The rise and fall of the Scottish Socialist Party – new pamphlet

This pamphlet is also an examination of the SSP leadership’s political mistakes and their abandonment of principled socialist and Marxist ideas before and after their break with the Committee For A Workers’ International in 2001.

With the capitalist system in a deep crisis leading to uprisings, general strikes and revolutionary movements sweeping the globe from North Africa, to the Middle East to Europe, the ideas of socialism are more important today that ever. Capitalism is a broken system and the building of mass working class parties and a socialist alternative is a vital task.

The book attempts to justify why the leadership of the SSP became the main prop by which the capitalist state machine, the sworn enemies of socialism and the working class, achieved the prosecution and jailing of Tommy Sheridan. “If Tommy was allowed to walk away untouched by justice, he would be unstoppable. History would be rewritten to his script and the reputations of honourable people would be forever stained.” Any hypocritical moralising bourgeois journalist could have written this sentence. Unfortunately, there are many more of the same vein in Downfall.     

The “honourable” author of Downfall at one time played a leading role in the ranks of Militant in Scotland – the forerunner of the Socialist Party. Judging by the evidence of this book he has retained nothing of his political past. The book’s title “Downfall” is no accident. It’s the same name as a film made of the last days of Hitler’s reign as fascist leader of Germany in 1945. McCombes openly attempts to equate Tommy Sheridan and those who backed him against the Murdoch Empire with fascism and dictatorship. “I had long understood the politics of tyranny – the social and economic conditions upon which people like Hitler, Mussolini, Stalin and a hundred other lesser dictators rose to power. But now, for the first time, I was beginning to get an insight into the politics of tyranny”, writes McCombes about Tommy Sheridan and the SSP members who opposed the party leadership.

McCombes, a former Marxist, today utilises the same language as the right-wing journalists who accused Tony Benn, Arthur Scargill and other leading left figures in the past as dictator’s and fascists. He throws the same insults and abuse at Tommy Sheridan and other socialists in Downfall as the Murdoch press routinely use against the left.

This abomination of a book, if it has any merit, helps shine a bright light on the political and moral – from a socialist standpoint – collapse of the group who broke from the Committee for a Workers’ International in 2001. As such it is a warning of the consequences of abandoning a clear and consistent political programme and Marxist methods and principles. Downfall is in that sense an appropriate name for this book given the central role played by the author in the events that led to the implosion of the Scottish Socialist Party. Downfall is in many respects a story of political infanticide; given that those who brought the SSP into life went on to engineer its destruction after only a few short years.       
   
The Scottish Socialist Party was launched in 1998 and until November 2004 had made a significant impact on Scottish politics. In the 2003 elections to the Scottish parliament the SSP polled 128,000 votes winning 6 MSP’s and almost 7% of the national vote. Today, only smouldering wreckage remains of a once sizable political force. The recent 2011 Scottish elections saw the party slump to just 8,200 votes, 0.4% of the Scottish poll. From a membership of around 3,000 at its height the SSP today has only a handful of activists.

If this book were a serious attempt to draw out the lessons of the SSP’s collapse and to point a way forward for a new generation it would at least have a purpose. The need for a powerful mass working class and socialist party in Scotland is more important today than ever. At a time of unprecedented crisis for the capitalist system, when millions are facing savage cuts to jobs, public services and welfare benefits, the absence of socialist and left political representation of a sizable or mass character is a major obstacle.

Instead, and perhaps not surprisingly this is not done. Nor is there any attempt to deal with the major issues facing working class people in Scotland. Not on the need to build a mass anti-cuts movement to face down the draconian cuts of the Con-Dem government. Nothing to say on the impending battles facing workers and trade unionists fighting to defend past gains on wages, pensions and jobs.

The timing of the book’s publication is clearly designed to literally cash-in on the public interest in the Tommy Sheridan case, following his jailing for perjury earlier this year. Apart from swelling the author’s bank account by many thousands of pounds there is another motivation for Downfall; to carry out a brutal, not to say self-serving, justification of the SSP leadership’s role in the jailing of Tommy Sheridan. As Alan McCombes boasts the “vast majority” of witnesses who gave evidence in the Tommy Sheridan perjury trial were members of the SSP and were “lifelong socialists defending their party”.

In order to defend the actions of the SSP leadership Downfall sets out to paint Tommy Sheridan as a monster. McCombes uses a mixture of tabloid phraseology and invective that would please any one of the long line of bourgeois writers who have made a career out off assassinating and distorting the character and ideas of socialist leaders. So Sheridan is variously described as having a “disordered personality”, being “almost inhuman”, “a man without principles, without scruples, without basic human dignity”, a “political gangster”, an “abuser of woman” a narcissist” And further, “Strip away the pious words and the practised facial expressions and you were left with a zombie.”

