What are Political Parties For?

What are Political Parties For? There is a great deal of noise at the moment about the formation of a new Party on the left of the Labour Party. There is a clear recognition that, as presently formulated, non of the existing Political Parties are able to deal with the many crises that are facing this Country and indeed all countries throughout the World. The solution offered by most of these Parties is simply to ignore those problems such as climate change and the threat of nuclear war, seemingly to believe that if you pretend they are not there, then they will go away. But the issues that directly affect the lives of people throughout the World are on a much simpler less earth shattering level. They are concerned with their everyday daily lives. What people need above all is to live at peace with their neighbours, have a sense of security knowing that the essentials of food and a home are available for them and their family, knowing that the educational needs of their children will be met, and that should they need medical treatment the answer to their needs is already in place, and that in old age they will be able to live out their later years in comfort. At present none of these basic requirements are being met and there is little prospect of them being met. What is more worrying is that all these ‘lacks’ are being bundled together under the term ‘austerity’ with arguments made against ‘austerity’ but without detailed practical proposals of how those ‘lacks’ will each be provided. It is not that working people are only concerned with their own needs, they have an understanding of the wider problems that exist throughout the World. The number of people marching and otherwise opposing the actions of Israel in Gaza and of Russia in Ukraine, the support given at a different level to charity shops and food banks, show that the basic instinct of the Working Class is to support those in need. In general, when workers go on strike the impulse of other workers is to support them. There is a recognition that community is more important than individualism. However, what we cannot ignore is the fact that for the past century the Ruling Class has had a deliberate policy of seeking to integrate the leaders of the Working Class into the organs of the State. This goes back to the troubled years after the First World War when the Working Class seriously threatened the State. The Ruling Class acted to enrol sections of the Labour Movement, those on the Right who opposed the more militant section, into the State structure, thereby enabling the Labour Party to replace the Liberal Party as the second Party of Government. That they were not entirely successful,was shown by many of the acts of the 1945 Labour Government including the introduction of the Welfare State and the National Health Service. The attempt to widen the nationalisation of industries, beyond the failing industries of mining and railways, to steel and transport even at that time were thwarted. Once the initial reaction to the end of World War 11 was over and sections of the Working Class became more prosperous, the Ruling Class again seized their opportunity, stressing individualism and rejecting the idea of community, they broke the power of Labour in the estates by enabling people to buy their council house below cost, and privatised major concerns, allowing people to buy shares in companies they already owned. Ultimately those companies, electricity, gas, water, telecommunications, became capitalist concerns adding to the profits of the dominant Ruling Class. What is clear from all of this is that the Capitalist Class has been conscious of what it has had to do to maintain its power. This despite the fact that the Ruling Class has never been united, there has always been divisions and different approaches.In recent times we have seen this especially in regard to the Common Market.Brexit was a cause of deep division which has ultimately led to the formation of the Reform Party, a maverick section of the Ruling Class which seeks to exploit the problems facing Working People by placing the blame upon sections of the Working Class who just happen to have a different ethnicity. It is important and necessary to deal with the question of race and immigration because these are issues that are being used to keep the Working Class divided. It is a fact that we live in a multicultural society. Britain has always been multicultural, check anyone’s DNA and you will find a mixed heritage. Britain has become more racially mixed during my lifetime. This has been to our advantage, culturally in many ways, through music, dance, food, and in developing a greater understanding of how we came to be the society we are. It is also a fact that our economy depends greatly upon those who have recently come to this Country. The related factor of the falling birth rate makes this question of added Labour even more relevant and economically important. An example of my earlier statement, which I only read about recently, is the influence of Islamic architecture from the Middle Ages which added to the knowledge of how much of our scientific knowledge owes its origins in the Islamic World that existed when Britain was in the Dark Ages. As far as immigration is concerned, the false hopes of a good life in Britain which those who face the perilous journey across the Channel hold only amplifies the dangers and difficulties in the Countries from which these immigrants are escaping, These problems are largely the result of the wars that the West has inflicted upon those Nations and the way in which Britain, as part of the West, has exploited these Nations and Peoples. It is important that we uphold our belief in International Socialism. It is