A critical aspect of organising the ‘unorganised’ is reaching out to migrant workers. Since May 2004, an estimated 6-700,000 people have come to work in Britain from Eastern Europe. This is the biggest single wave of immigration in Britain’s history. Many are highly skilled workers, such as doctors, teachers and nurses, filling gaps in public services created by the government’s lack of investment and training: 30% of doctors, 13% of nurses and 12.5% of teachers are from overseas. But the majority of migrant workers are super-exploited in low paid, casual work, such as in agriculture, catering and cleaning. They work long hours and are housed in overcrowded, substandard accommodation by their profit-hungry employers. We cannot substitute ourselves for the whole trade union movement. Nonetheless, a revolutionary party should always aim to reach and win the most downtrodden. One of the most important aspects of our work has to be to reach and win to socialist ideas the most thinking of this new section of the working class in Britain. Many arrive in Britain with illusions about the living standards they will be able to attain. However, once they realise how brutally they will be exploited, and how expensive the cost of living in Britain is, their illusions about ‘life in the West’ are usually quickly shattered.
The Treasury has raised its estimate of sustainable growth from 2.5% to 2.75% from 2007 onwards purely on the basis of increased immigration. This does not mean that immigration means growth or increased wealth for all. The Financial Times Survey on economic prospects for 2007 commented: “Continued high levels of immigration should raise the growth rate that the economy can sustain without sparking inflation, holding down wages compared with profits and benefiting most people.” Holding down wages does not, of course, benefit most people but a few at the top. The situation was summed up more accurately by Charles Goodhart a former member of the Bank of England Monetary Policy Committee who stated bluntly regarding increased immigration: “Winners: capitalists. Losers: workers.”
Under capitalism, moreover, the issue of immigration remains a powerful propaganda weapon in the hands of the ruling class. To counter this, Marxists must adopt a skilful approach. We have to steadfastly oppose the scapegoating of both asylum seekers and of economic migrants. However, in doing so we are aiming to convince as many workers as possible of this position. To simply dismiss workers’ concerns about increased immigration as merely a consequence of the undoubted racist propaganda in the tabloid press, as some on the left do, is a mistake and will never gain the ear of the vast majority of working-class people in Britain.
If we are to successfully put forward a programme which can unite new immigrants with indigenous workers and longer-standing immigrants, it is important that we recognise the different elements that are resulting in opposition to increased immigration among wide sections of the working class. It is, of course, true that racism and national prejudice is a factor. But the increased opposition to immigration, including among a layer of workers who are consciously anti-racist, is also a reflection of workers own experience of how the new generation of immigrants is being used by the ruling class to drive down wages and, because of the lack of resources, is adding to the pressures on public services and housing in the areas they are moving into. John Denham, Labour MP for Southampton said, on the effects of immigration in Southampton: “Southampton has not yet received any extra funds to meet additional needs for schools (who have to provide translation), the health service, or for enforcement action against poor quality and overcrowded housing. Local unemployment has risen by over 25% in the past year and there are real fears that the ‘hard to employ’ – lone parents, those on Invalidity Benefit and ex-offenders – are being squeezed out of the labour market. In some occupations, particularly construction, wages have fallen by around 50% over the past two years.” Denham may well be exaggerating but the general trends he points out do exist. One in ten under 25 year olds are now unemployed. One factor in the growth of unemployment among the young and unskilled is the increase in immigration. It is true that most immigrants from Eastern Europe are young and single, and therefore are making limited use of public services. Nonetheless, there have been numerous reports of a sudden increase in school class sizes and doctors’ waiting lists, often in the poorest areas, as a result of cuts combined with increased immigration.
Inevitably, there is support for increased immigration controls among broad sections of the working class. However, under capitalism, immigration controls will always act in the interests of big business, not the working class. Bending under pressure, New Labour has introduced restrictions on the right of Romanian and Bulgarian workers to work in Britain. However, these immigration controls will not alter the general trend of big business in Britain to encourage immigration. Romanian and Bulgarian workers are still allowed to come to Britain. However, they can only work legally if they are self-employed or accepted under a quota scheme. But of course, for capitalism, an illegal workforce is the easiest to exploit. As The Economist argued approvingly: “Illegal migrants are the most employment-hungry, market-sensitive arrivals of all.” Even before Romania joined the EU, two million Romanians had left their home country. Most went to Southern Europe where they worked illegally. This was tacitly encouraged by the ruling class of the EU countries just as it is now being in Britain. It is true that the British government has gone further in lifting immigration restrictions than other EU countries, but the process is the same in every country. Since the accession countries joined the EU, around half-a-million workers from those countries have gone to Germany, a similar number as has come to Britain. German capitalism did not simply lift the restrictions as Britain did, for fear of the political consequences, but instead granted work permits.
