New Left of Labour Political Party?
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Jeremy Corbyn’s pipe dream (from yesterday’s Guardian):
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2025/jul/29/jeremy-corbyn-labour-failed-politics-new-party
The original tweet announcing the new party stated:
“We will only fix the crises in our society with a mass redistribution of wealth and power. That means taxing the very richest in our society.”
In his article Corbyn is placing the emphasis on redistributing power rather than wealth and writes only of making “the wealthiest in society pay a bit more in tax to ensure that everyone can live in dignity”.
Since dividing up even all of the wealth of the wealthiest wouldn’t increase that of each member of the population by very much, no wonder he emphasises redistributing power, which is not quite so nebulous.
But, given the continuation of capitalism, who makes the decisions is the not the most important factor but what capitalism obliges the decision-makers, whoever they are and however they are chosen, to decide.
Comment on the Talking About Socialism website:
“In Facebook discussions on the New party there is already an intolerence towards Socialists and communists from the supporters of a lowest common denominator old Labour politics for the new party. This party is not for you or is not your bag and so on. And this comes from people arguing for a broad party, but not broad enough for Socialist and communists.
As Communists/Socialists we do not go with the Social Democratic flow. We campaign to persuade members of the party to become Socialist/Communists and attempt to make the politics of the new Party Socialist. The nostalgia for the welfare state and the post war settlement will not be political effective. The political and economic circumstances are vastly different today.
Talking vaguely about Public ownership without specifying its nature and extent is an unrealistic attempt, to repeat the limited state ownership of some sectors of the economy while leaving the rest of the economy in Capitalist hands. Again this is totally inadequate to deal with failing British Capitalism. The aim should be to abolish Capitalism not manage it.“
One Trotsky group that won’t be infiltrating the new party — the “Socialist” Equality Party:
Thought this article from Grace Blakely, former supporter of Momentum but now part of Greens’ “eco-socialist” group, may be of interest here:
“As many of you know, I joined the Greens a few months ago to vote for Zack Polanski. He’s run a brilliant campaign on an eco-socialist platform and I’m really happy to have been a vocal supporter.”
Here’s his online election campaign material. I can’t see anything socialist in it but he evidently thinks a lot of himself.
Interview with him in Socialist Worker here:
Interview with Zack Polanski: ‘Movement building is incredibly important’
Grace Blakely says: “It seems clear that Corbyn, Sultana, and the Greens will form an electoral pact along the lines of the left bloc in France – any other strategy would be absurd factionalism.”
It doesn’t seem that clear round where I live. Here the Greens have an electoral pact with the LibDems. All 5 Green councillors have been elected in 3-member wards where, by angreement, only 2 LibDems and 1 Green stood. But I suppose an electoral bloc between the Greens, the Corbynites and the LibDems could be imagined. All reformists together.
Yes, as earlier this year here:
Not quite as bad as the German Greens who, when in government until a few months ago, were real war-mongers.
One good thing about this will be the demise of TUSC. They have offered their name to the new party pending registration but, judging by this result on 7 August, that would be the kiss of death:
CANNOCK CHASE Hednesford Green Heath
JONES, Paul (Reform UK) 525
PEARSON, Alan (Labour Party) 230
HEWITT, Phil (Conservative Party) 126
ROCK, Rachel Lauren (Green Party) 101
JAGGER, Sharon Denise (Independent) 31
DRYHURST, Terry (UKIP) 5
KNOX, Gareth (Trade Unionist and Socialist Coalition) 1Here is the attitude of the so-called “Communist” Party of Britain (the Morning Star lot) to the proposed new party. In an article in the August issue of their paper Unity under the heading “Communists ‘broadly positive’ about the Corbyn/Sultana new Left Party”, its General Secretary, Robert Griffiths, writes:
“The experience of previous electoral initiatives on the left pose two other problems that will have to be confronted: firstly, the readiness of the ultra-leftist sects to infiltrate broad-based mass movements in order to divide them, pose as a ‘left opposition’ to the leadership and recruit from those they influence and mislead ….”
He doesn’t say how he thinks this problem should be dealt with.
“He doesn’t say how he thinks this problem should be dealt with.”
I’m relying on my fading memory here so apologies if I’ve misremembered certain details but I seem to recall that in both the case of Scargill’s Labour Party in the mid-1990s and Respect in the mid-2000s, the leading figures in both these left of Labour initiatives, took to ’employing’ their own pet vanguardists to police the admittance to membership. That was their attempt to ensure they wouldn’t be subject to heavy entryism.
It’s telling that both Scargill and Galloway had their roots – or were at least fellow travellers – in ‘Official Communism’.
This local by-election result from yesterday in an area just outside Nottingham is interesting.
CON 405 (28.6%, down 16.5)
RFM 400 (28.3%)
BA 275 (19.4%)
LAB 244 (17.2%, down 20.1)
GRN 70 (4.9%, down 6.7)
IND 21 (1.5%)BA is the Broxtowe Alliance, formed as a breakaway of councillors from Labour and presumably a candidate group for Corbyn’s new party.
If this result was to be repeated elsewhere both Labour and the Greens would have something to worry about.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cewxrzq0489o
It looks as if the Thinking About Socialism group are going to join the new party to try to put over what we can recognise as the case for socialism:
I don’t suppose they will be welcome unless they are prepared to campaign at election time for the new party and its programme of reforms. Which of course would compromise them.
They are not former members but former Trotskyists who seem to have independently come to much the same conclusions as us.
Since he says “I” it might even be the view just of the author.
There won’t be many more of them than the average number of members of one of our branches.
They will be well aware of us. They have in fact been accused by those they were planning to form a “mass communist party” with of “SPGBism” (the plan fell through because they discovered that the others were dyed-in-the-wool Leninists). See the thread on this under Events.
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