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Note: Some platforms warn you about “active content” that could access your computer. If you don’t trust me not to give your computer a virus, you can browse this website without allowing the active content. The only difference is that the buttons below would not be highlighted when the cursor moves over them.
This page is in drastic need of updating, because much of the information below is out-of-date and I have changed my views quite a lot. The following is a comment I have put on my home page about this:
I am attending Marxism 2009, organised by the British Socialist Workers Party (SWP). The SWP have issued an open letter to the left calling for a united force (specifically socialist in a form put on the internet but not in their paper) to contest the next UK general election, and participants in the No2EU electoral bloc wish to continue under a different name to stand in that election. In response, I am calling for a democratic revolutionary socialist party (perhaps as part of a broader federation preparing to stand in the next UK general election) advocating both proportional representation (PR) and participatory democracy (as advocated by Marxists, involving some degree of workers’ control of industry). Adding PR to a Marxist programme would make it popular, so that Marxists shouldn’t feel the need to hide it from voters by pretending to be reformists as they have tended to do in the past. I strongly supported the establishment of the Scottish Socialist Party (SSP), a broad socialist party led mainly by revolutionaries; indeed, I was the only speaker from England or Wales in a debate at the 1998 European School of the CWI to support moves by Scottish Militant Labour to establish that party. However, I wanted the views of revolutionaries in it to be reflected more and there to be more emphasis on grass-roots activities like direct action, when it concentrated on proceedings at the Scottish parliament. The SSP was reasonably successful in proving socialism can be popular, and the legacy of the SSP winning over 15% of the vote in Glasgow at the 2003 Scottish parliamentary elections is not entirely lost despite the implosion in the party and split, and loss of all the parliamentary seats, in the wake of the Tommy Sheridan defamation trial. However, in the current economic circumstances where staying within the confines of capitalism would entail massive spending cuts and/or tax rises, a party advocating a thorough sudden change of society (a revolution whether or not that word is used) is likely to be taken more seriously than one opposing cuts and demanding more public spending, without saying where the money would come from. Also, electoral results are not the only reason for standing but to put ideas across to a wide audience and build a party capable of challenging for power. I will hand out copies of a new Foundation for PR-based Socialism newsletter (which you can download in Micro$oft Word or PDF formats) proposing this (including a review of a critique of the SWP by the Socialist Party general secretary Peter Taaffe and a letter on reconciling PR with Marxism) and will discuss strategy at that event. Previous documents on strategy on this website are inevitably out-of-date; I intend to write a new document on that soon and move old documents to an archive. In the meantime, I recommend reading the section on strategic implications at the end of my New Good Intentions Manifesto. You may also like to read an out-of-date document I wrote on strategy on the 15th of September 2008, with a preamble written on the 30th of Ocbtober that year, by clicking here. If you wish to debate strategy on-line or follow the discussion, visit the Foundation for PR-based Socialism discussion forum.
For an older position, see my Murray Smith page about steps towards the development of a revolutionary anti-capitalist (rather than specifically socialist) party in France, which I am inclined to think is the best way forward internationally (uniting with anarchists rather than reformists). For an even earlier analysis, including my take on the split that was developing in Respect between the Socialist Workers Party and allies of George Galloway MP (that has now occurred), read my document Financial meltdown soon - prepare for revolution.
All socialist parties (the Scottish Socialist Party, Solidarity, Respect and the Socialist Party of England and Wales) performed badly in the British elections on the 3rd of May. [Actually, the only mainstream party in the UK that calls itself socialist, Plaid Cymru (the Welsh nationalists) considerably increased their share of the vote and are in coalition with Labour in the Welsh Assembly. However, they were considering a coalition with the Tories so that party is not particularly socialist!] Shortly afterwards, the Socialist Party in Ireland (linked to the party with the same name in England and Wales via the CWI) lost their only TD (MP), Joe Higgins.
