Football, the working class and a pursuit for truth and justice.

On a day of massive significance to Liverpool Football Club and Liverpool as a city, to the families of the 96 who unlawfully and tragically lost their lives on that fateful day back in 1989, I say thank you.

Thank you for your courage, your determination, your dignity, your tenacity. You inspire and show the world the most honourable and admirable traditions of our class, and for that we all owe you more than you will ever know.

Government, police, media. All complicit, all guilty, all defeated. All must now be held to account.

Their lies, their smears, their attemps to blame the Liverpool fans for that fateful day show clearer than ever and for all to see the reality of how the Establishment view our class. For set in the backdrop of an ever increasingly aggressive Tory Government, in the midst of all out class war against "the Enemy within" - Hillsborough becomes much more than a football fan tragedy. Today's verdict and the time it has taken the brave families to reach it is a timely reminder to all for the need to question and challenge power and authority wherever it may lie.

For those of us who love football, we must use the attitude, determination and bravery of the Hillsborough families as an inspiration moving forward in our fight to preserve and fundamentally alter one of the last remaining pillars of working class life; our beautiful game.

Our beautiful game which is being bent to unthinkable levels of corruption and laundering, a game which is increasingly pricing us all out, a game increasingly run by wealthy businessmen and a game which is delivering players earning weekly figures that those of us in the stands will never see in a lifetime. For those of us in Scotland, it gives us fresh urgency to the campaign against the Offensive Behaviour at Football Act. An unworkable and dangerous insult to us as law abiding citizens of Scotland who are discriminated against on a weekly basis for having the audacity to be nothing more than passionate about our game and our respective clubs.

However, the class victory which has been achieved today cannot be overstated. Those families, that city and that club have taken on all the British Establishment have thrown at them, and won. Defeated with principle, passion, dignity and unbelievable tenacity and bravery.

The truth is now out, let justice be sought.

They shall never walk alone.

The Independence Movement, the SNP and IndyRef2

I’m tempted to say we deserve better but for as long as we accept middle of the road managerialism then the harsh reality is we don’t. For with the close of the SNP spring conference today firing the starting gun on May’s foregone conclusion of an election Scottish Politics has defaulted to talk of a referendum that seemingly neither the government nor official opposition wants to fight in the much discussed but far out of sight  IndyRef2.

As someone who campaigned intensely for a Yes vote in 2014, I feel a great sense of sadness and dismay at how much of the energy and vibrancy that made the Yes campaign so special, unique and a joy to work in has been managed, curtailed and swallowed up by an almighty machinery at the heart of the Scottish National Party. Notwithstanding the likes of Woman for Independence and to a lesser extent the Radical Independence Campaign, much of the good, painstaking work that brought the debate to the left, enfranchised and excited the hearts and minds of people in communities and workplaces across the country has resulted in not too much real and long lasting change of note.

The 2015 General Election saw an unparalleled result in Scotland that no-one predicted, with the collapse of Labour across the entire country also coupled with a weak, business as usual offer from Labour in England and Wales opening the door for David Cameron to return to number 10 as the leader of a Conservative majority. A majority hell bent on systemically stripping away the benefits won by working people across decades with the rolling back of the role of the state and slashing public spending at a level even Mrs Thatcher would find radical coupled with a threat to remove the country from the European Union as an emboldened and strengthening right wing led by Farage and Boris attempt to hammer the rights of trade unions and workers further still.

In the face of such an assault, which will only intensify over the next few years, what does the Scottish Government do? 

The answer unfortunately is talk a good game while bending the knee and implementing their austerity further. Nicola Sturgeon commands personal and party support the envy of most Governments across Europe, yet with the scope to be bold and radical knowing full well she will return as FM after May, Nicola is instead even more cautious and managerial than her predecessor. From the reversal of longstanding SNP policy to scrap the council tax, to standardised testing in schools, centralisation of colleges, an unaccountable authoritarianism at the heart of the justice system, a systemic recruitment crisis in General Practice, the refusal to ban fracking and the slashing of council budgets the reality of SNP government falls far short of the rhetoric and this cautious approach now appears to be nesting into the demand for Independence.

For the summer of conversation to kick-start afresh the vision for Independence the First Minister speaks of is meaningless without a mandate from the people of Scotland in May to hold such a referendum, and after hearing her today insist they would handle a deficit in an Independent Scotland in much the same manner successive Labour and Tory governments have in Westminster I fear for the outlook of a second Yes campaign.

