I had little time for Derek Hatton or the Militant back in the 1980's. I have no more time for him now. But, his suspension from LP membership, again, is a disgrace. Once again, it is an indication of the spineless nature of Corbyn's leadership. The Tory media shouted repeatedly about Hatton, being allowed back into the LP, echoed by the same right-wing, Blair-right MP's that are doing all in their power to undermine Corbyn and the Labour Party, and Corbyn's leadership again caved. The Tory media and the Blair-rights shouted "Jump!", and Corbyn leadership responded, "Yes, sir, how high sir?"
In the 1980's, the sectarian politics of the Militant contributed to the isolation of Liverpool City Council, which Hatton led, as it fought the Tory cuts being imposed by Thatcher's government. That sectarianism, and the disastrous tactics of Militant, which failed to link up that struggle with the struggle of other Councils that Militant supporters did not lead, such as Lambeth, and more disastrously with the struggle of the NUM against pit closures, ensured that eventually the struggle would be lost. Yet, socialists had a duty to support the struggle that was being waged by Liverpool councillors, despite the sectarianism and disastrous tactics being employed by Militant and Hatton. When all was said and done, they were engaged in a struggle in defence of working-class interests against a Tory government. Socialists could no more disown that struggle, because of Militant's sectarianism and poor tactics than they could disown support for a strike, simply on the basis that it was being led badly.
For all the deficiencies of Hatton and of Militant they were engaged in a struggle for working-class interests. It was the likes of Kinnock that sought to undermine that struggle, by complaining that socialists, as they have done over the centuries, were being forced to act outside the law, a fact that offended the bourgeois sensibilities of the windbag. Although Kinnock complained about the City Council sending out redundancy notices to its employees by taxi - which was part of a typically stupid and opaque tactic employed by Militant to try to extend the struggle - the reality was that Kinnock was in favour of all Labour Councils not just sending out redundancy notices as part of a tactic, but of actually sacking their workers, so as to stay within the law, and comply with the Tory cuts, abandoning any actual struggle, in favour of waiting for him, and a Labour government to come to their rescue at the next General Election, a General Election, which in any case he lost! It was, in fact, only after the working-class again engaged in a massive campaign of law breaking, in defiance of the Poll Tax, that Thatcher was driven from office, creating the conditions for the Tories themselves to be thrown out of government in 1997.
And, within weeks of his typically hysterical, and hypocritical attacks on Liverpool City Council ove the issuing of redundancy notices, it was the Labour Party itself that was issuing redundancy notices to its own staff!
The expulsions of members of Militant and other left wing activists from the Labour Party, again facilitated by the sectarianism of Militant, which refused to join up with other socialists to fight the witch-hunt, was a disgrace. It was an expulsion of the most active, the most dedicated members of the Labour Party, by those that had lost the battle of ideas, as they continually failed to fight against the Tory onslaught, be it against Tory cuts to Local Government, or their failure to fully back the Miners during the 1984-5 strike. The basis of the expulsions of forming a party within a party were totally spurious, given that the Labour Party had been formed by a combination of separate parties, be it the ILP, or the SDF (which became the British Socialist Party, and then changed its name to the British Communist Part), or later the affiliation of the Co-operative Party. And, the Labour Party had always had within it various factions, all of which be they on the right or Left had their own publications, and organisation for the publication and distribution of those publications. The expulsions had nothing to do with these groups being parties within the LP - none of them, for example stood candidates in elections against Labour, or supported candidates of other parties against Labour, which many on the right certainly did, when the SDP was formed - but were a typical bureaucratic measure used by the party machinery to bolster the position of the Labour Right, whose role had always been to ensure that the Labour Party was constrained within safe bourgeois limits that did not seriously challenge the power of capital.
That Corbyn's Labour Party is returning to those same bureaucratic, right-wing measures that characterised the party under Kinnock is a disgrace, and yet a further sign of the way the right have captured Corbyn, and his entourage, though given the predominance of Stalinists within his inner circle, that they should adopt such bureaucratic measures is not entirely surprising either. It is an indication of what the left in the rank and file of the party can expect in coming months. The sectarian politics of the Stalinists advising Corbyn, is facilitating him being isolated from that rank and file, thereby aiding and abetting the Right of the Party, something that has been seen time and again in the tactics of Stalinists, for example, the murder of Vietnamese Trotskyists by Stalinists, the murder of Spanish Trotskyists and POUMists, by Stalinists in the 1930's, as the Stalinists forged their disastrous Popular Front with the Spanish bourgeois parties.
