The SWP-Respect conference at Westminster University on 17 November was essentially an SWP event â extra observers were turned away âfor lack of spaceâ. One observer from the CPGB who did get in told us that around 400 people attended and practically no direct discussion actually about the split in Respect took place! The leadership essentially put on a show of business as usual, with bland motions amounting to a rally.
The following text is from the leaflet we distributed to the conference.
The SWP and those close to it have now broken with George Galloway. The recent SWP national meeting declared itself against the âopportunist electoral politics [which] began to dominate Respect... For such people their model of politics was that increasingly used by the Labour Party in ethnically and religiously mixed inner city areas â promising favours to people who posed as the 'community leadersâ of particular ethnic or religious groupings if they would use their influence to deliver votes.
âThis is what is known as Tammany Hall politics in US cities, or âvote blocâ or âcommunalâ politics when practiced by all the pro-capitalist parties in the Indian subcontinent. It is something the left has always tried to resist. We seek peopleâs support because they want to fight against oppression and for a better world, not because they stand for one group...â
That is good. Or, at least, it will be good if the Respect remainder turns back to the left, and builds the broad coalitions which surely are desirable with other socialists rather than with the businessman element in the old Respect and with George Galloway.
The Socialist Green Unity Coalition has operated since the old Socialist Alliance was trashed, bringing together the Alliance for Workersâ Liberty, the Socialist Party, and the Alliance for Green Socialism, and running more candidates in the 2005 general election than Respect did.
The Labour Representation Committee, at its conference... [see separate report], is discussing motions which state that it can no longer be âbusiness as usualâ in the Labour Party. âAs currently constituted the Labour Party is no longer a vehicle for promoting progressive or socialist ideasâ. The LRC, another motion states, should âstart to work as a broader Workersâ Representation Committee... appeal to all socialists and trade unionists to join [the] projectâ.
The RMT London Transport Regional Council recently voted for the RMT to initiate an independent working-class slate, on broad workingclass policies, for the London mayor/ GLA elections â though, unfortunately, the RMT Executive decided that there wasn't enough momentum to do it.
Those are the forces a respect-worthy Respect should turn to.
Condemn âopportunist electoral politicsâ and âcommunal politicsâ? Good! But then some accounting and self-criticism are called for.
The âopportunist electoral politicsâ and âcommunal politicsâ are not things which crept into the old Respect recently and unexpectedly.
âSome Tribune of the People!â, the recent SWP national meetingâs resolution said about Galloway. âHe achieved the dubious record of being the fifth highest earning MP, after Hague, Blunkett, Widdecombe and Boris Johnson, with ÂŁ300,000 a yearâ.
Galloway had already told the Scotsman newspaper, in a sneering comment on the Scottish Socialist Partyâs campaigning slogan for workersâ representatives on a workersâ wage, that he âcouldnât live on three workersâ wagesâ and âneed[ed] ÂŁ150,000 a year to function properly as a leading figure in a part of the British political systemâ (Scotsman, 19 May 2003).
And when asked to summarise his politics briefly in an interview with the Independent on Sunday (5 April 2004), Galloway replied: âSocialist. Although I'm not as left wing as you think...â He hadnât been asked about abortion rights, but chose to make that the one specific issue he mentioned when asked for a general summary of his views.
âIâm strongly against abortion. I believe life begins at conception, and therefore unborn babies have rights. I think abortion is immoralâ. He claimed to have unshakable âfaith in Godâ.
The sudden switch from Gorgeous George to Godly Galloway quickly brought a press release from the Muslim Association of Britain:
âThese comments [on abortion], as well as his statements on faith and God in the same interview, will surely be welcomed by British Muslims who see Respect as a real alternative.â
In 2004, Respect circulated a leaflet in London boosting Galloway as a âfighter for Muslimsâ. It described Respect as âThe Party for Muslimsâ, and claims that âGeorge Galloway has been recognised by the Muslim world for his 30 years of struggle for the people of Palestine, Iraq and Pakistan. Married to a Palestinian doctor, he has deep religious principles [and is] teetotal.â
Way down in the small print the leaflet mentioned âlow-cost public housingâ and so on, but its basic pitch was that Galloway and Respect spoke for Muslims as Muslims. âTony Blair wants to see George Galloway silenced. We, as Muslims, want to see him continue to speak out for usâ.
It was grotesquely hypocritical even in its own terms. Take Galloway's âstruggle for the people of Pakistanâ, for example.
In the Mail on Sunday (17 October 1999), Galloway supported the military coup that installed the present government there. âIn poor third world countries like Pakistan, politics is too important to be left to petty squabbling politicians... Only the armed forces can really be counted on to hold such a country together. General Musharraf seems an upright sort to me and he should be given a chance to put Pakistan's house in order. Democracy is a means, not an end in itselfâ.
In the mid 1990s, Galloway ran a newspaper called East which was financed by previous Pakistani governments in order to promote their politics on Kashmir among British Asians. (See the article by Saeed Shah, a former journalist on East, in The Independent, 23 April 2003)...
As well as being hypocritical, the leaflet's appeal was sectarian, divisive, and calculated to tie Muslim workers and youth to their imams and community notables rather than uniting them with other workers and youth, Hindu, Christian, or atheist.
It was no less reactionary than appealing to Catholics to vote as Catholics for a candidate claiming to âspeak out for Catholicsâ, or Protestants to vote as Protestants for âa fighter for Protestantsâ...