Yes climbed the polls to rest at 45% support not through a strategy of continuity and managerialism but through radicalism and bold direction that had Scots connected with the realities of our political system to a degree which was the envy of the world. In order to win any future referendum, these radical ideas and cast iron policy discussions need to be at the forefront of the argument for a cessation of the British state. Voices of the likes of the Greens, the SSP, RISE, RIC, WFI and LFI are more valuable now than they were in 2014’s referendum. Now is the time to be bold and forward thinking, for Scotland’s people and our public services cannot afford to wait for anything else in the face of an emboldened Tory majority.

An independence referendum mark 2 is our leverage, we must take full advantage and ensure it remains at the centre piece of the anti-Tory offensive that Scotland will give us all a mandate to pursue.

Why Oxi means so much more than No

The Greek people have tonight delivered a resounding, brave, collective No to austerity and the lack of democracy and accountability that surrounds both European and world capitalist institutions. A momentus night in the history of Europe and one that inspires the left across Europe and the world. It does however mark only the beginning of the last chapter in the long struggle between Syriza & the greek people with the afore mentioned institutions of the Troika of the IMF, the ECB and the EU commission. What happens next will decide the future of the Euro project and mark a defining moment in the international approach to the end of austerity.

The capitalist institutions of the Troika have as of yet showed not only a disregard, but a complete contempt for the democracy of the Greek people in electing Syriza as their government back in February of this year, openly talking about regime change in Athens, brought about not in the traditional sense of military might but of financial blackmail and terror and they won’t now simply roll over in the face of a resounding Oxi from the Greek people. The coming days will see how far they are willing to go to impose a set of ideologically driven, economically illiterate proposal of an austerity driven European economy and will ultimately decide how a large proportion of the left views the viability of its current mainstream position in the debate over EU membership in the face of the withdrawal narrative of the right in promoting xenophobia, attacking workers and human rights and of national sovereignty in the upcoming referendum of 2017. If the capitalist institutions which as present the EU is and has been moulded to be so refuse to accept both the mandate of the Syriza government and of the referendum, the position of staying in to reform Europe into a people’s Europe based on the progressive advancements like freedom of movement and of workers’ rights becomes in my opinion untenable. For those of us who want to see and build a federal Europe which benefits the majority of the people of Europe the time may come where we realise the EU as an institution is incapable of becoming what we so desire. This vote also brings about questions relating to the independence movement in Scotland and our relationship with Europe, with capitalism as a whole and of a currency union, the pitfalls of such an arrangement laid bare for all to see as the Greeks have no control over the re-balancing/restructuring of a battered and failing economy which has been slashed beyond recognition by the forces of austerity and neoliberalism.

For now however we have a momentous result to celebrate and to learn from. The Greek people have stood up to the forces of reaction and fear among the threat of Euro withdrawal, default and capital controls and for that we in Scotland can only admire from afar. For the left in Scotland it gives us great joy, inspiration and a sense of togetherness across national and economic boundaries with our European comrades that only strengthens our desire for the kind of Europe we want to see; a Europe based on the politics of hope and internationalism with an economy centred around the needs of the majority of the peoples of Europe. 

If Scotland had shown the same conviction and bravery as the Greeks, we wouldn’t be staring down the barrel of the first all Tory budget since the year I was brought into this world in 1996. What we can however learn is that a mandate of opposing austerity and refusing to implement cuts coupled with hard work and commitment in protecting our communities can both gather popular support and be electorally successful. With a class war budget in the coming days and a national election less than 12 months away, we have much to fight for and much to ponder, doing so buoyed by the bravery and spirit of the Greek people. For that we can truly say… Oxi Thanks!

Tory budgets; fightback, resist and win.

With 2 weeks to go, working class Britain and the most vulnerable in our society brace themselves for the first Tory majority budget for 2 decades. For me, as a now 19 year old, this will be my first ever experience of an all Tory budget. Although the intricate details of it would appear to have been well guarded from the usual pre budget press leaks, the £12 billion of welfare and £80 billion of cuts over a 24 month period leaves no service, no job and no aspect of working class life beyond threat.

As Osbourne ramps up the economically backward, ideologically based austerity as he seeks to ensure the working class and out must vulnerable pay for a crisis of the bankers and super elites, the call to resist has never been so important. This is now about defending and protecting the most basic and most valued of services in our communities and institutions as every major gain fought for and won through generations of working class and trade union activism faces oblivion at the hands of the most right wing, if not ever more right wing Government, than Thatcher herself.

