Monitoring Wage Growth?

First the good news – Stats-Canada said 66,800 new jobs were created in January, but don’t uncork the champagne yet folks: the jobless rate went up from 5.6 per cent to 5.8 because more people were looking for work.

 So the more things change, the more they stay the same. 

The youth jobless rate went up from 11.1 per cent to 11.2 — what a great future they have to look forward too. 

The year-over-year hourly wage growth for ”permanent employees”, was 1.8 per cent, which was up from December’s 1.5, but below its May peak of 3.9. 

However, we must be of good cheer; the geniuses that try to run the Bank of Canada said they are monitoring wage growth ahead of its interest rate decisions as they try to determine how well indebted households can absorb higher borrowing costs.

 Imagine them trying to run a children’s party.

For socialism, 
Steve, Mehmet, John &contributing members of the SPC .

Reforms Devalued.

On Feb 8, NDP leader Andrea Horwath lashed out at Doug Ford and his

government for screwing around with various beneficial reforms. 

To quote,

"Ontarians have watched Doug Ford and his government continue their assault on the things we value most. In the past few weeks alone, Doug Ford has taken specific aim at education, including full day kindergarten, clean water, the Greenbelt, help for college and university students, autism services and funding for children and our public health system. None of this is what people voted for."

When asked what we can expect from the NDP, Ms.Horwath said,". . .more bills, ideas and proposals to tackle the things that matter.” 

This just goes to prove that if a government can abolish or water down good reform measures then its pointless working for reforms.

For socialism, 
Steve, Mehmet, John & contributing members of the SPC 

There Is Always Money for War Purposes.

Two unrelated events recently underlined capitalism’s crappy priorities.

 A fellow school bus driver said to me – "Commercial drivers get paid twice as much as us and they justify it by saying they are transporting valuable merchandise, but we drive kids, aren’t they also valuable?” 

You might think $60 billion dollars would help reduce poverty for some, but that is the amount the Canadian government are going to pay the US war company Lockheed Martin to design a fleet of warships. 

Great system isn’t it?

For socialism, 
Steve, Mehmet, John & contributing members of the SPC .

Glasgow Branch Meeting

Wednesday, March 20, at 7:00 pm
Maryhill Community Central Halls,
304 Maryhill Road,
Glasgow G20 7YE

Socialism is not production for profit. It is production for use. It is not production for private ownership and nor is it the state ownership of resources. It is the common ownership of the wealth. It is not inequality and misery and persecution and discrimination; it is egalitarian and fair. It is not poverty and want; it is freedom from want. It is freedom from war. It is freedom from squalor. It is the opposite of what exists today and it expresses what people need and dearly want and would love to see. 

Solidarity means fellowship, fraternity, mutual sympathy, interest in each other’s welfare regardless of nationality, race, gender, or sexual orientation. Socialism is People Power.

Fact of the Day

In the list of the top 25 local authority areas for people paid more than £150,000 Edinburgh comes 16th with 4,000 residents.

END TO THE POLICY OF CRUMBS

The Socialist Party aims at eliminating the class struggle by destroying the classes themselves and making the economic struggle of individuals impossible and unnecessary by abolishing commodity production. Socialists in all countries acknowledge the international character of the present-day working-class movement and proclaim the principle of international solidarity of producers.

We, the exploited, are the overwhelming majority. And yet the exploiters have the power and dominate us! Wherein lies their power?

It is rooted in their ownership of the greater part of the land, the mines, the factories, transport– in one word, in their ownership of the means of life.

It is maintained through their control of and command over the State, the armed forces, the police, the Courts, and the whole coercive machinery, with which they keep us on our knees.

It is rooted in their ability due to their command of the media to stupefy us.

We were given the right to vote, but the right to the sources of wealth, the right to the mines, to the factories, to their great estates, they keep for themselves. Ours is the voting power; theirs the wealth, the profits; such is democracy that we keep voting for the parties of the exploiters. Most of the law made in Parliament is destined to serve the interests of the exploiters. To us they throw the occasional bone, some crumbs, in order to hide their policy of roguery. The Labour Party demand from our masters are bigger crumbs. The Left preach socialism in fine phrase, but the mines, the factories, the large estates – they leave to the bloodsuckers. Open your eyes, ye poor and downtrodden. The Socialist Party want to show you, on every question or measure which comes before Parliament for consideration, that the Conservatives and the Labourites care for nothing except the moneybags of the exploiters. We want to show you that they deceive you at every turn. Only by sending men and women into this Parliament who will have no other aim but the ABOLITION OF THE WHOLE SYSTEM OF PRIVATE PROPERTY IN THE MEANS OF LIFE, will your interests be served, and will you be able to organise production on a new basis, in the interest of all. If you want to free yourselves from the oppression of capitalism, then you must break the power of the exploiters by common revolutionary action. Victorious revolutionary action presupposes a CLASS-CONSCIOUS working class. You will therefore have to remove the blinkers from your eyes.  It is for the purpose of making you see, in order to expose the daily practices in the political arena – the lies, the deceit, the humbug, and the misleading ways and intricacies of this sham democracy that we want to get into Parliament. Written right across every page of human history is the declaration that no people can be free so long as the private ownership of the means of production and distribution endures.

THE MEANS OF WEALTH PRODUCTION AND DISTRIBUTION TO THE ORGANISED COMMUNITY. The decisions which effect the whole of society, such as what to produce, how much to produce, when and where to produce it, and how to use and distribute it are the decisions which affect the total resources of the economy, and the lifestyle and opportunities of everyone within society. Control over these resources and decisions, that is workers’ management of the economy, is the socialist alternative to capitalism.

