The European Elections and the No2EU Campaign. (PART ONE)
All of the results
are now in and nearly all of the analyses have been made. And from any point of
view the European elections were a disaster for the Labour Party. Throughout
the country the Party is increasingly being seen by workers as a party that
presides over sleaze, corruption, handouts to the rich and, apart from weeping
crocodile tears, complete indifference to factory closures and job losses. As
Chancellor Alistair Darling said, "People felt disillusioned with us and didn’t
vote for us. That’s our fault. We should be able to inspire confidence."
(Guardian 09/06/09).
Darling is
correct. The Labour Party did not inspire confidence amongst its traditional voting base,
the working class. Darling however is not right when he tries to put forward an
alternative to recapture the Labour vote. For him it is a matter of simply
saying, “We need to clearly set out what we are for, our vision for the country
and our purpose for being in government. On that basis we can say: Give us your
support at the next election.” The implication from Darling is that the voters
did not understand Labour’s message as Labour failed to get it across. The
truth is that voters did understand what Labour stood for and did not like it.
So little did they like it that they stayed away from the polls in droves.
The European Election Results.
In the European
elections of 2004 Labour polled 22.6% of the vote, a total of 3,718,683 votes
on a turnout of 38.2%. That share of the vote itself was 5.4% down on the
previous European election of 1999. In 2009 labour only polled 15.9% of the
vote and came in third behind UKIP. Labour’s share of the vote fell by another
6.9%. In ten years the share has fallen by over 12%. This time some 2,381,760
voters turned out for Labour, meaning that Labour lost 1,336,923 votes between
2004 and 2009. The national turnout of voters fell from 38.2% in 2004 to 34.2%
in 2009. The turnout fell by 4% and Labour’s share fell by 6.9%. The clear
implication is that some of labour’s vote went elsewhere but most voted with
their feet and stayed at home, abstaining.
It had been
expected that Labour would be hit by the scandal of the sleaze of MPs’
expenses, prominent Labour resignations and the economic crisis, but the
message of the programme of Labour did not inspire even its core vote to turn
out. This fell by just under a staggering 36%! To regain that vote and to gain
new votes in the general election of May next year, less than a year away,
labour will have to inspire confidence with a programme that will protect
working class people from job losses, housing repossessions and cuts in public
expenditure resulting in cuts in social provision. Such a programme however will need a
wholesale onslaught against programmes of privatisation, against subsidies to
the capitalists and financiers to bail out their mess and a guarantee from
Labour that the burden of the crisis will not be paid by working class people
who did not cause the crisis. In other words labour needs a Socialist programme.
“Socialist” alternatives to Labour.
In the absence of
such a programme from Labour there were other political formations in the Euro
elections that offered a “socialist” alternative to Labour that would sweep up
disillusioned Labour voters with a “left” alternative. This alternative group
coalesced around the No2EU campaign that was initially set up as an electoral
alliance some seven weeks before the Euro elections by national leading members
of the RMT trade union with other “left” organisations participating. These
organisations included the Socialist Party, the Communist Party of Britain, the
Alliance for
Green Socialists, some members of Respect and other non-aligned Socialists. The
glue that held this electoral platform together was the common idea that Labour
was finished as a political voice of the working class and also there was a
need for a socialist voice that would defend the interests of working class
people. In addition, some members of this alliance, such as the SP, saw the
electoral platform as a stepping stone to the establishment of a new workers’
party.
Aims of the No2EU campaign.
There were
therefore three aims to this campaign. Firstly, to offer this “left” political
and trade union alternative. Secondly, to act as a possible forerunner of trade
unions presenting candidates in elections as has been discussed at recent
conferences of the CWU and the PCS. There is a growing antipathy amongst active
layers in the trade union movement to the policies of the Labour government.
The CWU is bitterly opposed to the plans to privatise up to 49% of the postal
services. The PCS is alarmed at the loss of jobs in public services which
severely curtails the ability of their members to deliver effective front line
services.
Thirdly, the No2EU
platform was seen by many of those who participated in it as a stepping stone
to the setting up of a New Workers’ Party. Many of the SP members in the No2EU
campaign are developing a strategy of organising a conference after the EU
elections to discuss a programme to set up such a party. They saw that the
various political groupings in the No2EU campaign would be able to coalesce
around a commonly-agreed programme that would offer a socialist alternative to
the pro-capitalist, pro-big business policies of the Labour Government.
Even before the
election the SP seemed a little apprehensive about the success of the No2EU
campaign when it complained that it was not receiving the press coverage that
it thought it should be receiving. It criticised the “censorship” of Question
Time which cut out a lot of the comments of SP members on the TV programme. If
therefore the No2EU campaign did not do well, some of the blame could be laid
at the door of the absence of media coverage.
Doubts about the No2EU programme.
Amongst many of
its more prominent candidates and supporters there were high hopes of being
able to pose a serious alternative but there were also some misgivings. The
No2EU campaign was seen as “a way of taking votes away from the BNP”, as an
“alternative to ex-Labour voters”, as an expression of a “need for a working
class alternative”, as a “forerunner of an alternative political party of the
working class”. These hopes however were, even at this stage, tinged with some
misgivings. The programme on offer by the No2EU campaign was “the best of a bad
job, not perfect, far from perfect, not where we would like to be”. There was
some “good stuff” in the programme, but it was not a “politically correct
campaign” but had to be supported “despite the warts” and the absence of a
“well worked out programme”. There was even the claim by a prominent member
high up on the No2EU list in the North
West that “Socialists won’t vote Labour” and
therefore a new workers’ alternative, a socialist alternative, was necessary.
