New political formations and managing capitalism

Westminster is designed to keep new parties out so it is no surprise that smaller fringe type parties find it hard to make many inroads into building a base. This is the case with parties who may even have been around a while such as the Greens or UKIP who are not new formations as such but new to the Westminster bubble as such. Even if UKIP's two mp's now are ex Tories these are still new mp's for the party and will boost UKIP voters confidence of a good showing next year in the general election which for me still looks wide open for anyone to win. I personally can’t see any one party forming a majority government next year with both major parties labour and the Tories can barely muster 60% between them. So what about the greens and UKIP. Their support has grown with some polls putting the greens ahead of the Lib Dems in national polls. The greens will be a threat to labour going forward but also UKIP will eat into labours heartlands too as recent by elections have shown us. So quite clearly the Westminster elite is structured to keep out fringe and protest parties The way politics and elections work in England in particular as Scotland is different having STV Single transferable vote. The electoral system of first past the post is an old archaic system which is designed for the major traditional parties to remain in power and make it hard for smaller new parties to gain a foothold in parliament. It is as we might say a club for the elite and exclusive. So while we may see the Greens and UKIP wishing to manage capitalism one day forming their own government It is unlikely given our electoral system of FPTP. Likewise any future new workers party which may or may not come into existence this century will also find it hard to make much progress not just because of a general anti politics feeling out there at the moment but simply due to the way we do electoralism with mainstream politics in this country. So while I do feel it’s a waste of the lefts time building new parties and focusing on elections getting this or that party into power to manage capitalism better than the Tories or labor I can also understand why this is a dead end strategy. The greens who pose as anti capitalist are not at all anti capitalist they are to be honest socially democratic to the style of the old labour left perhaps a sort of mixture of climate change and new layers of anti austerity disaffected ex labour voters/members and allot more in between. Nowhere in the greens thinking is putting the idea of capitalism firmly in their opposition they simply wish to tax the rich more and campaign for a green economy a sort of green capitalism if you like. This for me is just as utopian as Ed Milibands responsible capitalism as while I can see a green version of capitalism it still would not deal with work and how we could begin to find ways of reducing work and the need for wage labour. I do like a lot of what the greens say however and dabbled with joining them. I think they are well meaning and say allot of good things while not going far enough on many issues. But for UKIP they see a return to isolated great British capitalism and return to an era of the white British ruling the waves again they see the EU as evil and corrupt to its core. While they may have some points on Europe on its lack of democracy I may agree with I sense that their idea of wishing to leave the EU to return to a better off distant past is going to be mistaken due to its pitfalls and how as a world now we are global and allot of countries wanting to form closer ties instead of pulling away from each other. This is also the case for the awful left nationalist no to EU which is equally stating that British austerity would be preferable to EU austerity and that the EU is just a boss's club we need to get out of. Tailing UKIP on any issue is never a good plan comrades. So whether your party is in long term decline like the Tories or labour facing challenges from the left and right or the newcomers on the block who are taking advantage of a plague on all your houses with the main 3 political parties. But I always maintain whether you’re on the left or the right you can never manage capitalism as in the end it ends up managing you. So getting into parliament on a radical ticket ends up watering you down and deradicalises you rather than the other way. It’s the structures built into the establishment which is the design model not because people entering parliament are born sell outs although many might be of course. The rise of anti political parties is not just limited to this country either in Scotland the SNP have benefited from a surge in support for Scottish independence while across Europe there are new left and right popularist parties popping up very quickly from Spain to Greece and into Eastern Europe so this is by no means a British thing but the way our elections work dictates that this process is a much slower process. None the less the centre ground of politics if there ever was such a thing is collapsing. What comes in its place will set the agenda for the next phase of capitalism. The only way we can prevent this ever expanding circle of parties wishing to manage capitalism better than the last is to end capitalism for good. Its time to organize ourselves and not rely on political parties for change. By all means pressure them for anything you can get out of them but we must look past parliament for change long term. It will be down to the working class and the working class alone to change society not a new party or new individual with popular sounding rhetoric from the left or the right.

Could UKIP run Tories close in Hertford and Stortford next may ?

Whilst I’ve been totally turned off by electoral politics and parties in general I do keep an eye on local politics and the moves and changes in our area. Even if a relatively minor area in terms of political significance our area of East Hertfordshire is one to watch I feel. Our current MP is Mark Prisk of the conservative party. Mark who took a while to getting elected failing twice in 92 and 97 eventually was elected in Hertford and Stortford. He was finally elected as the Conservative MP for the constituency of Hertford and Stortford in 2001. Since gaining his seat at Westminster, he has been marked for ministerial office in a future Tory government. He has been promoted from the backbenches to serve at various points as Shadow Financial Secretary, Shadow Minister for Economic Affairs, an opposition whip and Shadow Minister for Business and Enterprise. He is author of several pamphlets on urban design. Currently Mark Prisk and the Tories hold the seat In East Herts with a big majority of 15,437. I would imagine Mark will regain his seat next year but could be run close if UKIP put up a good campaign on the ground. This is a tory stronghold with tories in power in all of the town councils and county councils even if nearby bigger towns of Stevenage and Harlow both have labour councils they both have marginal seats where labour will be looking to take back in 2015. Looking at wider trends across the country and how UKIP are gaining ground on both labour and Tories in the North and the south but not in London yet interestingly I may cover why in a future post. But UKIP who will be fighting a by election in Rochester and Strood on November 20th due to the defection of Conservative MP Mark Reckless to UKIP may see the UKIP really start uping their game on to a new level. Anyone who thought UKIP would just be a flash in the pan may need to think again. Whilst a lot of UKIP voters will be voting them as a protest vote to kick the other major parties a lot are disaffected tories who feel the tories have gone soft on certain issues such as immigration which is a big policy area for UKIP and often makes up the backbone of their politics which also ties into their Eurosceptism . Recent by elections have seen UKIP run labour and the Tories close and even gaining their first MP in the name of Douglas Carswell in Claction earlier this month returning him as a MP with a big majority of 12,404 . Could UKIP do the same in similar areas in the coming elections ? I do think so. Running labour close in a labour stronghold shocked many who felt UKIP were just a threat to the Tories recent months have shown this isn’t always the case. In the months other by-election, Labour held on to Heywood and Middleton but UKIP slashed its majority to 617. Mr. Farage told BBC Breakfast UKIP could hold the balance of power after next year's general election. A worrying thought if ever there was one. So could UKIP run the Tories close in Hertford and Stortford next year? I dont see why not. Mark Prisk is a well known Tory and well known in the area there is not much you can say against him personally apart from he is a Tory and goes along with their thinking and disregard for the poor. I have emailed him before and always had a reply even if I often disagree with his views. UKIP last time out in 2010 in East Herts gained 1,716 votes which was poor but have seen their vote share rocket in recent by elections in comparison to their showings last time around. The political ground has changed and UKIP are feeling the benefits so far as the country slips further to the right. Any thought that the left would do well out of a downturn in the economy and peoples lives has long since been proved wrong in fact it very much has benifited the right in the UK anyway. As for UKIP in East Herts they seem to be on the ball in terms of tracking down the Tories and aiming fire at the local Tories and their plans for development which is promised to increase our population considerably in the coming decades. I do think there is a base for UKIP to build on in East Herts there has been a history of Eurosceptic parties and thinking in the area we even had a party calling themselves the referendum party who claimed to have 50 thousand members back in 1996 who gained 2,105 votes which for a new party back in 97 isn’t too bad given the norm for newly formed smaller parties. UKIP can do well in East Herts and the threat is very real. Those who detest their form of politics must be aware of them and take them on in a big way. A piece from the Hertfordshire Mercury our local paper talks on UKIP selecting its candidate to take on Mark Prisk next year I quote below http://www.hertfordshiremercury.co.uk/UKIP-selects-Hertford-Stortford-parliamentary/story-23035085-detail/story.html " L A teacher who vows to fight for sustainable development and a better life for people on minimum wage has been selected as a candidate for UKIP in next year’s election. Adrian Baker, of Wareside, will fight for the Hertford and Stortford parliamentary seat next May. He said: “I know this is a strong Conservative area, and that we have a fight on our hands, but I welcome that challenge – especially in these exciting times where the old, failing, two-party sy stem is collapsing. “The simple truth is that both the Conservative and Labour parties have let the people of East Herts down. “People are seeing through Cameron's false promises on Europe, and are fed up with his inability to control immigration which is leading to mass development of the Green Belt, no more so than within East Herts where more than 15,000 new homes are proposed to be built.” He praised UKIP’s commitment for everybody on the minimum wage to be lifted out of paying income tax. On local issues he said: On local issues Adrian said, “We have had a massive building programme foisted on East Herts with over 15,000 new houses planned. “Nobody is listening to residents’ concerns or considering the effects on local infrastructure. “Incumbent MP, Mark Prisk, who has recently taken up a second job advising a development company, has been silent whilst bulldozers are poised to dig up our green fields around Hertford, Ware, Sawbridgeworth and Bishop’s Stortford, and our villages and towns are going to lose their rural feel as more and more building takes place. “I'll fight against unsustainable development in our area, but with net migration of 250,000 people into the UK last year alone, the pressure on our Green Belt will remain whilst the Tory government has an open-door border policy. “Until we take back control of our borders, the pressures on housing will never go away.” UKIP’s East Herts District Council Election campaign manager, Jim Boodrie, said: “With his dedication, and knowledge of the area, Adrian is the right candidate not only to lead our parliamentary election campaign, but also to spearhead the election of UKIP members to the East Herts District Council next May”

