The vote of the Labour Party Nattional Executive Committee on the motion for a recall Labour Conference was the first well publicised move of the Labour left towards challenging the right-wing policies of the Government. But the 16-10 vote against recall has apparently thrown the Tribunite left back into even greater inactivity and despondency than they were suffering from already.
In rcality the outcome of this vote is no refutation whatsoever of the need for recall TUC and Labour Party confercecs to tree une labour movement trom the shackles of the Wilson Government's policies. What it demonstrates is that these conferences cannot be gained by the means proposed by the Tribunite left.
No senious orcoaranons were madc by the Tribunites for this vote. There were no calls for the NiC to be flooded with resolutions, no raising of the demand for a recall conference at meetings addressed by the MPs up and down the country, no raising of this slogan at all the demonstrations and struggles which have taken place in recCHE CCAS SURPRISED Instead of mass campaignine in the labour movement.the Tribunites relied on a bit of lobbying in the Labour left's so-called inbuilt majority on the Labour NEC Then they were surprised when so-called lefts' like Alex Kitson of the Transport Workers voted against the recall. Yet it anything can be learned from the debacle since last summer, it is that so-called 'lefts' like Jones and Foot turn out to be the main props of Wilson, and that absolutely nothing is achieved against the Government by mere manoeuvrings in the corridors of power.
Look at une pamenic role or benn. for example. Here is someone with mass support inside the working class. A serious campaign by him would have tens of thousands of union and Labour Party mutants organisca against the Government s poncies. He may nave got up enough courage to vote for the recall conference, but you can be sure that this furtive little break with Wilson doesn't compensate one thousandth in the class struggle for the clear left cover ne gives to unis Government Dy remamms a memocromid And what a pathetic display the Tribunites make. The cover of this week's Tribune states: 'At stake is nothing less than the socialist character of the Labour Party itself.' And what have the parliamentary tents produced to save tne soc ialist character of the Labour Party" Around 30 of them may get up the courage to abstain on the public expenditure cuts.
The biggest attack on the welfare state ever me socaust character orine Labour Party supposedly at stake, and the most they can do is abstain!
No wonder these people can't get a recall Labour conference. They couldn't fight their way out of a paper bag or frighten a tame tabby cat - let alone defcat the anti-working class policies of this Government. They make no serious attempt to organise the struggle where it really counts, outside Parliament, and even if they did their complete cowardice even within the Parliamentary Labour Party would prevent them from achTIRE AN UDE SCHLOUS The rapidly right-moving editor of Tribune, Richard Clements, has been amusing himself in recent weeks by running little games and book reviews headed "Sectarianism', which are supposedly aimed against the revolutionary left. He would do better to invent one big game called "Sell-Out' which could fill the entire pages of his paper.
Given the choice between the undoubted oddities which sections of the revolutionary left sometimes get up to and Tribune's fawning on Foot and Jones, abstention on expenditure cuts, support for the Chrysler deal and refusal to wage any serious fight against unemployment, we have no doubt which errors' increasing numbers of class conscious workers will see as more important. The Tribunites will only enter the battle wher they are dragged there in the wake of the working class.
But the lefts mustn't be allowed to let themselves sink carefully back into itish the parliamentary twilight they love. They want nothing better than to withdraw from sight so that workers can forget ten acoons in the last monuts. Then, when the labour movement later moves forward again, the Tribunites could emerge from the shadows and kindly offer to place themselves at its head - just so that at the crucial moment they could display the same cowardice tney nave in une last monts.
The working class has no interest in allowing these reformists to retreat quietly into their asylums. Many workers still have illusions in them. The spotlight must be kept firmly fixed on these lefts. They must either be forced to take a step forware in me neces orme cass stuegie or stand further exposed for their refusal to fight.
ise those forces who supported the demand lor arcca raoour concicuce. gun dreds of labour movement bodies are or can be pledged to this demand. The Tribunites should use their position and support to call a national conference of all those demanding recall to discuss how to carry forward this fight and the struggle against me vovernments polcies.
but the crucasesson is to understand that nothing can be gained by manoeuvres or merely relying on supposed majorities in NECs. Only the mass action of the working class and the fight for open organisation of the left within the labour movement can force the recall of the Labour and TUC conferences. The decisive question now is to organstep forward.
ferences.