Some worrying signs here that Corbyn has learned zero lessons, is going to continue to spurn the support and/or collaboration of genuine leftists, and probably lead his supporters up the garden path. Personally I don't see any point putting energy into this venture if 'the collective' isn't going to articulate a strong anti-zionist stance, explain at length what happened with the a/s smear, apologise to the people Corbyn libelled and hounded out of the labour party, and promise something similar will never happen again. Otherwise there's no reason to take anything they say seriously, though I'm sure plenty of people will be happy to forget and sign up...
A New Left Wing Party in the UK? September 18, 2024
Keir Starmer has left about 70% of the landscape of historic western political and economic thought vacant to his left. It is unsurprising that a new party will arrive to claim the unoccupied ground.
A meeting at the weekend discussed a new party provisionally called The Collective, which may be led by Jeremy Corbyn, who addressed the meeting. That was strangely secretive but seems to have been an adjunct of Corbyn’s Peace and Justice Movement international conference, which occurred simultaneously and featured many of the same cast.
The Collective is not new. This name was used for a loose coalition of independent candidates in the last general election, although it did not register as a political party so the name was not on the ballot paper. I had expected it to join forces with the Workers Party for which I stood, which did not happen. I think a non-aggression pact was broadly observed, though I recall grumbles.
My general attitude is positive – I think a new left party is urgently needed as it sinks in to people just how right wing Starmer is. He is also becoming massively unpopular very quickly, while the Tories still are.
But I believe these practical points are important on the detail of what needs to be done on the left in the UK today.
1) Corbyn and Galloway must come together.
The Workers’ Party got 210,000 votes at the General Election, which is a good start that cannot be ignored, and is building a membership and organisational base.
I count both men as friends and I know they get on fine on a personal basis. Jeremy remains the leader who gained three million more general election votes in 2017 than Keir Starmer did in 2024. George Galloway has a large base of dedicated support.
The failure to come together as a united left in the 2024 general election was a historic opportunity lost. The blame for this did not lie with Galloway, who in January 2024 himself put a motion to the Workers Party conference enabling such merging. I did not discuss it direct with Jeremy, but I believe he thought his best chance of election was as an Independent.
My own belief is that a Corbyn-led party might have won several seats and this was a tactical mistake by Jeremy; whereas George needs to tone down his populist social conservatism, which alienated many around Jeremy, if the aim is for a united left.
The biggest mistake of all would be for the two parties to refuse to unite; which sadly is far from impossible. Initially any new party needs to be led by Jeremy to establish itself. George should be Deputy Leader. Neither man would wish to serve for an extended period.
I would like to see Andrew Feinstein eventually lead, not least because he most definitely would not want to do it.
2) The party must be anti-Zionist.
The destruction of Jeremy’s very real prospects of being Prime Minister by the utterly ludicrous, Establishment-organised slur of antisemitism cannot simply be ignored.
The truth is, I am very sorry to say, that as Labour leader Jeremy was far too willing to attempt to appease the Zionist lobby, by throwing people who would have walked through fire for him under the bus. Tony Greenstein, Jackie Walker, Ken Livingstone and Chris Williamson are among the scores of people who come to mind.
A great many of the expelled activists were Jewish.
A new party of the left should make plain that these anti-genocide activists are positively welcome, and celebrated.
3) The party must avoid cliquishness
If the new party is essentially Jeremy’s project, this is a problem. He does tend to surround himself with a very tight and unchanging group. If you will allow me a moment of delusion of grandeur, the fact that they held a conference on forming a new party of the left and did not bother to contact Craig Murray is an indicator they are not reaching out widely.
According to the report in the Canary, the Director of the new party will be Pamela Fitzpatrick, who is Director of Corbyn’s Peace and Justice Project, unelected to either position.
I exclude Ms Fitzzpatrick from this next, because I simply do not know in her case. But one irony, and the reason so many decent activists were stabbed in the back when Corbyn was leader, is that many of the close Corbyn clique are in fact Zionists.
They are “soft” Zionists, you know, the ones who want to treat the natives kindly, pat Palestinians on the head and build them cultural centres in their reservations. But Zionists they are. They support the continued existence of the terrorist entity in the Middle East.
The Peace and Justice Project has laudable aims and does advocacy and campaigning work worldwide, with a focus inter alia on South America, influenced by Jeremy’s impressive and underrated wife Laura. But I am obliged to say it is not the most transparent of organisations.
The Peace and Justice Project Ltd is a private company. I believe it has a very serious membership income but I am not entirely sure what it is. The published accounts tell you next to nothing, certainly not its income or membership figures.
There are a number of linked organisations – Progressive International is another – which appear to primarily exist to pay their staff to do stuff that other activists do for nothing, only with added layers of self-importance and entitlement.
Perhaps the paying bit is a good thing, and doubtless the abuse is much worse in the world of right-wing think tanks. But there is just something about it all that does not quite sit right with me, and makes me think it is not a good basis for a mass political party.
So, in short, a genuine new party of the left cannot just automatically get run by the bunch around Jeremy Corbyn, as appears to be the presumption.
4) The party must avoid British Unionism
I have always found it very strange that there are those who support Irish unification but oppose Scottish Independence. The current support of the UK state for the genocide in Gaza is just one example of its malevolence, which is a feature and not a glitch.
In Scotland the large majority of the left wing are pro-Independence; while the right, including the Starmerite right, are overwhelmingly Unionist. The space for a radical left unionist party is very small indeed.
