The success of Blaenau Gwent People’s Voice (BGPV) in winning two election victories in 2005 and 2006 shows what the potential for a new mass workers party in the Valleys. It is unclear how BGPV will develop in the future. New Labour’s attempt to force a Blairite candidate on Blaenau Gwent Labour Party using a women-only shortlist backfired and split the best elements from the party. The original reasons for the split became secondary to its anti-New Labour programme and it won the elections because it stood on the traditions of socialism and Aneurin Bevan, the founder of the NHS.
Socialist Party Wales is willing to work with members of BGPV in attempting to form a new mass workers’ party. Will BGPV be able to use its successes in Blaenau Gwent to form new People’s Voice (PV) organisations in the rest of Wales? There is the potential to develop such organisations across all the South Wales valleys. But it is unlikely a strategy of trying to win Labour Party members to form new PV organisations would succeed because the most active elements have left the Labour Party. The only way to broaden support is to use parliamentary and Assembly positions to campaign in other areas to win new layers with a bold programme of reforms. This would raise the prospect of a new party of the working class in Wales that could challenge the four pro-capitalist parties.
Forward Wales/Cymru Ymlaen basing itself on a narrow layer and conservative policies has been unable to break out of its Wrexham stronghold. It has now even lost most of its base in Wrexham and might lose the seat in the Assembly elections.
Wales has experienced a number of attempts to build new left alternatives to Labour and the social weight of the working class in society means that there is a huge potential for a new mass workers party. But it will come mainly from new forces in the trade unions, communities and the youth. The Socialist Party is gaining an increasing echo in Wales for the demand for a new mass workers’ party and we will continue to build the campaign while also be ready to react to new formations that may arise.
As in other parts of the UK, the BNP in Wales are using the absence of a new worker’s party to try and fill the vacuum left by New Labour’s transition to a party of big business. Recognising the difficulties in promoting the BNP’s “British bulldog” image in Wales they have attempted to portray this racist party in Wales as defenders of the white Welsh working class and the true inheritors of Welsh nationalism. Some of their propaganda leaflets headed ‘Rebecca Reborn’ (a reference to the Rebecca Riots in Wales in the 19th century) attacks Plaid Cymru for its neglect of the indigenous Welsh population and their appeasing of the Muslim communities.
However the BNP have watered down their crude racist propaganda to hide their extreme racist views and are concentrating their efforts on more social issues, immigration concerns etc, hoping to attract those voters discontented with the right wing policies of New Labour both in Westminster and the Assembly. The BNP will contest a greater number of Assembly seats in May and will hope to benefit from the increased national profile they have generated over the past few years. A layer of disillusioned voters, frustrated with the traditional political parties, may give a protest vote to the BNP, particularly in the run down urban estates of Cardiff, Newport, Swansea and Wrexham and an increase in their Assembly vote over 2003 is possible unless challenged.
The Socialist Party will work alongside all anti-racist/fascist organisations in Wales to defeat the threat of the BNP but in order to combat their real racist, homophobic, anti trade union agenda, a socialist alternative has to be offered to the people of Wales, linked to the campaign for a new workers party.
THE NATIONAL QUESTION
The national question and the issue of independence have receded somewhat in the past six or seven years. Plaid is downplaying the demand and is concentrating on arguing for more powers for the Assembly. But it would be wrong for Marxists to conclude that the issue has been permanently resolved.
The Labour Assembly government found it necessary to take on more powers to work effectively and increasingly there will be new demands for a Welsh parliament with law making and tax raising powers. If Plaid holds the balance of power in the Assembly after the elections there will probably be a referendum on the issue in 2011.
And events in Scotland could alter the mood in Wales. The SNP are running neck and neck with Labour in opinion polls and if an SNP-led executive were elected then the SNP would propose a bill for a referendum on independence within the first 100 days of office. An ICM survey for The Sunday Telegraph suggested support for Scottish independence had reached 52%. A vote for independence is not the most likely outcome, but even a referendum in Scotland would have significant effect on the mood in Wales, raising the issue of independence again.
