was two CLP's there now appears to be only one.How many active wards are there?How many TU affiliates?
And secondly Paul Kenny was only reporting the decision of his national Executive.He,unlike Ed Miliband cannot simply make a decision on the hoof and have it rubber stamped afterwards!

If the GMB have decided to make a bolt for the exit,largely one suspects to protect their political fund when the registration of political levy fund contributors is balloted next year.They would rather pay for broad campaigns to support their members than pay for a bunch of MP's.
What other unions will decide that the Labour party is no longer fit for purpose?
Will the void be filled by a hefty donation from that great advocate of transparency-Bro. Blair?

I thought not.
I wonder if the Labour party,regionally or nationally will examine the frantic recruiting going on by a local parliamentary wannabe in Northampton South?
It's likely that there will be a low poll for the candidate and there will be a high postal vote, and the candidate most of the local activists left really don't want under any circumstances will win the nomination.

Her adoption will bring a big smile to David Macintosh's face.

They cannot be serious!

I've stopped despising Tony Blair, now I simply loathe him.
Not content to destroy all that the Labour Party once stood for,not content to become the arch-druid of the market economy, and not content to take this country into a needless and cruel war at the behest of his Washington master-the fuckwit's at it again!
History Marx said repeats itself, first as tragedy and then as farce.
Yesterday Blair wrote an opinion piece in 'The Times' (and probably got well paid for it) in order to bolster Murdoch's line and do a little bit of self justification for his criminal foreign policy.
The gist of Blair's argument as to why military force should be used in Syria boils down to one thing, Assad is a nasty tyrant and we need to punish him!
Curiously Blair is very selective in which nasty tyrant he puts on the naughty step.In the same piece he rationalises why the military junta in Egypt is not a nasty tyrannical force by pointing out that Egypt is an ancient civilisation and is well used to military dictatorships-and anyway the Muslim Brotherhood are also very naughty boys,even naughtier than the Egyptian Generals!

Now just for a moment consider the Blairite rationale;
Is it one that is based on numbers?The Syrian regime has so far probably killed more civilians than the Egyptian one.
Well give them time and I'm sure they can manage to match the Syrians-or not!
Maybe he  has secret intelligence reports that indicate that the Al Qaeda operatives in Egypt are more pussy-cat like than those in Syria- we all know who reliant Blair is on secret intelligence reports and how reliable his information proves to be!
Maybe he is getting his information from some of the dodgy little emirates that pay him squillions of pounds for.......
The events of the past few days all sound so painfully reminiscent of those frenzied times before the invasion of Iraq.
Then there was the duplicitous 'debate' about whether we should rely on the UN, remember the British Government moving resolutions at the General assembly, and then the Americans(and the British Government) completely ignored the UN and went in anyway.
Remember how they bleated on about constructing an international task force of concerned nations,and blah,blah, blah, and of course it ended up with the USA,the UK and a few client states.(I expect Turkey was one then too)
Do you remember the passion and rhetoric that filled the Commons, and despite over 120 Labour MP's voting against invasion, and the Lib-Dems and even a few Tories-the bastards went ahead.
Right now they are softening the ground as they sharpen their Tomahawks
We will await the resolution say the Labour leaders in that grave tone of voice that we last heard before the Iraq debacle.
We know perfectly well that whatever set of words Cameron and Clegg will come up with, the Labour front bench will nod sagely and offer some pieties and then go down the road with the Coalition.

What has happened to that brave dawn of independence that the Lib-Dems displayed last time round, they won many thousands of votes because they seemed principled back then.
The cowards will justify what they are about to do because they like the sniff of power that the coalition offeres them.
And Labour, the party of Lansbury and even dear brave Robin Cook.
The only party leader with integrity tomorrow will be Caroline Lucas of the Green Party.
Like the last time even the top brass of the military are dubious, they have remembered just what went wrong last time.It's fine and dandy to lob in a few missiles and recreate a blitzkrieg everywhere,but what happens after?
What happens when there is no Police, when civil order has broken down, and armed bands of bandit factions are running wild?
Any fucking idiot can start a war, the trick is who will stop it!