The Socialist Party is necessarily a revolutionary party and its basic demand is the common ownership of the means of production and distribution and the operation of all industry in the interest of all the people. This will mean an economic democracy. Economic freedom can result only from common ownership, and upon this vital principle the Socialist Party differs diametrically from every other party. Between private ownership and common ownership there can be no compromise. One produces for profit, the other for use. One produces billionaires and beggars, palaces and hovels, the other abolishes class rule, wipes out class distinction, secures peace, and makes of this earth for the first time a harmonious habitable planet.

Organise for socialism with the Socialist Party

We are by now familiar with the type of extreme weather events caused by climate change. Few can deny that the world today is in a state of upheaval and chaos, reflected in the widespread turmoil and conflict. The fact that such conditions prevail throughout the world, and have prevailed for a long time, logically suggests the presence of a common cause. The Socialist Party has repeatedly demonstrated it is the capitalist system that does not and cannot work in the interests of the majority.

Businesses cannot afford to be overly concerned with stopping global warming. The existence of every corporation is based on its ability to make more profits than the next corporation. Business is not about to cut its profits for anybody. Business has not cut its profits to provide full employment or to avoid wars. There’s no reason to expect them to do such a thing in order to slow down climate change. As long as capitalist interests and their politicians can lay the blame on individual’s lifestyles and buying habits and persuade people that industry is operating as concerned citizens, the basic problem of climate change will never be solved. We have to recognize that there are forces in the society which are content to maintain its even though it drives society towards oblivion. We live in a world where global warming is the direct result of the crazy, profit-motivated system we live in. And so long as that system is allowed to continue, temperatures will continue to increase. The drive for profit leads to the neglect of everything that stands in the way of this has created ecological havoc from one end of the planet to the other.

Capitalism is a social system in which most people have to go to work for wages in order to live. This means that they are forced to sell their mental and physical energies to an employer. The interests of the seller of any article are in getting the highest possible price for what he is selling. Thus, the workers are forced to struggle for the best conditions for the sale of their labour power. This means that they must struggle for shorter hours, less intense working pace, higher wages and so on.

 It is obvious that the workers will be able to assert their interests more strongly if they do so together: this is the basic reason for the existence of trade unions. They are the only weapon which workers can use under capitalism to defend and to improve their working conditions. Because of this, all workers should join their trade union. Any trade union action which is in line with working class interests is worthy of wholehearted support from all workers —and receives the support of the Socialist Party.

It is true, however, that trade unions do many things which are quite opposed to working class interests; some of them, as our correspondent points out, tend to help capitalism run more smoothly. Such actions are contrary to trade unionism and the Socialist Party opposes them. Thus, we opposed trade union participation in the war effort and support of government productivity drives.

While we hold that, on balance, compulsory trade union membership is not in the best interests of the Trade Union movement and the working class, we also recognise that trade union action, and strikes in particular, cannot operate without trying to compel would be blacklegs to conform to the decision of the majority. It is hardly surprising that trade unions have their faults. They are, after all, a feature of capitalist society and they must recruit workers of all sorts of political and religious opinions, who are united only in the struggle against their masters. When socialism is established, trade unions will exist no more—the need for them will have disappeared. Until that day, life under capitalism is a battle, and the workers must fight it with the best weapon available.

A planned socialist society which has control of the means of production, distribution will ensure adequate precautions to ensure sustainability. For instance, carbon emissions into the atmosphere will be drastically reduced and less harmful alternatives sought. We will not be catapulted into situations in which whole populations are confronted by polluted air. Against this insane capitalist system, the Socialist Party raises its voice in emphatic protest and unqualified condemnation. It declares that if our society is to be rid of the host of economic, political and social ills that for so long have plagued it, the outmoded capitalist system of private ownership of the socially operated means of life and production for the profit of a few must be replaced by a new social order. That new social order must be organised on the sane basis of social ownership and democratic management of all the instruments of social production, all means of distribution and all of the social services. It must be one in which production is carried on to satisfy human needs and wants. In short, it must be genuine socialism. Despite the threat to workers' lives, despite the growing menace of environmental harm, a world of peace, liberty, security, health and abundance for all stands within our grasp. The potential to create such a society exists, but that potential can be realised only if workers act to gain control of their own lives by organising, politically and industrially, for socialism. Help us build a world in which everyone will share in and enjoy full benefits of the natural wealth of the planet. The Socialist Party calls upon all who realise the critical crises we face and who understand that a basic change in our society is needed to join us.

A local issue?

In 2005, the Socialist Party put up a candidate, Brian Gardner, to contest the Livingston by-election called after the death of Robin Cook. 

One of the hustings he attended was a question and answer public meeting hosted by the Save Fire Cover campaign of the Fire Brigade Union. When questioned Brian made no promises explaining, in the extremely unlikely scenario of him being elected, he could not fulfil any promises made. 

Instead, Brian pointed out in his answers that all these so-called “local” issues such as hospitals, schools and housing are pressing issues everywhere and importantly these are not really local issues, at all. It’s just that many people (and all of our opponents) think the solution is usually a local one, so there is no point looking elsewhere for the answer. Unhappy with the plans for the local hospital? Well, don’t worry whoever gets elected will have a word with the local Health Board and try and clarify the situation. Concerned about lack of fire cover because of closed fire stations? Don’t worry, one of the politicians will make sure you are consulted about it. 

In fact the problem underpinning most of the supposed “local” issues is usually much broader. It’s not just specific local problems (like poor consultation or ill thought through proposals). The whole issue of provision of essential services such as health care and schools is dictated by the level of resources allocated. And whether it is in Livingston or Llannelli, the same picture emerges: local services are extremely stretched and public sector workers are under pressure to work harder, for less money and now for longer with the retirement ages raised.

Our opponents are forever making all sorts of promises to the voters. They'll defend the NHS. They'll pay a “living wage”? In so doing we’d say they are fighting over the crumbs from the rich man’s plate, rather than upsetting the whole table. The Socialist Party’s view is that this is the merciless logic of the market system. The capitalist class don’t want to pay any more than they have to. Or anything more than the bare minimum. The reason? – ultimately, these costs come off the profits of UK Ltd.

