Behind the headlines: The strange tale of the SWP and Preston's council housing

international | politics / elections | opinion/analysis

Thursday May 06, 2004 23:49

by Maurice Mogadon

Corporate media reports often hide as much as they reveal. (Just what were those pesky protestors so angry about anyway?)

We might expect better from the independent or left media. Sometimes we get better and sometimes we don't. Indymedia itself contains some of the best and worst elements of non-corporate news sources. In this report I decided to look at what lies behind a story contained in the latest issue of a left paper.

The latest issue of “Socialist Worker”, the paper of the Irish SWP, contains a very curious article entitled “Britain: Support for Respect”. It details what it calls the “sensational” resignation of a Labour councilor in Preston, Elaine Abbot. Abbot has joined Respect, the Unity Coalition, a bizarre political formation consisting of George Galloway, the British SWP and a small number of Muslim community leaders.

The Muslims involved come from a strange mix of political backgrounds including the Muslim Association of Britain (MAB), with a few actual clergymen involved. The MAB does not officially support Respect but its President is standing as a Respect candidate as are some other leading figures. MAB is a relatively marginal political player amongst British Muslims but it is the British affiliate of the Muslim Brotherhood, the largest Islamic fundamentalist organisation in the world.

The idea is that Galloway will provide the public profile, while the SWP will provide an organisation on the ground. They hope that the Mosque officials and other prominent Muslims will be able to provide a block vote from their religious community. The actual politics of Respect therefore have to be kept suitably vague. There can be no adherence to socialist ideas or working class politics and no policy on such issues as abortion. A short statement of aims, inoffensive to anyone left of Margaret Thatcher is all that can be managed.

To give birth to this strange coalition, the SWP have wound up the Socialist Alliance, a broad alliance of socialists that they first took over and then ran into the ground. Despite their best efforts, Respect has actually attracted fewer prominent trade unionists than the early Socialist Labour Party or the Socialist Alliance did in its heyday and fewer defectors from the Labour Party.

You can imagine the excitement therefore when a solitary Labour councilor should decide to join the Coalition. Irish “Socialist Worker” positively gushes over the recruitment of Abbot. Their article tells us that “a senior member of Preston Council has sensationally resigned from the Labour Party to join Michael Lavalette as the second Respect councilor in the Lancashire town”. They don’t of course mention that she is only the second Respect councilor in the whole of Britain and that neither of them were elected as Respect candidates.

Lavalette is a member of the SWP who was elected as a Socialist Alliance councilor with the support of the local Mosque. His success in mobilizing a religious block-vote appears to one of the main factors leading to the Respect turn.

“Socialist Worker” goes on to give us Abbot’s explanation for her defection:

“This was a very difficult decision as I have
been a member of the Labour Party for 15 years, a Labour supporter all my life and a Labour councillor for Riversway Ward in
Preston for the last ten years. However, I have been very unhappy with both the Labour government and the local Labour
council for some time and decided that I must follow my conscience and resign. My views opposing the war in Iraq and the
continuing killing and maiming of innocent Iraqi people are well known. I am opposed to student top-up fees and increasing
backdoor privatisation of public services to totally unaccountable bodies.”

All very laudable. But unfortunately the article is being somewhat economical with the truth. For starters, we aren’t told that Abbot had just been deselected by the Labour Party and so found herself casting about for a political home.

More importantly we aren’t told about Abbot’s actual political record. She was no plucky left winger struggling against the Blairite agenda. Instead she had been in charge of the biggest privatization scheme ever to hit the town of Preston. She was the mastermind behind the privatization of the entire of Preston’s council housing, trying to hand it over to a private housing association.

While she was the holder of the housing portfolio, the Council was busy running down council home maintenance. That’s the standard tactic of Blairite councils trying to get rid of council homes. Let the estates get run down, then tell people that only if they accept privatization will they get the needed repairs.

Abbot didn’t just vote for the privatization scheme, she was its main mover as recently as two months ago. Rather puts her claim that she is opposed to “increasing backdoor privatisation of public services to totally unaccountable bodies” into perspective doesn’t it?

Abbot has not distanced herself from her previous role, yet the SWP hail the defection of this character as some kind of victory. Such opportunism presumably marks her out as a kindred spirit.

So next time you find yourself reading “Socialist Worker”, remember to keep a healthy skepticism about its attachment to such nebulous concepts as accurate reporting.

Abbot preparing the privatization proposals:
http://www.preston.gov.uk/News.asp?id=SXFB1B-A77FE099

Abbot welcoming privatization of 7,000 homes coming a step closer:
http://www.preston.gov.uk/News.asp?id=SX170E-A77FE2B0

Respect Coalition boasting about Abbot’s role as Council “Cabinet member for Housing”, without mentioning what that actually entailed:
http://www.respectcoalition.com/index.php?ite=149