In contrast leading figures in the SSP are painted in a somewhat different light. Frances Curran is an “an experienced and astute political operator”, Keith Baldassarra “selfless courageous and incorruptible” Allan Green “a moral authority in the SSP unsurpassed by anyone”, Catriona Grant “a political powerhouse” etc

This is the tone and approach of the entire book. It really no more than an attempt to put the crisis that faced the SSP in 2004 as a choice between Good versus Evil, at least in the eye of the author. Downfall is therefore a book more akin to a work of fiction, like Lord of the Rings or Harry Potter, than a serious political analysis Albeit one mixed with Stalinist distortions and tabloid character assassination.

The next day Tommy Sheridan resigned as the national convener of the SSP and the party was thrown into turmoil and never recovered. Here is what the CWI platform of the SSP said at the time following Tommy’s resignation:

“If the EC had not given Tommy Sheridan an immediate ultimatum to drop his denial and legal action and made it clear publicly that the right-wing tabloid allegations were an attempt to undermine the SSP and Tommy Sheridan, this situation could potentially have been avoided.

“The EC carries significant responsibility for that situation developing in the way that it has.”  November 23rd 2004

The full statement can be read at http://www.socialistworld.net/doc/1458

Eight years on we would not alter a single word of this statement. Despite our political differences with Tommy Sheridan, who left the ranks of the CWI in 2001 along with the other SSP leaders, we recognised this would do major damage to the SSP.

Tommy Sheridan was the public figure through which the vast majority of working class people identified with the SSP. This was a result of his uncompromising stand against the poll tax, his undoubted talents as a public speaker and a politician who was seen as a fighter for the poor and working class.

The CWI mindful of the damage that could be done to the party called for a united front by the SSP against the News of the World and the tabloids. Our over-riding interest was to avoid a damaging fall-out that would undermine the SSP.

What a contrast to the approach by the McCombes grouping inside the SSP. “Damage limitation was the name of the game” claims McCombes in response to the tabloid stories. Yet within days they had embarked on a course that was to cause catastrophic damage to the SSP. In response to Tommy Sheridan’s determination to take legal action they orchestrated a campaign to ensure his defeat.   

McCombes describes this as an attempt to “give a warning to Tommy” to halt what he says was a press campaign by Sheridan against the SSP leaders who had removed him. Already, the psychology and outlook of the McCombes group was that Tommy Sheridan was an enemy combatant who had to be defeated by any means necessary.

At a press conference held by the 6 SSP MSPs the week following Tommy’s resignation a reference was made to minutes of the EC meeting being under “lock and key.” It later became clear that these minutes contained a detailed report of Tommy Sheridan “admitting” to attending a swinger’s club in Manchester. These were used as a key plank of the NoW’s defence alongside the SSP leaders own testimony during the 2006 defamation case and again for the prosecution at the perjury trial in 2010. There was widespread anger in the SSP that such personal information could have been written down as a “minute”, kept and publicly declared to the press as having existed. The SSP leadership knew full well that if a defamation case went ahead they had already decided to give evidence against Tommy Sheridan.

A running theme throughout the book is the claim that the SSP leadership were motivated by pursuing a “fundamental morality”, of “telling the truth” and later of a “no-holds barred fight to the finish” against Tommy Sheridan. Sheridan was going to “destroy the SSP” and was conducted a kamikaze path of “self destruction”.

With this mindset all methods are therefore justified to “save the party”. This included selling a video, supposedly of Tommy Sheridan admitting to affairs and the swinger’s club visit, for £200,000 to the News of the World, following the 2006 defamation victory.

There is not a word of criticism in Downfall about the deal done between Bob Bird, Scottish editor of the NoW, and SSP member George McNeilage, who recorded a tape he claims in November 2004. With a straight face Downfall describes how McNeilage gives Bob Bird a lecture about the crimes of News International and the Wapping dispute before asking for £250,000 from the same organisation who smashed the print workers and effective trade unionism in 1986.  

McCombes explains how when the video was made public by the NoW “the reaction of most of us was straightforward relief”. George McNeliage had “put himself and his family in the firing line to bring out the truth”. Although not admitted by McCombes, it’s clear that he knew the video was going to be sold and that this was part of a conscious strategy by the leadership to ensure that a perjury investigation by the Scottish Crown would take place. The SSP minute secretary, Barbara Scott, phoned a Herald journalist and arranged for the press to be in attendance when she went to Lothian and Borders police HQ accompanied by SSP MSPs Carolyn Leckie and Rosie Kane to hand in her hand-written notes of the 9th November 2004 EC meeting. This was days after Tommy Sheridan’s defamation victory.

In contrast to these actions the overwhelming majority of socialists in Scotland, trade unionists and working class people generally celebrated Tommy Sheridan’s win over Murdoch’s News of the World in 2006. This was a class issue, of wanting to see a socialist fighter triumph against one of the most reactionary, savagely anti-union media organisations in the world. Not for the SSP leadership however who released a press statement the day of Tommy’s victory “Tommy has lied his way through the court case and we want no part in that. We have told the truth and we stand by the minutes of our party.” Colin Fox, by then the SSP new national convenor did, at least for a day, see things more clearly “Every socialist will rejoice in the jury’s rejection of the News of the Worlds journalism that this verdict represents.” Had the SSP leadership, even then, drawn back from their vendetta perhaps the SSP could have survived. But they chose a course of action that was to have catastrophic consequences.
          