Now in 2019, where are we? Did the elected politicians fix the problem of neighbourhood fire safety?

Livingston, a town of 50,000, has effectively only one fire appliance. A house fire in Livingston two weeks ago saw appliances from Bathgate and Edinburgh called to assist the Livingston appliance.

As Brian explained to the voters at the time. A vote for the Socialist Party is a statement that you don’t want to live this way and that you think another world is possible and you possess the confidence that humans can live and work co-operatively without the pressure of the wages system, or the rationing system of money.

https://www.scotsman.com/news/cuts-leave-scots-town-of-50-000-with-just-one-fire-engine-1-4890620

Fight with us for our futures

First of all it is a wrong conception to believe that socialism is going to be introduced by a socialist Government acting as an entity separate and apart from the people and managing their affairs for them. There will be no socialism until a majority understand socialism and organise to get it. They will decide what they want done and how they want it done. Once political power has been obtained, they, the majority, will decide how the proceeds of production are to be distributed among the members of society. Apart from the early period when there may be an insufficiency of certain kinds of goods (a heritage from capitalism) goods will be freely accessible to the members of society. There will be no private ownership of the means of life, hence no relationship of employers and employed and no buying and selling of labour-power. In other words, there will be no wages because there will be no system of wage-labour.

 Under capitalism the means of production and the products are the private property of the capitalist class. Money serves the purpose (among others) of enabling workers and capitalists to realise in a convenient form their respective shares of the products which the workers produce and the capitalists own; the workers’ share being their wages based on their cost of living. A money system is neither necessary nor possible under socialism. The means of production and the products will no longer be privately owned. The workers will not be in the position of selling their labour-power to a propertied class, and goods will not be the object of buying and selling transactions because buying and selling are only conceivable between private owners. Money will have lost its purpose and there will be no financial questions.

The workers are always having it drummed into them that they have a common interest with the capitalist class in maintaining capitalism. We are not concerned with the financial policy debates that arise under capitalism between the different sections of the capitalist class, although these questions greatly exercise the so-called “left-wing” organisations. They conceive it to be their duty or their interest to try to teach the capitalists how best to run capitalism, whereas we are concerned with pointing out to the workers how to get socialism.

The Socialist Party does not want to ‘nationalise the means of production. We, want to do nothing of the kind. Nationalisation or state capitalism is an arrangement by which the capitalists exploit the working class through the Government instead of through private companies. Under nationalisation the capitalists receive their property-incomes as before and remain the owners of the means of production. The difference consists in the holding of Government securities instead of company shares. It often means the replacement of a varying ratio of interest by a fixed rate. The change is in the interests of some of the capitalists. It is not in the interest of the working class. The Socialist Party has always opposed nationalisation. What socialism consists of is the removal of the capitalist class from their privileged positions as owners and controllers of the means of production and distribution. The change is a simple one. When a majority of the workers are socialist and are organised in the Socialist Party, they will gain control of the machinery of Government. By so doing they will have taken away from the capitalist class their only means of retaining their hold over the means of production, etc. Their political power taken from them, the capitalists will then just cease to be a propertied class.

The power of the capitalist to own and control his factories, land, workshops, &c., and only to permit these things to be used by the workers when and on such conditions as he thinks fit, is based on the laws of property and the armed forces which enforce those laws. That power is centred in Parliament and the rest of the political machinery, because it is Parliament which makes those laws and Parliament which maintains and controls the other political machinery and those armed forces. The Bank of England, like other private business concerns, exists and operates only by virtue of Acts of Parliament. It has no "power” and indeed no existence except that which Parliament permits. This fact is obscured by the circumstance that usually the capitalists in control of Parliament and the capitalists in control of the Bank of England either belong to the same group or see eye to eye because they have identical interests.

Very often a question posed to Socialist Party election candidates is “Why stand when you can’t win?” Our reply is that the goal of the campaign to inspire working people with an alternative vision of how society can run. We, in the Socialist Party, need to present a view of a democratic socialist society which can only be achieved through building a mass social movement. The reorganisation and transformation of our society, from a capitalist to a socialist society requires understanding, knowledge and the bonds of fraternity forged in the course of a struggle. The task that lies before us all is to build the confidence and the understanding, the political clarity which comes only through struggle that will enable the workers to take on and defeat not just an individual employer, but the entire employing class. It requires perseverance. Global warming and global warfare are not problems for politicians to solve while the rest of look on.  What’s emerging from all this is that humanity has to evolve for its own survival, and evolution is going to take all of us. We’re all in it together.

Today, the two looming “existential” threats are the possibility of nuclear war, and unprecedented climate change, yet neither of these seems to unduly concern our politicians. Brexit, a dispute between two capitalist class factions makes the daily headlines. Capitalism thrives on war, and we forget this historical fact at our peril. Nor do they seem worried about the drastic consequences of global warming, which has been denied, ignored, or downplayed in the media.

Workers creates the wealth and power that is then used against them. To be competitive, capitalists replace workers with machinery (computers and robotics) and cut wages. Weaker capitalists go bankrupt; their businesses are absorbed by the stronger, and ownership is concentrated into fewer hands. Workers’ organised ability to protect themselves from capital has waxed and waned. Today, it seems to be at a low point. Nevertheless, the capitalist class fears a mass international revolutionary working-class movement with the potential to end their rule and replace it by a productive system based not on the exploitation of the many for the profit of a few, but on human need: from each according to abilities to each according to needs. After a hundred plus years of campaigns to discredit, distort, defame, and demonise, the spectre of such a movement still haunts the ruling class.

What road to socialism?

