Weekly Update #49

Hello comrades,
This is a short update to let you know about our first meeting of the new year - we look forward to seeing you there!

Merry xmas and a happy new year,

Derby SWP

 

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Post-Conference Update

The SWP conference was held recently. This update shares some of our general perspectives and priorities for 2015 following conference's decisions.

As always there have been ups and downs this year for socialists.

There has been good news - thanks to hard campaigning by the broad anti-fascist organisations (in which our comrades made a significant contribution) Nick Griffin was not re-elected to the European parliament, and the BNP vote collapsed. Defeating fascists is always good news.

Industrially there have been more large-scale national strikes and in some cases the rank and file have been able to push their unions to continue action, such as in the fire service and NHS. Alongside this, movements have continued to show the strength of feeling in the public which opposes austerity, whether through the People's Assembly or support for Russell Brand. More concretely, the recent Unite The Resistance conference was bigger and more confident than previously, full of examples of active trades unionists leading fightbacks in industry and the public services, showing that there is a real core of workers willing to take action and lead it.

However, the revolution isn't imminent. In fact workers look set to be hammered by the ruling class for the foreseeable future, so the order of the day is to build the fightback wherever we can. The challenges are clear:

• The continued electoral and media success of UKIP provides three central challenges.

1. Their racist populism against migrants and use of the EU as a bogeyman will increase the space for hardcore racists like the EDL to spread their poison, and the same applies to the misogyny and homophobia which prominent UKIP members have injected into the public discourse.
2. Their policies are violently anti-working class and if they obtain a significant measure of political power we will see even worse cuts to services and worse working conditions than the Tories, architects of Workfare, have promised. Every victory for UKIP is a challenge to working people.
3. The willingness of the media to give them a spotlight has allowed them to project the most profoundly false and hypocritical image as some kind of 'anti-politics' party, when in fact they represent the most reactionary parts of the establishment. For example in Derby at the moment they have the nerve to front a 'save Moorways' campaign, when their own policies will mean that councils will be completely unable to run even statutory public services, let alone leisure centres. Their flat tax and privatisation stance would simply see Moorways closed or flogged off (more likely the latter), yet they will continue to push this and other equally deceitful campaigns unless they are stopped.

• Building Stand Up To UKIP as a broad anti-UKIP group has to be a big priority. In Derby we hope to start building a serious Stand Up To UKIP campaign early in the new year, and would like to involve as many groups as possible who are opposed to their racism, misogyny and homophobia.
• At the same time the fascist threat has not gone away. We must continue to be active in anti-fascist work and UAF wherever we can. Stand Up to UKIP is not a replacement for UAF as UKIP are not fascists and we must have different tactics to tackle them. Having said this, a strong turnout at the 21st March Stand Up To Racism demonstration in London for the UN's Anti-Racism Day will send a message to both UKIP and the fascist right.
• A credible left electoral presence in May will help to provide an alternative to the racist populism of UKIP and a positive force for change. Unity and alliances across the left nationally must be pursued to achieve this. Any electoral challenges should be serious, not tokenistic, so we need be clear about where such an electoral campaign can be successfully mounted.
• Continuing to build Unite the Resistance will help to build strength and confidence within the organised working class to resist the attacks by the establishment parties and build independent working class action that is the most important force in stopping austerity. Workers are the people who create the wealth and provide the services we need and without them the wealthy cannot rule and the powerful have no power; but workers need to feel their strength and be confident enough not only to fight back but to challenge their union leaders where they are not given a lead.
• We must continue to oppose western intervention and imperialism from any quarter and remain committed to supporting the Stop the War Coalition in the UK and the revolutionary working class abroad. The massive movements that sprang up to defend Gaza show the strength of feeling against war. Bombing ISIS will simply create new problems for the people in these countries and will leave them at the mercy of whichever imperialist force is doing the bombing.
• The referendum in Scotland has shown the appetite for a progressive movement for social change which is exciting for everyone on the left. The decision of Scottish Labour to elect Jim Murphy, a Blairite who represents everything that turned Scottish voters away from Labour, continues to show that there is a real space on the left and the SWP will be part of the efforts to create a united left party that can articulate these progressive demands for change. The SNP is not such a party and it cannot be left to be the receptacle of the hopes of working people.

We believe that these are the right policies to pursue, but the more people we have around us, whether members or simply willing to work with us on one or more of our activities, the stronger we are!

Our first branch meeting in the new year will discuss these decisions and how we can implement them in Derby. Why not come along? An update announcing the meeting time and date will be posted on here shortly, and will also be sent out to our email list and Twitter followers.

See you in the new year comrades!