Why UKIP is gaining ground and why the left is no where to be seen

Last nights win and close second win for UKIP should be a wake up call for us all. While UKIP has come far in 20 + years the left if anything has gone backwards and here I will explain why. UKIP are not just a protest vote and cannot be under estimated as much of the current left are doing. We must be awake and alert to their advance. I confidently predict if Labour form the next government which seems most likely although this could be wrong just going by current polling figures. Labour will form a government like no other labour go they will embark on a quest of austerity and carrying on where the Tories and lib dems will leave off. This is not to rule out the Tories and lib Dems who will have a say in who forms the next gov still. This will benefit UKIP who are posing as the anti establishment and the protest vote of the day so far and are doing well with that if we’re all honest. Much of the left appear blinded by UKIP and cannot see how they will grow in this coming period. Nigel Forage who is the main man of UKIP so far has positioned himself cleverly and is able to pick up disillusioned mainly Tory but also labour voters of the north which should send shockwaves down all sides of the left that how he is able to get away with this. Well let me spell it out for those who cannot see such things. UKIP is not going away anytime soon anyone who thinks they are just a flash in the pan and will go away once the general election comes into focus will be sadly mistaken I feel. I am no supporter of UKIP and it’s hard to pin them down what they are and what they stand for. Some on the left think they are fully fascist and racist and should be no platformed others are a bit more wary and see them more than just far right nutters and actually can see them becoming the main party on the right in UK politics in the coming period given the secular decline of the Conservatives. Too many UKIP are anti European and anti immigration. But delving closer into their policies which I advise all to do if they can would appear not so anti establishment as they may like to make out. In fact I’d go as far as to say they are Tories on steroids who want to take back the right as their own and start afresh as an independent Great Britain isolated from the rest of Europe. As far as I can see the left in the United Kingdom are failing at opposing them and in some case’s going along with what they say. Take the left nationalist no to EU yes to democracy the CPB and the socialist party backed by RMT stood for in this years and also 2009’s European elections agrees with the right in that too many workers are heading to these shores and something must be done about it. This is classic left nationalism which appeals to very few on the left as it stands and is rightly rejected by the working class who vote for this. No to EU is a disaster and a car crash and I’m glad it is being tossed about like a boat in a storm and will eventually be ship wrecked with any luck. I am neither for the EU or against it to be honest I don’t know enough about the inn’s and out’s of such things but I am sure I will learn about such things given time. At present no left force in Britain gets how UKIP are doing so well. Some say they are just racist and should be ignored. Others engage with them and find themselves floundering as UKIP are able to put forward a good anti austerity argument as to why we should leave the EU. This will be put out very clearly in 2017 if we do go for an in/out referendum which the Tories are fully signed up to. A lot of people have under estimated UKIP and their influence back in the main 3 parties and are rightly or wrongly hoovering up votes for those desperate for something different however it looks and sounds. The left in Britain in or out of the labour party have no answers to the UKIP march on power the country appears to be heading more and more to the right and this worries me deeply with no electoral left to talk of with TUSC only being trotted out in local elections and no to EU in the recent European elections just gone. Who can be under any illusion that the left get UKIP and know how to take it on. Quite frankly the left are floundering and have no answers to the current crisis of capitalism apart from the old tired out dogma’s of nationalisation which to me is supporting the idea of state capitalism. For me having been in a trotskyist group and seeing for myself its failings and lack of democracy it is no wonder that now no party on the left be it left or far left can put forward any sort of alternative to the current mire we found ourselves in. Simply put the left have vacated the battle ground in favour of minor concessions just to take their place in securing capitalisms long term future which will stabilise if nothing will rock yet again. Capitalism is never far from the next crisis yet the left in the UK are blinded by their own contradictions and cannot see beyond the end of their noses. We need an alternative that will put the working class first and not rely on any so called leaders of our movement. As workers we have the power to change society if we so wished. Let’s start here in understanding where we are and beyond. UKIP can be pushed back if the left actually get to gripes with what they are. For the left seeing voters leave to join UKIP is beyond them but instead of blaming them and writing those off maybe try to chat to them ask how things could be better and how. There is a world to win out there all the best

A look at the 2014 european elections results

As expected UKIP topped the polls in the European elections over the weekend in the UK Eurrosceptic and far-right parties have seized ground in elections to the European parliament, in what France's PM called a "political earthquake". UK Independence Party and French National Front both performed strongly. The three big centrist blocs all lost seats, though still hold the majority. The outcome means a greater say for those who want to cut back the EU's powers, or abolish it completely. UK PM David Cameron said the public was "disillusioned" with the EU. Mr Cameron said their message was "received and understood". French President Francois Hollande has called an urgent meeting of his cabinet, as Prime Minister Manuel Valls promised tax cuts a day after the results which he described as "a shock, an earthquake". Chancellor Angela Merkel - whose party topped the poll in Germany - described the far right victories as "remarkable and regrettable" and said the best response was to boost economic growth and jobs. Jose Manuel Barroso, outgoing president of the European Commission, stressed that the pro-EU blocs still had "a very solid and workable majority". He said a "truly democratic debate" was needed to address the concerns of those who did not vote, or "voted in protest". • ance National Front storm to victory - 25%, 24 seats; Centre-right UMP 21%; President Hollande's Socialists a poor third with 14% - lowest ever EP score • Britain Eurosceptic UKIP in first place, with 27%, Conservatives on 24% and Labour about 25%, Greens beating Lib Dems • Germany Angela Merkel wins another election - 35% for her Christian Union, 27% for the centre-left SPD. Eurosceptic AfD score strong 7% • Greece Partial results show far-left Syriza on 26%, PM Antonis Samaras' New Democracy on 23%. Far-right Golden Dawn set to get three MEPs, with 9%. Syriza leader Alexis Tsipras has asked the Greek president to call early national elections. supporters will be pleased that election turnout was slightly higher, at 43.1%, according to provisional European Parliament figures. at would be the first time turnout had not fallen since the previous election - but would only be an improvement of 0.1%. "The people have spoken loud and clear," a triumphant Marine Le Pen told cheering supporters at National Front (FN) party headquarters in Paris. "They no longer want to be led by those outside our borders, by EU commissioners and technocrats who are unelected. They want to be protected from globalisation and take back the reins of their destiny." Provisional results suggested the FN could win 25 European Parliament seats - a stunning increase on its three in 2009. spite the huge gains for anti-EU parties and those that wish to reduce the power of the EU, it is unlikely that the European Parliament will adopt a fundamentally different approach. The main centre-right and left groupings still hold the majority of seats between them. Add in the Liberals and the Greens and parliament is overwhelmingly pro-EU. In that sense if the main groups in the parliament choose to ignore those who didn't vote for them last night, they can. National politicians however, can't afford to ignore them. That's where this election is likely to really shake things up. This will have an impact not just on domestic politics, but on the national leaders when they meet in Brussels at the European Council - where their job is to shape the direction of the EU. Will this lead to a new direction and a shae up of the EU ?? only time will tell. All that is true is that we are heading into a new possibly unstable and turbulent period in European politics.

UKIP on the rise in local elections, a swing to the right in the UK ? or not ?

The UK media has gone berserk in telling us the the anti-EU, anti-immigration, right-wing UK Independence Party (UKIP) had a huge surge from nowhere in its vote. All the talk was that UKIP was about to win the biggest share of the vote and seats in the European Parliament when the results come out on Monday. It was now a 'major threat' to the centre-right coalition government and could even replace Labour as the main opposition and so on...... Actually, the local election results do not bear out that conclusion at all. It was Labour that polled the biggest share of those who voted in these minor elections, albeit only 29%. The ruling Conservatives also polled more than UKIP at 25%. UKIP was third at 23-24%, a leap up from last time, but hardly a victory. Indeed, this 'Poujadist' party will have no more than one-tenth of the council seats won by the two main parties, Labour and Conservative. And nearly all UKIP's seats will be concentrated in rural areas, particularly the better-off south-east and east of England (Scotland and Wales did not vote and UKIP is non-existent there). Actually the real winners, as usual, were the NO-VOTE party. The turnout for these elections was not more than 40%, so most people eligible to vote did not bother. Translating the share of votes into shares of eligible voters, we find that the winners of these local elections, Labour, got no more than one in eight potential voters to support them and the ruling Conservatives managed only one in ten eligible to vote. The government has been crowing about the return of fast economic growth that the UK economy is now experiencing under its policies. And there was apparently more good news in the this week's retail sales figures, which showed a big surge. But it seems that the British electorate does not agree that all is rosy. And we can see why when the latest data continue to show that average real incomes are falling as inflation outstrips wage increases . Even now, Britain's real GDP has not yet returned to pre-crisis levels, and with employment in badly-paid jobs and self-employment rising, the overall productivity of British capitalism has declined. Indeed, Britons are working harder and longer for less money. UK business investment was up 8.7% in the first quarter of this year compared with a year ago. That sounds good - until you see that investment is still some 18% below where it was in 2008 and this is nominal terms. The latest data show that the top 10% of British households own 44% of all household wealth (to use Thomas Piketty's definition) - they are not feeling the depression, only the 'boom'. And it's their sentiments that the government expresses. The reality is that there is increasing disillusionment with the mainstream political parties as we shall see when the EU parliamentary elections are announced In the UK, the combined Conservative and Labour vote in general elections has fallen to 60% from 80-90% in the 1960s, while separatist and other parties have risen from nothing to 12%. In this little local election, the combined vote of the top two parties was 54%. Voter turnout has plummeted from 75% in the 1980s to about 60% now, as politicians become increasingly divorced from their voters. Back in the 1960s, as much as 15% of MPs were manual workers, now it is less than 5% while those MPs who have never had a proper job and are just 'career politicians' is now 15%. The rest had jobs in the 'professions' and business and finance etc, with many millionaires among them. The 'surge' of support for parties like UKIP is a frustrated expression of people despairing at the main parties of capitalist democracy ever doing anything to improve their lot or even stop it getting worse. We'll see that sentiment expressed in the EU election results on Monday. I’ll takea further look at the European elections next week. reblogged and thanks to michael roberts at http://thenextrecession.wordpress.com/2014/05/23/what-a-surge/