Many people make fun of the effort the Socialist Party puts into producing, distributing and selling the Socialist Standard and our collection of pamphlets. They seek to compare our efforts with the sleek performance and wide influence of the big Dailies. The Socialist Standard, however, attempts to provide its readers with an understanding of events from a class perspective. By contrast, the aim of the mainstream press is to stop the development of such a coherent interpretation of the world, offering stories about things that in reality have no relevance to a worker’s life at all and presenting a skewed editorial line representing the interests of the owners and his fellow capitalists. The need to win workers to a socialist perspective is greater than ever. The Socialist Standard remains vital to this.

All reformist parties – no matter how grandiose their verbal allegiance to “socialism” and supposed socialist ideals – conceive of their political aims as lying within the framework of the capitalist state: as winning reforms from capitalism, winning a majority in the capitalist government, or even as “transforming” the capitalist government into a “socialist government” (i.e., requesting the capitalist state to commit suicide). A reformist party will not overthrow capitalism, since it functions within the framework of capitalism; and consequently, it cannot halt poverty or stop war, both of which follow necessarily from the continuance of capitalism.

The Socialist Party declares that its aim is to develop the class consciousness of the workers through our education and agitation. The struggle for socialism is the struggle against the capitalist class who live off the labour of others, and it is the struggle against all exploitation. The capitalist system rests on the exploitation of workers. It can only end in the working-class transferal of all land, natural resources and factories to the whole of society for the organisation of social production under which all that is produced by the workers and all improvements of production benefit the people themselves. The emancipation of the working class is the act of self-emancipation. All around us there are the signs of a world in crisis, yet men and women seem unable to do anything about it. Resources that should be used to comfort the sick, help the poor and feed the hungry are squandered. The greatest threat comes from global warming although the risk of global nuclear war always remains present. And the situation grows even grimmer. No wonder many are in despair. Even some socialists talk of society collapse, catastrophe and apocalypse and warn that in the choice between “socialism or barbarism”, the latter is becoming ever more likely. But all is not lost…yet. The Socialist Party retains trust in the ability of the working class to change society and understand that it means rejecting the whole profit system and the politics of class collaboration, even if they are not yet ready to take this step. The present downturn in the class struggle will not last forever. However, the Socialist Party is realistic about the present situation and has not given way to fake optimism. At the same time as recognising just how bad things are, the Socialist Party has resisted succumbing despair. The working class is far from finished, and our job is to keep preparing for the struggle for socialism. With socialism, we can go on to use the world’s resources in a sustainable manner where humanity’s accumulated knowledge and skill are used to create a world in which poverty, exploitation, and warfare are only bad memories. The Socialist Party has no illusions about the scale of the task, or about the limitations imposed by our size, influence, and talents. We know that only the working class can transform society. We don’t seek to place ourselves at the head of our class. We seek only to make workers conscious of their interests and their power.

The Socialist Party possesses a vision of the kind of society we want for ourselves and our children and their children. We recognise the inability of reformism to solve the problems that capitalism creates and understand that politics is all about winning the battle for socialist ideas with a vision of the ability of workers to transform the world.

After Capitalism

Widespread feelings of discontent can be found around the world yet outbursts of protest and rage are being followed by periods of apathy and resignation. Today’s anti-capitalist struggles require vision. A total blueprint of socialism is impossible but we can elaborate more on what we should expect in a socialist society. The needs of people, not profit, are the driving force of a socialist society. It can only be accomplished by democratising all levels of society. Under capitalism, labour is a commodity. Workers are used as replaceable parts, extensions of machines—as long as they provide dividends. Employers use their power of ownership to devastate the lives of workers through layoffs, shutdowns and neglect of health and safety. Unions, despite their courageous efforts, have encountered difficulties eliminating even the worst abuses of management power. Socialism will dissolve the economic foundation of one-sided management privilege. We believe in the ability of working people to manage their own productive institutions democratically. We do not offer a blueprint to a better future. We present an invitation to all workers to join us in our common efforts to eradicate a social system based on exploitation, discrimination, poverty and war. The capitalist system must be replaced by socialist democracy. Capitalism has failed, and so have efforts to reform it. That failure puts a campaign for the socialist alternative on the immediate agenda. The flaws of capitalism are too basic, the power of the corporations too great, the chasm separating the compulsions of profit and the needs of people too wide, for anything less to succeed. That is the only hope of humanity. Socialism is shared abundance.

Capitalism is the private/state ownership of the means of production, which gives most people no choice but to sell their labour power. Capitalism functions:

ONLY for the destruction of life, but not for the preservation of life.

ONLY to produce the means of destruction, but not to produce the means of life and the means of enriching life.

ONLY for war, but not for peace.

Capitalists often try to cover up their crimes with a cloak of patriotism, but the only patriotism they know is that of the $ sign. When the workers discover the real nature of the profit system they lose all respect for the master class. They see the capitalists in their true colours as thieves and parasites, and their "sacred" private property as plunder. They see state, church, media and university as tools of the exploiters and they look on these institutions with contempt. They understand the identity of interests of all wage workers and realise the truth of the slogan: "An injury to one is an injury to all." When the workers are organised politically and industrially with an understanding of their interests and their power as a class, it is only a matter of time before they abolish wage slavery. With economic control in the hands of the people, production will be carried on for use and not profit, and all activities of society will be for the benefit of the workers instead of for the maintenance of a parasite class. The world revolution of the working people, directly or indirectly, decisively affects the destinies of every one on this planet.

