2nd oldest political party

March 2024 Forums General discussion 2nd oldest political party

Viewing 15 posts - 1 through 15 (of 27 total)
  • Author
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  • #233498
    mullrae
    Participant

    Has the SPGB got it right about being the second oldest political party, from what I’m being led to believe the Labour Party started in 1900, 4 years before us.

    #233499
    Lew
    Participant
    #233500
    Lew
    Participant

    Well, the link was to page “L” but that hasn’t shown up. Scroll down to “L” for the Labour Party.

    #233504
    mullrae
    Participant

    So as far as you are concerned the labour party didn’t exist in 1900, it was a committee and not a party as such.

    #233505
    Lizzie45
    Participant
    #233506
    Anonymous
    Inactive

    Throughout my whole life, I have seen and known several organizations that have collapsed, they have been bigger and larger than the Socialist Party. Some have had larger membership and large incidence within the working class and they do not exist anymore. The SP has been publishing a monthly Journal for several decades, others can not publish a newsletter ( like the SLP of America ) and some have had a daily newspaper like the CPCML and they can not do that anymore, others had the power to call for a general strike and workers and students responded to the call they can not do that anymore either, The Bolshevik party is gone despite having so many theoreticians. A good house with a good foundation can stand an earthquake and a hurricane

    #233507
    mullrae
    Participant

    I think people are missing the point, the point is if we claim to be the second oldest political party in the UK, then we have to be able to back that claim up, otherwise we are no better than any other political party.

    #233511
    alanjjohnstone
    Keymaster

    “Indeed, though the Party was formed in 1900 under the name “Labour Representation Committee” (changed to Labour Party in 1906) it was admitted by the Secretary of the Party in 1918, the late Arthur Henderson, that until that year they were not a political party at all: “they had never in the proper sense claimed to be a national political party” (Labour Party Conference Report 1918, p.99).”

    Is Labour Government the Way to Socialism?

    #233512
    Wez
    Participant

    Excuse my probable ignorance but don’t both the Tories and Whigs/Liberals predate the SPGB?

    #233536
    ALB
    Keymaster

    Good point. I don’t think we have ever claimed to be the second oldest political party in Britain, only to have been formed before the Labour Party.

    In other words, this thread seems to have started off on a false assumption. Or, Mullrae, have you evidence that we have made this claim?

    #233539
    Lizzie45
    Participant

    “Good point. I don’t think we have ever claimed to be the second oldest political party in Britain, only to have been formed before the Labour Party.”

    For example; in the ‘about’ description:
    https://www.facebook.com/groups/779523775463252/

    #233540
    Thomas_More
    Participant

    We’re the oldest party that has “socialist” as a name in the UK is what is meant.

    #233541
    ALB
    Keymaster

    You are right. It does say that on that Facebook page. It needs to be changed and will be if and when we can track down who manages that page.

    It is not our main Faebook page which is here (with many more followrers — 4.6K as opposed to 929)

    https://www.facebook.com/socialistpartyofgreatbritain/

    #233542
    DJP
    Participant

    “For example; in the ‘about’ description:”

    It’s wrong and should be changed. But whoever thought that was some kind of selling point anyhow!?

    #233543
    Bijou Drains
    Participant

    The thing about the Labour Representation Committee is that it was a committee of Labourist MPs. It became the Labour Party in 1906 but the only members were Labour MPs, which included ILP, Fabian Society Members, etc. Individuals could not join that Labour Party as such and the separate groups maintained completely independent organisational structures. In that sense it was similar to some electoral pacts that occur in other countries with some joining and leaving, or a bit like the groupings that occur in the European Parliament.

    It was only in 1919 that the Labour Party effectively became the recognised political entity that is known today.

    The whigs and Liberals had similar development into political parties and their is an argument that the Tories didn’t become the Conservative and Unionist Party only formed in the 1960s, as until that point the Conservative Party (England and Wales) was separate to the Unionist Party (Scotland). I think I’m right in saying that Douglas Home was never a member of the Conservative Party and was the last non-Tory Labour Prime Minister. A good trivia question that I’ve used before.

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