Nigel Farage, is he as anti establishment as he likes to make out??

Today see's the latest in a line of political figures coming under fire for their expenses. This time it is the medias darling of the moment the UKIP leader Nigel Farage. Nigel Farage has rejected "outrageous" claims that his taxpayer-funded EU office expenses of around £15,000 a year are too high. The Ukip leader is facing questions about his use of the EU parliamentary expenses system after it emerged he pays no rent on a small Bognor Regis property designated as his UK office. Between 2009 and 2013, Farage has claimed between £13,000 and £20,000 a year in office management and running costs for the site, averaging around £15,000 a year. However, a former office manager told the Times that upkeep of the converted grain store in terms of bills and other non-rental costs only amounts to around £3,000 a year, leaving around £12,000 a year unaccounted for. Farage hit back in an interview on BBC Radio 4's Today programme, arguing he legitimately made use of flat-rate "allowances" from EU funds, which do not amount to expenses. He also said he would be prepared to have his expenses checked by an auditor "if that would settle the matter". MEPs can spend these allowances "how we see fit", he said. "I'm sorry, but this whole story and even the line of questioning here is simply wrong," he said. "Let's get this right from the start shall we? We do not claim expenses for running offices or any other activity that takes place within our member state the United Kingdom; we get an allowance, a fixed-rate allowance, and we can spend it how we see fit." "It is £3,580 a month, and that is given to every MEP; we can spend it how we want to, we don't have to provide receipts for it or anything like that. We are given recommendations as to what it can legitimately be spent on, which include the running of an office, paying for a mobile phone, buying equipment, hotel bills, restaurant bills, applying for subscriptions to websites, buying newspapers, there's a list as long as your arm on what this money can legitimately be spent on." Farage said he had always been open about using the EU cash to fight against Britain's membership while staying within the rules. He said he was taking legal advice about the Times story, accusing it of launching a politically motivated attack because it is an "establishment" newspaper". Hypocritical much? Nigel Farage likes to pose as being anti establishment but he is as much part of it as any MP out there. A former stockbroker in the city of London now turned career politician Farage has carved out a good career for himself and with UKIP looking set to do well in the upcoming European elections on 22nd may could this dent his image at all ? Earlier, the Times reported he had told them: "I don't pay rent on the office but I obviously pay for everything else," he said. "Whether it's the burglar alarm or electricity." He also disputed claims by the former grain store manager, saying: "About £1,000 a month is roughly what it is. Exceptionally I put more money in as and when it's needed." The newspaper reported he has been referred to the European expenses watchdog by a former Ukip official over how he has spent around £60,000 of office expenses since transparency declarations about expenses began in 2009. MEPs are not required to provide receipts proving how they spend their expenses, with the EU saying it is a "matter of honor" that they are spent correctly. The allegations emerge as Ukip is riding high in the polls while the Conservatives appeared to have taken a hit over former culture secretary Maria Miller's wrongly-claimed expenses. The Ukip leader said Miller has "taken the mickey out of the system" and called for David Cameron to introduce powers for the public to sack MPs over serious wrongdoing. Challenged about Ukip's own expenses scandals among MEPs, he said: "In the cases of the two individuals who behaved badly, I removed the whip and kicked them out of the party a long time before they were found guilty of anything." So Nigel, what are you waiting for? With extracts from today’s guardian http://www.theguardian.com/politics/2014/apr/15/nigel-farage-rejects-outrageous-eu-expenses-allegations?CMP=twt_fd

Why I won’t be voting this may

I have voted in the past and have even stood in an election myself but this year I feel no enthusiasm at all to go and vote at all. Let’s look at my options Tories. Well lets not even go there I’m so unlikely to vote Tory you may as well bet your mortgage on it they do not represent me and never have done. Lib dem, really? Seriously not worth bothering with, Tories in yellow ties. Labour. I was once a member of this party believe it or not and many working-class people will continue to vote labour till they are blue in the face. Fair enough what else is there in all honest? But if the only thing they have to offer come May and next years general election is well we’re not the Tories in name then don’t even bother. UKIP. Well the nastier more racist version of the Tories. Tories on steroids I heard them described as once quite apt I thought. TUSC and other left parties. Not worth bothering with in my opinion. I do not feel voting changes things and voting for a so called radical calling themselves a socialist or whatever may make you feel like you’ve done your bit but what can they really do inside a capitalist system riddled with ways of silencing any who try and change things from within. I have no intention of voting this year. It’s clearly something a lot of good people still look towards but for me you’re banging your head against a brick wall. People say power is with elected officials. It is not it’s with the capitalist as it always has been. Remember the old phrase if voting changed anything they’d make it illegal. It’s not so please draw your own conclusions. Best thing we can do is get organised in our own communities, workplace’s and lives. Join a trade union. Talk to your work mates or local neighbours. There is much to be angry about right now without a political election campaign to trouble people and divert good resources and time and money into. Let’s begin today by building solidarity and strength in our own actions. We do not need leaders to represent o us we can represent ourselves very well already without self appointed leaders looking to rise to power on the backs of the poorest in society. Say no and don’t vote this may.

French far right on the rise in local elections

France's anti-immigrant National Front (FN) has surged to power in a former Socialist town-hall bastion and sees more victories in local elections where voters punished President Francois Hollande for failing to tackle unemployment. In what leader Marine Le Pen called a breakthrough for her protectionist anti-EU party, the FN won power in the northern former coal-mining town Henin-Beaumont in a first-round vote on Sunday, and leads in at least six other towns before run-offs scheduled for next week. With turnout levels at a record low of 65 percent after a series of political scandals that have hit mainstream French politicians of both left and right, Hollande's Socialists and their allies won just 38 percent of the national vote, behind 47 percent for opposition conservatives, initial tallies showed. The FN won about five percent of the national vote - a proportionately high amount, given that it only fielded candidates in about 600 of the some 36,000 constituencies across France. Prime Minister Jean-Marc Ayrault urged voters across the spectrum to back whatever candidate was best placed to beat FN rivals in Sunday's second round. A triumphant Le Pen said she was not interested in voter pacts with the mainstream right even if that could win her a greater presence on town hall councils. "The National Front is taking root just as it wanted to do - and the crop is pretty exceptional," she told TF1 television. Results released during the night put the National Front ahead in the eastern town of Forbach, in France's former industrial heartland. In the south, the anti-EU party was in the lead in Avignon, Perpignan, Beziers and Frejus, and in second place in Marseille behind the conservative incumbent. 'Exceptional vintage' The party's leader, Marine Le Pen, said the polls marked the "end of the bipolarisation of the political scene" and were "an exceptional vintage" for her party. "The National Front has arrived as a major independent force - a political force both at the national and local level," Le Pen, who won 18 percent of votes in the 2012 presidential election, told TF1 television. The party's Steeve Briois was declared outright winner to run the former northern coal-mining town of Henin-Beaumont, which has long been in Socialist hands. Exit polls also put the National Front ahead in the eastern town of Forbach, in France's former industrial heartland. In the south, it was in the lead in Avignon, Perpignan, Beziers and Frejus and vying for second place in Marseille behind the conservative incumbent. There was some solace for the Socialists as a TNS Sofres exit poll showed their candidate for Paris mayor, Anne Hidalgo, was ahead of her conservative rival Nathalie Kosciusko-Morizet. The strong showing by the National Front will alarm Europe's liberal progressives, with the party long associated with racism and anti-Semitic statements. Le Pen's father, Jean-Marie, was prosecuted several times while party leader for Holocaust denial, once referring to the deaths of millions of Jews as a "detail in the history of World War Two". He has also been prosecuted for incitement to discriminate against Muslims. Since becoming leader in 2011, Marine Le Pen has sanctioned or ejected party members found to have made racist comments in an attempt to make the party more palatable to French voters. Her policies focus on reduced immigration and take a stance against EU enlargement. Does this sound all very familiar to you ? well it should as UKIP are looking to follow the FN's example and route to power. Reason for concern ? very much so i'd suggest. Source: http://www.aljazeera.com/news/europe/2014/03/french-far-right-party-soars-elections-201432321344496407.html

