Are You Getting Respect? posted by Richard Seymour

You're a Blairite, pissing yourself at the feebleness of the rubber-spines in the Labour back-benches, and how quickly they'll whore themselves to the Cabinet for a few crumby concessions. You're enjoying the facility with which The Guardian despatches these foolhardy radicals for standing in the way of progress. A warm feeling floods your gut as you realise that Tone will once again triumph, that dissent is always the losing side, and that the hammering steam-engine of progress will continue it's merciless trammel through all barriers. Just one thing stands in the way of a nice glass of Drambuie. The British public. The FUCKING BRITISH PUBLIC!! Lazy-minded, slackwitted, workshy, acne-scarred bastards the lot of them! And they actually give the vote to these people? Latest poll shows that 60% of the British people oppose tuition fees , Blair's new flagship policy. (Check that link, by the way, and note The Guardian's phrase "instinctively opposed" as if it couldn't be a rational choice). They damned-near fucked up the Iraq war and here they are yet again, with their 'I think they shoulds' and 'it ain't rights'. Luckily, noone in their right mind bothers to represent these arid twits...

Well, you aren't to know that today, Sunday 25th January 2004, at roughly 4pm, a new coalition was launched to fight New Labour in the polls - and it already has its first MP. Respect: The Unity Coalition is dedicated to opposing war, renationalising the rail, abolishing wasteful PFI schemes, defense of the environment, defense of asylum seekers and immigrants, freedom for Palestine, redistribution of wealth to fund increased benefits and pensions, a minimum wage of £7.40 to match the European Union Decency Threshold and a vote against the Euro which, as presently constituted, insitutionalises draconion crackdowns on public expenditure, neoliberal economic policies, and undemocratic decision-making.

It's National Executive will include:

George Galloway MP

Mark Serwotka, general-secretary of the PCS union

Salma Yaqoob, chair of the Birmingham Stop the War Coalition

Dr Sidiqqu, leader of the Muslim parliament

John Rees, SWP, and co-founder of the Stop the War Coalition

Linda Smith, treasurer of the London FBU

Dr Mohammed Naseem, Birmingham Central Mosque

and others.

There were considerable difficulties to overcome before a unanimous vote was made to endorse the whole programme and executive. Some wanted clearer wording on various issues, others wanted the new coalition to be a repeat of the Socialist Alliance or a revolutionary party in drag. The Socialist Party informed us that they would not be participating in the coalition, that they would await evidence of its performance and internal democracy. A few boos at this, because the spirit of the day was supposed to be unity, but Salma Yaqoob adequately summed up my thought, which was "no matter. We will continue to work with everyone who is prepared to work with us." That's it. There are all kinds of sectarian arguments drawing on a rich past of petty squabbling that one could make, but I'll restrict myself to saying that their electoral achievements (which they loudly proclaimed, "five councillors elected") would make them a valuable addition to the Coalition, supposing they were willing to submit to the unfortunate position of being a minority in it.

There was one truly disgraceful performance of the day which oughtn't pass without comment. The attempts by members of the Alliance for Workers' Liberty to raise the ghost of McCarthy in the conference hall, in the form of a despicable series of attacks on George Galloway, aped in every essential the contemptible MI6-Telegraph campaigns of recent note. I didn't know at first whether to give out a jaw-breaking yawn or a series of back-breaking somersaults of vomit. They attempted to pass a resolution claiming that Galloway's record was "right-wing (close links with Tariq Aziz; activity financed - on Galloway's own story - by the governments of Saudi Arabia and the Emirates and by a businessman well connected to the Baghdad dictatorship)". This shameful attempt at a smear could be torn to shreds by anyone with half an education, (his record is not right-wing, that 'activity' was charitable activity, ditto the so-called 'links' with Tariq Aziz), but that would be to miss the point. The truly pressing issue for the AWL, highlighted in a "point of order" speech made by one of their members when the resolution was deemed out of order by the Convention Arrangements Committee, was that Galloway's income exceeds that of your average skilled worker. It is a long-standing principle of revolutionary socialist parties that any of their members standing for elections should not receive a wage higher than the average wage for a skilled worker. Sectarian demand for ideological purity renders purblind even the most perceptive critics of capitalism, and in this case they seem to have missed that a) this is a pitifully minor issue and b) Galloway's income ends up being the wages of half of his staff, whom he pays himself, and has also transported him from meeting to meeting, demonstration to convention, speech to caucus - for none of these services has he demanded expenses. If the handful of spiteful buffoons who decided that the best expenditure of their efforts would be to smear Galloway had matched even a fraction of his energy and vigor on behalf of the antiwar movement, they would have had more credibility.

As John Rees pointed out in his speech, Galloway has taken the road less travelled - and that has made all the difference. He didn't accept a deal to stay in the party, which would have involved him issuing an apology for his remarks in the same week that Blair refused to apologise for the bombing of Iraqi children. And once expelled, he did not go the Ken Livingstone route of urging others to stay in the Labour Party in the canny hope of returning in better climes. He put himself right at the centre of the fight against New Labour.

Aside from such torrid moments, most quibbles were overcome and a united electoral force came into being. Speeches varied, but an electrifying performance from Tommy Sheridan of the Scottish Socialist Party presaged the familiar charismatic thunderings of George Galloway, as well as an unusually impassioned performance from John Rees. Salma Yaqoob was once again dignified, calmly passionate, subtly witty and acute in her perceptions. Adept at painting the big picture, she dwarfed sectarian infighting and once again made unity the imperative, the overarching theme. Ken Loach did a creditable turn, while the Muslim Association of Britain sent a speaker to endorse the founding of Respect which, although they did not join parties, they would urge their supporters to vote for.

The goals between now and June 10th, the day of the elections to the European parliament, are:

1 Raise £1m to run a creditable campaign the length and breadth of England and Wales.

2 Build the coalition in every town and city where we have worked with antiwar activists.

3 Convince up to a million people to vote for Respect.

Like a challenge do we? Of course we do.