Despite the
absence therefore of a programme that was “acceptable” to all the No2EU
candidates and supporters, they saw their EU election campaign as a socialist
campaign despite the fact that their campaign literature did not call for
socialist policies as an answer to the crisis of capitalism. It is true that at
pre-election meetings, and there were many of them up and down the country,
many speakers on the No2EU platforms did state openly that socialist policies
were needed but in the material that was presented to the electorate nationally
these demands were absent. Whether this was a failure of the differing left
political groupings involved in the No2EU campaign to agree on such a programme
or reluctance on the part of the campaign to present such a bold programme to
the electorate is not known. What is known is that those organised under the
umbrella of the campaign foresaw great events unfolding s a result of the
campaign as the Labour party was now damned and dead in the eyes of the working
class. All that remained was to bury it with the electoral success of the NO2EU
candidates and then finish the mourning period by establishing a political
alternative to Labour that would sweep up working class support as Labour was
finished.
Election Results
There was however
one spanner in the works of the plans of the NO2EU campaign. The electorate,
and especially the “disillusioned” working class Labour voters, did not vote as
was anticipated and the votes received by the No2EU lists were miserly in the
extreme. In London
with Bob Crow, leader of the RMT union, at the head of the No2EU list, only 1.01%
of votes were garnered. In the Midlands, with
ex-Labour MP Dave Nellist at the head of the list, they received only 0.9% of
the votes cast, despite the fact that Dave has an excellent reputation as a
class fighter, a workers’ MP who would serve if elected on a worker’s wage.
Dave had the courage at least to say that if elected he would use the platform
of being an MEP to wage a fight against capitalism. In London you had the spectacle of Bob Crow who,
had he been elected, would not have taken up his seat as an MEP as the
constitution of the RMT forbids officials from holding elected office in
Parliaments. In London
therefore working class people were being asked to vote for the NO2EU list
perhaps not knowing that if candidates on the list were elected, they would not
take up their seats. What a farce! Vote for me but I will not go to the
European Parliament to represent your interests!
In Coventry, the political base of Dave Nellist, a class
fighter well respected in the city, the No2EU campaign picked up 2851 votes or
4.3% of the total votes cast and Dave Nellist headed the No2EU list in the West Midlands. In the local elections of 2008 in Coventry, three Socialist
Party members including Dave standing as Socialist Alternative picked up 1920
votes with Dave getting 1643 votes and being re-elected as a SP city
councillor. In the Euro elections, the SP, in alliance with all the other
groupings of the No2EU campaign, increased the “socialist” vote by 931 votes.
This was the alternative to “disillusioned” Labour voters. The Labour vote in Coventry in the EU
elections was 17,785 and top of the poll despite the record of the Labour
Government. So much for the desertion from Labour that the No2EU campaign was
predicting! By the way, for all those on the “Left” who had been campaigning
against the danger of “fascist reaction” in the guise of the BNP, their vote in
the EU elections in Coventry.fell by 337 compared to the council elections last
year, but they still polled 5198 votes.
Away from the
political base of Dave Nellist in Coventry, the
No2EU result in the West Midlands, where Dave
headed their list, was a disaster. They polled 13,415 votes or 0.9% of the
total cast. They were even beaten by the SLP of Arthur Scargill that polled
14,724 votes. Nationally, the results were also disastrous. The No2EU campaign
polled 153,236 votes or 1% of the total votes cast. The SLP polled 173,115,
some 1.1% of the votes cast! In only three of the ten voting regions in England and Wales
did the No2EU campaign outpoll the SLP – London,
East of England and South East. So if the SP were prepared to go into an
electoral alliance with a number of organisations whose “socialist” credentials
were questionable, why not an electoral platform with the SLP? After all, their
combined vote for “Socialism” would have been 326,351 or 2.1% of the votes
cast. The answer may lie in a quote from one of the candidates on the West
Midlands No2EU list, “Arthur does not talk to anybody”. So a democratically
agreed “Socialist” programme would have been impossible with Arthur Scargill!
Where was the democracy in the drawing up of the programme for the No2EU
campaign? The main points were agreed by the RMT and later additions to the
electoral platform were allowed to make minor amendments! It would seem that one
“socialist” democracy is more acceptable than another “socialist” democracy!
Socialist Leaders and the working class.
So why did the
voters, in particular the working class voters “disillusioned” with the LP, not
vote for the No2EU candidates? After all many of the No2EU candidates have
decades of experience in fighting for the interests of working people in the
trade unions and on the political front. Bob Crow in London has an exemplary record of fighting
for his members in the RMT and for the interests of working class people in
general. Dave Nellist has a similar record in Coventry
and the Midlands. Rob Williams from Swansea has gained national prominence in his fight for
reinstatement after being sacked by ex-Ford company Linamar in Swansea and he has just won his battle. On
some of the No2EU platforms were excellent class fighters from the Visteon
plants from Enfield and Basildon
that were recently occupied. Here we had a coalition of determined socialists
and communists, with a sprinkling of liberals and social democrats, prepared to
go out and fight for the interests of the working class. The sincerity and the
intentions of these candidates could not be doubted.
Click here to read PART TWO of this article
