Alistair Tice, Sheffield Socialist Party
We can’t trust the Tory government to sanction the Russian oligarchs. The Conservative Party has been taking their ‘dirty money’ for years. But we do support the Merseyside dockers taking workers’ sanctions against the Putin regime.
But why stop at the Russian oligarchs? We’ve got our own oligarchs, they’re called capitalists: bankers, CEOs, and the bosses of the big corporations. They ‘fire and rehire’ and pay low wages, while making millions and billions for themselves and their shareholders at our expense.
We say: “Take the wealth off the 1%.” But the Tories are never going to do that, because it’s all their rich mates. And we know that Labour leader Keir Starmer’s not going to do that, because he always says “I agree with the government”.
That’s why we need to fund the Socialist Party, to build an alternative to the big business parties, and help build a force that can change society.
Unlike the Tories, and increasingly Labour, we get no money from any oligarchs or rich backers. Our money comes from ordinary working-class people.
It comes from members paying their membership dues, and it comes from donations to our ‘fighting fund’ from working-class people supporting our policies, protests and campaigns.
In the last two months, Yorkshire Socialist Party members have increased their monthly membership contributions by £450. Every increase counts, whether it’s an extra £1 or £2 a month, those that have doubled their subs, or the member who has increased twice! Every increase helps the work of the Socialist Party.
While most of our fighting fund comes from Socialist Party campaign stalls and fundraising activity, members often make one-off donations as a result of windfalls or to special appeals at party events. At the Yorkshire Socialist Party conference on 6 March, we asked those who can afford it, to dig deep and donate.
The community centre we met in cost £100 to hire. Local member Steve, who booked it and paid for it, donated that £100. And three people matched Steve’s £100 donation.
It cost our guest speaker, Socialist Party general secretary Hannah Sell, £50 in petrol to come and address our conference. Several people donated £50s to pay for Hannah’s travel expenses. Then more £25s, £20s, tens and fives were donated, plus coins as the rattling tin was passed around.
After attendees paid into our card reader in the room, and those on Zoom donated through the Socialist Party website, nearly £1,000 was raised. Can you make a donation like the supporters of the Socialist Party in Yorkshire have?