The CWI did not agree with Tommy Sheridan that he should take a defamation case over these stories and we said so. The capitalist courts are not the best terrain for socialists to fight on, especially over issues of a personal character. Given the millions that the NoW and Murdoch were prepared to invest this case it was clear that a lot of mud would be thrown and some of it would stick. Despite this there was no question as to whose side we would be on if a court case did take place. And we certainly did not see the role of SSP leaders as trying to ensure the defeat of Tommy Sheridan’s defamation case. Far less providing the bullets for the Scottish legal establishment to fire during the perjury trial in 2010.

In the United States during the 1940’s and 1950’s the anti-communist witch hunts demanded of those that were brought before the House Committee of Un-American Activities the “truth” about communist membership and activity. Many refused to cooperate, including Hollywood actors, directors and writers. A number were jailed for refusing to “name names” others were “blacklisted” and could not find work. These honourable examples stand in stark contrast to the un-socialist activities of the SSP leadership.     

The tabloid snake, with the toxic Murdoch brand at it’s head, live and breath on “sex scandals”. Why should a responsible leadership of a socialist party offer up one of its own as a sacrifice in such a way? In the disturbed social and economic situation we are in today, with the re-emergence of class conflict and struggle on a wider scale, the tabloid dogs will inevitably seek to undermine workers leaders and socialists with stories of a personal character. The phone-hacking scandal conducted by News International’s papers, and probably most of the British tabloids, as well as evidence of the hacking of email accounts testify to the drive to get personal information on “celebrities”.

The actions of the SSP leadership in the Tommy Sheridan case only legitimise these base methods by the tabloids in future campaigns against trade union and socialist leaders. Even if you believed every one of the personal stories that were ever written about Tommy Sheridan, and there are many of them are repeated, tabloid-style in Downfall, he committed no crime against the interests of the working class. Tommy Sheridan’s political mistake was to break politically with the programme and ideas of the CWI and what is now the Socialist Party, and to encourage others to do the same. He has paid a heavy personal price for that, given the role played by his former comrades.

Downfall tries to reply to the widely-accepted view on the left that by opposing Tommy Sheridan the SSP leaders were backing the Murdoch empire and the NoW. It cites the cases of the criticism faced by James Connolly and John MacLean for opposing the 1st World War, the Trotskyists who were persecuted for standing-up to Stalin and the attacks faced by Militant supporters for our opposition to the IRA’s methods of individual terrorism in Northern Ireland. So in the bizarre world of Alan McCombes collaborating with the capitalist state to ensure the jailing of a socialist leader is on a par with opposing an imperialist war, or fighting the Stalinist dictatorship in the Soviet Union. Alan McCombes’ attempts to put himself and the SSP leaders on the same level as Connolly, MacLean, Trotsky and others is not only an insult to their collective contributions, but is also an indication of an upside down world that he now seems to inhabit. The central issue for socialists is to oppose everything that strengthens the hand of the capitalists and weakens the working class and its interests. In no sense can the jailing of Tommy Sheridan be seen as a step-forward for the working class or for socialism.  

It was no accident that Tommy Sheridan had the support of the most militant leaders of the trade union movement who could clearly see the class nature of this prosecution. Standing on Tommy Sheridan’s side and not that of the News of the World or the SSP leadership was Bob Crow, general secretary of the RMT union, as were many of the leaders of the PCS civil service union. Tony Benn and George Galloway offered their backing and solidarity, as did many leading local and national trade unionists including from the FBU, Unison and the NUT among others.

Tony Mulhearn on behalf of the heroic 47 Liverpool councillors wrote

“History will show that your treatment by the forces of the state: the judiciary, their kept media, and the unscrupulous collaborators who were key witnesses in securing a conviction, will rank as one of the most outrageous and pernicious witch-hunts on record.”

Peter Taaffe, general secretary of the Socialist Party in England and Wales commented:

“Those former friends who crossed the class line will never be forgiven for backing the arch-enemy of all workers, Murdoch. Those who participated in our common struggle in the past will not be remembered for this but as finger-men and women, agents of one of the most undemocratic, venal and brutally anti-working class figures in history.”

During the police investigation Tommy and Gail Sheridan’s house was raided by a dozen officers who were searching for evidence – traumatising their two-year old daughter. Tommy Sheridan was arrested in a media-staged police action outside his place of work and charged with perjury. Gail Sheridan was suspended from work for 5 months after police tipped off her employer, BA, that miniatures that may have stolen had been found in her house during the police raid. She was cleared of all these allegations. To add insult to injury, when being interrogated by police, Gail was accused of acting “like an IRA terrorist” because she refused to answer police questions.

Despite Downfall’s attempts to claim that at the time of the perjury trial “Tommy Sheridan was no longer a threat to the state” the vendetta against him was an example of clear and unambiguous class revenge being sought. As even Downfall grudgingly admits Tommy Sheridan was a key figure in the mass anti-poll tax movement that was instrumental in the ending of the Thatcher era. The ruling class don’t forget that easily and their “cold cruelty” was a major driver in the prosecution of Tommy Sheridan.   