If the workers are to come to a right conclusion, they must first understand clearly their class position and how they are enslaved by the capitalist class. Wage-slavery is different in form from all preceding systems. It is more effective in binding workers to their task while at the same time conceding them the freedom to leave it. How this can be is easily seen without much knowledge of economics. Workers are free to leave an employer but their physical needs compel them to find another. To use an economic phrase, they are compelled to sell their labour-power in order to obtain the necessaries of life. Wages are the price of labour-power. Workers themselves are not commodities, nor are they treated as such by their masters. Every worker is the undisputed owner of his or her labour-power. We can sell it to any capitalist who is willing to buy. We sell it for stipulated periods and can discontinue the sale by giving notice according to the terms agreed upon. These are the extent of the workers’ rights, the actual position. Commodities are always subject to changes and fluctuations in price. The price of a commodity changes under three sets of conditions: when it is produced with a smaller or greater expenditure of labour-power; when supply and demand are unequal, and when the material of which money is made can be produced with a smaller or greater expenditure of labour-power.

The foulest lie of all is the connection which is drawn between immigration and the shortages of jobs, homes, school places, hospital beds. The Socialist Party makes clear that it is opposed to anti-immigrant propaganda.

Immigration controls are about how the ruling class divides and controls us. The capitalist class is for immigration when it serves their interests to expand the population of educated and skilled immigrants to serve big businesses, and to keep a population to work backbreaking, low-paying jobs. In a few years many countries will be faced with a shortage of labour and some have now to become a country where immigrants are welcomed. Who is going to pay for the old age pensions and social services unless There is an addition to the population which only immigration can provide in the years to come.

Racism is an effective way to confuse and divide white workers from non-white immigrants. The racists have taken hold of the ears and minds of the white working class. Many of our fellow-workers under attack are divided, in part because they have learned to absorb the prejudice, mistrust and hatred that the racists preach. We need to wage our struggles for justice with a long-term vision that ensures health care, economic stability and social recognition are available for everyone, regardless of national identity. Workers must be won away from nationalist patriotic garbage and see through the lies.

Capitalism is a condemned society. Capitalism cannot be made to work in the interests of the whole community. The only course now is for the complete change in the ownership of the world. The only possible hope of the working class is common ownership of the means of production.

Revolutionise Not Romanticise

Those who took part in today’s school strikes to draw attention to the climate crisis we face are doubtlessly sincere and caring young people who want something different. Environmentalists put out an appealingly radical message, but when examined it becomes clear that it is a case for the capitalist market with a green tint. Only by abolishing the system which is the cause of rising carbon emissions can the global warming effects be eliminated. It is simply impossible to reform this capitalist system to permanently benefit humanity. 

 There are members of the capitalist class who recognise that if they are to hold on to their power and wealth, they must appear to take into account the well-informed and vociferous demands of the environmental movement. However, they must also discredit the views of those people who point to the profit system as one of the main perpetrators of ecological destruction and unsustainable resource use. The apologists for capitalism sweep under the carpet the way in which businesses, driven by the necessity to make profit and expand capital, has systematically despoiled and polluted the environment and harmed the health and lives of workers, either at their place of work or where they live. To make money, screw everything and everybody else. This is the profiteers’ mantra.

The corporations propose policies of environmental reform which they believe can be incorporated into their production processes in the interests of the whole of society without endangering rates of profit. It is this poverty of thought which is the most lamentable aspect of their business-as-usual outlook. Capitalists only adopt new technologies and manufacturing methods or make new appropriate products when it is profitable to do so, not because the existing ones happen to be contributing to global warming or polluting the planet.

The Socialist Party has always argued the need for people to take conscious political action to create the framework of common ownership and democratic control of the means and methods of production and distribution, as the only way in which the social problems like pollution can be tackled. A society which was not constrained by private property, commodity production and buying and selling would use as a matter of course the best possible technology at hand to ensure the safety of those working in the plants and the protection of the natural environment. Social cost would be the deciding factor, not commercial cost. Capitalism is unable to do this. It is sheer folly to believe capitalists will adopt an environmentally sustainable plan if their competitors elsewhere in the world market do not. What would the shareholders say to a board of directors which introduced costly practices if it meant that the company lost its competitive edge and market as a result?

Those who believe that the threat to the environment can be dealt with within the capitalist system are hopelessly wrong. These dreamers imagine that politicians whose task it is to run the production for profit system can be persuaded to recognise and act on the danger which pollution brings to the planet. The Socialist Party has been saying for a very long time that people must wake up to the enormous threat of environmental damage which the profit system poses to the world around us. For decades it has been cheaper for capitalists to pollute the air workers breathe than to adopt clean technology. Methods of manufacture which are harmful and disease-spreading have long existed. Ourfood has been adulterated for as long as we have been wage slaves. Animals are made to suffer and die needlessly; endangered species which have no exchange value in the market are free to become extinct. There is nothing new about any of this. In order to make a quick dollar it has long been capitalism’s practice to destroy the Earth’s irreplaceable resources.

The Socialist Party is well acquainted with the arguments that green politics is about pragmatism, that is, cynical compromise. It is about “lesser evils". But why vote to support those who seek to administer the lesser evil when capitalism, which creates the evils, can be abolished altogether? The usual reformist answer is that the lesser evil will take less time to achieve than the grand socialist aim. It is a foolish myth that partial objectives are worthier of support. There is unlikely ever to be a green government, and if there is, then its greatest critics will be the environmentalist movement who will complain that it has sold them out. It is inevitable with reformism; it must sell out in order to fit in with the requirements of the capitalist system.

The Socialist Party is a materialist organisation, but not in the sense that the term is often used: it does not mean that it is obsessed by consumerism and wants people to have more and more “material” goods, such as cars. To be a materialist is to recognise that human beings are rooted in our social environments. Our consciousness is social, and through conscious action we can alter the material environment of which we are a part. The environment is not something “Out There” which must be protected; it is part of us and we part of it. The eco-warrior dream of a non-urban arcadian utopia, undisturbed by influence of Big Business and its needs, is looking backward at a deeply conservative ideal which serves as a valuable diversion for the ruling class.