Socialist Party Wales has always understood that the objective situation is somewhat different in Wales to Scotland. For economic, historical, social and geographic reasons there has been a greater degree of national consciousness amongst the working class in Scotland than in Wales. There has been a gradual rise in support for independence in Wales over the last twenty years, but the idea comes up against substantial barriers. As well as important social ties with England there would be a barrage of economic arguments of the type recently expressed by Rhodri Morgan against Plaid Cymru: “Independence is a non starter because in Wales we have 5% of the population of the UK, raise 4% of the taxation and have 6% of the needs”.
In Scotland the situation is different. Importantly in the recent period the more class conscious and radical elements of the working class in Scotland have tended to support the idea of independence. Socialist Party Wales’ sister party in Scotland, the International Socialists, has advanced the slogan of an independent socialist Scotland as part of a socialist confederation with England, Wales and Ireland to tie in the idea of socialism and an independent Scotland. The International Socialists have opposed the idea of stages put forward by the leadership of the Scottish Socialist Party: first a capitalist Scotland and then maybe socialism. We have pointed out that an independent capitalist Scotland would not solve any of the problems of the working class in Scotland.
In Wales, however, there has not been the same support for independence amongst working class people and youth. There are differing attitudes to the national question within the working class. There is general dissatisfaction with the Assembly but this expresses itself in different ways. Many working class people believe that the Assembly is a waste of money. But many of these support the idea of more powers for the Assembly. An older layer would support the abolition of the Assembly, but this is diminishing as an idea. Even the Tories support the Assembly now.
There is also a section of working class people who feel that Wales should have a parliament or even independence. This layer is not crudely nationalist but includes those who see the role of a Welsh parliament as a radical force in the struggle to change society. There might be a nationalist tinge but they aspire to change society. And there is also a layer of workers suspicious of nationalism and afraid that nationalism will be used by Plaid Cymru to cut across the labour movement. There is stronger support for a parliament or independence amongst young people but this is combined with a greater scepticism about politics in general. There are also different moods in the regions of Wales with, predictably, support for devolution strongest in Gwynedd and weakest in Gwent. Marxists have to be able to approach these different layers, perhaps with different emphases, but with the same programme.
The Socialist Party’s position on the national question in Wales has remained essentially the same for more than twenty years. As well as defending the right of national self-determination socialists support autonomy – at this stage an elected parliament with law making and tax adjusting powers because it is a basic democratic demand and also because it will benefit the interests both of the Welsh working class and the working class in the rest of Britain. The relative weight of the working class in Welsh society means that autonomy can be used to push forward the interests of workers and win reforms that encourage the movement both in Wales and the rest of Britain.
Marxists are not opposed to independence in principle; they advance whatever demands take the working class movement forward towards a socialist transformation. But we think that in Wales that are a number of problems that mean that Socialist Party Wales should not advance this demand. Firstly, the most important principle for socialists should be maintaining the unity of the working class. A struggle for independence in Wales not only risks dividing the Welsh working class from the English, but also dividing the Welsh working class itself. There is a significant section of the Welsh working class that is resolutely opposed to independence.
Secondly, if socialists were to adopt a position of fighting for independence at this stage then it would cut them off from the large majority of Welsh workers. From our point of view there is no point in alienating socialists from workers on an issue that we do not think would be decisively in the interests of advancing socialism.
Nevertheless Marxists must always reassess its position on the national question in a sensitive way. The guiding principle on the national question is what can advance the struggle of the working class towards socialism.
FAVOURABLE SITUATION
2007 opens with Socialist Party Wales in a favourable position with big opportunities opening up especially in the trade unions and amongst the youth. There is still a slight hangover from the 1990s in the consciousness of the working class but also a widespread agreement with our general ideas. The key issue is how a workers’ party can be built to carry them forward.
In this situation all sorts of political formations can be thrown up. Socialist Party Wales will have to be flexible in tactics while firm in principle, as Lenin put it, to react to the possibilities thrown up in the coming period. But we have the potential with the quality and standing of our members to become the leading left force in Wales.