These parties tend to present themselves as reformist, particularly at election time, even though a majority of their members have revolutionary views. This strategy has proved itself a failure. I was a strong advocate of the establishment of the Scottish Socialist Party (indeed I was the only person from England or Wales to support setting it up in a debate at the 1998 European School of the CWI), but I wanted it to properly reflect the views of its members rather than adopt the lowest common denominator politics that it tended to put forward.
My strategy now is largely based on proposing an ethical capitalist revolution via the
Ethical Capitalism Network. This could solve many of the world’s problems, by seizing the assets of companies and individuals who refuse to pay the levels of tax that governments decide they should or who shift factories to sweatshops overseas, but I am not completely convinced that they would all be solved without world socialism. I remain dedicated to a socialist revolution (preferably but not necessarily using peaceful methods) and will continue to help socialist organisations (although perhaps more from the outside than the inside), because socialist revolutions will not happen unless serious and strong socialist parties advocate such revolutions openly.
In January 2007, I set up the Foundation for PR-based Socialism as an international virtual organisation, consisting of a website (
www.PRsocialism.org) and the ‘PRsocialism’ discussion forum. It argues for a form of socialism based on proportional representation (PR) by single transferable vote (STV), as a more democratic alternative to Marxist conceptions of socialism involving hierarchies of committees (called ‘soviets’ in the USSR) which are particularly vulnerable to bureaucratisation and infiltration by conspiratorial organisations on the side of big business.
I intend it to be a fairly conspiratorial organisation that infiltrates political parties and other important organisations in society. It will also have a public face, including that website, discussion forum and a newsletter (the first edition of which will be produced for the Scottish parliamentary elections that take place on Thursday the 3rd of May).
I am a member of the Scottish Socialist Party (SSP) but want the Foundation to be neutral in the dispute between the SSP and Solidarity, after the split I comment on below.
The following text appears on the second edition of Revolutionary Platform News:
In November 2004, the Executive Committee (EC) of the Scottish Socialist Party (SSP) voted unanimously for Tommy Sheridan to resign as convenor when it discussed allegations in the News of the World (NotW). He sued the NotW for £200,000 in a five-week defamation trial this summer. According to 11 witnesses who spoke in that trial and 4 other SSP leaders who were not called, out of 19 who attended the EC meeting, he admitted to attending a swingers’ club called Cupids in Manchester on two occasions but said that the NotW would not be able to prove it. The jury decided, by 7 votes to 4, in favour of Sheridan. The NotW are appealing against the verdict and it seems certain that they will win the appeal – especially due to the fact that it will be heard by 3 judges rather than another jury. However, the appeal will not take place for about a year, and the 2007 Scottish parliamentary elections will have been held by then.
For SSP members like myself, a major consideration in which side we believe is how much respect we have for the witnesses who were called during the trial – and I know and respect SSP members opposed to Sheridan much more (in general) than those who supported him. Additionally there was such a weight of evidence against him, revealed in a huge amount of media coverage during and after the trial, that few people who have followed it truly believe that Sheridan was telling the truth. In fact, there is such a contrast between the reputation that Sheridan has built up for all the good things he has done, especially in the 18 million-strong mass non-payment campaign that defeated the poll tax and brought down Margaret Thatcher, and the reputation of the NotW and its owner Rupert Murdoch for mud-slinging and union-busting, that the attitude of most working class people is probably that Sheridan was guilty but they are glad that he won the trial.
Conspiratorial infiltrating organisations have been and still are at work within the SSP and every other significant political organisation. They can take either side of the class struggle – big business or the working class. When socialists discovered that MI5 was infiltrating working class organisations, they naturally set up conspiratorial organisations of their own. Capitalists therefore set up even more secretive conspiratorial organisations to infiltrate the infiltrators as well as open organisations in society. Since capitalism has been going on for so long, there is now a massively complex web of infiltrating organisations. There are also a lot of individuals who consciously take the side of one of the two key classes and try to cooperate with people on the same side and compete with those on the other. People can of course switch sides over time – otherwise revolutions would never happen!
