Which way forward for the Left? a mass Communist Party or a broad left socialist movement?

 Is it possible to salvage anything from the Corbyn Project or is the socialist left destined to talk to itself?

Register in advance for this webinar here or here

Tonight we had the launch meeting of the new Socialist Labour Network (LAW/LIEN) and 150 people attended. Ian Hodson, President of the Bakers Union was the guest speaker.

The process of forming a new organisation began at the end of November when All Members Meetings of Labour-in-Exile-Network and Labour Against the Witchhunt voted to merge into a single organisation. Both LAW and LIEN had been proscribed by Labour’s National Executive Committee last July 20^th.

Orgreave when the Police were used as Thatcher's cavalry to destroy the strike

The decision of the 2 organisations to merge was taken in the teeth of opposition from Labour Party Marxism which is the Communist Party of Great Britain in the Labour Party. 5 of the 6 members of LAW’s Steering Committee were also opposed to the merger and 4 of them explained their reasons in a statement Why we resigned.

This was accompanied by an article both in Weekly Worker and on the LPM website Something serious is needed: confronting Tony Greenstein and Merging into a cul-de-sac. I replied with Not a liquidation? and Self-declared heretic replies.

The fact that the CPGB and its leading theoretician Jack Conrad felt the need to personalise a political disagreement suggests that the CPGB is finding it difficult to mount a sustainable argument.

LPM insisted, contrary to all the evidence, that what was being proposed was not a merger but a liquidation and notwithstanding the evidence they have continued to insist that this is the case.

My article, for which I had provided a heading ‘Why the merger of LAW and LIEN is not a liquidation’ was retitled Not a liquidation? It was also accompanied by a subheadline ‘Abandoning any pretence of class politics, Tony Greenstein defends what he calls the ‘merger’ of LAW and LIEN and advocates yet another ‘transitional’ halfway-house broad front’

Despite Conrad admitting that ‘LAW has done very little, has been paralysed even’ my argument that LAW had not been liquidated was described as ‘clearly a pedantic attempt to pull wool over eyes.’ Conrad continues to argue that

‘while the words ‘liquidation’ and ‘closing down’ did not appear in motion 1, only someone who wants to cover up, to obfuscate, to hoodwink, would object to such an assessment.’

Such an unnecessary expenditure of verbs! To allege that your political opponents are, effectively, lying is not the way to conduct a comradely debate. And the evidence for such an assertion?  Zilch.

Black Lives Matter demonstration in Brighton

As far as the CPGB and other far-left groups are concerned the key task is to form a revolutionary socialist or communist party with which capitalism can be brought to an end. And suffice to say they have the key to the holy grail.

Many of us saw the Corbyn movement as a quite momentous political event. Hundreds of thousands of people joined the Labour Party. It made a profound effect politically and at the 2017 General Election, millions of people voted for a radical, not revolutionary, manifesto.  But for the sabotage of Labour’s right-wing, Corbyn could have won. As it is he obtained the largest swing since 1945 for Labour. One thing is for certain.  It put the frighteners on the British establishment. It also showed the potential for radicalism in Britain.

Elbit's factory in Oldham - they've had enough and are closing

But to the CPGB what happened under Corbyn Project was merely a diversion. An inevitable failure. Jack lays out his stall thus:

‘What needs to be understood is that socialist - ie, Marxist - parties, are built top-down, not bottom-up. What is primary is the programme: ie, theory. It is from there to the masses and in the process, of course, theory is enriched, concretised, taken to new heights. It should also be understood that Marxist parties do not require revolutionary conditions in order to grow. They can grow in peaceful, seemingly almost uneventful, conditions.’

The idea of even thinking about building a socialist movement outside the Labour Party is given short shrift. It is what they call a half way house, a Labour Party Mark II. What is needed in their eyes is to jump from a small revolutionary group to a mass revolutionary Communist  Party without even pausing for breath.

Labour needs be refounded as a united front of a special kind and politically armed with a Marxist programme and put under a tried and tested Marxist leadership.

BLM demo in Chichester, a town 30 miles from Brighton

What then of the Corbyn movement itself?  Jack doesn’t pull his punches.

what was notable about them - especially, sad to say, the younger generation - is that they were not politically determined, not politically educated and therefore did not fully engage. They voted Jeremy Corbyn against Owen Smith, but had not much of a clue when it came to national executive elections.

My own view is that we are not in revolutionary conditions or a pre-revolutionary period. On the contrary we are in a period of deep reaction, symbolised by Brexit, which was a project of the Right and far-Right.