And, as with those previous disastrous applications of the Popular Front, and of appeasement of the right, what has it achieved for Corbyn? It has meant that the strength of the Right in parliament has continued to be able to isolate and undermine his position. It has meant that they have been able to choose the time and nature of the attacks they launch against him. It has meant that Corbyn has continually had to abandon the very principles upon which he was elected Leader, whether it is his republicanism, his anti-imperialism, his support for democratic accountability within the party, his anti-racism, or his attraction to many as a person of principle.
The success of the Right is shown by the fact that Corbyn, whose parents met opposing Mosely's fascists in Cable Street, and who is best known as a fighter of all forms of racism and bigotry, is now branded as a racist and anti-Semite in the minds of large numbers of voters. Thousands voted for Corbyn as leader, and voted for his Labour party, in 2017, because he was seen as different to previous Labour Leaders, because of being a man of principle, but no longer. On every issue, he has been seen to abandon those principles, so as to appease the Right, who simply then come back for even more.
Hatton has applied for membership several times over the years. In the last few years, he has been accepted, only for that acceptance to be withdrawn, as the Tory media jumped up and down, and showed that they have great influence on determining what happens inside the Labour Party. Hatton clearly could not be denied membership on the basis of membership of Militant, because it no longer exists, having become the Socialist Party. Nor could he be denied membership for being a member of the Socialist Party, because he never has been, and nor has he supported their candidates against Labour in elections. In fact, even if that were the case, it really is not a reason for denying hm membership. Former Labour Chancellor, Denis Healey, for example, had been a member of the Communist Party, before he joined Labour. The right-wing Labour MP, in Stoke North, prior to Joan Walley, John Forrester, had also been a member of the Communist Party. But, in more recent times, Labour accepted with open arms the defecting Tory MP, Sean Woodward, and even made him into a Minister! Gordon Brown similarly made the horrible right-wing businessman Digby Jones into a Minister, though Jones himself boasts that Labour put him in this position, even though he did not even bother to take out membership of the Labour Party.
It was clearly difficult for Labour to find any excuse to suspend Hatton's membership on the grounds of being a member of or supporting some other party, but faced with their obsessive need to continually appease the Tory media, they had to find something, and so they dragged out a tweet from seven years ago, and used it to claim that it was "anti-Semitic". All those that insisted on all of the examples of anti-Semitism attached to the IHRA definition, to be included in Labour's definition, and code of conduct, claimed that it would not prevent criticism of the state of Israel, but it was obvious that the reason they insisted that all these examples be included, was precisely that it meant that criticism of the actions of the state of Israel could be claimed to be anti-Semitic. That is what has happened here, as Hatton criticised the actions of the Israeli government, and encouraged all British Jews to condemn them. This latter point, it is being claimed, is "anti-Semitic" because its implies that all Jews are responsible for the actions of the Israeli state. What arrant nonsense. If Britain were to wage a vicious war against another country, would not socialists call on all British people to condemn that action, wherever those British people lived, and would do so, because it makes far more impact if British people condemn the actions of the British state than if, for example, French people were to condemn the British state! Moreover, the Zionists, themselves make the same commitment, by claiming that Jews wherever they are in the world are citizens of Israel, with a right to migrate their over and above the rights of the existing, non-Jewish citizens of Israel. They encourage such a view, by claiming that Israel is not an Israeli state, with equal rights for all citizens, but is specifically a "Jewish" state.
But, even if it were the case that Harron's statement could be construed as meaning that all Jews are somehow responsible for the actions of the Jewish state, as opposed to being simply a statement calling for a mobilisation of public opinion, and most effectively Jewish public opinion, against the actions of Israel, is that really what most people would consider to constitute "anti-Semitism"? I don't think so, and if Labour party members are to be suspended, for making statements that somebody somewhere, might, for whatever reason, take offence to, then the Labour Party will indeed find itself not dealing with just 600 complaints, but an endless stream, as would any other organisation.
But, the charge of anti-Semitism against Hatton is totally spurious. It was simply a convenient excuse to suspend his membership, as the leadership once again, collapsed into a jelly like substance squirming on the ground, as soon as the tory media, and the Labour Right confronted it. It is rather like all of those expulsions of Jewish members of the Labour Party, initially charged with "anti-Semitism", that then had to be changed to other trumped up charges, such as the catch-all "bringing the party into disrepute", when it was obvious that the initial accusations had absolutely no substance.
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