Some of this conspiring was revealed before, during and after the trial. Sheridan argued in court that a “cabal” was manoeuvring against him, as his explanation for the 11 EC witnesses giving evidence against him. However, it is clear that they told the truth, which was necessary to avoid going to jail for purgery or contempt of court. Eventually, two open factions, the anti-Sheridan United Left and the pro-Sheridan SSP Majority, were formed.
At an SSP rally on the 2nd of September, current convenor Colin Fox said that he asked a woman who wanted to join the party despite its difficulties after the trial whether she was paid by the state. This was a clever way of pointing out the most important factor behind the crisis – infiltration. I realised that Colin was on the side of big business during the 2005 general election campaign due to him repeatedly refusing to answer questions directly, on the issue of immigration on Newsnight Scotland and on various issues during an ITV programme where a studio audience asked him questions – but his mention of infiltration is a strong indication that he is now on the side of the working class. Former Labour MSP John McAllion is planning to challenge Colin for leadership of the SSP, presumably backed by the United Left. It is very important that the SSP’s convenor is a revolutionary like Colin rather than a reformist like John.
Tommy Sheridan, together with the Socialist Worker and CWI platforms of the SSP, has launched a rival party called Solidarity: Scotland’s Socialist Movement, splitting the left that had united in a single party. The Socialist Workers Party/platform (SWP) dominates Solidarity and will try to run it in a similar manner to how it runs Respect in England and Wales, as a broader party which encourages Muslims to join irrespective of whether they are socialists. The CWI want the word “socialist” in the name of the party, and are annoyed that the party will usually be referred to merely as “Solidarity”. They argue in the September issue of International Socialist that it should be renamed, perhaps as the Socialist Solidarity Movement. However, the SWP’s dominance and the publicity Solidarity will have received under its current name (as well as the fact that the CWI’s suggested name is extremely unwieldy) will ensure that their attempt to rename it at the November conference fails.
Another tension within Solidarity will be the issue of independence, which Sheridan supports but the SWP and CWI oppose. CWI Scotland’s leader Philip Stott claimed in the same issue of their paper that the SSP argues that independence would solve capitalism’s problems. This is a complete lie – the SSP realises that socialism is not on the verge of coming to power and that a capitalist independent Scotland would be a step towards a socialist Scotland and socialist world.
The SWP were an extremely negative force within the SSP. They had been able to mobilise around a third of the delegates at SSP conferences around terrible positions such as support for the entire Iraqi “resistance” (including those carrying out suicide bombings and beheadings which help the West’s strategy of divide-and-rule). However, they had grown in strength by the time of the conference earlier this year (due to the SSP’s internal difficulties) and they won some of the votes. Their departure from the SSP is a very useful by-product of the launch of Solidarity.
An indication of the extreme control infiltrators on the side of big business have over the SWP in Scotland, with members encouraged to follow orders from above rather than thinking for themselves, is that their 120-strong meeting to discuss Sheridan’s call for a new party decided unanimously to leave the SSP. In England, the SWP have significant layers of genuine activists in their ranks, and this will be the case in Scotland too after the launch of Solidarity. Their role was so bad in the SSP that few genuine activists stayed in their platform.
The SSP has got through its crisis and had an uplifting rally in Glasgow on the 2nd of September attended by 350-400 people. There are eight months before the Scottish parliamentary elections, which should enable us to grow in strength so that we can do at least as well as in 2003 when the party won six seats.
Tony Blair has taken New Labour so far to the right that there is a massive vacuum capable of being filled by a broad socialist party led by revolutionaries, such as the SSP.
I had been living in Manchester since September 1984, and since the spring of 1989 I have been a political activist. I moved up to Glasgow (to Flat 1/10, 220 Wallace Street, Kingston Quay, Govan Scottish parliamentary constituency/SSP branch) on the 20th of April 2006, since that is where I expect the world socialist revolution to start, it is where I can have the greatest influence politically due to the strength of the SSP, and it will be a better area for finding good political people to recruit to my band Galaxia. The SSP received over 15% of the vote in Glasgow in the Scottish parliamentary elections on May Day 2003, getting two members (Tommy Sheridan and Rosie Kane) elected.