Black Lives Matter demonstration in Brighton

We need to look to our strengths and weaknesses. Trade union strike action has been at an all time low. Unions today are half the size they were under Thatcher.  Yet at the same time we have seen the rise of social movements like Black Lives Matter, Extinction Rebellion and direct action groups like Palestine Action. The question for socialists is how we can relate to and generalise from the specific. We need to be able to make the connection between climate change and environmental destruction and the nature of capitalism and how it operates. In other words socialism needs to be made relevant.

Only this week we learnt that Palestine Action had chalked up its first victory, the closure of Elbit’s factory in Oldham. I have a personal investment in this campaign as I’m presently out on bail for taking part in an action. It demonstrates that direct action can work. It is no accident that Palestine Solidarity Campaign, which is controlled by the former Trotskyist Socialist Action denounced Palestine Action in the strongest terms.

Black Lives Matter demonstration in Brighton

Other issues include a theoretical assessment of the period we are in, the decline of trade union power, the conservatism of a working class that is supposed to be the agent of revolutionary change and asking questions such as whether revolution is even possible in the heart of the imperialist beast.

Come to the debate and take part!

Tony Greenstein

Join the Fightback this Friday at the Founding Meeting of the Socialist Labour Network (LAW/LIEN)

Help Us Build a Socialist Movement by Organising Grassroots CLPs 

To attend the meeting please first join either:

https://membermojo.co.uk/labouragainstthewitchhunt

https://membermojo.co.uk/lien

(£10 waged/£5 unwaged)

At the end of November All Members Meetings of Labour-in-Exile-Network and Labour Against the Witchhuntt voted to merge into a single organisation. LIEN members voted by 4-1 and Labour Against the Witchhunt members voted, despite vociferous opposition from Labour Party Marxism/Communist Party of Great Britain members 47-27 to do likewise.

Ian Hodson, Guest Speaker and President of the Bakers Union

The founding meeting of the new organisation was to have been on December 17. Unfortunately too many people tried to get in! Our Zoom facility only catered for 100. We have ensured that this time around up to 500 people will be accommodated so, just to make sure you get in, please sign in early!

Name

The Steering Committee has proposed that the name of the new organisation should be Socialist Labour Network (LAW/LIEN). There are however 7 other proposals and you can find them all here

The Witchhunt

It is or should be obvious that it is impossible to fight against the witchhunt inside the Labour Party. The reason is very simple. As Ken Loach put it ‘democracy is dead inside the Labour Party.’ If you put your head above the parapet it is chopped off by some anonymous bureaucrat. An insidious culture of informing has been cultivated that is modelled on the Stasi and Gestapo.

Anonymous nerds, incapable of constructing a single coherent sentence or having an original thought don't have to face the task of explaining their reactionary politics. All they have to do is send an email  to Labour’s Disputes Team fingering someone and the suspension letter will go out the next day.

You might not thing that Starmer and his clones have a sense of humour but you would be wrong. Virtually every candidate for suspension/expulsion accused of ‘anti-Semitism’ was also accused of ‘undermining Labour’s campaign against racism.’ You may indeed wonder what this fight consists of given the number of Jewish and Black/Muslim members expelled. However in the Orwellian world of Starmer and Evans fulsome support for Israeli Apartheid is compatible with fighting racism!

Sonali at the  Labour Grassroots meeting on January 2^nd

Momentum, CLPD and the Socialist Campaign Group have been cowed into silence

If anyone has any doubts about the fear and cowardice of what’s left of the Left in the Labour Party about fighting Starmer and the Witchhunt then all you need to do is to watch Sonali Bhattacharyya, co-Chair of Momentum. Sonali who appeared on Labour Grassroots on 2^nd January. Sonali reacted with a mixture of arrogance and affront to peoples' criticism. 

Crispin got off to a bad start when he asked Sonali about Momentum’s strategy to fight what is happening in the Labour Party and to make it more attractive. So badly did she take the criticism that she has told Crispin Flint, the genial compare of the show, that she will have nothing to do with him or Labour Grassroots ever again.

Sonali Bhattacharyya

When asked why Momentum has failed to campaign against the witchhunt or support expelled members, which Jackie Walker challenged her on, she simply refused to answer parroting the statement that Momentum has supported hundreds of members legally. Even if this is true, and it is open to doubt since no one will admit to having been helped, this is insufficient.