The left and its complacency with the far right

Just last week the widely written off BNP gained a fair few votes in a by election in Wythenshawe and Sale East Michael Kane won with 13,261 votes, beating UKIP's John Bickley, with 4,301, in second. Rev Daniel Critchlow, for the Tories, came third on 3,479 votes, and Lib Dem Mary Di Mauro, came fourth on 1,176. Labour leader Ed Miliband said he was "delighted" by the result while David Cameron said he would listen to voters. The full results were: • Mike Kane (Labour): 13,261 • John Bickley (UKIP): 4,301 • Reverend Daniel Critchlow (Conservatives): 3,479 • Mary Di Mauro (Lib Dem): 1,176 • Nigel Woodcock (Green Party): 748 • Eddy O'Sullivan (BNP): 708 • Captain Chaplington-Smythe (Monster Raving Loony): 288 • Turnout: 28% With a low turnout smaller parties can get more of a look in on a smaller turnout as they don’t need such a big vote to get a decent vote. This is clear with the BNP in this case who many on the left have all but written off claiming they are in disarray and are no longer the party to be aware of instead focusing their attacks and exposures of the likes of UKIP now. But a 708 vote for the BNP shows even in big labour strongholds the fascist vote is still there bubbling under the surface. This is also the North West where Nick Griffin of the BNP holds his MEP seat for this year anyway. For me it shows that the right and especially far right is not gone away and does need confronting at all times. This 708 could tip over a thousand next times and who knows if the BNP were to ever get properly organised and with a good financial backer like UKIP now have then they would quite easily become a force again. So why does the left not seem to be taking the BNP seriously anymore. Well I think it stems from the fact the BNP lost a lot of their seats and votes in last years local elections and this was seen widely to be the final nail in its coffin. But if I’ve learnt anything about fascists is that they will always com back if an alternative is not posed for people. After the walking out of Tommy Robinson from the EDL the far right is without a figure head to rally around. But do they even need one in an area where labour takes for granted will always win and win well is a grave concern for me as the far right will see this as a chance to put down roots in such areas of greater Manchester and so on. Whilst I do not think UKIP are ea out and out racist or fascist party it is clear in their rank-and-file there is many nutters with some very archaic views on society and particular on immigrants to this country. I do think we should be aware a new found modern idea of fascism could come in the form of a euro sceptic disguise. Not all forms of fascism are the same and to think fascists only come in one form and one form only is a dangerous mistake to make. I do think the left needs to be aware of the right at all times and look to provide alternatives and not alienate people. The truth is many people are concerned about immigration in this country but are not always found to be racist at all but are buying into the media’s myths whipped up by polititians to blame immigrants for a lack of jobs, homes and low wages. In reality we need to unite together and fight for all to have the rate of the job and good levels of benefits if not. The right is on the rise across Europe I sense with Greece’s Golden Dawn the national front in France and various neo Nazi’s in Hungary and beyond. It is a worrying time but it is also something we can’t take our eye off the ball about in my opinion.

Can fascism make a comeback?

Yes it can I’d argue and it already is in some parts of the world in places like the Ukraine and Greece for example there are significant forces building and more worryingly growing all the time. When I was a member of the socialist party combating fascism was not a priority we were always told the capitalists would only use a fascist koo as last resort and the working class will have many chances’ to take power well before it comes to fascism. What they did not tell us was that fascism could make a comeback well before that and indeed right under our noses’. For me it appears as though the old centre ground centre left and centre right are in crisis and are finding their votes and popular support in collapse right across Europe. The centre left in particular is facing a big decline as ice outlined in previous posts on this blog this is no more confirmed than France's president Holland this week seeing his poll ratings sink to their lowest ever for any French president of all time. This is quite an achievement considering the dross they have produced down the years. Fascism can find a hold in times of fear and desperation in the downtrodden middle class's but also the working class too. Fascism was always considered a middle class movement those who have been disenchanted but this misses the point fascism can cover multiple classes in its mass popular support it is a tempting appeal when things are heading quickly down. Fascism in its traditional sense opposes communism but this is the traditional understanding we have fascism in the future and even today will and do look very different to what we understand it to have been in the past. Things do not repeat themselves in history but can take parts of the past with them. I think we may see the rise again of a mass movement against corruption on a European scale and even more so in here in the UK with the likes of UKIP appealing to those who are fed up with the current political elite even though many of their leading figures are hardly too far out of touch of the political establishment themselves. IN a piece in the guardian last November "In the years since the global banking crisis in 2007, commentators across the political spectrum have confidently predicted not only the imminent collapse of the euro – but sooner or later an unavoidable implosion of the European Union itself. None of this has come to pass. But the "European Project", launched after the devastation of the Second World War, now faces the most serious threat in its history. That threat was chillingly prefigured last november in the launch of a pan-European alliance of far-right parties, led by the French National Front and the Dutch Party of Liberty headed by Geert Wilders, and vowing to slay "the monster in Brussels".. Of course, the growth in support for far-right populist, anti-European, anti-immigrant parties has been force-fed by the worst world recession since at least the 1930s and possibly since before 1914. Mass unemployment and falling living standards in the euro-area and the wider EU made worse by the crazy and self-defeating austerity obsession of European leaders has opened the door to the revival of the far right. Parties that skulked in the shadows for decades after 1945, playing down their sympathies with fascism and Nazism are now re-emerging having given themselves a PR facelift. Marine Le Pen, leader of the French NF, plays down the antisemitic record of her party... The Dutch far-right leader has ploughed a slightly different furrow – mobilising fear and hostility not against Jews but rather Muslim immigrants in the Netherlands. Like Marine Le Pen, Wilders obsessively focuses on the alleged cosmopolitan threat to national identity from the European Union. It is a chorus echoed in other European countries by the Danish People's party, the Finns party and the Flemish Vlaams Belang among others. For now, the French and Dutch populists are carefully keeping their distance from openly neo-Nazi parties such as Golden Dawn – whose paramilitary Sturmabteilung – have terrorised refugees and immigrants in Greece, and the swaggering Hungarian Jobbik, who terrorise the Roma minority. For now, our own Ukip is tactically keeping its distance from the new European far-right alliance while whispering a similar story about "east European immigrants". Ridiculous comparisons have been drawn by some commentators between the rise of the populist far right and the growth of the radical left – notably the Syriza party in Greece, which has pushed for a reverse of austerity crisis policies, both in Greece and throughout Europe. In fact, Syriza represents the main challenge to Golden Dawn's offensive. Moreover, while the Italian Northern League may be drawn to the far-right alliance, the bulk of the semi-anarchist followers of the comedian Beppe Grillo in the Italian parliament are anti-fascist and unlikely to take the same path. According to some pollsters – the far right might win as many as a third of all the seats in the European parliament after the European elections this May. That would still leave the centre parties – Christian Democrats, Social Democrats and Liberals – with many more members. But for the European parliament to form a credible majority all of these parties might well be forced much closer together than is good for them or good for European democracy. It could threaten eventual paralysis of the European parliament itself. Such a situation would be unsettlingly reminiscent of 1936, when the centre and the left – notably in France – temporarily halted the swing to fascism but formed an unprincipled and ineffective coalition. Its collapse on the eve of the Second World War accelerated the advent of Phillippe Petain's Nazi collaborating regime. History does not normally repeat itself in an automatic fashion. But it would be foolish to take the risk. More worrying than the growth of the far right are the temporising gestures to the racists and anti-immigrants now coming from mainstream Tory and even Liberal Democrat politicians and from some of the new "Blue Labour" ideologues. The warning from the likes of David Blunkett that hostility to Roma immigrants might lead to a popular "explosion" is worryingly reminiscent of Enoch Powell style rhetoric. An effective antidote to the growth of far-right populism requires that the European left is capable of articulating and following through on a comprehensive alternative to economic stagnation, an ever-widening income and wealth gap, the degradation of our social standards, civil liberties and democratic rights and the mindless drift to a global arming catastrophe. But to succeed that alternative has to be fought for at European as well as national and local levels, and to be delivered will require more, not less, European integration." So to conclude fascism is back in some shape or form and can grow further still if allowedto. Our job must be to oppose it wherever it raises its ugly head. http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2013/nov/15/far-right-rise-european-marine-le-pen-geert-wilders

Why I’m not sure about No to EU

Next year in 2014 is the European elections where the old and battered banner of No to EU is being rolled out again. It was last used in 2009 when the CPB and various other anti EU leftists used it to stand in 2009 under the name NO to EU yes to democracy. A fairly bland banner if ever you heard one. I may be wrong but bringing this awful banner back "no to EU" with no alternative posed is a big danger in my view. I do feel this will play into the racist and right wing UKIP agenda. The likes of Bob Crow of the RMT are big supporters of a left challenge to the EU and have opposed the European Union all along apparently yet I am not sure a left message will get a hearing next year given the media presence of UKIP and the Tories and others No to EU won’t get a look in. Seeing No to EU on your ballot paper will instantly make you think they must be another UKIP. People won’t stop to think and read what no to EU are saying if anything along an alternative line people looks at quick snappy slogans and will link No to the EU with UKIP unfortunately. I am deeply troubled this stance of standing against UKIP with this message and trying to play them at their own game will not pay off and will only play into the hands of right wing nationalists and euro skeptics. It’s a dangerous game to play I think I think the left and socialists should have full support and solidarity with our fellow workers in Europe and oppose austerity and call for the most widespread solidarity and linking up of workers across the continent. Only by mass joined up action can we affect things. Standing in the European elections and allowing UKIP to set the agenda is a dangerous thing in my opinion. If we are going to say let’s leave the EU we must say what we'd do instead as just leaving the EU is not a strategy or any sort of alternative for as long as capitalism lives on. Just like in Greece an exit from the EU will not end austerity and we must be careful not to dress this up as this. Only a break with capitalism will do pointing the direction on a class basis towards a socialist society meeting the needs of the many should be our goal. Tail ending left nationalism is a strategy which does not fit well with me and I am not sure I’ll be able to support such a project if I’m honest. A good long think on what as Marxists we should say about the EU needs to happen. The EU may look very different in a decade or son’s time and some countries may end up leaving but leaving on a capitalist basis is no answer to the troubles and struggles workers face.