Capitalism will pass a few minor reforms because the capitalists themselves realise that their investments are being damaged by the filth created by a lack of environmental concern. Just as they passed The Clean Air Act of 1956, so they will attempt a few more self-regulating laws. Needless to say, these laws will be evaded by those rich and powerful enough to do so. Even when the capitalists are agreed on their common interest, there will always be one or two who will try to make a fast buck at others expense.

The world belongs to the rich. We, who produce everything and run the planet from top to bottom, have given it to them. Our task is to take it back from them; to reclaim the planet for ourselves. If you do not stand for the socialist transformation of global society, in the end, you’ll all end up a rather futile reform group, in a pointless crusade, pleading with the master owning-class to make the planet a little bit better.

And we equally must disillusion those modern-day misanthropes who see humanity as a plague upon the planet and preach catastrophism and the apocalypse.

COOPERATIVE SOCIALISM

30 Years of Scottish Bombast (1953)

From the July-August 1953 issue of The Western Socialist

The political scene in Britain (particularly Scotland) to-day, provides, in some important respects, a striking contrast to that of 30 years ago. To describe and analyse the intervening years would be an inquiry into decay and decline; a study in bilge and bombast; a picture, sad in itself, of promise without performance.

It would indeed be a journey through a period littered dismally with the bones and residue of movements which got their sustenance from the energies and hopes of many thousands of working people.

To-day, in Glasgow, and the industrial belt of which it is the centre, one meets many men and women, now despairing cynics, who were, thirty years ago, enthusiastic, selfless workers in the various movements.

Then, thirty odd years ago, as now, war-time conditions were slowly changing into normal capitalist conditions of “peace”: rationing was giving place to the accustomed sway of the purse, and a greater variety of goods were appearing in shop windows to tease and tantalize working-class housewives. Another obvious feature in common, a natural aftermath of the long war years of unbridled violence and deceit, is an increase in crimes of violence, rape and fraud. And, of course, what is delightfully described as “delinquent youth.” In other words, the behaviour of young men and women, growing up in their most malleable years in a world of organized, colossal murder; whose playgrounds were air-raid shelters and bombed buildings; who accepted as natural the “blackout” with all its inevitable framework.

The drift away from organized religion is ever more marked today and it could perhaps be said that highly organized gambling — particularly the “football pools” — with their billion-to-one chance of winning £75,000, have ousted religion from its former supremacy as a social dope and bulwark of capitalism.

“Tomorrow? Why, tomorrow I may be myself with £75,000” is a faith more potent, and supplanting than of the Sacred Articles and Beatitudes.

A striking commentary on Capitalism is the fact that the gambling industry fast rivals others in order of importance. And that in this retreat of theology, its hired and paid (evidently underpaid) laborers are quisling to the football pools, as scrutiny of the prize winners lists sometimes reveals.

Here in Glasgow, 30 years ago, events had earned the area the totally unjustified title of the “Red Clyde.” The Communist Party had recently been formed out of a host of individuals and movements conspicuous by their sound and fury, and by their lack of Socialist understanding — “Armed insurrection,” “Direct Action,” “Minority movements,” “Collapse of Capitalism,” “Anti-Parliamentarianism,” were some of the slogans shouted by many a man now seated comfortably in Parliament. Some indeed now Peers of the Realm.

The Labor and Independent Parties — then part of the same organization had their stronghold here on Clydeside and in the landslide of 1924 when a record number of I.L.P. and Labor Members of Parliament were elected, scores of thousands of elated workers assembled in the centre of the city to see the conquerors off to London to capture the bastions of Imperial Britain. It seemed to many excited workers that the world was theirs and the late James Maxton M.P., confirmed this impression by declaring “The working class is now the ruling class, so why should they go in rags?” Everywhere in the area. Labor and I.L.P. orators were pushing their themes of Nationalization. Everywhere, there were meetings, demonstrations, United Movements, “New Worlds,” “New Perspectives.” “Revolutionary situations” were perpetually conjured into verbal being.

Joining in the unholy chorus, the Communist Party added its own nostrums of “Direct Action” and “Soviet Power.”

Elements of DeLeonism contributed their proportionate share with their Industrial Unionism and wild talk of “taking and holding the means of Life.”

The Glasgow Branch of the SPGB had just been formed by a literal handful of men. Amidst trouble, difficulties, most of them unemployed, meeting in hovels in which they lived, in the jungle of wind and bombast surrounding them, they presented the case for Socialism. A case which at first, largely met with sneers and ridicule. and on many an occasion, with violent measures being taken against the couple of speakers. Today, what is the general political and industrial position in contrast to that of then?

In the industrial field, the open allegiance of the prominent Trade Union officials to not only Labor Government but the present Tory one exceeds anything of 30 years ago. Indeed, Trade Unions threats to become mere adjuncts of Governments and the employing class instead of what their pioneers intended them to be—organs of working class struggle. Insolent admonitions to work harder and forego wage-claims abound from every quarter of the Trade Union movement. “More production for the export markets” is now an official Trade Union slogan. Here and there, of course, the pinch of the cost of living and the increased tempo of production force workers to take action but, in the main, such episodes meet with, not only the disapproval of the Government, but with the opposition of the official Trade Union movement.

At Conference after Conference, spokesmen ruminate on problems of national self-sufficiency, of capital investment, of the problems of British Capitalism in the markets of the world; on anything and everything except working-class interests.

At the Scottish Trade Union Congress held in Rothesay in April of this year, a Mr. T. O’Brien, M.P. who is chairman of the British T.U.C. delivered himself of the following piece of unvarnished nonsense:

  "There were workers who thought of efficiency as something to do with the boss, but nothing to do with themselves. I say this to all of them — if they persist in such attitudes for long, then all they will have to live on will be their illusions. And illusions are a poor currency in World Markets. We are right in a period when we can’t afford inefficiency in management or low productivity in the workshops. Whether industry is privately or publicly controlled or owned it is everybody's job to help the nation to earn its living. These are not class issues. They are the plain unvarnished economic facts." Daily Express, April 13, 1953.

