Unions must lead working-class stand
Rob Williams, Socialist Party Executive Committee
The blocking of Greater Manchester mayor Andy Burnham from contesting the selection process to be Labour’s candidate in the Gorton and Denton by-election opens up a new stage in the crisis in Starmer’s New Labour Mark II government. It brings the whole question of the need for a political voice for the working class front and central.
It has been reported that Labour’s Starmer-dominated Organisation Sub-Committee of its National Executive Committee (NEC) made the decision on Sunday 25 January by a vote 8-1, including Starmer himself, just the day after Burnham beat the deadline to apply for permission to stand.
Members of GMB and USDAW unions will be asking why their representatives on the sub-committee reportedly voted to bar Burnham from standing, actually confirmed by USDAW on its website. They will correctly see this as further evidence that their respective union leaders are tied hand and foot to the Starmer project, and will build the campaigns for a real debate about the unions’ political strategies.
It’s clear that Starmer moved to bar Burnham because, on the basis of him winning the by-election, it would have effectively triggered a leadership election against him. Instead, he has now given Burnham a ‘put up or shut up’ ultimatum. As we go to press, Burnham has told the media that his “full focus” is on his position as mayor of Greater Manchester. But this move and counter-move opens up a further rupture in Starmer’s Labour.
Saving Labour
In many respects, Burnham was putting his name forward in an attempt to ‘save’ the brand of Labour from potential election oblivion, as Starmer’s party dwindles in the opinion polls. Ultimately, Burnham would be trying to save Labour as a party that supports, defends and protects capitalism. It is this that underpins the crisis in Labour, as with other mainstream pro-capitalist parties.
But given the crisis-ridden character of British capitalism, attempting to ride the storm of a chaotic world, tipped into ever greater turbulence by Trump, to set himself up as an opponent to Starmer is forcing Burnham to position himself to the left of his party leader. Many workers will rightly argue that that is not a difficult task!
Writing in the Guardian newspaper on 22 January, Burnham counter-posed what he claims is his record as mayor, in contrast to “the British right and not the Labour government”. But in reality he is attempting to contrast himself with Starmer’s 18 months of austerity.
Some union leaders will claim his ‘Manchesterism’ is the way forward, but Burnham hasn’t faced down the cuts of Tory and now Labour central government, despite having a platform to lead a mass campaign of defiance. Members of Unison and Unite are currently taking strike action on pay at Transport for Greater Manchester, which is headed by Burnham.
Unions
New left Unison General Secretary Andrea Egan, an expelled Labour Party member had called, on officially taking office, for a “democratic process” for selecting the candidate. This is a departure from the uncritical support given by the previous right-wing pro-Starmer leadership that was defeated in the union’s general secretary election.
But Starmer’s decision now poses what is the way forward for the unions, particularly Labour-affiliated ones like Unison and Unite?
Unite already has policy from its conference last July, initiated by Socialist Party members and close allies, to open up a debate in the union about its relationship with Labour.
In response to Burnham’s ban, Andrea tweeted: “I know many, many trade unionists will be so disappointed and angry at local members not being given a say over who their candidate should be. This isn’t the way any democratic organisation should be run. Now’s the time to unite our movement not divide it.”
But Unison members will now ask on what basis does our movement unite? We need political representatives who stand and fight for the programme of the unions and the workers’ movement. Both Unison and Unite’s policy for local government is to call on Labour councils to refuse to pass on the cuts and instead implement no-cuts needs budgets. Another Labour-affiliated union, the CWU, supports renationalisation of Royal Mail and had the policy passed at Labour Party conference in the middle of their national 2022-23 strike, but was then ignored by Starmer.
A workers’ candidate
Union after union supports the Unite Birmingham bin workers, brutally fired and rehired by a cutting Labour council to the tune of £8,000 a year, using vicious strike-breaking measures. The unions demand the scrapping of the undemocratic 50% industrial action ballot threshold, that still persists a year and a half into a 160-seat majority Labour government. And the unions have supported motions at TUC Congress against the murderous assault of the Israeli regime on Gaza, propped up by Starmer.
That is the programme that a workers’ candidate should be standing on in Gorton and Denton, and in the elections that are coming in May. The events of the last few days have shown that being tied to Labour means having to accept the diktat of Starmer and his pro-big business acolytes.
The unions, both Labour-affiliated and not, must immediately declare their intention to stand a candidate in the by-election on a union programme, that can take on and undermine the divisive bile and poison of Reform, and open up the road to a real political vehicle for the working class.