I set up a Manchester International Socialist Mailing List (originally called the discussion group of Manchester International Socialist Movement), which has mainly served as a forum that I have used to post all my important messages since the run-up to the war on Iraq. I decided, however, to distance myself from the International Socialist Movement (ISM) platform which led the SSP, due to intending to unite all serious revolutionaries within the SSP (including genuine ones in the Socialist Worker platform) together with those not currently in any platform into a single platform (the Revolutionary Platform of the SSP), and due to some important differences with the strategy of the ISM and with several of its leading members. The ISM has unfortunately decided to dissolve itself, leaving nothing in its place except for the Frontline magazine and website, but this could be a blessing in disguise for the growth of the Revolutionary Platform.
However, Manchester is in my opinion the other city in the world apart from Glasgow where the left is very strong, partly due to my activities and the activities of many other good socialists that I have known, and partly due to historical reasons – Karl Marx lived in that city, the trade union movement started there, and the first real computer (i.e. running a program) was built at the University of Manchester. I will therefore not give up on Manchester but travel back frequently and retain membership of Manchester/England-based organisations. There have often been big demonstrations and meetings in Manchester, but up to now that has not been reflected by the development of an organisation like the SSP, largely due to the relative strength of the Socialist Workers Party (SWP, which is better in Manchester than elsewhere in Britain but still sectarian and fairly heavily infiltrated by conspiratorial organisations on the side of big business) and actions by the forces of big business to wreck genuine socialist organisations like the Socialist Party (formerly the Militant Tendency and then Militant Labour) which I was a member of for about eight and a half years, such as by infiltration (for example, see my page on Racism and Fascism about the damage caused by a black regional secretary called Phil Frampton who eventually revealed himself as an agent of big business by causing a massive faction fight in the Manchester/Lancashire region).
A very important development in recent years in England and Wales has been Respect: the Unity Coalition, launched primarily by the SWP in conjunction with George Galloway MP who had been expelled from New Labour due to his opposition to the war on Iraq. Galloway was re-elected and Respect got some other good results in the May 2005 general election, but only particularly in constituencies with a large number of Muslim voters. Furthermore, although socialism is included as one of the things that Respect stands for, it is hardly mentioned in Respect literature or by Respect speakers, and Respect is a cross-class formation rather than one representing the working class. Therefore, Respect is far from ideal and is full of contradictions which will undoubtedly lead to a split at some point in the future. There is a need to develop a united opposition to the opportunist strategy of the SWP, and I have launched the Revolutionary Platform of Respect, as a virtual organisation with a website and discussion group.
George Galloway’s decision to take part in the Celebrity Big Brother TV programme quite possibly alienated enough Muslims so that Respect failed to take control of Tower Hamlets council in the May 2006 local elections. Nevertheless, Respect won 12 seats there and four others elsewhere. However, the strategy of targetting Muslim voters had the side effect that candidates with Asian names received more votes than others, resulting in all 16 councillors being Asian and none members of the SWP. This could cause a crisis in the SWP, despite the fact that two of the new councillors have subsequently joined that party, as I pointed out in the first edition of Revolutionary Platform News.
The Socialist Party’s initiative of the Campaign for a New Workers’ Party looks more promising, and I urged people to support that initiative in a leaflet produced for the RMT conference in London on the 21st of January 2006 calling for the launch of a broad socialist party led by revolutionaries (which you can read by clicking here).
