Self defence is no offence

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THE BRE from back page union establishment have been mortally alarmed by the drive for rank and file control in the Party, as indeed have the ruling class and its press.

It threatens the whole system of see-saw politics in Parliament on the basis of no fundamental difference in the way the two main parties administer the system.

The setbacks and subsequent retreats of the Left have given the signal for the counter-attack.

After the Blackpool conference victory in 1980 we warned in Socialist Organiser that if the Left did not push on to decisive victory, then there would inevitably be this backlash.

"Blackpool... unblocked some of the passages through which a real revolution can surge.

It is one of the most important political breakthroughs for the labour movement in decades. But at best it is half a revolution: the opening half.

We would do well to remember what Saint-Just said during the French Revolution: Those who make a revolution by halves only dig their own graves'."

Workers' Action had made the basic assessment of the alternatives that. faced the labour movement before the first breakthrough in 1979: "Remove the 'checks and balances', , that is, make the Labour Party accountable to its members, and the framework for an easy coexistence within Labour's "broad church' is gone. .. The option of muddling along and avoiding sharp, binding decisions and choices is diminished.

Also diminished is the scope for the 'socialist' faking which for decades has provided so much of the cement for the Labour Party "coalition' In a genuinely democratic Labour Party, where decisions and policies might immediately be tested for their relevance to the real world, the climate would suddenly turn unfavourable for this type of politics. The choice would be between the hard, Meire right...

[Now] either the left will go on from a victory on Consolidate the Latour to as a genuinely socialist party • 80=8,000 NO CONSPIRACY The French Revolution: "thos seeking to overthrow capitalism on the basis of the class struggle of the working class, and build up a mass membership around such policies. Or the left will be purged and the Labour Party transformed from its present ramshackle self into a tight and intolerant party modelled on the West German, Swedish and other Social Democracies...

Those are still the alternatives. And the proposals of the commission of inquiry would amount to a very large first step towards the intolerant model. There will be worse to come if they get away with it.

They must not get away with it.

The proposed purge, whose first victim will be Militant and maybe Socialist Organiser, is not in response to anything the hard Marxist left has done. It is in response to the democratisation drive.

Militant did not inspire, initiate, lead or erganise that campaign. The CLPD did. Militant is the 'easy target' not the target.

The goal of the witchhunters is to restore the PLP and the bureaucracy to THE Bradford 12 trial was a political trial from beginning to end. The case began with a political statement from the Bradford 12 and ended with the jury making a political assessment of the case, which was self defence is no offence - the Bradford 12 are innocent.

So last Wednesday the remaining 11 defendants were acquitted with no coverage on national TV news and very little coverage in the press the following It seems that the media are either not interested or maybe even scared about reporting the outcome and implications of the verdict e who make a revolution by halve real control within the new rules established in the last three years. Their strategy is to divide and disorganise the broad left coalition that defeated • them in 1979 and 1980 • Militant and other Marxists are only the first in line.

If the witch hunters take into their hands the power of preventive censorship of what can and cannot be published in the Labour Party, and the right to purge at will by declaring whole layers of the Party 'outside the law', , then sensible people should conclude that they will use it, and not only against the Militant.

Those Lefts in the ILP, Clause 4, and others, who help tie the noose for Militant now, or who discreetly 'mind their own business' should be clear in their minds about one thing: they themselves will afterwards have to live in the shadow of the noose.

* Every unofficial publication and group in the movement must be got to declare that it will not register under the proposed "aliens law'.

* As many CLPs as poss must be got to declare that this Jury had set a precedent on defending the black community, on. the police and on conspiracy The Bradford 12 were found not guilty because the jury believed that they were defending the black community from the threat of fascist and racial attack during a period of intense racial unrest where the police were not interested and failed to give that protection.

The case exposed the failure and attitude of the police to the West Indian and Asian communities. As far as they were concerned there was no probas dig their own graves".

that they will not implement the proposed new rules.

* CLPs should be got to declare for the positive right of minorities to organise in the party, and of groups like the CP, SWP, WSL ete to formally affiliate - should they want to - to the mass party of the trade unions.