Is society moving to the right?

This is a dangerous trap to fall into I’ve noticed. Given the recent anti immigrant rhetoric coming from all of the 3 major political parties and also the rise of UKIP in the polls and especially the last county council elections some on the left have drawn the conclusion society is moving sharply to the right. I don’t think this is the case and is a mistake to think so and follow the right ward shift of the mainstream political parties. The Tories, Labour and the lib dems think that to take on UKIP they must come out with even more policies that shift them to the right. Even New labour have come out in the last few weeks in support of a benefit cap and announcing further cuts they would make. Of course it is far easier ground for the labour party of today to move to the right than it would be to the left. A recent poll out in the guardian showed that labours supporters attitudes towards the poor have hardened in recent times this is no surprise given all they pump out is about strivers and skivers, how they made a mistake letting immigrants in to the country and failing to put any sort of alternative across tot e working class. But this mustn’t be mistaken for a shift in society to the right. I do still believe there are many people out there who are looking for an alternative, a genuine alterative from cuts, austerity and the misery of privatisation. Before the recent attack in Woolwich the likes of the EDL and the BNP were in all honesty on their knees struggling for support. It was a shot in their arm the attacks in Woolwich but the overall trend does not show that the EDL and the BNP are gaining support in fact quite the opposite. Falling into the media’s trap that the working class are mostly racists and work shy and lazy is something the left and more importantly socialists should look to avoid. We as Marxist have a long term perspective about the current system of capitalism we live under. The fact that it is in eternal decline in Brittan will produce those to look for an alterative and find the easiest way to blame something or more often than not someone. SO far the media and politicians have been very good in directing the anger and blame at other workers, the unemployed, the disabled, the elderly and other minorities in society in order to deflect blame from their own failing system which is now becoming a drag on society itself. What is missing though in my view is a mass workers party who have a media presence as they would be so big they couldn’t be ignored putting that alternative a socialist alternative for the working class and middle class as they are affected too. That this is a system based on the blind pursuit of profit and only that. Divide and rule is one of the oldest and most effective tactics in the ruling class book of tricks and up to now is working very ell. If we had a mass workers party putting forward the counter arguments to cuts, privatisation and racism in the media all the time in the newspapers and beyond we could start to see some of these lies that are pumped out on a daily basis start to be found out. Of course a new mass workers party would have to fight tooth and nail for airspace but with support of the trade unions this could be possible with funds to for campaigns to make people aware of the true extent of the crisis and how we need to change society. SO far this looks a pipe dream for many as most trade unions still fund a capitalist pro cuts labour party and any media opportunities for any sort of alternative like TUSC fin it incredibly hard to get any airtime at all. But things will change and as the crisis deepens workers will look for an alternative they will have no choice but to. We must guard against division, racism and any other sort of way of dividing us. We are workers first and foremost. If we look at things in terms of class every time things makeup more sense. Society isn’t turning to the right. Whilst it could do evidence wouldn’t suggest that the right is in the ascendancy. The Tories are falling in the polls and struggled to get near a majority in the last general election. UKIP are being carefully used by the media and the ruling class to tap the growing anger at the cuts down a blind alley of nationalism and racism. This will not wash once UKIP are found out. There is clearly a protest vote element in UKIP’s vote right now and we must not write off those who do vote UKIP for this reason. Instead we must patiently explain why UKIP are no alternative for workers and that a new mass workers party is still necessary as ever.

Understanding UKIP’s influence on politics

today there seems to me to be a strong urge to state how insignificant UKIP’s chances are in the parliamentary elections they tell us UKIP who currently sit on 18% in the national polls who also received 25% a quarter of the vote in the county council elections last week does not matter. They state that the nearer we come towards the general election providing the government doesn’t fall beforehand and well who knows with the Tories currently tearing themselves apart over the EU. But this is to completely miss the point UKIP for now have a mass media presence on news channels political chat shows and being interviewed allot. This makes them already significant in the eyes of the media and is a good choice of weapon for them at this stage. The ruling class is torn as we know there is no consensus in what to do to solve the economic crisis they have tried almost everything and have gone back to austerity as a default now. With UKIP holding so much influence within the media no doubt their say will set the agenda for Tories and new labour with the anti immigrant rhetoric stepped up. We are already hearing calls for Ed Miliband to take a tougher stance on welfare from some parts no doubt UKIP play their part in this pressure too. But as the calls for an EU referendum grow louder and louder from the Tories back benchers and the UKIP poll rating staying at a steady high teen’s level they will begin to set the boundaries of the political debate in this country. Nigel Farage who was a stock broker for many years and a Tory even up till 1992 when John Major signed the EU treaty at Maastricht... which lead to many of the UKIP’s positions today 1992 was in a way the year zero for them. Everything since has made their skin crawl with the EU and the red tape. The regulation over trade is something which gets to them and their big business and even small business friends. But it is true that UKIP do have influence in politics today even if they do not have any seats. They do however now have many county councillors which will see how they cope with local democracy I predict not so well but in other ways this could also strengthen their base at a local level by pointing to actual policies they have carried out for people. Much like with the BNP they got local people on side by saying simple things they can do for people getting hedges cut roads resurfaced things like this which may appear small are incredibly popular with the folk in the shires too. A typical fascist tactic too is something we’ve seen in Greece now with Golden Dawn who is administering food at food banks now to only Greeks and turning away so called foreigners and immigrants. This strategy whilst providing fascist and anti immigrant propaganda is a way of getting people on side and I can see being a tactic of the far right in this country too in the future providing a service which the state no longer does whilst offering you a deep message of hate for other people be them disabled, benefit claimers, poles etc etc you can imagine it now. But what is for certain UKIP’s populairist right wing nationalist politics are a sign of this crisis despite being around before the economic crisis but finding much more of an echo now in darker times. I can’t ever imagine UKIP being a party of government but when the ruling class is desperate they can take decisions which are not always in their most obvious interests at first. UKIP are certainly a useful tool for the ruling class right now who may also want to cut across any protest vote going to a left wing alternative too they can channel anger into UKIP and fuel and deepen divisions further this way too. Be aware of UKIP but don’t over play their threat to the left still needs to get its act together in Britain but also by UKIP’s rise this may jolt some into speeding up that process. We will see.