The socialist alliances (SAs) which were launched on the initiative of Militant Labour (now the Socialist Party) have mainly been destroyed by the SWP in conjunction with a few allies, in order to concentrate on Respect. The main opposition to the bureaucratic way the SWP ran the SAs – the Socialist Alliance Democracy Platform (SADP) – has resurrected the Socialist Alliance as a national organisation linking a small number of remaining local alliances, at a conference on the 12th of November 2005. A small splinter group (which unfortunately does not want to remain part of the national network of SAs) has continued the SADP, becoming known as the Democratic Socialist Alliance (DSA); these seem (in general) the most serious of the activists continuing the SA project, particularly some of those in the Manchester area. In my opinion, the DSA is the best name – clarifying that we don't want a dictatorial regime like the ones that collapsed in the USSR and Eastern Europe, and to distance ourselves from the bureaucratic way in which the SWP led the SAs.
In the long term, the solution to the splintering of the left in England and Wales may lie with the DSA, and with revolutionaries within the DSA uniting in the Revolutionary Platform of the DSA. Alternatively, if the Campaign for a New Workers’ Party takes off, the solution will lie with the party it creates which would also need a Revolutionary Platform. The Revolutionary Platform’s only requirement for membership will be that members regard themselves as revolutionaries and wish such views to be reflected within the party or alliance, will enable revolutionary socialists to organise in a united way against reformists and infiltrators on the side of big business. SWP and Socialist Party members fed up with the sectarianism of their leaders should consider launching faction fights within their parties in order to join the Revolutionary Platform (as sub-platforms or just as individual members) at some point in the future.
I have laid the groundwork for the development of an organisation like the SSP (as I hope the DSA or new workers’ party will be) by discussing with a lot of people and handing out a lot of leaflets, mainly in Manchester, in the seven years since I left the Socialist Party. I failed in my attempts to launch a Greater Manchester Democratic Socialist Alliance (GMDSA) before the 2005 general election, but the Manchester area SADP/Stockport SA eventually renamed itself as the GMDSA. I intended to stand as an Independent Socialist candidate in the Manchester Withington constituency in the general election, but failed to get nominated in time. Nevertheless, I did hand out many copies of my manifesto (which you can download or read on-line by clicking here), promoting the GMDSA. I additionally handed out an A4 leaflet with the first page of my manifesto on one side and details of the Revolutionary Platform of the SSP plus information on torture and protests against the G8 in Scotland in July on the other (which you can read by clicking here), mainly in Glasgow. I think I delayed getting ten people to nominate me until too late due to subconsciously realising that it was better not to become an MP, due to believing primarily in revolution from below and having a lot of other projects (particularly my future revolutionary socialist band Galaxia), and realising that it was far more important for me to help the SSP try to get good votes in Glasgow – putting the interests of the working class as a whole before my own interests.
The following text is my history of the Scottish Socialist Party, taken from my document Scottish Socialist Party history, 2005 conference report and Revolutionary Platform plans.
Militant Tendency was a revolutionary socialist organisation that infiltrated the Labour Party to try to convert it into a genuine socialist party (although it was believed within the organisation that that would never be possible and that it would be necessary to lead a split-off from Labour at some point in the future). Infiltration (or "entrism" as it was known) was also used as a means of recruitment – from about 25 to several thousand at its height during the miners' strike and when Militant led Liverpool's Labour council in its dispute with the Tory government (which won a lot of extra money in the first year inflicting the first major defeat on Margaret Thatcher, but which collapsed in the second year to 'trendy left' councils like Blunkett's Sheffield caving in – it ended in the farce of the council sending out redundancy notices to the entire workforce, supposedly as a delaying tactic but widely misunderstood (and Labour leader Neil Kinnock's infamous speech at the Labour conference was a disaster for Militant). I put this decision, made jointly by the leaderships in Merseyside and at the National Centre in London (as all key decisions were during this dispute) as being due to infiltration by conspiratorial organisations on the side of big business.
Militant's growth due to entrism was largely a result of leading the Labour Party Young Socialists for several years – until it was closed down by the Labour leadership.
Margaret Thatcher's second major defeat – and the one that brought her down as Prime Minister – was also due to Militant. It was the Militant-led and initiated mass non-payment campaign that defeated the poll tax, involving over 18 million people at its height who hadn't paid or were in arrears (out of about 40 million adults eligible to pay). The poll tax was a flat rate tax, albeit with a 20% rate for unemployed people and students, for local services to replace the "rates".