Saturday’s anti-austerity protests, both in Glasgow and in London, as inspiring and as heartening as they were, need to be the springboard for and not the end of resistance to a Tory government with a mandate of a mere 24% of the population.

Through re-listening recently to the tales of the SSP National Workplace Organiser Richie Venton on the titanic struggle waged by the city and council in Liverpool in the 1980s of which he was a driving force behind as Militant regional organiser, it reignites the passion and potential for a mass anti-cuts movement in Scotland, the likes of which have never been seen before. In Liverpool, the City Council refused to set a cuts budget, instead choosing to invest in building much needed council housing, schools and parks, while rallying the communities behind the demands of returning the millions stolen from the council in budget cuts set by Tory central government, and in 1984, won.

In Scotland today, post referendum, where levels of political engagement and activism are at a level never seen before the potential to emulate and exceed the Liverpool example are staggering. In the last general election, over 50% of the Scots electorate voted for the SNP on a ticket of being anti-austerity and to lock the Tories out of Downing Street. With 1 Tory MP in Scotland, the democratic deficit has never been so clear to see, and with a majority at both Holyrood and Westminster, the SNP need to lead, alongside others, the movement against savage cuts from a government rejected on mass by the people of Scotland, not simply bend the knee and pass down Westminster cuts while proclaiming to be anti-austerity and blaming Westminster. Scotland didn’t vote for austerity, and working class communities won’t stand idly by while a democratically illegitimate government tears away the social fabric of Scotland and slashes services and jobs upon which our communities rely upon. We never have, and never will.

The much acclaimed Scotland’s voice won’t be heard from the green benches alone. Only a grassroots campaign, based in and organising around the schemes and workplaces across the country can ever defeat the Tories and cause panic at Westminster. The anti-poll tax movement, the anti-bedroom tax movement and the Independence movement are prime examples. We don’t yet know the details, but Wednesday 8th July signals the start of what will be a long, thankless and tiring campaign to save our communities, our jobs and public services.

The time for talking is over, the time for direct action starts as soon as Osborne “commends the budget to the House.” Only community and class solidarity, resistance and the presentation of a viable alternative will do. In building that, we all have a part to play.

The disaster of a Tory majority.

Well, as expected, I’ve returned to WH Smith and not the House of Commons for employment. My area, like every other in Glasgow and nearly every other in Scotland fell to the SNP on a massive majority and massive swing.

No need for the arithmetic skills today, just political opinion and election hindsight which I have now (with a serious lack of sleep since Thursday all be it) to try note down my post-election thoughts by party and the next steps for the Independence movement in Scotland. 

TORIES- A fantastic and unexpected result for the Tories. A majority which looked impossible before the election and many people didn’t fancy him to lead a Government at all post May with the arithmetic. For working class people the length and breadth of the UK however, a disaster. Tory cuts will be brutal, and we need to be ready to fight them and an upcoming in-out referendum on Europe. Right wing mania till 2020

.

LABOUR- Pathetic. Lost England to the Tories by a massive margin, with some big name casualties along the way including their own Shadow Chancellor. Quite possibly one of the hardest results to take for Labour activists given the polls suggested they were most likely to form a Government post-election and will surely go down as one of the worst in the party’s history. An unpopular and weak Tory Coalition slashing public services but a lack of alternative and vision has left them with no sense of direction or purpose south of the border. In Scotland, a toxic alliance with the Tories and a Blairite warmonger appointed as leader were the final kiss of death. And still he refuses to step down, if they don’t force him out, they can rule out doing anything next year at Holyrood either. The case for an autonomous Labour party here with a left wing leader never been clearer, but for me it’s a case of the brand is now toxic. The UK leadership looks certain to go to a right winger in the party, with my tip being shadow business secretary Chuka Umunna.

LIBERALS- Tuition fees and a lack of trust. All that really needs said. Although notable and unexpected casualties including Vince Cable and Simon Hughes. Clinging onto Orkney and Shetland and Clegg in Sheffield Hallam a glimmer of light on a very dark night for them. Good luck to whoever takes over the reins there, they’ll need it.

UKIP- Vote share very impressive but the FPTP system has been their downfall. Loss of talisman leader in Nigel Farage adds to their problems with the possibility of him returning after the summer which I wouldn’t rule out. Didn’t have a good short campaign and perhaps peaked too soon and were cast aside in the media frenzy over Nicola Sturgeon in the TV debates. In a proportional system will do well, and will probably keep vast amount of voter base throughout the country. May even have one eye on sending lot of resources into bouncing back strongly in Holyrood next year to keep momentum within the ranks.

