The attempts by the Scottish Defence League to carry out a major show of strength in Edinburgh on Saturday ended in farce and humiliation for the fascists and racists.
More than 300 anti –fascists, many organised through the Edinburgh anti-fascist alliance, and including members of the International Socialists and the Youth Fight for Jobs campaign, went to the Royal Mile where the SDL were holed up in a pub, a few yards from the Scottish parliament.
The SDL claimed their number would be boosted by members of the English and Welsh equivalents, who would be joining them in Edinburgh, but in the end no more than 50 managed to make the pub that they were meeting at.
A huge police mobilisation spent over 5 hours providing a protective cordon – before eventually the SDL were put in a bus and forced to leave under police protection. They were not even able to show themselves in public – a major setback for the SDL after their boasts in the run up to their mobilisation. This is the second major defeat for the SDL in Scotland following their attempts in Glasgow in November last year.
On the same day over 2,000 trade unionists and anti-racists marched through the centre of Edinburgh on the Scotland United demonstration. Delegations and banners from the CWU, PCS, Unison and the FBU were on the march, as were groups from the Muslim community, students and socialists.
The Scotland United rally heard the usual rainbow array of political representatives, including the Tories, Labour, the SNP and the Lib Dems all of whom are carrying out cuts in jobs and public services. The Lib Dem leader of Edinburgh City Council, Jenny Dawes, spoke at the rally but at the same time her administration has been using scabs to break a strike by Edinburgh council bin workers and savagely cutting the council’s budget.
None of these politicians have any strategy to defeat the BNP. In fact with all the main parties also united in Scotland in a campaign to cut public spending, the consequences of this can be a rise in electoral support for the racist ideas of the BNP and others, unless a socialist alternative is built.
There was a strong interest on Saturday for the Trade Unionist and Socialist Coalition leaflet which announced the intention by TUSC to stand in 8 seats in the general election in Scotland. Leading public sector trade unionists including from Unison and CWU will be standing. So also is Tommy Sheridan the co-convenor of Solidarity.
This electoral challenge can be a step forward in the campaign to build a real alternative for the working class and trade unionists and help undercut support for racism in Scotland.
Saturday’s event was a major setback for the SDL and an important victory for the anti-racist movement.
Lessons from Glasgow and Edinburgh
The International Socialists support’s mass mobilisations to directly prevent the SDL from marching or seeking a show of strength through “static demonstrations.” In both Glasgow and Edinburgh the anti-fascist alliance mobilisations, of largely young people, have played a vital role in finding and preventing the SDL from carrying out a public show of strength and we have participated in them. However, it is wrong, as some in the anti-fascist left have claimed, to counterpose the role of the anti-fascist alliance mobilisations to the much larger demonstrations in the cities, called by the trade union movement, Muslim communities and others on the days that they SDL have attempted to mobilise.
In both Glasgow and Edinburgh the Scotland United demonstrations have been far bigger that the anti-fascist alliance mobilisations. Moreover, they have played a very important role, despite the speakers who address these rallies – with some exceptions – in mobilising and giving confidence to those who want to oppose racism and fascism. Nevertheless, a discussion should take place with the trade unions, the anti-fascist alliances and others to seek broader cooperation on the tactics to be used in dealing with the issue of the SDL and the BNP.
