One of the most interesting things about the last two years of working class struggles has been the complete inability of the Labour Left to play any significant role whatsoever. In the great industrial struggles the constituency left has played no role, and the 'great debate' between Jenkins and Foot evoked virtually no interest compared to, for example, the tremendous debates on German re-armament in the early 1950s. As so many political strategies either base themselves on a rise in the Labour left, or at least see it as a necessary stage through which the working class must pass, it is necessary to analyse carefully whether the present insignificance of the constituency left is purely a temporary phenomena, or whether it reflects more profound underlying causes.
historical survey One of the most remarkable things about the Labour left has always been its helplessness. A first examination must therefore look at its fundamental inability even within its own reformist terms, to make any dent whatsoever in the policy of the Labour Party.
Probably the best organised and certainly the most militant of all constituency 'left' groupings was the Socialist League of the early 1930s. This openly discussed the question of 'unconstitutional action, opposed the League of Nations as an "International Burglars Union" and called for a "Workers Government". The League became one of a core of left groupings that included various supporters of the C.P. and Bevan. Bevan was at that time going through a militant period and declared himself in favour of the General Strike as a political weapon. However, behind all the show of militancy in fact the Socialist League and the people around it were reformists to the core. When the Socialist League was banned by the Labour leadership it tamely dissolved itself. When Bevan declaring the danger of the "fascist threat" formed a Workers Defence Group he did not instruct it in how to fight but instead took it on long hikes across the South Wales mountains. Nevertheless, compared to later Tefts", the Socialist League and its followers were a positive hot bed of revolutionary fervour and agitation.
The next significant opposititional movement to appear inside the Labour Party were the Bevanites of the early 1950s. This was possibly larger than the Socialist League but was never a serious threat to the Right. In October 1952 the Bevanites won a considerable victory at the Labour Party conference when the Labour leaders Morrison and Dalton were removed from the National Executive Committee (NEC). Bevanites were elected to six of the seven NEC places voted on by the constituencies. However, in exactly the same month the Parliamentary Labour Party voted for an end to organised groups in the Party. The Bevanites tamely disbanded. In any case the Bevanite revolt of the 1950s bore only a superficial resemblance to the Socialist League of the 1930's: it was a 'left-wing' movement but it advocated no unconstitutional action, nor, more importantly, did it anticipate any from the right.
The last real fling of the Labour left was in the nuclear disarmament debates of the late 1950's. This was a far smaller and less organised affair than either the Bevanites or the Socialist League. In 1960 it was estimated that the left wing "Victory for Socialism' group had 400 members, while the right wing Campaign for Democratic Socialism claimed 3,011 members in the constituencies and between one fifth and one third of the C.L.P. Executive members. (Figures from The Newsletter, 30 Jan. 1960, S. Haesler, "The Gaitskellites")
The left having won, on the issue of nuclear disarmament at the 1960 Conference, it then plunged into headlong retreat. First they arranged a compromise with the right, which led to a defeat at the 1961 conference. The left then fell in behind Gaitskell at the 1962 conference as he spoke of "a thousand years of British history" and the necessity to avoid joining the foreigners in the Common Market.
The decline of the constituency left was finished off by Wilson. Under the flurry of the nonsense about the "White hot heat of the technological revolution and a series of "left" speeches, Wilson swung the Labour Party even further to the right at a rapid rate. The old emphasis on the welfare state was dropped, opposition to immigration controis was abandoned, even the pathetic promise of the nationalisation of the road haulage industry was given up. The left however ignored every bit of this in a wave of adulation unknown since the heyday of Be. van. Even after the Wilson government had sent military aircraft to South Africa, delayed pension increases, supported the Americans in Vietnam, and done precisely nothing about the economic power of capitalism, Tribune still talked of "the spirit which Harold Wil son has displayed on many previous occasions" (Tribune 20th November 1964). Even when it came to the 1966 elections, after Wilson had been in power for a year and a half, the left was still relatively euphoric. Michael Foot wrote in the election issue of Tribune that March 31st (election day) will mark one of the essential days in the forward march". Tribune then went on to declare that the essence of Wilson's programme was "Pensions up, Rent Act Security, Unemployment down, Prescription Charges off..." After another year of Wilson cuts, freezes, red-baiting and union bashing the Labour left sunk into an embarrassed silence from which it has not yet emerged. It is this relapse into practical irrelevance and even silence that has to be explained. In the past if the left of the Labour Party has always been unable to really challenge the leadership, nevertheless it has at least been able to put up the pretence of a fight, and thereby create a political focus for the struggles of the working class. Is its apparent inability to do this due to the spinelessness of a few individuals, or to a very temporary situation? Or is it due to deeper causes? To answer that we must analyse more carefully the reasons why the 'left" has never been able to mount even a real reformist challenge to the leadership. electoralism The most basic point that unites the Labour left and the Labour leadership is the belief that socialism can be achieved through Parliament. This has fundamental effects for their political practice. Once this Parliamentary viewpoint is accepted, then politics becomes defined as what occurs at or around elections. The struggle in the factory, not being around elections, is then simply seen to be the 'trade union struggle'. The best that can be hoped for here is that the trade unions will cast their votes in the right direction at the Labour Party conference, will campaign for their members to vote Labour, and most importantly of all, will give money for the electoral campaigns of the Labour Party. For the Labour Party, including the left, any kind of political action other than that around Parliamentary and other elections is inconceivable.