SNP- A fantastic result. Bouncing back from referendum defeat with a Labour whitewash across the country. Taking all 7 Glasgow seats in particular is a real watershed moment in Scottish politics. However, its essentially a feeble 56 as with a Tory majority they wont be able to exert any influence at all or force any concessions. Leaves them with a decision to make on when to re-visit Independence, after being at pains to avoid it and effectively manage the British state. 

For Scotland, after comprehensively rejecting the austerity consensus of Westminster and booting out the Labour party on mass with the exception of the folks of Edinburgh South, a bitter pill to swallow as David Cameron strolls into Downing Street with more MP’s than before the election and with a mandate of a majority government. In my opinion, the question of Independence returns to the top of the agenda again. 

Our communities, our NHS, our most vulnerable, our disabled, our young people, our public sector workers and services, the entire working class, cannot take 5 years of the democratically illegitimate, most right wing government since Thatcher. An in out referendum on Europe, repeal of the Human Rights Act, £12billon in welfare cuts, no benefits at all for under 25s, and a further 5 years of savage cuts to public funds mean that to not revisit the Independence question is to essentially abandon the Scottish working class. For the left south of the border, it opens up an anti-austerity narrative to another wise rabid right wing landscape and may be the only way to force Cameron out of Downing St and trigger another election. 

We need another referendum before 2020, to save our communities, regardless of how well that suits the SNP election strategy. If the SNP don’t take up the mantle of a referendum in the next Parliament, it’s down to the left to keep it top of the agenda. A challenge I’m most certainly up for pursuing. 

We want, and we expect.

Here we are then. A month to go. After 6 months of scattergun politics from Murphy, McDougall and McTernan at the helm of the ship, Labour still looks to be heading the way of the Titanic. Johann must be thankful, she got the first lifeboat off and never looked back, puncturing a whole in the rest of them as she left. But what does the Labour collapse mean for working class Scotland?

Now, “Scotland” on its own, in the context of an election is often a vague and meaningless soundbite, in a society sadly scarred with the inequality of ours, how can it be anything other when 1% of Jock Tampson’s bairns exploit their fellow bairns to the extent we see today. So I’ll address this directly to working class Scotland. Working class Scotland which voted Yes, and now looks to be waving bon voyage to the Labour party in unprecedented fashion.

Post referendum politics seems to be unpredictable times. Take my area, and the area I’m standing as an SSP candidate, a Labour stronghold, gradually melting away. Now, I’ll shamelessly steal the words of SSP co-spokesperson Colin Fox in that working class Scots should be thankful for the collapse, a good riddance to what’s been bad rubbish for decades, but what troubles me now is what we are replacing them with, or in some cases recycling them into.

After 2 years of referendum, in which the voice of working class Scots sent shivers down the Whitehall department corridors and Westminster benches, unprecedented levels of engagement and ideas, I find channelling our creativity and our desire into one centralised and powerful party very depressing. Particularly when in doing so expecting radical change and having to prepare for what will undoubtedly be the crash of realisation post 7^th May as Westminster does what it does best, survive political turmoil.  A true reflection of what the Yes campaign was and what it hoped to achieve would be a broadly based alliance, reflective of the country we wanted to build. Taking in socialists, greens, community campaigners and more, but that idea was put to bed long ago and we are where we are, so what next?

For the SNP, gains they never thought they’d see, even in the wildest of wet dreams. Potentially with a balance of power scenario on their hands, and the chance to determine the occupants of 10 Downing Street. For the Labour party? Disaster. With the loss of seats, comes the loss of income. The loss of income, comes the loss of staff. The loss of staff, comes the loss of campaigning ability. The loss of campaigning ability, comes the loss of reputation. The loss of reputation, comes political wilderness. It’s really that serious for them. Politicians who assumed their positions in these once safely head seats won’t be gone after May the 7^th, they will relocate, somewhere on a regional list for the Parliament in Edinburgh no doubt, the same parliament they fought so hard to keep inadequate to solving the problems which scar Scottish society today. The infrastructure and party discipline in between? Evaporated. We are, make no mistake about it, witnessing the end of an era. Like the Liberals prior to the Labour movement, Scottish Labour is a beast that will soon be almost extinct over the next decade.