There are incredulous efforts by McCombes to testify to the even-handed and benign nature of the Scottish legal system and the police in one section of his book. So desperate is he to refute the self-evident fact that there was a class-driven vendetta to go after Tommy Sheridan that he claims that because the SNP “control” the justice system and the Crown Office (which is not the case), it is not an instrument of the capitalist state for dispensing class justice. “The SNP backed the anti-poll tax campaign” (again this is not true as they, in the main, did not support the mass non-payment strategy and today would run a mile from such a campaign that “broke the law”). The leading figures in the Crown Office who triggered the perjury inquiry and the prosecution of Tommy Sheridan come from “backstreets” and went to “state schools” after all.

It’s a basic ABC of Marxism that the state machine, including the legal system, is overwhelming biased and in the last analysis exists to defend capitalist interests. That extends to criminal justice that is overwhelmingly weighted against women, the working class and the poor generally. Look at the numbers of people jailed for crimes linked directly to poverty, stealing, small time drug dealing and drug and alcohol use etc – they make up the overwhelming majority of those in prison. That includes in Cornton Vale – Scotland’s Women’s’ prison. The top echelons of the legal system, the judges, the leading Advocate’s etc are very much trained, educated and in that sense handpicked to ensure the interests of capitalism are protected. Was not Tommy Sheridan jailed for defying a court order in 1992 during the poll tax campaign? Were scores of miners not prosecuted in Scotland for defending their jobs and communities in the 1984-85 miners strike? Or are we to swallow the idea that since devolution and under the influence of the pro-capitalist SNP there now exists a benign legal system in Scotland?    

Leon Trotsky (pictured above) faced similar accusations from Fenner Brockway, a reformist, who was a member of the Independent Labour Party in Britain in the 1930’s. Brockway attacked Trotsky who at that time was fighting to build a new Marxist international following the 3rd International’s Stalinist degeneration. He accused Trotsky of trying to build the 4th International from the “heights of Oslo. Trotsky replied’

“He, Brockway, cannot allow a new International to be constructed from ‘the heights of Oslo’. I leave aside the fact that I do not live in Oslo and that, besides, Oslo is not situated on heights. The principles which I defend in common with many thousand comrades bear absolutely no local or geographical character. They are Marxian and international. They are formulated, expounded and defended in theses, brochures and books. If Fenner Brockway finds these principles to be false, let him put up against them his own. We are always ready to be taught better. But unfortunately Fenner Brockway cannot venture into this field….. That is why there is nothing left for him to do save to make merry about the ‘heights of Oslo’, wherein he promptly commits a threefold mistake: with respect to my address, to the topography of the Norwegian capital and, last but not least, to the fundamental principles of international action.”

Surely the geographical location of the CWI’s international offices is a completely secondary question to the CWI’s political programme and analysis?  But McCombes criticisms about “London control” are simply an example of his own nationalist political degeneration, reflected in an inability to debate ideas from a socialist and internationalist standpoint. He is left instead to resort to slurs.  

Militant emerged as the largest Marxist and Trotskyist organisation in Britain in the 1980’s. We led mass struggles including the Liverpool City Council battle of 1983 to 1987. We spearheaded the anti-poll tax movement which at its height involved over 10 million people refusing to pay the poll tax.

Militant at its height had 8,000 members and significant influence in the trade unions and the Labour Party. Three of our supporters were elected Labour MPs and were “workers’ MPs on a workers wage. Militant earned the hatred of the ruling class for our uncompromising stand in defence of the working class. Particularly, as a result of our leading role in the Liverpool City Council struggle when we inflicted a savage defeat on the Thatcher government. What a contrast to today when you can barely find a single Labour councillor, never mind a council who will refuse to make the cuts demanded by the Con-Dem government. In Scotland Militant had a powerful position in the workplaces, a number of trade unions and in the Labour Party, particularly the Young Socialists, the youth section of the Labour Party but also in a number of constituency Labour parties as well.

Scottish Militant Labour was the autonomous section of the British Militant organisation. SML was set-up in 1991 following a lengthy debate in the Militant and the CWI over a proposal from the Militant leadership to establish an open organisation in Scotland. This marked a departure following our many years of work in the Labour party. By the early ‘90’s Labour had largely been transformed from a bourgeois workers party (a pro-capitalist leadership under pressure to carry out reforms from its trade union base) into an out-and-out party of capitalism. It was losing its working class membership and the democratic structures of the party had been largely extinguished. The left and specifically the Militant had been expelled from the Labour party by the right wing leadership, egged on by the capitalist press. The Labour Party Young Socialists had been shutdown and was relaunched as a conveyor belt for budding careerists.