UKIP rise in polls we need a socialist reply

Last weeks county council election threw up a popular vote for UKIP who have gained some ground of late focusing on immigration and the question of the EU. But for socialists we need to do more than just say people are fed up with the other mainstream parties to give a proper analysis that this recent phenomena deserves. A proper look into UKIP’s policies has not been carried out and taken apart by our dear capitalist media I wonder why? Well they are diverting the attention from the real issue and that is the deepening crisis that which their system of capitalism finds itself in today. UKIP do not oppose the European Union because it benefits the bosses at the expense of workers. They have no problem with privatisation of public services and industries, restrictions on trade union rights, redundancies or forcing wages down. The leaders of UKIP and many of their backers are mainly right-wing Tories who are trying to push the Tory party into opposing the EU. Many rich donors are now transferring their political donations from the tories to the UKIP party now not totally abandoning the Tories mind you but certainly opening a split on the right of UK politics which will be interesting how it plays out long term. These right-wing businessmen aren't giving millions of pounds to UKIP because they want more money spent on hospitals and education. They oppose the EU partly from a standpoint of wanting more "free trade" and "deregulation" of businesses. That is, more freedom for big business to gamble with our jobs and pensions, and to profit from the sell-off of more public services. The UKIP leader who has had reams and reams of media coverage and it has felt like wall to wall coverage I thought the BBC were bad enough inviting Owen Jones on all the time but Nigel Farage in the last week or so has taken it to a new level entirely. We must be careful as socialists to separate those who vote UKIP through ha sense of frustration with the other parties in a out and out protest vote from their own members who more or less are a load of cranks of course with only in the last few weeks BNP sympathisers have found their way into the party and UKIP say they have no way of stopping them. But UKIP are not fascist as some say they are they may become that in the future but at this stage they are not. Whilst not fascist, UKIP is a party of the hard-right which campaigns not just against the EU but also against LGBT equality, for harsh immigration controls, deeper spending cuts and a quicker break-up of the NHS. In the European parliament it is in a grouping which includes the far-right, anti-gay United Poland party and the right-wing Italian Northern League. Although UKIP inhabits the world of the hard-right it is important to distinguish it from fascist parties such as the BNP. The aim of fascism is to smash all working class organisation and ultimately all forms of democracy (including parliamentary democracy). UKIP comes from the traditional right-wing of UK politics - a lineage which includes Conservatives such as Enoch Powell and Norman Tebbit as well as UKIP supporters like the recently deceased Patrick Moore. In other words: bigoted, nasty and slightly eccentric, but not fascist. Its party organisation is not of the disciplined combat form which characterises fascist parties. So where does UKIP's support come from? The party does seem to have gained support from a section of working class Labour voters - in 2009, 27 percent of UKIP supporters had voted Labour at the previous election, compared to 21 percent who had voted Conservative. This perhaps reflects how the poison of anti-immigration rhetoric pumped out by the press and politicians (including Labour ones, of course) have gained a hearing among some workers. This is combined with the intense bitterness that exists towards the establishment (including the EU) which UKIP has tried to tap into with slogans such as "Sod the Lot: Vote UKIP". Therefore there are some former Labour voters, motivated by hostility to immigrants and/or anger at the establishment, who might vote for UKIP. However since the Tory-Liberal government was formed in 2010, UKIP support seems to be coming increasingly from disillusioned Conservative voters. In 2012 the polling data changed markedly - only 3 percent of UKIP supporters previously voted Labour while 37 percent previously voted Conservative. Under the hammer of austerity from a Tory government working class voters who flirted with UKIP might well be returning to Labour. UKIP certainly seems to be targeting "True Blue" Conservative voters as a priority. After George Osborne's autumn statement UKIP's main objections were that he did not go far enough in cutting spending or attacking workers rights - hardly an appealing message for Labour voters. UKIP leader Nigel Farage has also used opposition to gay marriage in an attempt to peel away further Conservative votes. Therefore the Conservatives crisis is UKIP's gain - they can present themselves as the new home for the disillusioned Tory base. UKIP success in exploiting Tory divisions puts pressure on Cameron to tack to the right - as he has done over the EU - but if he goes too far he risks making the party unelectable. This is his dilemma. The background to the rise in UKIP's support then is a crisis within the Conservative Party. Without understanding this it can seem that the votes and opinion poll support for UKIP heralds a right-wing shift in society, when in fact it is an outcome of the fragmenting of the Conservative Party's traditional base. This does not mean we should be complacent. A right-wing which is a minority can still be an organised force which influences a wider layer of people, especially when its views are amplified by sections of the media and pandered to by politicians. Socialists must be alert to the dangers of right-wing scapegoating and racism in an economic crisis, and be at the forefront of combating these trends. Politically challenging racism and all attempts to divide workers is central to the development of effective resistance to austerity. The crisis is bringing both opportunities and dangers. This brings me to my final point is that the need for a clear socialist party with key policies to cut across the growing UKIP support in working class areas to give workers hope is key. The Trade Union and Socialist Coalition can go so far with this but it’s also for the trade unions of which 6 million people are members of to join and to demand their unions fight back demanding no scape goating of immigrants and to fight for the rate of the job. We do need a new party of the working class labour has lost its working class base. Although workers may still vote for it with their nose pegged this doesn’t answer the question of working class political representation. TUSC hopes to fill that vacuum by offering a clear break with the policies of austerity and despair.

A look at last weeks election results for TUSC

One hundred and twenty candidates, standing in 117 wards in 20 councils, contested the English local elections on May 2nd under the Trade Unionist and Socialist Coalition (TUSC) umbrella. In addition, TUSC stood a candidate in the Doncaster mayoral contest and two candidates in council by-elections that were held on the same day. Elections took place in 35 English local authorities, to fill 2,362 seats. TUSC stood at least one candidate in twenty councils with elections (60%), contesting 5% of the seats. This contrasts markedly with when these particular seats were previously contested in the four-yearly local elections cycle in 2009, before the formation of TUSC. Then, a year after the financial crisis had broken, there were literally less than a handful of candidates presenting a working class alternative to the pro-austerity consensus. The spread of candidates also compares with the situation in 2011 – the first local elections seriously contested by TUSC when we fielded a candidate in 2% of the seats – and 2012 when TUSC stood in 25% of the councils with elections, in 4% of the seats. This year it was mainly county councils up for election, overwhelmingly Conservative controlled after Labour’s 24% vote share in 2009 – although Cumbria had been run by a Labour-Conservative coalition! The Tories held 1,477 (62%) of the seats to Labour’s 273 going into the May 2nd poll. It would be totally wrong, however, to caricature this year’s elections as mostly rural contests. The councils that were up for election administer a range of services – from education, adult social care and youth provision, to libraries, highways and emergency services – that cover a population of 24 million, control combined budgets of £43 billion, and employ 750,000 workers (including school staff). Workers living and using public services in these local authority areas are being hit by austerity politics. But the councils up this year are not the same terrain as the metropolitan boroughs that will be facing elections next year. It will be harder then for Labour candidates, for example, to present themselves as ‘anti-cuts’ in Labour controlled councils. The election report includes a ‘league table’ presenting the TUSC results in percentage order and, separately, the results of all parties’ candidates for each seat contested by TUSC. There is also a comparison of the results achieved by TUSC candidates, aggregated into local authority-wide figures, with the votes won by Labour, Green and Liberal Democrat candidates in the seats TUSC contested. Significant features of the results include: ■ The TUSC candidate for the mayor of Doncaster, Mary Jackson, polled 1,916 votes in Ed Miliband’s ‘backyard’ (he is the MP for Doncaster North). ■ Mary’s 3.1% share of the vote put her in sixth place, ahead of the Liberal Democrats and not far short of the other ‘party of government’, the Tories, who polled 2,811 votes. ■ The total vote for all TUSC candidates on May 2nd was 10,182. ■ In the local council seats that TUSC contested, the ratio of Labour voters to TUSC voters this year was fourteen. In other words, for every person who voted for TUSC (8,188 in the local council elections), there were 14 people who voted Labour (119,204). ■ This ratio has widened compared to that in the 2011 and 2012 local elections – although, in a metropolitan council comparator, the ratio narrowed in Bristol compared to the 2011 local elections in that city (the last council elections there) and last November’s Bristol mayoral poll. ■ Across the local council wards and county council divisions that TUSC contested, the ratio of Green voters (19,652) to TUSC voters (8,188) was two-and-a-half. For the Liberal Democrats, defending 353 seats in these polls, the ratio of their voters (43,521) to TUSC voters was five to one. The Labour Party put up more candidates this year – 2,174, in 92% of the seats – than in recent previous local elections. In 2011, for example, still recovering from the 2010 general election defeat, Labour fielded candidates for just 72% of the seats available and eight TUSC candidates did not face a Labour opponent. This year every TUSC candidate faced a Labour candidate, in a context where Labour controlled just one council before May 2nd. Next year though nearly half of the councils up for election are Labour controlled – and they will have just set their budgets for a fourth year of implementing the Con-Dem cuts. The Trade Unionist and Socialist Coalition’s fight to present an anti-austerity alternative to the establishment parties will move into a different gear. For more information anda full report please visit www.tusc.org.uk

59 votes for a clear anti cuts candidate in a Tory stronghold

59 was the number of votes I gained this Thursday 2nd of May. In a county council election. Although this doesn’t sound huge and I’m in no way making it out to be I am quite impressed with this myself. Seeing as I only stood last minute as a paper candidate which means you just appear as a name on the ballot paper nothing else no leafleting or stalls or anything is actually pretty good I think. This is more people than I know and shows that even in tory stronghold like Ware North a part rural area to the north a genuine anti cuts message can be heard loud and clear and people will react to this. Up until the election I was saying in my head seeing as I’d done no work for the election due to helping other candidates in neighbouring Harlow in Essex I’d do well to get 20 given the anti party feeling and the poor turnouts. So 59 while still not much more is a decent vote I would say given the lack of media coverage and all the other factors working against an anti cuts voice in the UK. Other notable results were in Harlow West ward we gained 270 (3.5%) Which again looking at the percentage isn’t huge but as a vote is a decent one for us standing in Harlow for the first time. In Doncaster we were standing for mayor and gained just shy of 2000 votes this again is laying down an important marker for future battles and elections to come. We must remember as Marxists that elections and bourgeois elections as they are that are the lowest form of class struggle you can put a lot of work in and get little reward back. But for myself and others just standing and providing that alternative is important to us and is sign things are changing ever so slowly. I will no doubt blog on the incredible rise of the UKIP vote in these elections and what it means to us the working class in time. But for now thank you to all who backed me and TUSC in these elections. It’s a start and if we did not stand who would be providing that anti cuts anti privatisation alternative it certainly wouldn’t be the labour party! You can find out more and follow TUSC results as they come in on www.tusc.org.uk