The organisational forms of the Labour Party are then determined by this set of ideas. The most suitable units for organising for elections are obviously geographical ones that correspond to the electoral boundaries:
hence the constituency parties. However, these geographical units are not directly connected to the point of production and would therefore be useless for attempting to influence the course of struggle in the factory.
This point however, does not worry the Labour left because once politics has been defined as occurring around elections, then the struggle in the factory is simply the trade union struggle which it is obviously the job of the trade unions to deal with. At most the constituency Labour left gives passive support to 'trade union' struggles, collects money etc., but in no way intervenes directly to attempt to alter the course of the struggle.
This situation of split between the constituency based sections of a Labour or Social Democratic Party, and the struggle within the trade unions has been increased by the whole history of the Labour Party.
Firstly. It has been truly said of the Labour Party that of all Parliamentary Socialist Parties, it has always been the most dogmaticnot in its socialism, but in its Parliamentarianism. This has meant that the Labour left has never had any tradition of extra-Parliamentary struggle which would allow it to appeal directly to the men engaged in the factory struggle. May, 1958: Frank Cousins general secretary of the Transport & General Workers Union addresses e Secondly. The particular division between politics and trade unionism which exists within the Labour Party has always been part of an unwritten understanding between the Parliamentary leaders and the trade unions bureaucracy. This understanding has been that the trade unions will use their vote to keep the right wing in control in the Labour Party, in return for which the Labour Party will keep out of the affairs of the trade unions. The old right wing union cry of "Keep politics out of the trade unions", therefore has its coun terpart in the Labour Party leadership's cry of "Keep the trade unions out of politics" (i.e., support the right wing).
This arrangement within the Labour Party has historically worked to the advantage both of the union bureaucrats and of the Parliamentary leaders. It prevents any left challenge to the L.P. leadership succeeding and it enables the T.U. leaders to avoid facing any political challenge within their unions. In the struggles of the 1930's it was always the trade union leaders who used their votes to defeat the Socialist League and its followers. In 1935 the 75 amendments of the Socialist League to the NEC policy document were all defeated by the union vote. In the struggle against the Bevanites the union bureaucrats never wavered in their support for the right and they never hesitated to use any means they thought necessary. When faced with a hostile audience of Bevanites at the 1952 conference Deakin, head of the TGWU at that time, declared that "You know that you would listen if you wanted to get money from the trade unions". At the 1954 conference it is probable that Deakin was instrumental in applying pressure to the Woodworkers Union Executive to reverse the democratically taken decision of its conference to oppose German rearmament by threatening to use the bloc vote to have a representative of the Woodworkers thrown off the NEC. The unions were also instrumental in seeing that in 1954 Gaitskell was elected Party Treasurer against Bevan and from there went on to be Party Leader. The importance of this union bureaucracy wheeling and dealing was fully recognised and appreciated by the Labour Party leadership. Shinwell at the 1952 conference openly declared, lems. "Thank heaven for the trade union movement at this time. Thank heaven for what is called the block vote."
Once this situation is understood, then the historical dilemma and powerlessness of the Labour left can be understood. To achieve any real results in the Labour Party it would have had to have been able to challenge the positions within the unions of the bureaucrats. That would hav meant organising politically directly inside the trade unions. But once the left tried to do that it would have been forced by the logic of its positions to take up political positions on all the struggles within the factory. It would have had to have broken with the very idea that pol tics is concerned with elections that is at the heart of the ideas of the Labour Party. If it had been forced to admit that the extra-parliamentary struggle could be a political struggle then the door would have been opened for the break up of every idea of a specifically Labour left. It would also have meant that the leaders! of any such movement could very easily have passed out of the control of the handful of Par mentarians who have always considered it their 'right' to lead the working class. From this pro spect the left naturally shied away like the Devil from holy water.
From this picture we can now see clearly the reasons for the complete helplessness of any specifically Labour left. The constituency left could never challenge the Labour leadership without first challenging the trade union bureaucracy, and it could not organise to challeng the trade union bureaucracy without breaking with the very ideas of the separation of trade unionism and politics which are at the very heart of the Labour Party. Even the best of the socialist militants of the Labour left were completely trapped in this dilemma and it rendered useless and futile all their activities. It is in this fundamental dilemma that the com plete powerlessness of the constituency left must be sought and not in some theory of 'conscious betrayal" on the part of the many deeply committed socialists which the 'left' has attracted over the years. (With the leaders of course it is another story. Corruption and b trayal were only too frequently conscious and calculated here.) left's dilemma The way in which the Labour left has historically tried to get out of its dilemma of being unable to challenge the trade union bureaucrats is by an alliance with the CP. This however in no way solves its real probThe left' is still faced with the trade union bureaucracy, and in any case the historical twists and turns of the CP perio. dically make collaboration impossible. Unable, because of its situation as a specifically Labour left, to gain a base inside the trade unions the constituency based opposition has only ever been able to count for anything when the political, social and econo-