Under these conditions the CWI and Militant leadership in Scotland and Britain recognised that an open organisation in Scotland, given that Militant had played a leading role in the poll tax struggle offered the best strategy for building the forces of Marxism. Comrades in Scotland in conjunction with the Militant leadership at a British level produced a document arguing for an open turn in Scotland. A major debate took place, including the formation of a minority faction around Ted Grant and Alan Woods who wanted to stay in the Labour Party. Following the debate and the overwhelming agreement in favour of the Scottish open turn they split from the CWI. The documents relating to the “Open Turn debate in the early 1990’s can be read at: www.marxist.net/openturn/main/index.html

SML made a number of important gains in the early 1990’s as a result of our leading role in the poll tax campaign. It was Militant who had spearheaded the mass non-payment strategy. We were the driving force in helping to establish the anti-poll tax unions and federations that led and organised the anti-poll tax struggle.

Tommy Sheridan was catapulted into the leadership of this mass movement and this helped give SML a huge impetuous. Tommy’s jailing in 1992 for defying a court order not to attend a mass demonstration that prevented a Warrant Sale by Sheriff Officers backfired spectacularly against the ruling class. From his prison he won 6,200 votes standing for the Pollok seat in Glasgow – coming second and defeating the SNP at the general election. A month later Tommy was elected from his prison cell to Glasgow District Council in a result that sent shock waves through the political establishment in Scotland.

SML achieved some stunning election victories and by the end of 1992 we had 4 district councillors in Glasgow and two on Strathclyde regional council for the east end of Glasgow. In total between May 1992 and February 1994 SML won 33.3% of the vote in the 17 elections that we contested and emerged as the dominant force on the left in Scotland. In the June 1994 European elections Tommy Sheridan standing for SML in Glasgow polled over 12,000 votes almost 7.6% of the citywide vote. This compares very well to the 18,500 votes – 7.6% vote polled by Tommy Sheridan in 1999 when he was first elected to the Scottish parliament.    

At least McCombes manages to mention his involvement in Militant and our role in the Liverpool and poll tax struggles. However, he also finds it necessary in Downfall to distort what Militant was and indulges in some shocking “red-baiting”. Pro-capitalist journalists whose stock-in-trade is attacking the trade union and socialist movement would applaud many of his cheap insults. Perhaps he hopes to curry favour and gain a permanent position in the Scottish media pack on the back of this book.

In reality Militant, today the Socialist Party, and our international organisation the CWI are scrupulously democratic. Full debate on policy, strategy and tactics, including differing views to that of the leadership, are encouraged through democratic discussion. The parties and groups that make up the CWI ensure full participation by our members at all levels from the branches, to the national committees to the national congresses of the national sections that make up the CWI. We operate on the basis of democratic centralism that affords every chance for members to have their say. This can take the form of debate and discussion as well as resolutions, documents and even the right to form factions – organised groupings to advocate a specific policy for the party or international. Once a position is decided at a congress the party then unites to carry that policy out – while continuing to uphold the right of all members to argue for a change in policy or approach.    

Each national section of the CWI has its own democratic structures and elected leadership which is responsible for developing its perspectives, policy, strategy and tactics as they apply to their specific countries. The CWI as an international has the right and duty to discuss the work of the national sections, just as the national sections also are encouraged to discuss the work of its sister sections and those of the CWI as a whole. In that way we learn from each other and this helps strengthen the overall experience of the CWI as a whole.       

At an international level an Executive Committee (IEC) is elected at the World Congress that is made up of delegates from each of the national sections of the CWI. An International Secretariat is elected to ensure the effective running of the CWI between meetings of the IEC and the World Congress.  The idea of an “intolerance of dissent” is laughable when you consider the almost three years and huge numbers of voluminous written exchanges that took place between the CWI and leaders of the SSP before they left the CWI in 2001. The documents which formed the “Scottish debate” are available at http://www.marxist.net/scotland/index.html

In fact the example of the debate that took place over the launch of the SSP runs completely counter to Alan McCombes claims that the CWI is intolerant of dissent. Downfall only touches very briefly on the differences that arose between the grouping that went on to become the leadership of the SSP and the CWI leadership. In early 1998 Alan McCombes wrote a document agreed by the Scottish Militant Labour executive committee called “Initial proposals for a new Scottish Socialist Party”. As Downfall briefly summarises this was a proposal“ to wind up Scottish Militant Labour in favour of a broader socialist party” to prepare for the 1999 Scottish parliamentary elections. More accurately it was a proposal to dissolve SML by transferring all the full timers, offices and equipment to a new SSP and to wind-up the cohesive revolutionary organisation that had been built in Scotland over decades of work.

Not surprisingly the overwhelming majority of the leadership and the national sections of the CWI opposed this. The CWI leadership proposed instead two possible alternatives. Option 1 was to relaunch SML as a Marxist SSP affiliated to the CWI  and Option 2 was to support the creation of the SSP as a broad socialist party but also to maintain an organised and well-resourced Marxist force within the SSP. After 6 months of debate and discussion the majority of SML voted to go ahead with the launching of the SSP while effectively dissolving themselves into the broader party.