But these are emergency measures. The right/soft-left drive against a democratic Labour Party can only be securely stopped by a left offensive. The attempt at a purge is the consequence of the left's retreat after the setback we suffered at the last Party conference.

Resume

We must stop the Left's retreat andresume the offensive. Everything else will depend on that.

Turn the Labour Party outwards to challenge the Tories, and in the process build a mass membership which wants the Party to be a democratic, fighting, class organisation, and will not tolerate a new dictatorship of the parliamentarians.

* Organise in the unions now for Labour Party democracy - and for trade union lem of racist attacks for the ethnic minorities living in Bradford.

The attitude of the arresting police officer was revealed in the following statement: "West Indians in tea cosy hats motoring in town centres constitute by appearance alone suspicion that they were involved in muggings"

The case also exposed the conditions under which black people live in Britain. Always under the threat of their families, their homes and themselves coming under physical attack.

The solicitor for the Bradford 12 puts it this way:

'For the Asian commundemocracy.

* Fight for socialist policies and democratic accountability so that Labour can be a real alternative to the Tories. Fight for a workers' government challenging capitalism, not a re-run of the 1974-9 Labour government.

# Campaign to draft Tọny Benn to challenge Foot for the leadership.

* Mount a new crusade in the movement to stop Lab our's would-be authoritarians in their tracks.

VIDYA ANAND, a member of the London Labour Party executive, told Socialist Organiser: "Witch hunts, proscriptions, and inquiries are sought by those comrades who do not believe in democratic principles. What they can't win by argument and persuasion, they are now seeking by coercion and intimidation.

"I am sure the labour movement will reject it totally" ity, this is a country families are subjected to daily abuse, in which the graffiti of Nazi Germany remains unerased on walls, where the men who protect the ideology that sent Jews to the gas chambers walk the streets in public parades escorted by the police force, - a doctor knifed to death by a racist who wins a £5 bet, a taxi driver has his throat cut because he, like the doctor, is the object of blind hatred because of the colour of his skin."

These are the conditions black people live in in Britain. And this is why the Bradford 12 had to defend its own community. One are S NORTH Islington Labour Party has declared it will be joining other Labour Parties to form a campaign in the Party against witchMora slogan in our Bradford 1 Campaign was Self Defenc is No Offence - Free th Bradford 12. And this what the jury's verdict was.

After this success w must build on its four dations. The Leicester Brac ford 12 Committee is now i the process of organising national anti-racist, ant fascist conference: We wis to build the campaign ar not allow any of the issur raised in the trial of th Bradford 12 like poli harassment, fascist attac to drop. The fight has ju begun.

Contact: The Bradfo: 12 Committee (Leicester c/o Blackthorn Booksho High Street. Leicester. hunts unless the NI decides on Wednesd 23rd to drop the whe issue.

The North Islingt Executive Committee m last Sunday, 20th, al decided to lobby the NI "We call upon the NI to totally reject the repr on the Militant Tendency it declared.

'We object to the repr on the following grounds:

*The terms of referen singling out Militant 1 attack now leaves the w open for the NEC to mo against other groups witt the party in the future.

*No comment or infor tion was sought or obtain apart from that of regior organisers, individı MPs and the right wi Labour Solidarity Group.

*The recommendati of the report calling for compulsory register non-affiliated groups wil in the party and giving t NEC ultimate control or who is allowed onto ti register amounts to a facto change in the cons tution which cannot dealt with in this secreti and arbitrary manner."

IAN WILLIAMS (mem er of NUR National Executive):

"I consider that 1 Weighell is trying to 'cl up' the NUR and now b trying to do the same in 1 Labour Party _ with so success in the light of 1 report going to the NEC.

•What he's forgotten that witch-hunters usu end up burning the in cent parties and the r "witches' just go und ground. I don't think he dealing with witches j now anyway. He and like just go around pointi the finger at people • whom they disagree. I I don't think this will I very long. Sid Weigh and other right wing are due to retire soon _ least in the next five year «What we need now i united campaign to fi the witch hunters now a show that we're not goi to stand for this kind backlash. And thi we'll win."

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• THE BRADFORD 12' FREE

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