Legal help on an individual basis is not the same as campaigning to end the expulsions, the witchhunt and Starmer himself. Momentum have failed to make it clear that Starmer, Evans and his neo-Blairite strategy is the enemy. They have been cowed into silence. Nearly 2 years ago Sonali and Forward Momentum ousted Lansman’s cronies in the elections. Since then they have maintained a Trappist Silence. They have neither been seen, heard or said anything of note.  

Labour Against the Witchhunt

I was the only 1 of 6 members of the LAW Steering Committee to support the merger. Subsequently 4 of them penned a statement Why we resigned. To his credit Steve Price, although part of the majority that opposed the merger refused to sign that statement. Steve is now standing for the new Committee. I hope that he is elected. Those who decided not merely to throw their toys out of the pram but to junk the pram altogether justified their decision by writing:

We cannot support the view that the struggle against the Labour witch-hunt is over, or that “LAW has outlived its usefulness”, as Tony Greenstein, the proposer of the motion to merge, put it.

The problem is I never said anything of the sort! What I did say was that LAW had outlived its usefulness, but they are not one and the same thing. The fight against Labour’s witchhunt will be carried out largely outside the Labour Party and in the unions. Organising within the Labour Party is not possible and that is why nearly 2/3 of LAW members supported my motion.

There has been a considerable debate in the pages of Weekly Worker despite their annoying habit of using headlines and subheadlines, not to describe my articles but to attack them! Innovative journalism. See at the bottom for details of the various articles and statements.

The Agenda

The meeting will be opened by Ian Hodson, the expelled President of the Bakers' Union. In addition to adopting a new name we will be electing a new Steering Committee. The joint Steering Committee of LAW/LIEN is proposing that the Committee should be 10 strong. There will be 17 candidates for the positions.

To participate in the meeting, you have to be a paid-up member of either group. To join, you can sign up via this link: https://membermojo.co.uk/lien. 

We intend to build and network shadow socialist CLPs as part of our local campaigning work.

Agenda

RECONVENED FIRST ALL MEMBERS’ MEETING OF LAW WITH LIEN 

14th January 2022

By ZOOM 

1	18:00	Meeting begins/final entry checks
2	18:05	Welcome from Chair of Meeting (Esther)
3	18:10	Speaker to be confirmed
4	18:20	Debate to inform formulation of Aims and Priorities Aims and priorities of the consolidated organisation here  (Norman to introduce) Member discussion (contributions no more than 3 minutes)   Draft Priorities to inform debate and based on interim discussion with members and joint steering committee Priorty 1: Opposition to witch-hunt here Priority 2: Establishment of Shadow CLPs and networks here Priority 3: Education Programme (for future agreement)
5	19:20	Name of Consolidated Organisation: SC proposal: “Socialist Labour Network (LAW with LIEN)” Proposed by Roger Silverman Further proposed names to be included in poll- to be returned to SC by cop 12th Jan. Updated list here Proposers to have one minute to speak. Members to vote for their preferred name (1 vote)
6	19:30	Election of Steering Committee. Nomination statements here. Data protection role to be assigned by the new steering committee. Each nominee is allocated 1 minute to speak. Zoom poll.
7	19:50	Next Steps
8	20:00	Meeting Close

 

Proposed standing Orders

Voting     

1.. Please click ‘Raise Hand’ if you want to speak (either in ‘Participants’ on the right hand side or ‘Reactions’ on the bottom of your screen). Alternatively write ‘I want to speak’ in the Chat.

3. For items 4, 5 and 6, we intend to use ZOOM polls. If you want to vote, we recommend that you have access to a device of your own. If this is not possible (and you are sharing a device), we will count manually raised hands.

Points of Order  

1. Attendees are urged to raise points of order only when necessary and reasonable. Attendees can raise points of order regarding conduct or procedures by pressing the blue thumbs down button (under ‘More’ at the bottom of the ‘Participants’ panel). Alternatively, describe your point of order in the Chat window.

2. The Chair’s ruling on any point arising from the rules or standing orders is final unless challenged by not less than two members; such a challenge shall be put to the meeting and be carried with a simple majority of those voting at the meeting.

Emergency motions

1. Emergency motions may be accepted at the discretion of the chair (decisions on admitting emergency motions can be overturned by a simple majority of conference).

2. We will accept new amendments to emergency motions only. Please write them down and present them in the ‘Chat’ window, with a clear indication of where it should go.

Discussion on the Merger in Weekly Worker

Why we resigned

Merging into a cul-de-sac

Not a liquidation?