A socialist opposition to the “boss’s club” EU

Now all this week we have heard on the news of David Cameron’s speech on Europe it really wasn’t as big as they made out if the Tories win the next election we will get a referendum after the Tories have re negotiated the deal with EU so many if’s there this is supposable to win over the Tories back bench’s and block the rise of UKIP. But so far the debate on Europe has been dominated by the right well there is opposition to the EU from the left and I will look to outline the opposition to the “boss’s club”. The EU had lots of support at its inception from even some on the left who’d brought into the idea that there was no alternative to capitalism even some ex Marxists in fact peddled this line. For many years the EU and the Eurozone with the single currency sustained healthy levels of growth. In 2013 this is turning into a nightmare due to the straight jacket of the Euro and the deepening euro crisis. The Socialist Party and Committee for a Workers' International (CWI, to which the Socialist Party is affiliated) predicted from the start though that the eurozone could not stay intact. The economies across the zone varied significantly in their features, strengths and weaknesses, yet were confined to a straitjacket of a single currency and interest rate. This was workable to some extent in a period of economic growth but was bound to come under insurmountable pressure in a recession. Reflecting the depth of the crisis, Europe's ruling classes and governments now have no achievable solutions to the crisis to offer and are deeply divided within and between them on what to do. Some argue in vain for a new EU constitution with more central powers and an end to national vetoes on treaties. Others want a looser relationship with the EU or to be out of it altogether. All reveal their bankruptcy - they cannot deliver stability and growth. However, their floundering is not taking place in isolation. Millions of working class and middle class people have participated in strikes and demonstrations against the onslaught on their living standards that is being spearheaded by the EU chiefs. The EU is increasingly being seen as the bosses' club that it is - that has enshrined in its constitution the rule of the market and the attacks that flow from that. Opposing the capitalism-serving institutions that make up the EU certainly doesn't mean rejecting international links and cooperation between ordinary people. The key questions are: What is the character of the institutions, who is controlling them and in whose interests are they acting? The EU is controlled by 27 of the European capitalist ruling classes and flowing from this they act in the interests of big business and the rich. Socialist societies across Europe would be able to democratically elect representatives to an entirely different type of institution - ones serving workers' interests. This would be the basis for a European socialist confederation - an alliance of socialist states - that could democratically, and with full accountability, enable economic, environmental, social and cultural cooperation in the interests of the overwhelming majority of people across the continent. In the last European elections we stood candidates under the No to EU yes to democracy banner no doubt we will try and stand candidates again for a democratic socialist alternative to the EU maybe tagging the no to EU yes to democracy slogan on to the end of our TUSC material perhaps. No doubt UKIP will benefit in these elections given their firm opposition to the EU from the right but its right workers are offered an opposition to the EU from the left a non reactionary class perspective which can help overcome the divisions in society and unite people under a common cause for socialist policies. Lets not let the right dominate this debate let us speak up loudly from the left with our own confident ideas of a democratic socialist alternative with true internationalism not right wing nationalism

Are UKIP any alternative for workers?

I’ve heard a lot of late of the UK independence party so I thought I’d tackle them head on in this blog post. I’d like to give a detailed analysis of whether the working class should see them as any sort of alternative at all to the major political parties. No doubt UKIP will gain in support in the short term due to the disaffection from the 3 major parties they have some very wealthy backers and have a well known representative in Nigel farage who gets a lot of television and radio air time despite his complaints far more than reel alternatives like TUSC and those genuinely opposed to the cuts. UKIP are trying to position themselves as anti establishment and we as socialists must be very clear this is a absolute lie given their funding base and the aims of its party UKIP are yet another establishment party playing on the fears of workers and middle class voters on the issue of Europe and given the Euro crisis its no wonder a reactionary anti EU stance is getting an echo with voters at the moment. But we must be wary of the dangers they pose. IN THE 2004 elections to the European Parliament one-third of the UK votes cast went to parties without representation at Westminster. The biggest of these was the UK Independence Party (UKIP) who won 16%, pushing the Lib Dems into fourth place. UKIP do not oppose the European Union because it benefits the bosses at the expense of workers. They have no problem with privatisation of public services and industries, restrictions on trade union rights, redundancies or forcing wages down. The leaders of UKIP, and many of their backers are mainly has been right-wing Tories who are trying to push the Tory party into opposing the EU. One of UKIP's biggest donors in the past was Stuart Wheeler. He is a rich businessman and Tory party member who have donated millions of pounds to the Tories. Now he has donated £100,000 to UKIP and called on other Tory party members to vote for them. These right-wing businessmen aren't giving millions of pounds to UKIP because they want more money spent on hospitals and education. They oppose the EU partly from a standpoint of wanting more "free trade" and "deregulation" of businesses. That is, more freedom for big business to gamble with our jobs and pensions, and to profit from the sell-off of more public services. In their first election TV broadcast on 7 May 2004, UKIP called the EU "a bloated organisation that is riddled with corruption where expenses and subsidies are abused". They should know - they are just as deep in corruption as all the other capitalist parties. Of the 12 UKIP members of the European parliament (MEPs) elected in 2004, UKIP have had to expel two for corruption. UKIP leader Nigel Farage has taken £2 million of taxpayers' money in expenses and allowances as a MEP, on top of his £64,000 a year salary. Tom Wise, elected as a UKIP MEP in 2004, has been kicked out of UKIP twice after allegations that he channelled tens of thousands of pounds meant for his researcher into his own bank account. He has now been charged with money-laundering and false accounting. Another, Ashley Mote, was jailed for benefit fraud in 2007. UKIP had selected him as their number two candidate in the South East despite knowing he was facing charges for fraud, but were forced to expel him a few months after his election in 2004. Incredibly, because Mote's prison sentence was less than one year, he was able to return as an MEP! A key UKIP slogan is "no too unlimited EU immigration" - a cynical attempt to tap into the real fear that exists about jobs and wages. This fear is not just as a result of the current economic crisis but also present and previous UK governments including new Labours attempts to use migrant labour, particularly from Eastern Europe, to drive down wages and increase the profits of big business. The only way workers can defend their rights is by taking collective action, like the recent N14 general strikes across mainland Europe showing the potential power of the European working class. Workers all around the EU need to stand together against job losses, the 'race to the bottom' in terms of wages and working conditions, and the attempts to push through privatisation and to break trade union agreements. UKIP do not care about workers' rights. John Whitaker, ex UKIP MEP for the North West sacked his constituency office manager after she had a stroke - an employment tribunal found him guilty of unlawful dismissal. UKIP's attempt to gain votes as an 'anti-establishment' party is contrived. Its policies and actions make it part of the right wing establishment. So UKIP who may gain in the short term by reactionary views towards the EU have no real practical solution for the working class of Europe or of Britain for that matter and must be treated with the contempt that they treat workers with. They are no alterative and we must be on our guard against them with their rich mates ploughing money into this right wing anti immigrant party. With UKIP nationally now regularly out polling the Lib Dems and attracting some rather unsavourily far right characters many of which are ex BNP we must always be wary of the far right racist possible fascist threat which if the labour movement fails to give a lead could easily gain in support as a reaction.

Building a new electoral base for socialism will have to be done, but will take time, patience and ingenunity

This excellent post i found on the Trade Union and Socialist Coalition website highlights the tasks for a new socialist electoral base which does need to be built and the need for it is greater than ever i feel. I talk to people on the internet alot who feel no party truely represents them. Well TUSC is what is missing i think. A true new workers party with socialist roots and appeals. Under neath i have posted a excellent article that many may or may not find interesting. I know i certainly did.

This article comes from Will Mcmahon a TUSC representitive helping to promote its message.

Over the last decade or so many socialists living in Britain who come from a variety of different political traditions have reached the conclusion that the route for socialism has been cut-off through the Labour Party and we have to begin again by building a new socialist party.

Electoral battles are but one front in an on-going battle with the ruling-class and will for a period involve many more electoral defeats than successes. Ultimately, electoral outcomes will be governed by waves of class struggle, union strength and working class confidence. However, irrespective of the ongoing level of class struggle, working people are asked, and are asking themselves, on an almost annual basis, which party are they going to vote for?

In England, the Walsall Democratic Labour Party and the Socialist Alternative in Coventry have demonstrated that local bases for socialism can be built and sustained for a number of years. While a local vote for a local socialist is a good answer to some local political questions, most political questions in the electoral field are, in the end, answered by voting for national governmental alternatives.

The long run survival of these bases ultimately depend on a national political formation to replicate their success in other areas. The question for socialists is how do we build this national political alternative and what vote is a good enough indication that the project is making headway?

Some argue that the target of five per cent (the percentage vote needed to retain your deposit in a constituency election) is the threshold by which success and failure can be measured. This is not a view I share. Nor is this view shared by those who have built minority parties that have had an impact on national politics over the last two decades.

The tables below show how these parties have developed their presence as national force. Note the low votes that they have had to endure while they have been building their electoral machines for future challenges. Rather than taking the view that it is not worth standing if the vote is likely to be less than five per cent, they have stood ever further and wider into what sometimes seem completely hopeless areas. They have adopted this strategy for one simple reason: it has enabled them to spread and deepen their roots and consequently to develop their national organizational strength.