not enough that we should end exploitation in this Country, we must include the whole World in our aim for a complete transformation of how the World is governed. But it is also not enough to state the problem and call for a better World. We have to have an alternative. At present we have a situation in which the more prosperous section of Society are dominant in all Political Parties. The calls for a new Party of the Left have a tendency to reflect the aspirations of that section. This tendency is towards building on the various movements which have led to people protesting and marching to let their views be known. There are key elements in these movement: the opposition to the events in Gaza, the brutal attacks, the numbers of children, medical staff, women and journalists killed, is shared by all of those who desire a change in society. Opposition to war has always been a feature of Working Class politics. But what we need to oppose, politically, is the cause of wars. We need to look beyond condemning Netanyahu, Trump and Putin and recognise that war is an aspect of imperialism and that it is the nature of capitalism to use war as an extension of economic power and sanctions. We also need to recognise that other movements, including opposition to racism, in support of women’s rights, and for freedom of sexual expression, are in themselves valid and important positions to take. But ultimately these issues by themselves will not lead to a transformation of Society. We need to go back to the basic structure that Marx identified in society, the conflict between the ownership of the means of production and the necessity for a class of workers to sell their labour. We live in a class based society with a dominant Ruling Class who maintain their wealth and power by exploiting the Working Class. The Capitalist Class has been successful in convincing sections of the Working Class that they are ‘above’ the Working Class, that they are different, wiser, cleverer, with higher standards, that they have nothing in common. Anyone of my age will remember how council estates were depicted. The attack upon people who lived in such estates as inferior and unable to appreciate good standards. The fact that council estates were extremely well planned and the houses built to high standards, standards that were removed to allow modern private estates to be built, were ignored. The simple fact that the Working Class has always had a greater sense of community than the richer elements of society. Day by day they would live their own lives, doing their own thing, but come a crisis, and the spirit of solidarity and common feeling comes to the fore. The latest example was during the year long miner’s strike. Today, as noted earlier, it is seen in the support for food banks and action in support of the Palestinians. How else can you explain the fact that there is so little publicity given on the BBC and other news networks regarding action in Gaza and on the many demonstrations in opposition to what Israel is doing. How little publicity is given to marches opposing racism and in support of Muslims and other ethnic groups. The Ruling Class knows better than to publicise these events which ultimately challenge their rule. But the question I wrote this piece to answer is ‘What are Political Parties For?’ As far as I am concerned, the aim of any Political Party, that I support, is to achieve a classless society in which every one lives secure and happy lives and in which there is no alienation or domination by any superior group. Therefore any new Political formation of the Left must have that as its ultimate aim. It must also recognise that such an eventuality is not possible under the economic structure of Capitalism. But, we live in the real World. There are strong forces at work which militate against the change that is needed. It is not that change cannot come through our Parliamentary system. (But the transformation of Society cannot come through Parliament). Life is changing all the time. Sadly, since the high point of 1945 things have gradually changed for the worse. Back in the 1920s there was hope that things could change. Hope was there in 1945. Is there hope now? I believe that there is. At the present time there are several issues about which there are murmurings of protest. First we saw rebellion within the Parliamentary Labour Party that destroyed Starmer’s bid to remove benefits from disabled people. This was only a partial victory but it indicated what is possible. There remains the issue of the two child limit and the question of the winter fuel payments. All of these raise the question of who should pay for the financial crisis? Is it those least able to defend themselves or the rich who could easily afford to pay more without unduly suffering? This question immediately raises the question of Class. There is another issue brewing concerned with the provisions provided to children with Special Educational Needs. An issue being faced by the Government and raised by the Reform Administration at Kent County Council in respect of the provision of transport for these children. This situation has been acerbated by the past failure to adequately meet the needs of these children. This places Education under the spotlight. Teachers are already upset by the proposals for their salary, the offer of 4% being inadequate, and the funding only partial, thereby adding further cuts to the general education provision. On what I consider an even more serious issue, further reform is being planned for the National Health Service. There is a danger that, with negotiations over Trade Deals with the United States, United States Companies will be given even greater access to the NHS. Once again Doctors are taking action in