We Need a New Workers’ Party
One ‘leading critic’ of Gordon Brown summed up 12 years of New Labour rule when he declared; “It is one thing to lose to the Tories, but actually to do so badly that we are letting in the fascists is quite another”.
Ian Leech, Unison shop steward Glasgow
The MP’s expenses scandal – outright thievery to most people – has thrown the political establishment into a crisis. But a crisis for politicians who fought so hard to supplement their £65,000 a year salary with £300 a month in food allowances, moat cleaning, home and garden repairs and public money to buy houses while they cash in on the profits is unrecognisable to most people living through the biggest recession in modern times.
What may be a ‘crisis’ for MP’s legitimacy and careers is in no way comparable when measured against the pain and hardship currently being experienced by millions of working class people facing a catastrophe of debt, homelessness and job losses.
Throughout the European elections and the scandal of MP’s expenses, time and again working class people in the workplaces or on the streets would ask the question “who is there to vote for?”
MP’s from all parties (SNP included) are being exposed for making either frivolous or blatant fraudulent claims against the taxpayer, but it is New Labour, as the party in power, who got hit the hardest. As a result we now face the horrendous prospect of a return of a Tory government under David Cameron.
The MP’s expenses scandal, rocketing unemployment, the collapse of the Labour vote and the election of two members of the fascist BNP have demonstrated, once again, the need for a new party of the working class.
This is why the RMT General Secretary Bob Crow’s declaration in favour of a new party that must be rooted in the Trades Unions and the communities is so welcome.
A party that would stand as the genuine voice of working class people and campaign both locally and nationally against the impact of the capitalist crisis and the parties that support this rotten system could grow rapidly.
A workers party whose MP’s and MSPs would be prepared to live on a workers wage like Joe Higgins is doing now as an elected MEP in Ireland and as Tommy Sheridan in the Scottish parliament and Dave Nellist, Pat Wall and Terry Fields at Westminster have done when they were elected socialists.
The No2EU – Yes to Democracy campaign set up for the Euro elections which was led by the RMT and involved representatives from militant struggles like the Visteon workers, Limamar and Lindsay Oil as well as Solidarity and the Socialist Party in England and Wales was a first step in the process of providing that alternative for working class people.
Now the next step needs to be taken. The International Socialists intends to fully commit to supporting all steps towards the creation and building of a new party of the working class as an important step forward in achieving the goal of a socialist society.