McCombes claims in Downfall that this debate was tantamount to the CWI leaders “moving to crush the rebellious Scots” as “we came under siege as they denounced our plan for being reckless, irresponsible and disloyal.” This comment would not be out of place in Mel Gibson’s enjoyable Braveheart film, but it’s also as about as historically accurate as large parts of the movie itself. In truth what took place was a democratic debate over his and the majority of the SML leadership’s plans to end the work of our Marxist organisation in Scotland.

Clear in their opposition from the beginning were stalwarts of Militant in Scotland including Ronnie and Eric Stevenson. In the end there was an agreement to maintain a separate CWI platform in the SSP, although it was a much looser grouping called the International Socialist Movement (ISM). The debate at all levels of the CWI was nothing other than open, democratic and involved a thorough examination of the SML leadership’s proposals.    

In fact the CWI World Congress of 1998, while putting on record its strong opposition to the way in which the SSP was launched went on to say:

“This Congress does not believe that the proposals put forward by the SML EC for the organisation of its members in Scotland are adequate for the functioning of a cohesive revolutionary organisation based upon the policy, programme and methods supported by the CWI and its sections.

“Congress appeals to all comrades in Scotland to fully participate in this process with a view to correcting what the CWI believes is a major political and organisational mistake.

Extract from a resolution agreed by the 1998 CWI World Congress

No expulsion or threats of expulsion, no “venom and fury” from the CWI as Downfall claims. Instead a commitment to continue the discussions around the fundamental political issues that surrounded the Scottish debate. In fact prior to the SSP leaders leaving the CWI in 2001 they proposed an “amicable divorce” – seeking an agreement for a mutual parting of the ways. The CWI leadership who wanted the ISM to remain in the CWI and to continue the discussion opposed this. They were confident that over time and through experience the majority of the ISM membership would be convinced of the need to rebuild a revolutionary organisation in Scotland.
 
The period of the 1990’s was a difficult and complex time for socialists and Marxists internationally. As Peter Taaffe a leading member of the CWI and the Socialist Party in England and Wales summarised in his book Marxism in Today’s World

“The situation in the 1990s proved to be difficult terrain for the CWI and others who stood on the left, particularly the socialist and Marxist-Trotskyist left. The collapse of Stalinism ushered in an entirely different period to that which had confronted previous generations in the 20th Century; it was the most difficult, in a sense, for 50 years.
 
No other Trotskyist ‘International’ understood so quickly and clearly the main features of the situation which flowed from the collapse of the Berlin Wall as the CWI. With the Berlin Wall collapsed not just Stalinism but also the planned economies of Eastern Europe and the Soviet Union.

By this, he meant that liberal, capitalist democracy could not be improved upon. It was, therefore, the only form of organisation of society which was now possible or desirable.”

It was clear to the CWI that the process by which the ex-workers parties were being transformed into capitalist formations necessitated the building of new mass workers parties. We were unique in understanding this process. The position of the CWI and the majority of its sections internationally was to advocate the building of new mass workers parties and encouraging all genuine steps in this direction, while also continuing to build distinct and cohesive Marxist organisations.  

The sections of the CWI have and are participating in a number of new left formations internationally in an effort to help build political representation for workers and young people. Most recently the Socialist Party in Ireland initiated the United Left Alliance – a grouping of left parties, independents and campaigns – which had 5 TDs elected in the general election. Joe Higgins and Clare Daly were elected for the Socialist Party (CWI). In Germany the CWI section participate in Die Linke – the Left Party. In France we work in the NPA, the anti-capitalist party, in Brazil we helped establish the PSoL and there are many other examples of our combined approach of advocating new mass workers parties while building our own Marxist forces.      

Despite the claims in Downfall the CWI supported the setting up of the SSP. But we insisted on continuing with the maintenance and building of a clearly identified Marxist trend within the SSP. In contrast Alan McCombes with the support of Tommy Sheridan and the other SSP leaders abandoned this task. That was the fundamental point of difference during the debate. In reality the debate that took place in the ranks of the CWI over the launch of the SSP was over the need to maintain a revolutionary party, policy and programme. The Scottish leadership had drawn the conclusion that this was outdated, outmoded and historically redundant.

Their abandonment of the revolutionary party was a direct result of the experience of the 1990’s, the throwing back of political consciousness and the certain isolation faced by Marxists at that time. The leaders of the SSP in launching the party in the way that they did were already breaking from a consistent socialist position and seeking to liquidate the Marxist forces that had been built in Scotland under the banner of Militant. At its height Militant had over 500 members and played a leading role in the mass anti-poll tax struggle. Ironically, the success of the SSP in its initial stages was overwhelmingly based on the political authority and base of support build up by Militant and SML over years and decades of work, both in Scotland and Britain.  

Alan McCombes and the other SSP leaders, including Tommy Sheridan, who was by this time elected to the Scottish parliament, left the CWI in January 2001. They had refused to continue the discussions with the CWI and in early 2000 a minority faction was formed within the ISM to fight for the rebuilding of a Marxist organisation in Scotland.