An even more penetrating and squalid insight into the functions of the Labor Party and its allies — the official Trade Union Movement — during the so-called boom years, was given by the last Labor Chancellor of the Exchequer in his Budget speech reported by the National Press on April 10, 1951:

  "During the past few years of labor scarcity and sellers’ market, workers had been in a position of unexampled strength of bargaining power. Had they considered only their own immediate interests they could have pressed their advantage home."

Little wonder the more sober-minded Capitalist press greeted somewhat ruefully the narrow victory of Churchill and his Tories in Oct., 1951. Apprehensive forecasts of subsequent widespread industrial disorder were speedily proven wrong. Trade Union leaders like O’Brien, Deakin, Lowther and others were not slow in assuring the new Government of their support. So that, shortly after, Mr. Churchill could gurgle happily the famous understatement, “four-fifths of both parties were agreed on four-fifths of their programs. ”

In Scottish Labor Party circles this process goes on apace, so that a Mr. G. McAllister writing in a Labor Party paper the Glasgow “Forward” could opine that while Churchill stood for 10 per cent Socialism in the national economy, Mr. Morrison, the second in command of the Labor Party, stood for 15 per cent and that the new bogey man of Wall Street — Mr. Aneurin Bevan — stood for somewhat more!

The same “Forward” had an article recently by a prominent Labor M.P., Mr. Arthur Woodburn on “What do we mean by Socialism” wherein with a nonchalance worthy of the Stalinists, he threw overboard the theories of half-a-century .— “Planning and not Nationalization is the cornerstone of Socialism.” In the usual run of reformist politicians, not a word of apology does he express for a lifetime of sedulously identifying Socialism with Nationalization, the aspirations and energies of humble workers, lending their support to the Labor Party, do not appear in his balance sheet.

The formerly mighty I.L.P. now shrunk almost to nothingness, still maintains a precarious existence. Boasting sometimes of how it differs from the stinking organization which preyed, vulture-like, upon the workers for so many years, it reveals the same old lousy story of reform. With its divisions of Pacifism, Quakerism, Catholicism, Secularism, jostling side by side with a counterfeit Marxism, it presents the same old mixture of confusion and futility. And even more productive of sardonic comment is the ease and facility with which prominent members of the I.L.P. can leave the I.L.P. for the more comfortable and secure Labor Party.

It would, perhaps, be illuminating to digress temporarily in order to examine briefly a prime and significant example of this phenomenon.

In the noisy days of 1923-24 onwards, Gorbals, a constituency in Glasgow of world renown (or notoriety) was represented, on behalf of the I.L.P., by a Mr. G. Buchanan. His seat embraced the most squalid slums in Europe, possibly the world. Rows and rows of the most terrifying, rat-infested slums. Lice-ridden, the habitat of millions of bugs, with a population of the most diverse in Scotland, where Scottish, Irish, Jewish (from all parts of Europe) and Indian workers lived literally on top of one another, it had, and sadly still has, the greatest infantile mortality in Europe. An area where criminals were bred, where gangsters and bullies were ten-a-penny and yet withal thousands of men and women retain their dignity and integrity.

In short, a working-class constituency, par excellence.

Mr. Buchanan, who held the seat for twenty years with one of the biggest majorities in Britain, and on the basis of “decent homes,” “high wages” and all the other vote catching nostrums, decided blandly around 1945 to leave, in between elections, naturally, the I.L.P. for the Labor Party.

Regardless of the blazing fact that his constituents were still in in the company of lice and vermin, still in the same old filthy slums, with their infants still dying in greater numbers than anywhere else, he transferred his allegiance. Although the men and women who had supported him all through the years were still exploited, oppressed and insulted, exacerbated by years of bereavement, sacrifice and hardship in the years of war, and although he had won the seat in 1935 in the teeth of Labor Party opposition which seemed to indicate their preference for the I.L.P. Without even going through the motions of consulting his electors, he joined the Labor Party. Since then he has fared much better than the workers of Gorbals. He is now Chairman of the National Assistance Board, which, after a Means Test, relieves the poor and needy (over 2 million cases in 1952). The remuneration of the Chairman of the Board is £5,000 per year. He, McGovern, Carmichael, F. Brockway and many others left the I.L.P. and joined the Labor Party when the writing appeared on the wall for the I.LP.

For the first 30 months of the Labor Government elected in July 1945, the Communist Party supported the Government. This support, of course, was directly in line with Soviet foreign policy, best seen in all its naked callousness by the statement of the late demi-god Stalin in Crimea 1945: “The alliance between the Soviet Union, the United States and Great Britain, is based not on casual and transient motives, but on vitally important and long-standing interests.” This also led the Communist Party to oppose every strike during this period. For example, the strike of the Grimethorpe miners in Sept., 1947, was denounced by the Party as a “stab in the back of the working class.” Their General Secretary, Mr. Pollitt, who had in his pamphlet “Questions and Answers,” 1946, so obsequiously re-echoed Mr. Stalin’s Crimean declaration, however, in December 1947, in his report to his members was compelled to abandon as unreal, his own and his semi-divine leaders prognostication by stating:

  “Because of the United States and British policy of refusing to co-operate with the Soviet Union, the differences have deepened to the point where today there are two world camps. It is necessary that important changes be made in C.P. policy.”

Thereupon, the C.P. attacked the Labor Government until its defeat in 1951, The attack, naturally, was mainly in the area of foreign affairs. In recent months the C.P. has reached the depths of nationalistic slime in its anti-American policy. Defenders of native culture against Wall Street; on guard against Yankee music, literature and films; assailants even of the “crew” hair-cut and the “drape” suit; disdainful of the crepe soled shoes, coat shirts and ties of America, they present a sordid spectacle.