A few days ago a commentator likened events in the Middle East to August 1914 in Europe.I fear there are too many parallels for us to feel comfortable.
We need to ask the question-why the unseemly haste? Why is it likely that the conflict will start before even the UN weapons inspectors can complete their report.
According to unimpeachable intelligence reports Washington and London are totally convinced that Assad launched the poison gas,because someone tried to assassinate him a few days ago.
Yet we still do not know what poison gas was used?Was it a sophisticated sort that requires a complex delivery method, or any old common or garden ricin that any A-leel chemistry student can make in his kitchen?

Or indeed any dissident little bandit that can provoke a situation where the government collapses and they can take over.
Or maybe it was a government store of nasty poison that was accidentally blown up?
Who knows, and at the current rate of movement,who will ever know?
Sarajevo could be with us again!
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Column in the Chronicle & Echo

Check out my monthly column in the Chronicle and Echo.You can find it on the C&E's website under the Opinion Heading.You can also find previous columns by searching my name.The only difference between them and this blog is that the language is cleaner!

After Falkirk?-No reckoning.

For several days the events in Falkirk were all over the media like a rash, well they were until a woman had a baby,then of course all eyes, and cameras  were focussed on a private hospital (£5,000 a night) where a young woman was allegedly with child.
I say allegedly because of course being superhuman beings living high above us on an ethereal plain its quite possible someone else had the child.
It was always rumoured that James 2nd was smuggled into the royal bed in a bedpan (given the lousy track record of the Stuarts perhaps they should have anointed  the bedpan as King!)

So events in Falkirk vanished, well not quite,the Labour Party in what appears to be a fit of hubris called in 'the polis' and were determined to uncover dirty deeds at the crossroads, humiliate Unite the Union and get everything back in Blairite order-and nodoubt appoint a Progress sponsored candidate to replace Joyce-the Blairite disgraced thug.

An ominous silence followed, then quietly like a fart under the duvet it was announced that the Police could find no case to answer-that there was no evidence that Unite had done anything untoward and the case was never even opened.

There was of course the important report,compiled by Party apparatchiks and shown only to the Leader,Mrs.Deputy leader and if we are to believe it,Seamus Milne of 'The Guardian'.

This key report on which the suspension of two party members and the putting of the CLP under 'special measures', not to mention breaking the links with the trade unions and effectively destroying the financial base of the party-what did this smoking gun of a report reveal?

Well according to a radio report on little listened to Radio 4 last night-absolutely nothing!
That's right,zilch.
The Union had behaved quite properly,within the rules,and had recruited over 100 new members, afeat anywhere else in the party bwould be greeted with rejoicing and dancing in any remaining Labour Club!

Whats more, the family 'recruited without knowing thety were recruited' were not amongst those recruited by Unite!
Think about that for one second-the people that Progress and its stooges  were building up such a head of steam about had nothing to do with Unite!
So what has Miliband achieved? A massive amount of distrust throught the unions and with many of the members that are left in the party.A distinct loss of funds and support from organised labour.

Evidence from people like Paul Kenny of GMB suggest that the new arrangement will produce only 10%of the political levy payers bothering to join the party, and above all else a weakening not simply of historic links but practical and organisational links with 6.5 million members of trade unions!

Nice one Ed.
And who will benefit? Well the Blairite outfit Progress,home of all those bright young things that want to be MP's and owned lock stock and stinking oligarch Lord Sainsbury.
Amazingly my spell check thought I meant Lord Salisbury-so not much change there.
it seems to me that Progress is as much a party within a party as dear old Militant used to be in the bad old days of a mass party.But at least with Militant you knew what you were getting, committed local activists and MP's like Tony Mulhern,Pat Wall and Dave Nellist-any one of whom I'd swap for 200 Mandleson's!