Following the split the minority faction became the Scottish section of the CWI – now called Socialist Party Scotland. From the beginning we found ourselves in opposition to the political backsliding of the SSP leadership who were moving rapidly away from the political ideas they once stood for. This was reflected in a number of key debates that took place over the political programme and direction that the SSP should take.

Nor were there any demands for the renationalisation of those industries that were privatised during the 1980s and 1990s. The manifesto said the aim of the SSP was to build a “social Europe” rather than a socialist Europe. McCombes and the SSP leaders opposed amendments from SSP branches that called for the party to advocate a socialist Europe.  

The SSP leadership highlighted the examples of Denmark and Norway as models for how an independent Scotland that taxed the rich could operate. Denmark has “some of the most impressive public services in the world” claimed the manifesto. This was no more than support for a 1960’s-type of Scandinavian social democratic model for capitalism with a socialist Scotland pushed off into the dim and distant future.

The CWI platform of the SSP in contrast argued for support “for increased taxation on the rich linked to a though-going programme for democratic public ownership of big businesses and for a socialist Europe as the only long-term solution to poverty and unemployment.” Against the backdrop of the crisis engulfing Europe with Greece, Spain, Portugal, Ireland facing economic collapse, mass movements and the possible break-up of the Eurozone, how timid and inadequate does the SSP’s 2004 manifesto seem today ?

Similarly over the national question in Scotland there was an increasing turn to left nationalist ideas. McCombes claims in his book that he and Frances Curran worked together to gradually push SML from 1995 on towards “a more clear-cut pro-independence stance”  – which the CWI leadership only supported through “gritted teeth”

Militant and the CWI have always taken a sensitive and principled position on the right of nations to self-determination. We base our approach on the analysis made by Marxists, including Lenin and Trotsky, They fought for a policy that advocated the right for nations and minorities to self-determination, up to and including the right of independence. They argued against outstanding revolutionaries like Rosa Luxemburg – who felt this was a concession to nationalism. At the same time the Bolsheviks stood implacably for the unity of the working class regardless of nationality or religion. This was summed up in their idea of a voluntary and democratic socialist federation of states.

The CWI position’s was extensively explained in September 2003 by our statement on Scotland and the National Question.

“Some on the left, including the official Labour left in Scotland in 1979 dismissed the very existence of a Scottish national consciousness. People like Robin Cook, who at that time stood on the left of the Labour Party campaigned against devolution. Others equated support for national independence as a reactionary idea. This led them to oppose calls for devolution or national independence as a diversion from the struggle for socialism.

To take account of this change in consciousness in 1998 Scottish Militant Labour, the then Scottish section of the CWI, changed it’s programme on the national question. With the support of the CWI internationally we advocated an independent socialist Scotland which would link up with a socialist England, Wales and Ireland in a socialist confederation or alliance.”

Extract from Socialists and the National Question – Written by CWI Scotland in September 2003. The full statement can be seen at https://www.socialistpartyscotland.org.uk/news-a-analysis/scottish-politics/158-scotland-and-the-national-question

SML’s 1998 conference that voted to update our programme on the national question and support an independent socialist Scotland was backed by the CWI international leadership.  This change was an attempt to reach those workers and young people who looked to Scottish independence as a solution with socialist ideas. We did so by putting the idea of independence in the context of socialism and also explained the need to unite the working class by linking the struggles of the Scottish workers to those of workers in England, Wales and Ireland. Even then, while being extremely sympathetic to those who had illusions in nationalism and supported independence, we always sought to link that to the struggle for socialism as the only lasting solution to the nightmare of life under capitalism.  

Effectively McCombes was proposing a political block between the SSP and the SNP. The CWI in  Scotland opposed this move because we believed the SSP leadership’s proposals would lead to the submerging of socialist ideas into a convention whose role would be to promote the benefits of capitalist independence.

Rather than strengthening the forces of socialism such a “popular front” for independence would serve only to weaken and disorientate the forces of socialism while bolstering those of nationalism. Against the backdrop of falling support for independence the convention failed to take off.
 
A number of the SSP MSPs continued to put the case for an independent capitalist Scotland. Carolyn Leckie, a SSP MSP in 2004 in parliament said:” Nothing less than full independence is what the people of Scotland need to save our NHS.” In fact an independent Scotland based on capitalism would not save the NHS, but would inflict savage cuts – particularly in this period of capitalist crisis and austerity.  

This and many other examples indicate the fundamental breach made by the SSP leaders from the ideas and approach of Marxism. In contrast the CWI in Scotland argued for support for an independent socialist Scotland linked to a socialist confederation with England, Wales and Ireland. We sought to ensure the SSP’s political independence from pro-capitalist forces, including the SNP.  Today, the Socialist Party Scotland (CWI) supports a multi-option referendum on Scotland’s future and we will campaign for a socialist Scotland and a parliament with full powers over the economy, the minimum wage, benefits etc.

By the time the November 2004 crisis over tabloid stories about Tommy Sheridan’s private life erupted, the SSP leadership were in headlong retreat from the ideas and principles they once defended. Disarmed politically they capitulated in the most abject manner when the Murdoch press came calling for the SSP’s leading figure. Downfall illustrates very clearly that they decided that Tommy Sheridan should be sacrificed to “protect the party”. In doing so they ensured the destruction of the party itself and were indeed authors of their own downfall.