The ‘race to the bottom’ is intrinsic to modern capitalism. Globalisation is used as a means to increase profits by driving down workers’ living conditions. In the first instance, this has been carried out by moving production abroad. Now, increasingly, immigration is being used to hold down wages in those sectors that cannot be moved abroad. At the same time, in a globalised world where travel is more possible than ever before, it is inevitable that people try to better themselves and to escape from the terrible conditions created by capitalism in their country of origin. The only way that the working class can counter the consequences of increased immigration is to unite and fight for decent pay and conditions for all. However, as long as capitalism exists, the struggle to stop wages and conditions being undermined by all possible methods will continue. The only way to permanently end the ‘race to the bottom’ is the socialist transformation of society. Nonetheless, the potential for successful struggles for equal pay exists, as was shown in Ireland with the magnificent Gama struggle followed by the Irish Ferries half-day strike. Our propaganda has to centre on the urgency of this task and that it suits big business if workers are divided. In reality, the real difference of interests is not between indigenous workers and immigrants, but between oppressors and the oppressed. After all, if you have over £250,000 in your bank account, regardless of by what scurrilous means you got it, there are no immigration controls and you are simply welcomed with open arms by the government.
The trade unionisation of immigrants is not a new issue for the British working class, but it will form a vital aspect of both the struggle against low pay and the struggle against racism in the coming years. As far back as 1839, when William Cuffay, who was born in St Kitts in the Caribbean, founded the garment workers’ union, immigrant workers have played a role greater than their numbers in the British labour movement. The labour movement at it best has also played the key role in fighting racism. In the 1950s, for example, it was the railway workers’ union which played the leading role in getting rid of the colour bar in many London pubs. This flowed from a realisation of railway workers that the only way to stop the bosses using workers from the Caribbean as cheap labour was to unionise and launch a common struggle for decent pay. In the 1970s, trade unions were instrumental in the battle to defeat the far-right racist NF.
It is as a result of these traditions that black and Asian workers in Britain formed a strong bond with the labour movement even though the majority did not come from an urban background in their home countries. In the 1970s, black and Asian workers played a key role in many industrial struggles. The Grunwicks strike against low pay in 1976, which largely involved Asian women, was one of the key battles of the decade. Even today, after the fall in union membership as a result of the 1990s, it is still the case that Afro-Caribbean workers have a higher level of union membership (32.4%) than the workforce as a whole (26.6%).
Today, lower levels of trade unionisation, and the more brutal nature of global capitalism, makes the organisation of migrant workers both more difficult and more vital than it was in the post-war upswing. To a limited degree the trade unions have already been forced to act. In Southampton and Glasgow, the GMB has launched Polish branches, and the T&G has appointed Polish organisers and started to produce special material in Polish. One of the GMB organisers explained in The Guardian (6 December 2006): “We were expecting around 20 [Polish workers] to come [to a meeting on joining the union] and were amazed when 130 arrived.” With a correct approach from the trade union leaders, the potential exists for Polish workers in Britain to play a role comparable with Latinos in America in spearheading a new wave of union radicalisation. However, this will be limited if the recruitment of Eastern Europeans workers is just seen as a way of increasing the membership figures, rather than as part of a strategy to fight for better wages.
Capitalism internationally is using immigration as a means to increase profits. However, its capacity to do this is limited by the potential that exists to create dangerous instability. The nation state is the basic unit of capitalist society, while at the same time being an obstacle to its development. Today, in the era of globalisation, the productive forces – industry, science and technique – have long outgrown their national base. Therefore, the capitalists strain hard against the limitations of the nation state. However, they can only partially surmount them. The big corporations are, almost without exception, still based in and tied to particular countries. They are reliant on the market and the political superstructure of their home nation. An intrinsic part of that political superstructure is a national consciousness which the capitalist class taps into in order, for example, to win support for its wars. The capitalists cannot switch national consciousness on and off at will.
British capitalism felt it had no choice but to limit immigration at the end of the 1960s, despite the economic advantages it could gain by speeding it up, because of its fear of the potential for social instability. Today, when the lives of workers in Britain are, in general, becoming more difficult – as working hours increase and public services deteriorate – the potential for instability and conflict is clear. For the ruling class at this stage, this is less important than the drive to increase profits, and the increased restrictions on Bulgarians and Romanians are essentially cosmetic, although in the event of a recession they can be forced to introduce further restrictions. Even at this stage, the ruling class is concerned about increased instability, both in terms of the growth of the far-right and the increased alienation of a layer of people from ethnic minorities, particularly young Muslims. However, it has no solution to this, which is fundamentally caused by the nature of modern capitalism, and so is fumbling around to try and find the best approach. This is reflected in all of the capitalist politicians’ lack of clarity on whether ‘multi-culturalism’ (which can never fully exist under capitalism) or forced ‘assimilation’ is the way forward.