Maybe however it's not so much a conspiracy by the shallow opportunists but rather a complete fuck up by the paid officials of the party.We have long experience of their incompetence here in Northampton.How long has Northampton South been suspended?(no special measures here)
Well as long as the party apparatus has been run by wannabe Blair clones-remind me where Emillie went?

With the announcement that Binners is standing down in Northampton South the race will be on to select a Labour candidate.With the party still suspended the regional party will play a big part in selecting the candidate.I understand that already a rather dubious local councillor with more front than Blackpool is busy recruiting amongst communities where many folk barely speak English.
But they don't need to go to meetings-postal votes are just fine.

A Stooshie in Falkirk

remember Eric Joyce(not to be confused with James Joyce or Joyce Grenfell)? He is currently the one-time Labour MP for Falkirk,but soon will not be on account of beating up the odd Tory in the Strangers bar!
There was a time when the delightful Mr Joyce was the apple of the Blairites eye, not only was he a bright shiny Labour MP but he had been a bright shiny British Army officer and thus a welcome addition to the massed ranks of Blairite aficionados
He might almost have been parachuted into working class Falkirk, much in the way other favoured sons and daughters were all over the place.
A Mandelson up in Hartlepool,a Miliband up in South Shields,another Miliband up in Doncaster,even a Blair in solid old mining constituency of Sedgefield!
It wasquite marvellous how so many of the London elite managed to turn up in rock solid proletarian parliamentary seats, clutching their CV's from years in Whitehall working as special assistants to ministers,or leading London councils for ooh...microseconds, or even having worked on the pit face in a barrister's chambers.
Luckily all of these class warriors seemed to have pristine union cards issued by the TGWU or the GMBU,often in London offices by union officers doubling as party hacks.
But you see in those days when the Labour Party was keen to forget its labouring class roots,when in wanted shiny TV presenters or journalists or barristers or doctors of the spinning variety or even army officers  or businessmen,then all the talk of fixing short lists and favourite sons and daughters was something those sweaty old lefties did in smoke filled rooms!
New Labour was above all those machinations, it was as new as a new penny and wanted its people in parliament to represent Mondeo man and encouraged those in the class who wanted to get 'filthy rich'-that was what was new about new Labour!

they were happy to have a shrinking party, and they didn't mind a few mucky trade unionists hanging about as long as they passed over their dosh-why some like Alan Johnson might even cop a safe seat,but truth to tell they preferred big bundles of wonga from rich city types- after all they weren't too interested in policy-all they wanted was the odd peerage and a bit of a guzzle at Chequers now and then.

Over the last few weeks The Times(prop.R.Murdoch) has been running a vicious campaign against Unite the Union and Len McCluskey in particular over the Falkirk selection process.Unite have committed the unpardonable sin of wanting a union supporter to win the nomination in a working class constituency, and they have done the unforgivable thing of recruiting working class men and women in the union to Falkirk Labour Party(don't suppose many of them were Falkirk based barristers,spin-doctors,business tycoons or senior military personnel)
No they were probably unemployed,factory workers,shop workers,lorry drivers- all those men and women who were the creators of the trade union movement generations ago, who moved on to found a party for Labouring people....it seems to me that at last the wheel is starting to turn full circle.

Imagine working people taking control of a working peoples political party! I bet none of them ever read 'Progress' or wonder why so many of the New Labour project managers  are working for the coalition or Murdoch's papers!
Eric Joyce was one of the New Labour breed,doesn't that say everything about why they need to go!(oh and by the way he was one of the biggest expense claimants in the PLP- but they never slung him out for that-he got slung out for smacking a Tory.

In to the Valley of Death.....