Despite our political differences with Tommy Sheridan and the rest of the SSP leadership we strived might and main to urge a different path for the party. We fully participated in building the SSP, its elections campaigns, trade union work and more besides. We raised criticisms not for personal reasons or to settle old scores as McCombes believes, but to ensure that the SSP did not fail. As we wrote in November 2004
 
“The CWI in Scotland has worked for and welcomed the impact the SSP has made in the last few years. It has succeeded it attracting a new generation of workers and young people to the idea of socialism. The affiliation of the RMT union to the SSP has underlined the potential that exists to build socialist ideas among the organised trade union movement. Anything that undermines this represents a blow to the socialist movement in general. “

McCombes accuses the CWI of supporting Tommy Sheridan and not the actions of the SSP leadership because the CWI were “out for revenge against me” for breaking with the CWI and of supporting “the Cult of the Great Leader”. The “control freak” Peter Taaffe had “never forgiven Frances Curran and me for our role in freeing the Scottish Left from London control.”  We can only mourn to read such bile from an individual who played a positive role in the ranks of Militant for 20 years before his capitulation to the 1990’s and subsequent move to the right.

There are hundreds of thousands of people in Scotland screaming out for an alternative to the tired establishment parties. All of whom are pursuing variants of the same destructive neo-liberal capitalist agenda. Despite the political differences we have with him we support Tommy Sheridan playing a central role in that alongside the hundreds of ordinary SSP members and the thousands of trade unionists, young people and anti-war activists who want to build a fighting principled socialist movement.”

CWI Scotland press statement September 9th 2006

The RMT did indeed vote to sever its links with the SSP. Their affiliation to the SSP in 2004 earned their expulsion from Blair’s New Labour Party. The Scotland No2 branch of the CWU also disaffiliated from the SSP in the wake of the defamation case. The big majority of the active trade union members left the SSP, with many joining Solidarity.

The 2007 elections to the Scottish parliament saw Solidarity emerge with the largest socialist vote. Solidarity polled 31,066 (1.6% of the national vote) votes to the SSP’s 12,831 (0.6%). In Glasgow Tommy Sheridan and Solidarity won 8,525 votes which was 4.15% of the Glasgow wide vote compared to only 2,579 – 1.25% for the SSP. This was however 2,000 votes short of Tommy being elected and all 6 SSP MSP’s elected in 2003 lost their seats.

Following the perjury investigation and the full force of the police and Crowns’ vendetta which led eventually to the trial and jailing of Tommy Sheridan, Solidarity was pushed back and could only poll 0.4% in May’s elections.

The task of building a fighting left and socialist alternative to the parties of cuts is already under way and will grow in the months and years ahead. Socialist Party Scotland, who are playing a leading role in the anti-cuts movement are calling for a widespread anti-cuts challenge for next year’s Scottish local government elections. A coalition of candidates prepared to stand on a platform of no cuts, support for workers and communities opposing cuts and for the setting of needs budgets.

Jim Cameron a leading trade unionist, anti-poll tax campaigner and member of Militant in the 80’s and early 90’s wrote to the Herald in response
 
“In last Saturday’s edition of your newspaper your “Investigations Editor “Paul Hutcheon used the excuse of reviewing Alan McCombes’s book Downfall to launch a vitriolic, personalised, and thoroughly unprofessional attack on Tommy Sheridan.

Paul Hutcheon rejoices in the fact that Tommy Sheridan is in prison, describing his imprisonment as “a happy ending”. He would have done better to balance whatever faults Tommy Sheridan has and whatever mistakes he has made with the contribution he made over many years of his political career, and to regret the fact that his qualities and commitment are not now available at a time when they are so badly needed.”  

But perhaps it’s the last page of Downfall that is the most significant. McCombes admits to having “voluntarily stepped down from the frontline to make way for a new generation.” No longer active in socialist struggle and on the evidence of this book seemingly prepared to make his peace with capitalism, McCombes future lies elsewhere as a “freelance writer and journalist”.

His cynical and self-serving parting shot is a book that deserves to be treated with disdain from an individual who has deserted Marxism. Downfall is a crude and dishonourable attempt to justify his and the SSP leaderships’ role in the prosecution of Tommy Sheridan and the destruction of the SSP. Under the banner of Marxism and socialism Alan McCombes fought for many years. Today he debases himself with character assassination, anti-Marxist rhetoric and abuse dressed up as “integrity”, “morality” and “truth”

In contrast, those of us who are striving to build a socialist alternative to a rotten and corrupt capitalism will continue on. The work of the Socialist Party in Scotland and the CWI internationally is going from strength to strength. Powerful new mass parties of the working class will emerge under the hammer blow of events to challenge the capitalist elite. Above all a new generation of workers and young people will find in the ideas of Marxism and scientific socialism an answer to this world of crisis. A socialist future and a socialist world that will end poverty, unemployment and war for all time.