In mid 1983, having recently been elected a Councillor, myself, in one of those wards where the Left had been in control for some time, Burslem Central, which bordered my own ward of Tunstall North, I went with Andrew Dobraszcyc down to a planning meeting in London, at the GLC, for the establishment of a National Labour Briefing Network that would bring together all of these local Briefing groups that were being established. It was agreed that a National Editorial Board would be established, to produce a National Supplement that each local group would put out along with their own local publication. At this time a local North Staffs Labour Briefing did not exist. It was decided to create one, as part of affiliating to the national network. In part, this was now facilitated by the fact that the old, right-wing Labour MP for Stoke Central, Bob Cant, had stood down, and been replaced by Mark Fisher, who was also a member of the Campaign Group of MP's.
The Right had been weakened. The SDP had split away, but, in Stoke, most of the old Right stayed within Labour. At the end of 1982, Burslem Central had held its selection meeting for the 1983 local elections. There was also a by-election in the ward, meaning that two candidates had to be selected. Myself, and Jason Hill, a long-standing member of the IMG, stood for selection. We were up against the sitting Labour Councillor Stan Dutton, who was also a stalwart of the right-wing dominated Potters Union (CATU). Both Jason and myself stood on the same platform that had been adopted by the SCLV, and campaigns against the Tories attacks on local government of – No Cuts, No Rent or Rate Rises. We both made it clear that if elected, we would act on that basis.
There were several revolutionaries in Burslem Central at the time. They were members of the IMG, and the Chartists, and of Militant, as well as supporters of Socialist Organiser. But, they were not a majority. Slightly more than 50% of the Branch was comprised of the soft left. Most of them, other than the Branch Chair, Harry Edwards, were committed to vote for me and Jason. Harry Edwards, also a member of the CATU Executive, was not present at the selection meeting, avoiding having to make a choice between voting for me, or for the Right. I won, and in the weeks and months that followed an unprecedented campaign, particularly against me, as a well-known Trotskyist, was launched by the local media.
Stan Dutton, immediately decided to stand against us as an Independent Labour candidate. He was openly supported by other right-wing Labour Party members, who put up his posters and leaflets in their windows, even in other wards! I am setting this out in detail, because it relates to the notions about creating some kind of broad left alliance that, for example, Paul Mason, put forward a while ago, and which some have been trying to push as the basis of support for Starmer.
One of the reasons that sections of the soft left had supported my candidacy I was told, by others who had their ear to the ground in the ward, was the idea that, because I, and others, were criticising those that were refusing to stand against the Tory cuts, they wanted me to have to put our positions to the test. In other words, they believed that when it came to it, we would buckle. In the weeks after the selection meeting, and with my son only just over a year old, I trudged the mile or so from my home to the council estates of Burslem Central, every day, pushing my son around in his pushchair, canvassing every house, and making detailed lists of complaints to be reported to the ward, for action to be taken.
Imagine my consternation, when one of the SO supporters in the ward, Neil Dawson, spoke to me one night, and said that he had been asked to approach me to reduce the level of my canvassing, because other members could not make the same level of commitment. I did not require them to do so, I said. In fact, I found out some time later that the real reason was that the soft left in the branch had their own agenda. Because there was a by-election in the ward, whoever won with the lower number of votes, would be taken as having won the by-election, and would be up for election again the following year. The soft left's agenda was to try to have me buckle over fighting cuts, and then to select another candidate a year later. The extent to which this was undertaken, I was told, was that some members of the soft left, were telling some voters only to cast their votes for Jason, so that I would have the lower vote. Normally, because candidates whose names appear higher on the ballot, for the same party, get the higher vote, I would have been expected to have obtained the larger vote. The fact that I got a smaller vote backs up this claim.
In terms of the election itself, it didn't matter. Not only did Jason and myself win, but we won with massive votes, and huge majorities, larger than had been seen in the City for years. But, the fact of this division, and the nature of the soft left, did not take long to materialise. Soon after the election, the inauguration of the new Lord Mayor took place. The branch's position had been, for some time, that the Mayoralty was an anachronism. Neither myself nor Jason turned up to the ceremony. Contacted by the local press for a comment as to why I had not turned up, I said, I had been unable to attend. Pressed on what I thought about the position of Lord Mayor, I stated what I understood to be the branch position that it was an outdated bit of pomp and frippery that should be done away with. No sooner had it appeared in the press than I was summoned to an emergency meeting of the Branch, on a Sunday morning, to be told that I had no right to have made such a comment without first approving it with the Branch! I was never told why the Branch would ever be opposed to its elected representatives advocating what was, after all, branch policy. Nor did I get an answer to my question as to whether I had to get Branch approval of any comment I might make in any Council meetings, where I might similarly be advocating Branch positions!
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