Editorial of the Socialist issue 1201
The latest Tory prime minister, Rishi Sunak, has two main messages: the Tory Party must “unite or die” and that he’s ready to attack the working class. A huge new austerity onslaught is being prepared, comparable to, or exceeding, the 2010 Con-Dem version, from which public services and living standards have not recovered.
How the working class organises to fight the Tories, building on the current strike wave, is the most important factor in how Sunak, his government, and their impoverishment plans are brought down. And they can be.
The Suella Braverman affair is just one illustration of how unity in the Tories is a dream. What’s more, Tory MPs prioritising keeping their own seats will not easily be whipped into voting for the attacks Sunak intends to make on the majority in their constituencies.
The Tory party’s historic role, in the final analysis, is defending capitalism. It’s a system that prioritises producing private profit over meeting society’s needs, through exploitation of the working class.
Historically that system claimed it carried the promise of a better future for the next generation – but who believes that today? The rich get richer, but for the rest of us it’s a worse tomorrow – unless we fight. Instability not unity is the order of the day for parties that defend that system.
Organise to kick them out
We cannot wait for the Tories to “die” – they must be kicked out. What they offer – more hungry cold children – is not acceptable. Nor is it inevitable. The victories on pay being chalked up by groups of striking workers stand testament to that. Workers’ collective organisation and action can change events in the interests of our class.
Royal Mail’s attacks on the strikes organised by the CWU postal workers’ union are a sign that the strikes are successfully ramping up pressure on management, but also an indication of the seriousness and difficulties facing the current national disputes. Behind the bosses are the Tory government and all the institutions of the capitalist state, such as the courts. Fighting this requires the determination shown by the CWU, but the class attacks demand a class-wide response.
One way of showing our class won’t stand by while our people, and the right to strike, are attacked by the bosses is for the CWU strike fund appeal to be a bold campaign across the TUC, combined with launching a strike fund for all unions on the front line. The huge response such a call would get would show the bosses our class is backing our class and we’re preparing to fight to the win.
With millions of workers now balloting across the NHS, civil service and schools, the clearest indication that this movement will stand firm against attacks from the Tories and the bosses’ is stepping up the coordination of the strikes. Cross-union meetings at every level would give enormous confidence to workers on the picket lines that this is a fight their union leadership is fighting to win.
If the Tories build on Royal Mail’s attacks by introducing further anti-trade union laws, basically banning strikes, coordination will need to be accelerated with a 24-hour general strike.
Coordination
Discussion and coordination at every level can build confidence and further strengthen the movement. Workplace union meetings and picket rallies could thrash out the tactics of the strikes and feed back to the leaderships, strengthening the movement. Rank-and-file participation needs to be built. Strong and effective broad left organisation is needed to bring activists together to discuss and fight for a militant programme within their union.
Trades councils can bring unions together in local areas to build solidarity but also to bring their strength and authority to fighting local issues.
This approach is also needed on a national basis. Millions of people are angry with their plunging living standards. Turning this anger into a mass movement requires a leadership with a programme that shows our interests lie in uniting and fighting back.
That starts with: inflation-proof pay rises, pensions and benefits; a £15-an-hour minimum wage with no exemptions; rent caps and a mass programme of council house building and of home insulation; fund and staff our NHS; nationalisation of energy, water, rail, post, and the banks under democratic working-class control; and a socialist alternative to capitalist exploitation and poverty.
Even Tory councillors are fearful of Sunak’s cuts. But local government has the potential to form part of the working-class fightback. It’s estimated that around one in seven people are skipping meals, which equates to over four million people living in areas where Labour lead the council. Those Labour councils have an estimated £82 billion in spending power that could be mobilised now to fight against inflation poverty, refusing to pass on those cuts, and instead fighting for funding and to bring the Tories down.
But instead, Keir Starmer’s Labour is laser-focused on showing it’s preparing to be a government that will defend the interests of the capitalist class not the working class. Otherwise it would step into the Royal Mail, BT and rail disputes and commit to nationalising them on day one with no compensation to the fat cats. In 1971 the Tories nationalised Rolls Royce just as quickly when the capitalist class demanded it. But Starmer won’t – and our class doesn’t have our own political voice.
Candidates offering a workers’ alternative at the local elections in May – and at the general election whenever that takes place – are needed. The workers’ movement must also demand that the trade union leaders take such decisive steps towards building the new workers’ party that is needed.
The Socialist Party fights for all these steps for the workers’ movement, including building a new party – and for it to be armed with a socialist programme in preparation for the inevitable battles with the defenders of capitalism.
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