Right now it seems the left in this country, and indeed across the world seems to be getting its act together.Although much of what is happening is inchoate confused and sometimes contradictory there does seem to be a pattern emerging.
Capitalism is not quite in retreat,and its not exactly down on both knees but it is stumbling,and it does seem to be even more confused than the forces of the left.
I mean the left in the broadest sense,not exactly the full blooded tightly knit parties of Bolshevik revolutionaries,but rather a wider movement that in the main has seen through the weakness of social democracy and is stumbling towards a new socialist identity.

To be sure the events in Turkey,Brazil,Greece,France Denmark(maybe I've confused the events in Denmark with Borgen!) are all pointing in the same general direction.
There are stiring too in the Middle  East,although they are generally confused with religious sectarianism and in some cases gangsterism, and saddest of all there is the need to rebuild a socialist alternative in South Africa, where the ANC under Zuma has become a corrupt and self serving elite.
But generally things are moving.Of course we have to acknowledge that there are forces moving in the other direction too.That when capitalism is in real crisis it frequently turns to fascist ideology to strengthen its sinews and provide boots on the ground.Throughout Europe and the United States the evil forces of the far right are growing.In Greece,France,Russia,Scandinavia and even Germany fascist parties and -paramilitaries are starting to reappear.
In Britain many on the left thought we had seen off the BNP only to see them reappear once again,disguised as the EDL or in suits and sheepskin jackets as UKIP.

The labour Party in time of capitalist crisis is behaving with predictable timidity, but then the social democratic race has run its course.The party that carried so many of our hopes has become a hollowed out shell for careerists and opportunists Whilst there are pockets of folk who still think that there is a socialist vision lurking in the party that ditched Clause4   and was happy to encourage "the filthy rich" most have deserted to either give up or seek comfort in single issue politics or the pub.

This weekend however revealed that there is something exciting going on.The Peoples Assembly in London attracted several thousand people and inspired a great many.It must have been successful given the virtual press blackout it engendered.
How significant too that this weekend Miliband chose to inspire those comrades left in the party with the
promise to continue the coalition's austerity policies after the next election.
Hurrah for that inspirational leadership!
At the same time the huge growth in the Left Unity movement, inspired by Ken Loach's moving film 'Spirit of 45' that may be the Autumn lead to the creation of a broad based left party that will bring together more people than anything before.

If you add on top of that the growing ferment and anger in the Trade Union movement, and the recognition that the struggle against the austerity and cruelty of this government and the set-up it validates-then the signs are good.The creation by Unite of Community Branches that stretch out from industrial working members to the widest community, to folk engaged in battles against the bedroom tax,youth unemployment,deprivation, racism,discriminating in all its forms-then you have potential for a new dynamic.

So why do I sometimes feel a bit like Captain Nolan in Tony Richardson's film 'The Charge of the Light Brigade'.You remember the scene,when Cardigan led the light brigade down the wrong valley, and Nolan,realising the mistake tried to ride in front of Cardigan to tell him where the enemy was.cardigan ordered him back and before Nolan could remonstrate he was killed!
Now I don't feel that I will be shot by big Russian guns,or fall from my horse,but I have a sense that there are dangers,and they're not coming from the bloody enemy.
There are all the old sectarian moans and objections.Look at any local Facebook,for instance the Northampton Peoples Assembly and you will see old battles being resurrected again.You know what's coming when the word 'traitor' is bandied about, and worse still 'commie', in a casual and illiterate way.

there will always be differences on the left, and sometimes they are irreconcilable ,as happened in Spain during the Spanish Civil war, and as in Chile in 1973 when the debate between advance to consolidate against consolidate to advance got in the way of a united struggle against the fascists.But surely we have learnt something after decades.

this state is the enemy,and if we want a fair just and equitable society then we need to ignore the siren voices and move together-forward!  

To lose one Councillor may be careless...

It is often assumed by anonymous bloggers and the like that I am somehow anti-Labour.Having spent 40 odd years in the party,and thirty of them on the thankless task of being an unpaid municipal social worker,I think I've paid my dues to the social democratic shining vision on the hill!

