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Campaign for a New Workers' Party conference decisions

The following resolutions were passed at the CNWP conference on 12 May 2007:

Way Forward for the CNWP

In the fourteen months since its foundation the CNWP has made important steps forward. We now have more than 2,500 signatories to the CNWP ‘declaration for a new workers’ party’. In 2006 we held successful meeting on the need for a new workers party at eleven national trade union conferences, as well as numerous local and regional trade union events. In the recent local authority elections CNWP supporters have been involved in supporting a wide range of candidates; both socialists and other anti-cuts and anti-privatisation activists.

However, we believe that we have only scratched the surface of the potential for the CNWP, and that potential is likely to grow in the coming year. This conference takes place just as Blair, after ten long years, finally leaves office. But the end of Blair will not mean the end of Blairism. It is clear that Gordon Brown, Blair’s heir-apparent, fundamentally follows the same anti-working class, pro-big business policies as Blair.

Gordon Brown’s programme for government includes cuts and privatisation in the NHS, education and other public services, public sector pay cuts, and the continued support for US imperialism’s policies abroad. Even if, desperate to differentiate himself from Blair, Brown removes British troops from Iraq, he will support them remaining in Afghanistan.

The civil service strike on May Day gives some indication of the kind of trade union opposition Brown could face, particularly over the issue of pay. It is not excluded that, under mass pressure from the working-class, Brown could temporarily retreat from some of his government’s most brutal attacks on the working class. However, this would not fundamentally alter the vicious neo-liberal nature of a Brown government. Therefore, while there will be some workers who ‘hope against hope’ that Brown will reveal himself as more left than Blair once elected; these hopes will be shattered on the basis of their experience.

We do not believe that New Labour under Brown, any more than under Blair, can be ‘reclaimed’. The Labour Party today is an empty shell without democratic structures. Since 1997 the trade union leaders have given more than £100 million of their members’ money to New Labour. It hasn’t bought them a fiver’s worth of influence.

We argue the only way forward for working-class people and trade unionists is to build a new party that actually stands in their interests. Therefore the trade unions should disaffiliate from the Labour Party and begin to build a new mass workers’ party. We will argue that the unions should maintain their political funds and use them to convene a conference of working class organisations to discuss the formation of a party, and to commence the process of drawing up a party programme.

Unfortunately, at this stage the majority of trade union leaders are still mistakenly arguing that New Labour can be changed. If they are sincere in this, those in affiliated trade unions should support John McDonnell MP’s campaign for the Labour leadership, as the only candidate who stands on a programme that is in the interests of trade union members, in that it is against cuts, low pay and privatisation. While we do not think John McDonnell’s campaign will succeed, given the pro-big business nature of the Labour Party, if he gets on the ballot paper, we will call on those trade unionists that have a vote in the election to vote for him.

However if, as we unfortunately expect, the Labour leadership contest or coronation confirms Labour cannot be reclaimed, McDonnell and the other Labour lefts should draw the necessary conclusions from this and throw their weight behind the building of a party that stands for the millions not the millionaires.

We also not that, in the absence of a new mass workers’ party, disillusionment with New Labour is also leaving room for the far-right, racist British National Party to make some gains, falsely posing as a party of the ‘white working class’. We believe that, in order to successfully cut across the BNP, a campaign is needed which both exposes the racist, reactionary character of the BNP and works towards building a party that genuinely stands in the interests of all workers.

The CNWP will continue to vigorously campaign to popularise the idea of a new mass workers’ party over the coming year. In order to do so we agree the following:

• We will actively support any initiatives towards the development of a new party. In particular we will encourage those trade union and trade union leaders that no longer believe that New Labour can represent their interests to take active steps towards founding a new party.

• We reaffirm our support for the declaration for a new workers’ party, as amended by today’s conference, and will continue to use it as a means to build impetus for the idea of a new party. We aim to have at least 5000 trade union, community, environmental and anti-war activists signed up as CNWP supporters by the end of 2007.

• We will produce a short pamphlet on public ownership and the case for a new workers’ party.

• We will take an active part in local campaigns against cuts and privatisation, as we are doing on the NHS, and popularise the idea of a new workers’ party within them. We will also take part in local campaigns against the BNP, raising the need for a new workers’ party. We will appeal to local community, trade union and campaigning organisations to invite CNWP speakers to their meetings.

• We welcome the RMT initiative to organise a conference on the theme of ‘rebuilding the shop stewards movement’. We will encourage CNWP supporters to attend this conference from their unions and for them to promote the link between rebuilding the trade unions and shop stewards movement and the need for a new workers’ party.

• We will organise a second CNWP speaking tour in the autumn out of which we aim to develop the local CNWP campaigns further.

• We will have a major intervention into the national demo on the NHS taking place on October 13^th.

• We will again organise CNWP fringe meetings at as many trade union conferences as possible.

•  We will approach all left councillors in the autumn to discuss a common agenda.

• We commit ourselves to monthly emails to all supporters of the CNWP and for the website to be updated at least fortnightly. We will ask supporters of the CNWP to make a regular donation, even just £1 a month, to help fund our work. We will also approach trade union branches to donate to the CNWP and/or to buy our material to circulate amongst their members.

• We ask the steering committee and officers to act to continue to develop the campaign and to call a third national conference in 2008 to assess the progress we have made and look at how we take the campaign forward from here.

This conference comes at a time when New Labour is moving further to the right and is intensifying its attacks on our public services; we are seeing ever growing privatisation and job losses throughout the public sector. It is vitally important that the CNWP grows and develops over the coming period by being involved with all those struggles taking place up and down the country to defend services. To this end we call on the CNWP to take the following steps as a matter of urgency. 

• Increase the intervention in the Trade Unions, especially at the forthcoming annual conferences, as far as is practically possible there should be caucuses of supporters and public meetings at all major trade union conferences. This should also apply to trade union regional, women’s and youth conferences where possible, with literature produced specifically directed at trade union activists. The caucuses of trade unionists established at the launch conference should meet from time to time to discuss how the aims of the CNWP can be developed in the trade unions.

• Communications need to be improved between the steering committee and supporters with a periodic newsletter being produced which will publicise activities around the country as well as provide useful campaigning information. Such a newsletter could serve to link up the campaigns taking place in the areas by providing contact names and rally support for these local activities. Initially this newsletter could be E-mailed to supporters and finance permitting later circulated more widely to supporters.

In addition to this, an updated version of the CNWP declaration was passed, which can be read here, and the following officers were elected:

CHAIR – Dave Nellist

VICE CHAIRS – Gerry Byrne; Jeremy Dewar; Clara Pyard

SECRETARY – Roger Bannister

ASSISTANT SECRETARY – Hannah Sell

TREASURER – Greg Maughan

TRADE UNION OFFICERS – Glen Kelly; Terry Pierce

OFFICER FOR WALES – Andrew Price

YOUTH OFFICER – Tracy Edwards

COMMUNITY OFFICER – Mel Mills

PRESS OFFICER – Pete McLaren

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