SLL E-Bulletin #65 - 28 October 2021

Stand up to fight the Right!


The vision of democracy that Evans/Starmer have in the Labour Party – “you can only vote if you agree with them and if you don’t, you won’t be allowed to vote” – will be put to the test in the coming months in Sheffield.

As the right’s moves to increase its grip on the party machinery nationally continues apace with the demise of the Local Campaign Forum to be replaced by Local Government Committees (yes, that again!), members have an opportunity to act.

The first opportunity is happening now as selections progress for next May’s local elections and candidates put their visions (myopic in the case of the right) forward to be selected.

Sheffield’s Labour Group, only in 'power' now due to an alliance with the Greens, is moribund in political terms tinkering at the edges as the city’s budget is further slashed by the Tories.

The crises of Brexit and Covid have put further pressure on local authorities and this winter’s cruel concoction of a cut in Universal Credit, a crisis in social care provision and a hike in taxes is going to hit the most vulnerable hardest.

What the Labour Group needs to do is launch a very public campaign to expose the hypocrisy of a Tory Government hell bent on levelling Labour councils to the ground rather than levelling up.

Recent reports that monies earmarked for the most deprived areas have, in fact, gone to more affluent Tory councils tells you all you need to know about Johnson’s corrupt administration.

So, candidates prepared to stand up for the city against the Government are urgently needed now.

Meanwhile the right’s plot to remove anyone left of Neil Kinnock will be further cemented by the demise of the Local Campaign Forum and the subsequent downgrading of influence from Branches & CLPs.  Left delegates should continue to argue that delegates be elected from LP branches to the LCF.

The three-way split of voting between the Labour Group, Trade Unions and CLPs means that any platform for local campaigning against austerity and further cuts will be reduced.

Mandelson, back in the fold and advising Starmer, recently stated it “is perhaps absolutely fundamental for people out in the country, when they’re asked to vote for Keir Starmer as their next prime minister, they can know with almost complete certainty that they’re not going to wake up one day and find Jeremy Corbyn there instead.”
 
Anyone still harbouring any illusions that the present Labour Party under Starmer is a voice for socialism or just the basic role of defending the working class should wake up from their Champagne induced hangover before it's too late and recognise the journey into obscurity to which Labour’s current leadership risks steering us.