The desire to break up the imperialist UK – whose continuing Imperial instincts have helped devastate Iraq, Afghanistan, Syria, Libya and Palestine in recent times – is a perfectly decent left-wing impulse.
The Alba Party in Scotland is already anti-NATO and anti-monarchy, among other left-wing markers.
Ideally, a new left party should simply leave Scotland (and perhaps Wales) alone. If it does wish to campaign in Scotland, it should take the line that Independence is for the Scottish people alone to decide, and support the unfettered right of the Scottish people to choose, at a minimum.
But any genuine left-wing party should wish to break up the rogue UK state.
Keith, I think we know your view on Corbyn - ad infinitum........repeat after me, Corbyn is useless, Corbyn is useless ,Corbyn is useless, Corbyn is useless, Corbyn is useless ,Corbyn is useless, Corbyn is useless, Corbyn is useless , Corbyn is useless...............................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................useless, useless, useless ..............
I don't know you Keith, you're likely decent enough but honestly, please contribute something more original. With love from NZ, Cheers, JKM
Do have the last word whilst getting carried away with your silly assumptions. Nothing analysed, meaning you don't have facts at hand, it seems. It's just mantra. If I wasn't fully awake, I'd go along with your 'analysis'. Thankfully, I sussed it, you are just a wind-bag sloganeering : ). Really boring. Do work on this please and provide content.
Rules of engagement touted to the replier to your post. Last word *is* the last word. Logic. No other precedent is required. Mishmash the logic as you wish.
I see Craig has taken a few digs at Corbyn and Galloway - I personally prefer Galloway as his opinion actually chimes with many in the working class - Corbyn and his ilk are liberals, they don't do Marx and have already led the soft-left to disaster - who was it again told Corbyn that Keith Starmer should be in his post GE 2017 Shadow Cabinet, that other Troksyist fool, McDonnell. That worked out brilliant, brilliant for Keith and the Establishment.
So, we have a Leftwing Party, its called WPGB and gets the support of Communists depending on the type of candidate is running.
Corbyn et al had their chance and blew it, Galloway's fine but we need new faces and not the over 70's running the show.
Get Mick Lynch in charge! He destroyed media smearers nm
..he knows the msm well and knows how to deal with them...yet to see any of those hacks get the better of him in any interview. I believe he genuinely has the interests of the working class at heart, that's got to be one of the main qualifications, if not the main one.
Mick Lynch? He said he'd be voting Starmer. Labour, whatever the price, apparently! nm
Surely if we've learned anything from the Corbyn 'moment' is that it is next to impossible to change anything much from within the British electoral system. To think otherwise is like pissing in the wind.
Re: Craig Murray: 'A New Left Wing Party in the UK?'
'Surely if we've learned anything from the Corbyn 'moment' is that it is next to impossible to change anything much from within the British electoral system.' - good point, the 'hope' that John M mentions below could in fact be the most damaging thing Corbyn et al could offer the British public at the moment if that means our energies get diverted down another ineffective cul de sac instead of direct political engagement such as strikes, direct action, organised boycotts, building alt media, sabotage, etc. People fall asleep and renounce their agency when they have 'hope'.
"'hope' that John M mentions below could in fact be the most damaging thing Corbyn et al could offer the British public at the moment if that means our energies get diverted down another ineffective cul de sac"
This is what the Liarbour Partei has been for since the 20s.The last working-class hero in England.
Clio the cat, ? July 1997 - 1 May 2016 Kira the cat, ? ? 2010 - 3 August 2018 Jasper the Ruffian cat ? ? ? - 4 November 2021
Re: Craig Murray: 'A New Left Wing Party in the UK?'
The problem here is that neither Jeremy nor George are suitable leadership material for a new left wing party. Jeremy provided some hope as a leader because he is a moral man with a good moral record, and traditional left wing policies that are actually popular with much of the public. But he failed the leadership test, and why would we be surprised or disappointed with this, or slag him off as so many contributing here do? He wasn't a backbencher for all his many years in Parliament for no reason, and his elevation to leadership was pure serendipity. He just doesn't have the political nous to be a leader, the needed degree of controlled nastiness and manipulativeness, and sadly it seems, a sturdy defence of his allies when needed, for self-preservation against your enemies without, and your enemies within.
George, whatever moral qualities he does possess and political fighting spirit, on the other hand is a blow-hard, and possesses all the qualities that Jeremy lacks to total excess. He's probably impossible to work with - there are likely not enough knives in the kitchen for the his future frustrated political colleagues to backstab him. He's never been able to construct any lasting team around him despite his many appearances in Parliament under different political banners. His political belligerence is both his usefulness and his achilles heel.
Nor is Craig leadership material. He does seem to have good qualities in his political resumé but he's not actually physically that robust, suffers high levels of stress - and wouldn't want the job anyway.
What we seem to be seeing a diverse and well-meaning collection of basically good radical people rightly frustrated with the absence of effective left wind politics in the UK. But from that it seems unlikely to me any effective political party or opposition to the status quo will emerge.
In regard to "soft Zionists", I am not sure what Craig means. He says they are politicians who "support the continued existence of the terrorist entity in the Middle East". So does that mean they support the continued existence of Israel or not - as it is now or as a more conciliatory country within the confines of its internationally recognised legal borders and behaving within the confines of international norms and laws? Craig doesn't define this and I think he should.
In regard to independence for Scotland - that of course is almost Craigs raison d'être, and I'm unsure in what way a new left wing party would "leave Scotland alone".
on September 20, 2024, 6:23 pm