I'm still very fond of many of the good folk I've known in Northampton Labour Party and remember withy pride and affection the battles we all fought together.
And there's the operative word, 'together'.
Whatever set back and misfortune we found ourselves in during the miserable eighties and nineties we were united in a spirit of comradeship.
There is a danger for us old fogies to wallow in a political nostalgia about our heroic struggles and  unreconstructed class warriorship which you 'youngsters' know nothing about.
Of course there were bitter internal conflicts, we took Northampton South CLP to the brink of extinction because we as a party refused to allow SDP types to operate within the party.We refused them the right to stand as candidates and it took the mighty Eric Heffer MP to come up and read the NEC's edict to us-with I might add no effect whatsoever.
It was only the intervention of a General Election and the defections of a bunch of numpties that saved the party.

Defection to the right has been a frequent feature of Northampton's socialist tradition, but that was usually because we were behaving as a naughty left wing party and being cruel to those who preferred being Tories with slightly pink rosettes.
For much of the last thirty odd years we were red in tooth and claw ,we often made Militant look decidedly effete. 

But times have changed and the party that I joined somewhat reluctantly in 1972 has become a hollowed out shell not really fit for purpose.

The party in Northampton was different, there were generations with different ideas and methodology.The Party we joined was still one of Reginald Paget, a right wing aristocrat with decidely odd views.He was sympathetic to some dubious right wing regimes and was a passionate fox hunter.
However Reggie had been a lawyer at the Nurenberg  Trials and was the MP who seconded Sidney Silverman's bill to end capital punishment.
Reggie was a paradox who was a reactionary in foreign policy and a radical in domestic affairs.Possibly a classic Midlander!

His party reflected that, a mixture of old fashioned shoe union members,some pre-war 'Labour League of Youth' radicals mellowing with girth and bank balances and some devoted working class pavement sloggers who desperately wanted change and were prepared to make any compromise to reach the New Jerusalem.

As a bright eyed bushy tailed urban revolutionary it seemed unlikely that Marie and I would fit into the provincial traditionalism of the Labour Party.
But we did because of the generosity of spirit and tolerance of our noise that we found.In Castle ward our neighbour was a remarkable lady,Doll Pickering, a stalwart of the United Reform Church and a widow of an earlier Castle Ward Councillor,John Pickering.There was a whole host of older members like Doll, Bet Roberts in Semilong, the legendary Frank Tero from Semilong too and into that heady mix a handful of young turks.Graham Mason, Geoff Howes,Marie and me.

The older members gacve the youngsters encouragement,a gentle guidance and supported us even when we must have sounded like outrageous Bolsheviks storming the Winter Palace.

I note with sadness the report from some young observers to the Labour group complaining about the lack of support, the sulphurous nature of relationships within the group and party and the breakdown in trust.
This is echoed in John Palethorpes blog,what a chance to work with young people and let them experiment with ideas .
Opposition is the best place to let the young eagles fly!
What's happening, factionalism not over politics but personalities,jockeying  for position and power and worst of all making a complete bollocks of opposing the Tories in any meaningful way.
When all you have is careerism and shallow opportunism with no ideological base other than 'campaigns' that revolve around knocking on doors and 'listening' then it's hardly surprising that you attract the feeble minded and politically shallow.
Can you be surprised that the battles are all personal and at the first sign of trouble the toys tumble out of the pram and they 'defect',to Tories or worse-UKIP!
Although in truth I see little difference between the Official wing of right wing politics and the Provisional wing.

I now doubt if the Northampton Labour Party can be saved for anything remotely like socialism so I say clearly to those who still believe a socialist alternative,even here in Northampton is possible, the the Left Unity project,initiated by Ken Loach and his moving film 'Spirit of 45' may be the solution.
'Those who don't learn by their mistakes are doomed to repeat them."