The poll tax was brought in in Scotland one year before
England and Wales (it was never introduced in Northern Ireland). That was ideal
for Militant, because the organisation was particularly strong north of the
border, especially in Glasgow. The left was stronger generally due to the
greater poverty and the national question.
[In my opinion, this decision as well as the decision to introduce the poll tax at all was far from a mistake by Margaret Thatcher, but a masterstroke. It produced the conditions under which a fairly small revolutionary socialist organisation could reach the big time by leading a campaign of millions. In the past, different layers of workers had been taken on and defeated one by one, and this time we were all being taken on at once. In my opinion, Margaret Thatcher was a revolutionary socialist in disguise!]
Militant's success at leading such a huge campaign was tempered by the fact that it actually lost members during it due to burn-out and the failure to recruit sufficiently! This was mainly due to the betrayal by All Britain Anti-Poll Tax Federation Secretary Steve Nally after the riot at Trafalgar Square in London after the 200,000-strong national demo on the 31 st of March 1990, to mark the introduction of the tax in England and Wales, when he said under questioning from a journalist that the Federation would hold an investigation into the cause of the riot (rightly) and would "name names". Naming names to the police, or other people who would pass them onto the police, is a complete no-no within left-wing movements, and its refusal to expel Nally and put in motion a new election for Federation Secretary put Militant on the defensive at the very time that they could have been recruiting thousands or even tens of thousands of new members. Militant said that Nally was not properly prepared for the interview (it was hard to believe that response to violence had not been discussed bearing in mind that previous violence had taken place at some town hall demos) and that he had meant that he would name names to the movement and not the police – but the police would have enough spies within the movement to make the two equivalent. Nally's remark also ensured that the Federation did not hold an investigation into the causes of the violence; a subsequent TV documentary showed the police started it. [At the time, a tiny anarchist organisation called Class War claimed responsibility. They weren't actually a violent organisation at all – they were known for amusing headlines, but they seized the opportunity to grab the limelight. They all but completely vanished from the UK political scene soon afterwards. The term "anarchist" is widely interpreted to imply "violent", but at an "Earth First! Gathering" I attended last summer, mainly attended by anarchists, I went to a meeting on violence and only one person said he advocated it!] It is obvious to me that Nally was a big business infiltrator into Militant.
Militant was much more insulated from Nally's "mistake" north of the border since there was an entirely peaceful 50,000-strong demonstration in Glasgow on the same day.
[I joined Militant later in the campaign, as it proved it was serious (on the 6th of June 1990). More of my views on the poll tax are contained within my autobiography "Transition" on the internet at http://www.socialiststeve.me.uk/transition.htm.]
Since Militant was conducting most of its activities outside the Labour Party, Labour was going a long way to the right and expelling left-wingers to the point where it would be a long time before it went to the left again (if it did at all and I didn't think it ever would), and conditions in Scotland were in advance of England or Wales, Militant made the decision to launch Scottish Militant Labour (SML) in advance of the 1992 general election.
The Chair of the Scottish (and All Britain) Anti-Poll Tax Federation was Militant member Tommy Sheridan. Tommy was banned from demonstrating in a certain area of Glasgow, due to being arrested at a previous anti-poll tax demo, when the first attempt at a "warrant sale" took place anywhere in Scotland – which happened to be within that area of Glasgow. Warrant sales were particular to Scotland (which has some different laws to the rest of Britain), and were sales of people's goods in the streets that had been seized by sheriffs' officers (bailiffs). A large number of people surrounded the warrant sale preventing it from going ahead. Tommy ripped up the court order (interdict) in front of the TV cameras, making a fiery speech, and got jailed for six months.
Tommy stood for SML in Glasgow Pollok constituency from his prison cell, in the 1992 general election and got over 6,000 votes, coming second to Labour. He stood again, also from his prison cell, in the local election to Glasgow Pollok ward (part of the constituency) a month later, and got elected to Glasgow City Council.