Something serious is needed

Self-declared heretic replies

Labour Against the Witchhunt and Labour-in-Exile-Network Vote to Merge into a Single Organisation

 A Single Anti-Witchhunt Organisation Committed to Build Shadow CLPs Can Only Strengthen the Fight Against Starmer

Fringe Meeting at 2018 Liverpool Conference (left to right) - Jo Bird, Tony Greenstein, the late Tony Mulhearn, Anya Ndwuke (chair), Chris Williamson, Alexei Sayle

Last Friday night members of Labour-in-Exile-Network voted by 31-8 to merge with Labour Against the Witchhunt. The following night LAW, at its first All Members Meeting for 3 months also voted to support a merger, albeit by a narrower but decisive majority of 47-27 with 12 abstentions.

The successful Resist at the Rialto events in Brighton during the Labour conference were organised jointly with LIEN, LAW and Resist

Members of both organisations voted to form a single organisation dedicated not only to fighting the witchhunt but to campaign on a broader basis. We have an NHS that is being privatised, a Police Bill which is a massive encroachment on civil liberties, a Nationality and Immigration Bill which will result in more deaths in the Channel. The idea that the only game in the town is the Witchhunt is an obsession. Starmer has just given a speech to Labour Friends of Israel saying that the Israel of pogroms against Palestinians is a ‘rumbustious democracy’.

It is unfortunate that the majority of the LAW Steering Committee, having lost the argument and the vote have resigned rather than accepting the view of LAW members. Their argument is summed up in this week’s Weekly Worker that we are ‘Deserting the Fight’. No comrades we are refusing to allow the fight against Starmer and his neo-liberal politics to be confined to simply machinations in the Labour Party.

Motion 1 in favour of the merger was passed with one amendment. The second motion, opposing the merger, moved by supporters of Labour Party Marxism therefore fell automatically.

At a time when thousands of Labour Party members are either under ‘investigation’, suspended or expelled, it makes obvious sense that two organisations that agree on all the fundamental questions facing socialists, inside and outside the Labour Party, should merge. The Left has been historically weakened because of unnecessary splits over minor points of theological doctrine.

2019 Fringe Meeting with Ken Livingstone, Jackie Walker, Alexei Sayle and Chris Williamson

Opponents of the merger, primarily Labour Party Marxism argued that there is still much work to be done fighting the witchhunt. That is true but conditions have changed massively since the Corbyn witchhunt began in 2016. This point was made eloquently in an introductory speech by Graham Bash, the recently expelled Political Officer of Jewish Voices for Labour and someone who was a member of Labour for 53 years.

Graham emphasised that the scale and reach of Starmer’s witchhunt is bigger than anything that the Labour Party has ever experienced in its history. Previously particular groups like Militant were targeted.  Now it is anyone on the socialist left who speaks out against the leadership. People like Pamela Fitzpatrick of CLPD, a well respected local councillor in Harrow, the recipient of abuse by right-wing trolls, has been expelled whilst her abusers have got off scot-free. The suspension of a previous Labour Party leader, Jeremy Corbyn, is itself unprecedented.

LAW picket of Jackie Walker's Disciplinary Hearing

When nearly all the Left capitulated to the false ‘anti-Semitism’ attacks LAW was virtually alone in standing up to the Zionists and and people like Margaret Hodge. We organised pickets of the disciplinary hearings of Marc Wadsworth and Jackie Walker, organised well-attended fringe meetings at Labour Party Conference and gave support to Ken Livingstone, Chris Williamson and others.

We also led, with JVL, the campaign against the adoption by the Labour Party of the IHRA misdefinition of anti-Semitism with a large picket of the NEC meeting in September 2019 which adopted the IHRA.  We warned then that far from putting the ‘anti-Semitism’ attacks to bed they would increase in volume.

Jo Bird's reaction to her expulsion, that she is glad to get out of the Labour Party, is a typical reaction. Labour Party Marxists simply don't understand that people don't want to stay in Labour's poisonous cavern

Unfortunately Corbyn and Jennie Formby chose not to listen to us and they embarked on a policy of appeasement of the Right. At meeting after meeting I repeated the same message that the expulsion of Jackie, Marc and myself was not about us – we were collateral damage – the real target was Corbyn himself. That should be clear even to the most venal and stupid member of Momentum, even to Jon Lansman, now that Corbyn himself has lost the Whip.