In less than two decades, UKIP (with a constituency mainly based on and to the right of the Conservative Party) have broadened their base by standing more and more candidates across the country. Rather than being troubled by the five per cent threshold, or even some much lower votes, (eg 0.53 per cent in seats targeted in 1992 and 1.06 per cent in 1997 when UKIP saved just one deposit out of 194 candidates) they have pressed on in the belief that their core political message has political resonance. After 20 years and five general elections UKIP have built an electoral base that has begun to alter the electoral arithmetic and are now close to a million votes.

UKIP
Year Candidates Number of Votes Seats Deposits Saved % Total Vote % Vote in Contested Seats
1992 17 4,383 0 0 0.01 0.53
1997 194 106,028 0 1 0.34 1.06
2001 428 390,563 0 6 1.48 2.16
2005 496 605,973 0 38 2.20 2.80
2010 572 920,334 0 99 3.10 3.45



The Green Party has followed a similar strategy. According to the five per cent rule, the Green Party should have stopped standing a wide numbers of candidates in elections long ago and simply concentrated on their heartlands. But they didn’t; once again, convinced that they had a national political constituency constituency, they stood widely. Note that the experiment they conducted in 1997 of standing fewer candidates was quickly abandoned.

GREEN PARTY
Year Candidates Total votes Average votes per candidate % of total vote Average % of vote per candidate Saved Deposits Number of MPs
1979 53 39,918 753 0.13 1.46 0 0
1983 109 54,299 498 0.17 1.04 0 0
1987 133 89,753 675 0.28 1.35 0 0
1992 253 170,037 672 0.51 1.27 0 0
1997 89 61,731 694 0.21 1.34 0 0
2001 145 166,477 1148 0.63 2.75 10 0
2005 182 257,758 1416 1.04 3.29 22 0
2010 310 265,187 855 0.96 1.81 6 1



Finally, look at the votes of the BNP, built on a growing economic crisis that has impacted on some of the most depressed areas abandoned by Labour in its search for the hallowed middle ground of politics:

BNP
Year Number of candidates Total votes Average votes per candidate Percentage of vote Change (percentage points) Saved deposits Number of MPs
1983 53 14,621 276 0.0 N/A 0 0
1987 2 553 277 0.0 0.0 0 0
1992 13 7,631 587 0.1 +0.1 0 0
1997 56 35,832 640 0.1 0.0 3 0
2001 33 47,129 1,428 0.2 +0.1 7 0
2005 119 192,746 1,620 0.7 +0.5 34 0
2010 338 563,743 1,668 1.9 +1.2 73 0



It took the BNP a bit longer to work out that by focusing on a few areas in the hope of maximizing a local vote the party had cut itself off from all those whom might vote for it nationally. By 2005 the penny had dropped in the Griffin bunker and by 2010, in the space of just three general elections, the BNP had gone from 47,129 votes to over half a million.

As suggested above, there are political, social and economic reasons for the rise of the fascist vote, but the determining electoral factor was that the BNP stood widely across the country so that they could collect up as many votes as possible from their core constituency and develop roots in those areas. Fortunately, the BNP’s response to almost tripling its candidates and votes between 2005 and 2010 has been to implode into internecine strife. However, the far right will regroup and continue to exploit the vacuum left by the absence of a socialist alternative in areas abandoned by Labour. The fascists understand that 1.9 percent nationally – or half a million votes, is not to be abandoned without a fight.

The tables above show that a small national party can make enough inroads to create an electoral block that begin to change the terms of the national political debate if it stands widely enough to express a level of political strength. The lesson is don’t stand in just the few seats where it is possible to get above five per cent – this will only serve to cut you off from the overwhelming majority of your core support; and don’t let low votes limit your electoral ambitions – to build a national party stand as far and wide as possible. What we all know is that building a new electoral base for socialism will have to be done – but it will take time, patience and ingenuity.

Building a political home for your core support to live in

By standing as widely as possible TUSC would be able to advertise its presence to as wide a layer of its core support as possible and invite them to join. The most reliable estimates suggest that despite the growth in their aggregate electoral vote, all three parties discussed above have quite small party memberships. UKIP has about 10,000 to 14,000 members (depending on how you count); the Greens have around 10,000 members and the BNP have between 6,000 and 8,000 members. In rough terms this means that at the last general election the Greens have one member for every 25 votes received and the BNP and UKIP one member for every 60 votes. (Labour was one member for every 50 votes).

If TUSC were to make a broad challenge at the 2012 and 2013 local elections and 2014/15 general election then merely by advertising its presence and presenting itself as a national political party it could draw more potential members into its orbit and build the platform for a core membership organization. If TUSC was ambitious and aimed for two per cent average vote in core seats in England at the next general election then, assuming TUSC actually built a membership campaign and structure alongside the election campaign, the number of people joining would increase and bring more resources and people for the future battles to come.

By core seats I am thinking of those seats that Labour won in 2010 in England (191) – although TUSC could stand much wider than that number. For example, if TUSC were to average 1000 votes across 200 constituency seats it would win 200,000 votes. To put this in perspective, TUSC and allies stood 180 candidates in about 170 council wards in 2011 and got 25,000 votes. This was, proportionally, about six times more than the 12,000 votes that TUSC got in around 500 average council wards it stood in as part of the 2010 General election. (Incidentally, even though TUSC was late off the blocks for the 2010 General Election, you will see if you revisit the tables at the start of this article, even that vote is comparable to UKIP/Greens/BNP when they first stood.)

General Election England 2011
Party Seats Seats
change Votes % %
change
Conservative 297 +92 9,908,169 39.5 +3.8
Labour 191 -87 7,042,398 28.1 -7.4
Liberal Democrat 43 -4 6,076,189 24.2 +1.3
Green 1 +1 258,954 1.0 -0.1
Speaker 1 0 22,860 0.09 -
Turnout: 25,047,355 65.5



So 200,000 votes in England is not beyond the realms of the possible if it was decided as a plan of action to stand 200 general election candidates. (The Greens stood 200 candidates, almost half in the more prosperous South East and got over a quarter of a million votes.) It is out of such results that a national party can be built. At a Labour Party votes to membership ratio (1/50) this would produce a possible membership of 4,000, or the Green party ratio (1/25) it would be 8,000.

It is for this reason that it is the aggregate vote (rather than the low vote in particular areas) makes a difference over the long run. A national presence, even on a low percentage vote, can translate into a party membership that in itself can build a local election campaign presence in areas where they did not previously exist. Rather than shun the low votes TUSC should stand widely to accumulate more of them – because they are the raw material out of which a nationwide socialist presence will be built. Put simply, in order to rally to a flag you have to be able to see it in your locality.

The aim would be to create a virtuous circle of standing widely, and out of the contacts made building a national membership and resource base, then using this national membership and resource to build a local electoral interventions to reach more people. Out of this strategy, combined with an ongoing presence in working class communities and trade union campaigns, some local strongholds would emerge and be sustained. Then rather than being embattled out posts these areas would be the advance guard of a growing nationwide electoral challenge. This is the lesson of the Green Party and, unfortunately, even UKIP and the fascists.

Electoral politics can be brutal.

The count can feel quite an uncomfortable place to be when you know that you are going to come last (as I have done twice since February this year). Especially after you have trod the streets week in and week out leafleting and knocking on doors trying to winkle out the socialist vote, when your party is new and the potential voter may not have heard of it or your candidate. As can standing next to Labour Party members who may have won, many of them councillors who have recently voted to cut local services to working class communities.

If the thought of a low vote feels like a rebuff from the class then it is perhaps worth considering the 33, 45 or 96 working class people who saw the election name ‘Trade Unionist and Socialist Coalition – against the cuts’ and in the ballot box decided to vote for you or the candidate you have worked for. They were sending a message: ‘I am a trade unionist and a socialist and I agree with you’. This is the kindling of a new socialist party and alone is a reason to stand and to begin the process of building a new party that can represent the working class; but this will only be worthwhile if it done as part of a national project that those voters they might later consider joining.

In 2011 for every Sheffield, Coventry or Preston there were other TUSC votes that were just below or above one per cent. It is important to get all votes into perspective. For new small national parties this range of votes is normal, especially with small financial resources and finite numbers of people to call upon and, it has to be said, a relatively late election campaign. However, what is important about the TUSC results was not those at the top or the bottom of the range of votes, but those in the middle two quarters – the middle 50 per cent. The voting range in the middle is between 2.2 and 5.4 per cent (perhaps a welcome surprise to some of those who stood for the first time) and more than respectable for a new party standing it is first local elections. Not at all disappointing, but in fact something to build upon and comparable with other new parties in Europe who have the benefit of a much more proportional system. For example, The United Left Alliance in Ireland received a mid range vote of between 1.5 and 9.2 per cent.

We have a base – but we have yet to reach them

Between 1997 and 2010 the Labour Party lost over two million working class votes. While some of these voters decamped to other parties, the majority have simply stopped voting because they have no party to vote for. Then there are those left wing voters who do vote Labour because there is no other credible left alternative available. These are the millions that TUSC can reach but only if it has a strategy bold enough and wide enough to reach them.

Will McMahon, a member of the TUSC Independent Socialist Network 24 May 2011