Labour's Burning. posted by Richard Seymour

This morning's Guardian advised me that it looked as if the FBU were about to vote to break their historic link with the Labour Party. Fuck no! I thought, although not with any sense of disapproval. I expected another compromise resolution, or some bluster by Labourite union bureacrats. But no. With the RMT having been booted out the "back door", the FBU have left via the "front door". And, good Christ, who can blame them? Gilchrist, who can blame them?

They strike for a perfectly reasonable wage, (their present hourly rate is less than mine, and my pay is rubbish!), and what does the government do? Refuse even the most nugatory concessions, brand the firefighters "Scargillite", criminals even. The firefighters have given years of loyalty, support and funding to the Labour Party, and they got nothing but injury and insult in return. Part of the surprise in this move, however, derives from the way in which their leader, a left-winger, has consistently and passionately argued for retaining the link. But as he noted, it became more and more difficult as New Labour's policies succeeded in antagonising core supporters and trade unionists.

The first potential beneficiaries are, of course, Respect, who have proclaimed the decision with comments from Linda Smith, treasurer of the London FBU:

This is a massive reaction to the way fire fighters have been treated by New Labour. 85 years of history have been swept aside because of their betrayal. We are now going full speed ahead for strike action to get the pay we are owed.

Respect already earned the support of the London FBU before the elections, in large measure because Linda Smith was standing as a Respect candidate. The possible alternatives are the Greens and the Lib Dems. I don't think it will be the latter, and the former have not really been courting the unions enough for them to be the first consideration.

So, I hope to see firefighter money paying for Respect election material. Because unlike New Labour, we support working people in their struggle for better wages, better conditions, and against privatisation and specious 'reform' packages.

Incidentally, there is a fantastic interview with Asad Rehman about Respect in this month's Red Pepper . One telling point Asad makes is that the Green and Respect vote emanates from different social strata, but I will cut and paste a nice swatch of it for you to read:

How do you think the participation of Muslims in the anti-war and anti-capitalist movements has influenced the traditional left in this country?

You can already see small but significant changes. For example, it is no longer a cardinal sin to argue for a specific space to pray during demonstrations. More ideologically, socialists have traditionally followed Marx’s dictum that ‘religion is the opium of the masses’. Now more socialists can be heard saying that religion is also ‘the sight of the oppressed creature, the heart of a heartless world, and the soul of soulless conditions’.



My political background is Marxist, but I’m also a Muslim. In the past on the left you would have had to stay quiet if you believed in God. Now you’ve got people who are saying, ‘I’m for the Muslim community and I also believe in the left’. We are forcing open a space not only within the Marxist left but also in contrast to the right-wing Islamists as well. We have multiple identities and need multiple spaces. Those who want to engage with us have to recognise our rights to these identities and spaces.



The danger is that the left only perceives us as the new vanguard and that they will walk away the moment new priorities emerge, like they have done in the past with other minorities. Even such a process itself will leave the Muslim community in its larger sense – and it’s worth remembering that we are not a homogeneous community – more politically aware.



Let’s focus more on Respect’s politics: is it a party, and how much support is there for it?

It’s a party in the electoral sense that it is standing candidates and has a platform on which the candidates all agree. But it’s not a party in a Leninist model of everybody having to conform to a particular ideology or specific viewpoint. Respect is a rainbow coalition with people from different traditions coming together.



How do Respect’s politics differ from those of the Greens?

The Greens are clearly a progressive force, and I think it’s sad that Respect was not able to create an alliance with them; both occupy a common space that would have made the anti-war voice even stronger. The current divergence is not written in stone, however, and there may well be an alliance in the future. But a crucial weakness of the Greens is that they are an overwhelmingly white party: they have very little connection to minority communities.



Will Respect and the Greens cancel each other out at the elections?

I don’t think that is likely. Respect will probably mobilise sections of the electorate whose natural voting instincts are not to vote Green. Respect is more likely to be appealing to traditional Labour voters and the Muslim and black communities.

This suggests that an electoral alliance would be enormously profitable for both sides, as well as for the anti-New Labour voters. Socialist Worker makes the case well this week:

Together the Green Party and Respect polled 13.2 percent in the European election-more than three times as many as the BNP, more than the UKIP and challenging the Liberals (15.3 percent). In the West Midlands the combined vote was 7.6 percent-greater than the BNP. Again, in the North West the combined vote was higher than the BNP's. But this gives only part of the picture.

If the Greens and Respect had come together in a united campaign with a single candidate in each area, it would have galvanised bigger numbers than each can achieve alone. Every anti-war activist, trade unionist and all those angry about environmental destruction would see that there was a truly credible force.

Imagine a Red-Green coalition at the next election - one with union backing, radical policies, a good racial mix, and sound antiwar and anti-privatisation credentials. That could be the start of something beautiful...