When you don't like the way members voted you describe it as a 'hostile takeover' - this is the attitude of the trade union bureaucracy to democracy in the unions 

The throwing under the bus of Chris Williamson, Ken Livingstone and many others like Pete Willsman and Christine Shawcroft, simply whetted the appetite of Margaret Hodge and the JLM. When Corbyn opposed Open Selection he signed his own death warrant. When he and Formby proposed ‘fast track’ expulsions they laid the basis for Starmer’s purge and Corbyn’s own suspension.

But the opponents of merging the two organisations wanted people to believe that LAW today is the same as it was 2-3 years ago. That simply is not true.  In the past 6 months LAW has done relatively little other than with LIEN. On LAW’s own website there is no activity registered since the Resist at the Rialto in late September. The fact is that there is next to nothing we can do to fight the witchhunt inside the Labour Party because there is no democracy left.

LAW has no branches today - it has a passive membership

On July 20^th LAW and LIEN organised the well attended picket of Labour’s NEC at Southside and during the Labour Party conference we organised a whole series of alternative events at the Resist at the Rialto in Brighton. It makes sense to merge into one group.

You only need to look at the Wikipedia entry for LAW. It lists a whole series of our activities but stops in May 2019. The reality is that LAW has been on a life support system for the past two years. Before the last AGM membership had plummeted by one-third. Ironically the only thing that restored LAW’s previous membership was Starmer/Evans decision to proscribe LAW!

The Steering Committee which has met fitfully in recent months has failed to involve members in its work or bring them aboard. There are no separate working groups or strands. Members are just passive observers. LAW is not the campaign it was when we had regular monthly All Members Meeting. Members of the Labour Party are reluctant even to be seen on pickets or demonstrations when that will be taken as support for LAW and instant expulsion.

The preamble to the first motion began with Ken Loach’s statement:

‘democracy is dead in the labour party...this is a political vacuum, this is the biggest challenge to the left in my lifetime,  we do need a new political movement, across the whole left, inside the Labour Party and outside, it’s got to be ready to become a party when the time is right.... Otherwise we fragment. People are leaving and we will fragment. At this critical moment when you have this mass of people just driven out of the party where are they going to go? If we miss this opportunity it is a very black outlook.’

What then were the arguments of opponents of the merger? LPM has always taken the position that there is nothing in between the Labour Party, a bourgeois workers party in their eyes, and a revolutionary Marxist Party. All or nothing and they get nothing.

The late Tony Mulhearn - one of the heroes of the Liverpool Council refusal to set a rate in the 1980s, who came under attack from Kinnock

The CPGB didn’t always take this position having participated first in the Socialist Alliance, Respect and Left Unity. The CPGB/LPM have never explained the change in their tactics from opposition to ‘autolabourism’ to a devotion to labourism! In 1997 they refused to support a vote for Labour at the General Election. Now they damn anyone who even thinks of standing against Labour!

Ironically the first person to propose a merger wasn’t me but Tina Werkmann. I urged caution! At the LAW AMM on July 24 a motion ‘to explore the merging of LAW and LIEN’ was passed. Moved by Tina it read:

 This meeting believes that:

4.     Unity is strength. While there are obvious political differences in the history of both groups, the composition of both memberships and some campaigning priorities, we believe that both groups have enough in common politically to justify a possible merger.  

5.     Such a merger would send out a strong signal to many of those who are feeling disheartened and politically disoriented by the current trajectory of the Labour Party. 

6.     It might encourage more people and groups to join our merged organisation. 

This meeting therefore resolves to start exploring a merger process between both organisations...

A Zionist Without Qualification

At a joint LLA, LAW and LIEN members and supporters meeting on October 14 Paragraph 6 of a motion Bringing the Left together moved by Tina was identically worded to Para. 4 above! Para. 7 of the same motion was almost identically worded to Para. 5 above.

A number of other amendments moved by Roger Silverman, Diana Isserlis and myself made Tina’s motion even more explicit.

For reasons that are not clear, Tina reversed her position and put out a paper Why a merger between Labour Against the Witchhunt and Labour In Exile Network is a bad idea Tina wrote:

There are a number of reasons why I personally oppose a merger at this moment in time, despite the fact that I initially proposed ‘exploring a merger’ between the groups. Yes, unity is strength, but this unity has to have a serious political purpose if it is to be effective. I would be very much in favour of building a democratic and socialist movement based on the revolutionary politics of Marxism. But that is not what is being discussed here, far from it.