Tommy's success was the springboard for further SML election successes, and they subsequently united with other socialists in the Scottish Socialist Alliance (SSA). The SSA's main activity was in Glasgow Pollok (again) in a campaign of non-violent direct action against the extension of a motorway. The SSA project was successful because SML took it seriously, conducting most of their activity under the banner of the SSA. Although Militant Labour was subsequently set up in England and Wales, and socialist alliances were set up south of the border too, Militant didn't take the alliances particularly successfully down here and the later name change from Militant Labour to the
Socialist Party signified the beginning of the end of the abandonment of the socialist alliance project by the organisation in England and Wales. [The Socialist Workers Party (SWP) later joined the socialist alliances, and wound up the national network (with a few allies) at a conference on the 5th of February this year. I am proposing the formation of "democratic socialist alliances" – to distance the new organisations from the Stalinist states that collapsed in the USSR and Eastern Europe and from the bureaucratic way that the SWP ran the socialist alliances (where you had committee meetings a week before full socialist alliance meetings and required resolutions to be submitted to those meetings, with seconders as well as proposers).]
In 1998, a big discussion took place in SML, the Socialist Party and similar organisations around the world linked by the
Committee for a Workers' International (CWI). The discussion was around a proposal by the SML leadership to transform the SSA into the Scottish Socialist Party (SSP), with SML becoming the International Socialist Movement (ISM) platform of the SSP. The transformation involved moving from fortnightly SML meetings and monthly SSA meetings to fortnightly SSP meetings and irregular ISM meetings (as and when they are required). The newspaper (Scottish Socialist Voice) and property (not much since the office was rented) was transferred from SML to the SSP. The SML leadership's proposal was very strongly supported in Scotland, but the British and international leaderships opposed the move on the ridiculous grounds that if the ISM did not meet at least once a month (I think) and there was not a frequent newspaper/journal, it would be dissolving the organisation! Look now, folks, the ISM still exists, it has three of the SSP's six members of the Scottish Parliament (MSPs), had both candidates for Convenor at this year's conference, has an irregular journal "Frontline" that is published as and when issues justify it (rather than just produced for the sake of it or to out-sell another platform) and had a fringe meeting at the conference. So much for a "dissolved" organisation!
Despite these ridiculous arguments, the SML proposal only had the support of the overwhelming (if not unanimous) majority of the French organisation (led by Murray Smith, who later became a leader of the SSP with responsibility for international links, and is now a leader of the French LCR; he was the only member of the international leadership to actually visit Scotland!) and the Manchester/Lancashire (my region) and Merseyside regions of the Socialist Party.
The main opportunity for rank-and-file members of the CWI to take part in the discussion was at the "1998 European School of the CWI" – a conference where anyone in one of the CWI's sections was welcome but no decisions were made. At that event, I was the only member from England or Wales to speak from the platform in favour of setting up the SSP. It was through noticing that some people were swept along by the mood as the balance of forces shifted from one side to the other during the event, whereas others retained a poker face throughout, that I recognised that there was a large amount of infiltration going on (that I initially put down as state infiltration but I now realise is more usually by more secretive conspiratorial organisations on the side of big business – and by those on the side of the working class to oppose them). When the CWI and Socialist Party ultimately took the decision to oppose the setting up of the SSP (but reluctantly allow it to go ahead to avoid splitting the international) that I resigned from the Socialist Party. I remained a Socialist Alliance member, and continued to take part in activities on a range of issues, most significantly against sanctions and war on Iraq. However, in that time I have spent large periods of time as a political prisoner on psychiatric wards, as a result of becoming a significant player in the world situation at that European School.
The SSP was created in time for the first elections to the Scottish parliament (in 1999). Because they were conducted by proportional representation, Tommy Sheridan was able to get elected as an MSP for Glasgow. On May Day 2003, the number of MSPs went up from one to six.
Tommy was the Convenor until he resigned last year, and was
replaced by Colin Fox MSP at the February conference.
