Over 1,000 activists attended the Summit of Resistance at the end of March, prompting the organisers to launch local We Demand Change (WDC) groups across the country. While the campaign has stepped back from its initial electoral aims, there remains a question mark over what exactly it is.
The Labour Party has repeatedly betrayed those who voted for it last year. From the winter fuel allowance and disability benefits, to Gaza, deportations and trans rights, Starmer’s party is ruling for the benefit of the bosses and the rich, not for its working class electorate. He is borrowing from Farage’s racist, culture war playbook, rather than challenging right wing populist arguments.
With further austerity measures likely to be announced in June and benefit cuts yet to be voted through, we urgently need a powerful movement of resistance. To force Labour to tax the rich rather than rob the poor, we need to threaten their grip on government. We need to bring the trade unions and their millions strong memberships into struggle alongside young and oppressed people.
To the degree that We Demand Change presents an opportunity to do this, it is a positive step forward. However, the campaign must not limit itself to simply cheering on unions that are mounting strike action.
First there are not enough unions fighting back, as their leaders drag their feet and compromise with the government and local councils, rather than ‘embarrass Labour’. Secondly strikes that remain under the control of the bureaucrats will follow the tried and failed strategy from 2022-23 of stop-start strikes, secret negotiations and clutching at rotten deals.
We Demand Change groups must become hubs for rank and file militants to organise independently and, if need be, against the union leaders.
What kind of party?
Any attempt to steer the campaign towards the creation of a soft-left electoral vehicle is a distraction at best. Unfortunately both the Socialist Workers Party and Counterfire have developed quite an appetite for this.
At the Summit of Resistance, there was discussion of standing candidates. It was clear, however, that Corbyn’s Peace and Justice Project is unwilling to participate in the party project. So, on the surface at least, We Demand Change has decided against being an electoral vehicle.
Internally, however, the Socialist Workers Party (SWP) has told its branches to prepare for a turn to electoral work. At meetings of the newly formed local WDC groups, SWP members have indicated their desire to stand ‘independent’ candidates in upcoming elections and seek local support from WDC.
They assume these candidates would stand on WDC’s eight demands, which cover the key political issues of the day around militarism, austerity, Palestine, climate and LGBT+ rights. However, these demands fall far short of addressing the crisis currently unfolding. An unspecified wealth tax to make the rich pay their ‘fair share’ is as radical as they get: essentially Corbynism 2.0.
Counterfire had some success in this year’s local elections, with the Preston Independents, led by Michael Lavalette, winning three seats. Lavalette proudly explained to their 3 May national event that they chose to stand as independents, rather than socialists, to broaden their appeal; that they rejected the template of standing on a programme, or full manifesto, preferring bullet points; and that they would seek to work with other (i.e. capitalist) parties for the good of their constituents.
This is a recipe for opportunism. For revolutionaries, the main point of standing in elections, at least in the first instance, is to popularise the cause of socialism, not a vague ‘independence’. A programme to deal with the immediate pressing needs of the working class and oppressed not only provides a basis for accountability, but also a guide to action for the voters, whose activity should be at the heart of any new party. If the Lavalettes of this world simply trade votes in the chamber with Labour, Green and Lib Dem councillors, then all of this is lost.
The experience of Syriza, Podemos, Bernie Sanders and Corbyn himself demonstrates that weak, reformist reiterations of social democracy do not work, and have failed to stop the rise of the populist right. To use WDC to capitalise on dissatisfaction with Labour by standing Labour-lite candidates who promise reforms with no strategy to achieve them would be a betrayal of socialism.
More than that, it would distract from the task of breaking the unions from Labour by demanding their leaders fight against Labour’s austerity and its drive to war. It would stunt discussion about the correct political basis for a new party – how any socialist party must aim to mobilise millions, not just on election day but every day, to take action, starting from today’s defensive struggles and leading to the overthrow of capitalism.
Rather than steering WDC towards leafleting for council elections we need a united front of campaigns and trade unions that takes up the demands of the oppressed, to force the government to back down and undermine support for Reform. We are confident that this struggle, rather than shady backroom deals, could lay the basis for a real alternative to Labour – a revolutionary party, rooted in working class and oppressed communities and capable of leading the struggle for a better world.