With the power afore mentioned for the SNP however, is an unprecedented hope. Working class Scotland may be about to put its trust in Nicola Sturgeon and the SNP on May 7^th, and working class Scotland expects them to deliver. Minimum wage demands, scrapping anti-union laws, end to austerity, investment in local communities, a shorter working week, more powers for Scotland. Everything is up for grabs, and the weight of expectancy looms. We want, and we expect. Significant gains, nothing less will do, an £8.70 minimum wage and the holding onto a discriminatory youth rate by 2020 for example isn’t good enough, no-where near it. It appears we may be about to change the party, and if in doing so wields no substantial rewards for working class people, the time may well come that we change the system itself.

A timely reminder then this Easter weekend of the words of one of Scotland’s greatest sons, the late great James Connolly:

“If you remove the English army tomorrow and hoist the green flag over Dublin Castle, unless you set about the organization of the Socialist Republic your efforts would be in vain. England would still rule you. She would rule you through her capitalists, through her landlords, through her financiers, through the whole array of commercial and individualist institutions she has planted in this country.”

They think its all over, is it now?

Well, no surprise to those sport minded folk reading this blog piece from the title what I’ve decided to moan about here… With Jim Murphy and Scottish Labour kick starting a nationwide debate on the bevvy ban at football matches, I thought I’d take the time to talk not just about this but to interlink the general stigma associated at football fans through Scottish society, in particular your average working class punter.

Football remains, despite the ludicrous figures on players wages and transfer fees, one of the few remaining aspects of working class livelihood and tradition that Thatcherite economics couldn’t destroy. The average punter’s affiliation to their club is often as strong as the love and bond for their friends and family, or dare I say, their political party, (me included). Before I go on any further, I’ll make this very clear: I make no attempt to hide the fact that I am both A- A Celtic supporter and B- Partial to a pint or two. So, let’s get to kick-off…

That’ll be the last football related pun, hopefully. The blanket ban on booze at football matches is ridiculously outdated, regressive and is in my opinion deep down a class issue. What surprises me is the outcry from self-described progressives and from those who wish to ditch the old stereotypes of Scotland and our people at the prospect of a law abiding football fan enjoying a beer or two at the football. The same fan who you refuse the right to a pint at halftime, is most probably already drinking higher strength beer in a less controlled environment in pubs before the game, there are ways now of limiting the beer consumption available such as scanning the barcode on every ticket and season book used when purchasing to a limit of for example 3 pints that simply didn’t exist in 1980. So you can limit their drinking, tone down the % of alcohol in said pint and help struggling football clubs attract a larger crowd and generate more income from those already in attendance through the purchasing of a couple of pints and further fans enjoyment of the match should they choose to accept the lure of a frothy ice cold Tennents. There is also the notably expansion, at every stadium I’ve visited recently, the family sections to drive family attendance at the football here in Scotland (which remains lower than in England by the way, despite fans being allowed to have a pint in the concourse at halftime and before the game). I see no other conclusion to reach, that when a Rugby fan, or a football fan that can afford to pay for the hospitality suites at matches can enjoy the privilege of an alcoholic beverage if he or she so chooses, that you deny that same choice and right to your average working class punter who’s here to enjoy the game and support his or her team than that of a class issue at its heart.

There is in Scottish society at the moment, an attitude that see’s football fans, yes that’s me and potentially you, reading this, foot the blame for many deeper problems in Scottish society. Between the blanket ban on booze for us reckless and rabid working classes, the seemingly unlimited powers destined at the door of Stephen House and Police Scotland to ruin lives of otherwise law abiding citizens on a case that often doesn’t reach court or when it does is thrown out by the judges via the Offensive Behaviour at Football Act you’d be forgiven for us feeling a little bit pissed off to say the least.

It’s time to treat football fans like we do others who enjoy a cultural day out at the weekend or through the week at the theatre, concerts, other sporting events or just a general night out in the town or the local boozer: like dignified and respected members of society and as grownups. The logical conclusion to the arguments for a booze ban would see outright bans in the City Centre at the weekend, as all the evidence shows that violence rates go up when such Saturday and Friday nights swing round at the end of the working week. It’s irrational, outdated and unpopular.

Oh and a word of caution to SNP members, and pro-independence supporting friends and campaigners. Just because Jim Murphy agrees, does not make the issue toxic. He has carefully selected these issues, and yes I agree there are bigger fish to fry as the saying goes, this is an issue like many more he will jump on before May 7^th that appeals to a broad spectrum of potential wavering voters. He may be looking for election material and entering the game in the 88^th minute on some of these, but to ignore and simply criticise because he’s the one advocating it could very well be a potential own goal that leads to many more appearance fees for those Labour MP’s at Westminster.