Far right and racism
The far-right, in the form of the British National Party, has been able to make some electoral gains. The membership of the BNP remains relatively small – estimated at 9,000-10,000 – in comparison to the perception of the electoral support it has in some areas; however, it is likely to be able to make further gains in elections, particularly for as long as no mass workers’ party exists. The BNP is exploiting the vacuum that exists by posing as a party of the ‘white working class’ and, in a few areas, it has been able to win the votes of sizeable sections of the working class, at least in local elections. It is also starting to attract a layer of the petit-bourgeois, as demonstrated by the ‘prima-ballerina’ who recently joined it. The BNP’s written material often contains superficially ‘left’ propaganda against NHS cuts, low pay and so on combined with racism which, while subtler than its material of the past, is nonetheless designed to whip up racist hatred. The recent court case unsurprisingly revealed that, while its official statements may have become more subtle, when talking to each other and those they consider ‘their supporters’ they remain as crudely racist as ever. However, the court case also demonstrated that the BNP will not be successfully marginalised just by using the bourgeois courts, or by pious statements from mainstream politicians. On the contrary, given that it is a deep-seated alienation from the capitalist politicians that is fuelling electoral support for the BNP, such statements are more likely to increase its support than undermine it. The need for a class-based alternative to the BNP is crucial to limiting its further growth. Therefore, if there is a further delay in the development of a new mass workers’ party, the possibility is posed that the BNP could make a more qualitative electoral breakthrough – establishing itself as a semi-stable far-right racist party, such as exists in many countries of Europe. The experience of most other European countries is that the active membership of these parties remains limited but they are able to win the allegiance of a significant section of voters. Although there are other factors, including the, up until now, clumsy and crude approach of the BNP, it will be the consciousness and combativity of the labour movement, and particularly the development of a new party, which will be the central factor in pushing back the BNP. However, as events in Belgium have shown, the threat of the far-right, with a section of the most conscious workers, can at a certain point act as a catalyst for the creation of a new workers’ party.
The main focus of the BNP’s racist propaganda recently has been against Muslims. While this has been used as an excuse by New Labour to pass the religious hatred legislation, the primary reason for the BNP’s change of tack is not legal, but political. In the wake of the horrific 7/7 bombings there was a 600% increase in racist attacks, with Muslims and those who could be perceived as Muslims suffering the worst. The BNP is attempting to take advantage of this increased racism against Muslims. Meanwhile, New Labour has used 7/7 to justify forcing through a whole raft of attacks on democratic rights. This has included instructing universities to check up on the computer use of ‘Asian looking students’ and creating what Asian Metropolitan police officers described as “the offence of travelling while Asian”. None of this legislation or directives will prevent future attacks – on the contrary, they will increase the anger and alienation of Britain’s Muslims, already searing as a result of the occupations of Iraq and Afghanistan, and therefore increase the tiny minority that is prepared to carry out the profoundly mistaken policy of terrorist attacks. This is particularly the case because it has been combined with a stepping up of anti-Muslim propaganda in the media, but also from both the government and the Tories. Incredibly Blair declared in a recent speech: “I think it is great that in British politics today no mainstream party plays the race card. It is not conceivable, in my view, that this leader of the Conservative party would… misuse the debate on immigration and that is both a tribute to him and to the common culture of tolerance we have established in this country today.” This is not true about Cameron, whose speech at Tory party conference did have elements of playing the race card, but it is particularly untrue about New Labour. The comments Blair made in that same speech, that Muslims had to “integrate” and “conform… or don’t come here”, alongside the remarks of Straw, Woolas, Brown and others, were a reaction to increased racism, and an attempt to bolster their electoral support by pandering to it. The result has undoubtedly been a further increase in racism. Marxists’ starting point has to be to defend the rights of Muslims and all ethnic and religious minorities against racism and attacks on their democratic and religious rights. At the same time, we have to both reach the working class as a whole with a transitional approach, explaining that it is not in their interests to allow New Labour to whip up racism and division and, at the same time, attempt to convince the most thinking sections of working-class Muslims that their interests lie, not in turning inwards, but in uniting with the working class on a socialist programme.
Increased racism against Muslims is one aspect of a general social fragmentation. The undermining of collective action – the simple idea of sticking together with each other – and the undermining of community consciousness have added to a sense of alienation and helplessness among some of the poorest sections of the working class. It is no accident that, according to a recent survey, the murder rate has doubled since 1967. But the increase is concentrated almost exclusively among the poorest sections of working class men. If you live in Britain’s poorest neighbourhoods you are six times more likely to be murdered than if you live in a wealthy area.
The brutalisation of parts of British society is not only related to the attacks of British capitalism but also the weakness of the labour and trade union movement in fighting against it. In the past, the Labour Party, while it had a capitalist leadership, nonetheless had a working-class base, and gave voice, at least partially, to workers’ struggles to improve their conditions. Together with the trade unions it played a role in cutting across racism. This was instinctively understood by Muslims in the past – when they supported the Labour Party seeing it as “less racist in both attitude and practise than other parties”.
