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 7th 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 7th, 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 7th, 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.”
I don't disagree with some of this, but it's essentially an argument for voting for the SNP. The party really needs to start distinguishing itself from the SNP (who are not left-wing) because at present every SSP voter in the country is voting for the SNP instead. We're not losing votes to Labour yet that's where all the energy is going in the campaigning.
ReplyDeleteIndependence is great, but socialism is what really matters. Voting to leave one neo-liberal country and create another with a big business friendly Alex Salmond at the helm dishing out tax cuts to oil companies, corporations and airlines isn't much of an improvement.