But Tina knew back in July and October that neither LIEN nor LAW were revolutionary Marxists. What changed? A clue can be found in the accusation that the LIEN Steering Committee lacked ‘political incoherence.’ This incoherence ‘reflects the fact that the organisation has no clear political programme.’ Well neither LIEN nor LAW has such a programme. The point is to develop a program of ideas. 4 months ago that wasn’t a problem. Why now?

I understand why LPM opposea a merger. They consider that they, all 30 or so of them, are that organisation. In a motion to the LAW Steering Committee of 9^th November Stan Keable proposed:

to withdraw from the recent joint meetings with the steering committees of Labour in Exile Network and Labour Left Alliance, and to end LAW’s participation in joint all members and supporters meetings. 

The joint steering committee meetings, while nominally favouring continuing the struggle in the Labour Party, have in fact been dominated by proposals to orientate away from Labour, to give up on the struggle within Labour, and to attempt to create an alternative movement or party based on the failed politics of Corbynism, aiming to keep together the thousands of disillusioned comrades at all costs. ... we believe such a project will only add to the widespread demoralization and disorientation of the Labour left that already exists.

The LPM motion to the LAW All Members Meeting meeting of 27^th November LPM stated that:

We reject the proposed merger of LAW with the Labour in Exile Network, which we believe would effectively liquidate LAW and add to the widespread demoralization and disorientation of the Labour left that already exists.

LPM have always had a consistent policy, at least since the election of Jeremy Corbyn, that they reject the formation of any broad socialist group outside the Labour Party. Especially with those who espouse ‘the failed politics of Corbynism.’

Instead I was belaboured with the fact that I was in a minority of 1 on the LAW Steering Committee in favouring a merger. However the meeting on Saturday wasn’t particularly impressed either by Tina’s change of heart or LPM’s implacable opposition to anything smacking of what they call a Labour Party Mark 2.

What I didn’t expect was the bad faith reaction of both LPM and Tina to reject a democratic decision of LAW members and simply resign and refuse to implement the decision. On the LAW Steering Committee Whatsapp group Tina posted:

This feels very much like a hostile takeover and the only outcome is that it will close down LAW. Pretty shitty outcome.

On the LAW Facebook page Tina declared that the proposal to merge was a ‘Hostile takeover, really. Not sure it serves any purpose apart from closing down LAW.’ To which I responded that:

‘The Steering Committee opposed the merger. The members voted for it. Yes the members have taken LAW over as they realise it was going nowhere fast. Labour Party Marxists wanted to preserve LAW in aspic as a trophy that does very little.

You remind me of Bertold Brecht's satirical poem "Die Lösung" (The Solution) in which he portrays the East German communists, after crushing the 1953 German Workers Uprising of wanting to abolish the people and start again

Leaving aside the fact that Tina herself was proposing what she now calls a ‘hostile takeover’ this is unbelievably arrogant. LAW’s Steering Committee was clearly unrepresentative of the membership. It is the members who have taken it over. This reaction is similar to the reaction of the Labour Right in 2015 to the ‘hostile takeover’ of the Labour Party by the Corbynistas!

This is the language of a Board of Directors of a company to a takeover bid by some venture capitalist. It demonstrates a contempt for democracy. Instead of asking why, repeatedly, I have been in a minority on the Steering Committee yet not at All Members Meetings, Tina blames the members! Bertold Brecht captured this brilliantly in his poem The Solution.

It is often said that whatever their political differences, Trotskyist and Stalinist groups often have a very similar attitude to democracy. One only has to look at the SWP with its self-perpetuating leadership.

The reality is that socialists and socialism are being driven out of the Labour Party by Starmer – all in the name of fighting anti-Semitism! The opponents of the merger, instead of accepting that they were defeated, are now trying to make the creation of a unified organisation that much more difficult. The only people to gain from their actions will be Starmer and co. I would therefore appeal to them to pull back.

The creation of a unified organisation is not the ‘liquidation’ nor the closing down of LAW. There is nothing LAW could have done that it can’t do in a merged organisation. LIEN is obviously committed to fighting the witchhunt and always has been.

LIEN already has a Witchhunt Analysis Group amongst 7 other groups. LIEN is already far more active over the witchhunt than LAW. There is obvious room for an 8^th Anti-Witchhunt group.

At a time when Starmer has declared to the Labour Friends of Israel that the Israeli Military State is a rumbustious democracy, what is needed is a little more respect for democracy in our own ranks!

Tony Greenstein