relation to pay. The changes in the NHS that are being planned will take the NHS further away from what was intended in 1948 and will worsen the situation for Working Class People. These two issues raise another point that I would like to raise. In the 1960/70s there was a lot of noise made about Worker’s Control of Industry. At the first Conference that I attended of my Trades Union, The National Association of Schoolmasters, the Educational Lecture dealt with The Collegiate Governance of Schools. Later, when I obtained a Diploma in Educational Administration from the Institute of Education, University of London, my Special Study dealt with ‘The Organisation and Control of Schools in a Democratic Society’. This drew evidence from Schools in which different structures of control were being explored. Since those days Education Policy has regressed. In both Education and Health control has passed from the Professionals involved in these institutions to Bureaucrats who have no direct involvement in teaching or health provision. What is a very clear feature of the Health Service is the quality of treatment given by the Provisioners, nurses, doctors and the like, when a person actually gets to see such people face to face, and the bureaucratic structure which seems designed to prevent such face to face meetings. How much better would it be if the skills of the Teachers in our Schools, Lecturers in our Colleges and Universities, and the Doctors, Nurses and other Medical Professionals in the Social Services, were to be directly involved in the Policy Formation and Management of these Services! The case needs to be made and direct action taken to ensure that such a situation is brought about to the benefit of the whole of Society. The nature of work within our Society has changed. In a Research Briefing published by the UK Parliament House of Commons Library in October 2024, it was shown that Services account for 84.8% of jobs in the UK. The largest proportion are in the Health and Social Care Sector (13.5%) and in the Retail and Wholesale Sector (12.8%). The graph shows the complete distribution. What is clear is that, from 1965, there has been a serious decline in Manufacturing and Construction (the Secondary Sector) and a corresponding increase in the Tertiary (Services) Sector. The Primary Sector (Mining and Agriculture) has shown a steady decline from 1920 onwards [information from the Government’s Office of National Statistics]. These figures indicate the different situation that we are now faced with. Whereas, at, before and after the turn of the nineteenth century, the vanguard industry for action was the Mining Industry. The situation is very different now. A strike of miners had an immediate effect upon the economy of the Country. A similar strike nowadays by Railworkers, Power Stations, Transport Workers would have a similar direct economic effect. A strike by Doctors, Nurses, Teachers, Social Workers would have an immediate effect upon the people they serve, but only indirectly on the Government and the Economy. For such strikes to have a real impact on the Government and the Economy, they would need to have full and direct support from the community, including strong forms of action beyond basic supports of cash and kind. What all of this calls for is a strategic plan of how the Working Class can defend what they have, improve their living conditions directly in terms of wages and benefits and in the wider social conditions of their lives, and ultimately take greater control of the governance of their lives. A fundamental issue that has to be dealt with is the divide between the better off sections of the Working Class, who own their own homes, have their own transport, are computer literate and are able to access private health care,and that section of the Working Class who are increasingly being marginalised and cut off from developments in technology (QR codes and the like) that are increasingly being introduced and who rely upon a declining public transport provision, especially in bus services to hospitals and out of town shopping centres. Before we engage in the ‘exciting’ formation of new Parties, we need to determine what are our political priorities. An argument could be made, in the short term, to seeing the Labour Party as the best hope to defeat the Reform Party at the next General Election. For this to happen there would need to be a complete change of leadership and policy direction. An indication of such a possibility was seen in the rebellion mentioned earlier. But a much deeper rebellion would be needed by Back Bench Labour MPs to reassert those fundamental ideas that brought so many of the Working Class to support the Party in the past. But that past history also shows how sections of the Labour Party have always acted against the will of the People and in support of the State. This danger will also be present with any new Party. Any new Party must base itself on the Working Class and Working Class Institutions, particularly the Trades Unions and Trades Union Councils. This in turn calls for activities within Trades Unions and Trades Councils to reaffirm the nature of the Trade Unions to defend workers rights, wages and conditions but also to go further and take up a political position calling for Workers control in all industries and institutions and Workers Control in Society as a whole. Strong support for Movements is absolutely necessary, but we cannot ignore the need to be fully engaged in Local Authorities and in Parliament, but neither of these can replace the struggle between the Working Class and the Capitalist Class. Whatever Policy we adopt, and whatever actions we take, must all be in preparation for the transformation into a Classless Society. Scribar 13.7.25