Starting from the stellar heights of “Go home Yank” in which they suggested in a front page article of the “Daily Worker” that an inebriated G. I. who had allegedly misappropriated a crucifix from “an old Saxon Church,” should get life imprisonment; rising to dizzy cosmic heights of a knight-like solicitude and concern for the sexual virtue of the innocent, unspoilt British womanhood beset by threats and wiles, by the dollars, nylons and other merchandise of the PX of the licentious American soldiery, they have descended to the noisome depths of “Let Britain Arise" 1952, in which Mr. H. Pollitt proposes as a serious measure: “That no foreign worker shall be employed while a British worker is unemployed or on short-time." In other words: “Workers of the world — divide — you have nothing to gain but your jobs.’’ Or: “Did your mother come from Ireland? or Italy? or Spain? or America?"

Arguing “that if we have to have a Coronation, let’s make it a British one — untainted by the products of Broadway or Hollywood," agitating for a lowering of the cost of production of labor-power, squealing about the need for “East-West Trades,’’ defending every tortuous twist of Kremlin policy from Vishinsky’s “No” to Molotov’s “Yes,’’ bleating about Scottish, Irish and Welsh Home Rule; moaning about the “sell out of Britain to Wall Street,’’ the C.P. of Great Britain is in truth, indeed, an object of contempt in the eyes of workers with even a spark of working-class principles.

The small Trotskyist party, the R.C.P. were compelled to “liquidate” when their counterparts, the C.P. became slightly critical of the Labor Government. Its self-appointed leadership is now in the comfortable bosom of the Labor Party. All its noise and its innumerable and uncomprehensible theses, its fury and bombast, now muted to a safer and more respectable key.

The Scottish Nationalists, with no real roots in the working class, still shout the funny slogan of “Scotland for the Scots.” Some of their misguided followers, infuriated by the choice of the title of Queen Elizabeth II, and quite obviously motivated by an over literal interpretation of Thurber’s “Secret of Walter Mitty,” and encouraged by the indignation of the regal title expressed by Scots, Tory and Labor M.P.s are engaging in the pleasant pastime of sticking home-made bombs in mail-boxes bearing the obnoxious slogan “ER II.” In the West of Scotland there is a very small but vociferous crew of Anarchists. People who take the discordant views of Jesus Christ, Proudhon, Stirner, Bakunine, Tolstoy, Kropotkin and the Syndicalists, yes and even the I. W. W., in one indigestible swallow and confront the workers with the confusing result.

That is the dark side of the picture.

On the other side, we have, first of all, the Socialist Party of Great Britain, plugging away at the serious, un-melodramatic job of spreading the Socialist idea. The two branches in Glasgow, although faced yet with great difficulties, meet with nothing like the hostility encountered by the pioneers of 30 odd years ago. The myth of Socialist Russia is not nearly as widespread. Nationalization as a panacea has lost its vogue. The stupid theories of armed insurrection and the like, are virtually extinct. Perhaps the most hopeful sign of the times is that the younger workers, in discussion, seem to value more serious argument than the shouting of windy slogans. It rather seems, too, that the day of the reformist party is past. And as more and more of the working class recognize the already open identity between Sir Winston Churchill and Major Attlee, they must turn their attention to the Socialists.

Therefore, the Socialists in Scotland, like Socialists the world over, are confident of the working class ultimately accepting the view that the world and all that is in or on it, should belong to all.

It is a hard task, but one well worth the doing.

Tony Mulheron, 

Glasgow Branch, 

Tony Mulheron was a Glasgow dock worker, who was a member of the SPGB from Feb 1935 to May 1938 - briefly resigning his membership - before rejoining the SPGB in Dec 1938, and remained a member of the Party until his death in 1982.

Taken from
https://socialiststandardmyspace.blogspot.com/2019/03/30-years-of-scottish-bombast-1953.html

Climate Change - Socialism is the Answer

THE CAUSE OF CLIMATE CHANGE IS CAPITALISM

Today many thousands of youngsters are expected to walk out of their schools to protest the inaction of governments over the climate crisis we are all confronted with. Since one teenager – Greta Thunberg – held a solo protest outside the Swedish parliament the school student movement has spread across the world. Anna Taylor, 17, who co-founded the UK student climate network, said: “Young people in the UK have shown that we’re angry at the lack of government leadership on climate change. Those in power are not only betraying us, and taking away our future, but are responsible for the climate crisis that’s unfolding in horrendous ways around the world,”  adding that “those least responsible for contributing to climate change are already suffering the worst effects”. She continued: “It is our duty to not only act for those in the UK and our futures, but for everyone. That’s what climate justice means.” 

In Scotland, the Guardian is aware of strikes planned in 19 different locations, from South Uist in the Outer Hebrides to St Andrews on the east coast, with large gatherings expected in Glasgow’s George Square and outside the Scottish parliament in Edinburgh.

One of the UK’s most prominent school strikers, Holly Gillibrand, will be taking part, after staging a weekly action outside her school in Fort William, in the Scottish Highlands. Asked whether she feels optimistic about the potential of Friday’s protest, Holly replied: “I wouldn’t say optimistic is quite the right word. It shows there are thousands of students out there who care very deeply about the environment and are willing to miss school to demand that politicians take this ecological crisis seriously.”

Méabh Mackenzie is organising a protest with about 30 fellow pupils from Daliburgh primary school on the island of South Uist, with the express purpose of standing in solidarity with other threatened island communities across the globe.

The 11-year-old explained: “I just wanted to share what I believe in. Uist is really low lying and I really love the place and don’t want it to disappear. I think all the striking around the world will let politicians and lawmakers know that they have to do something because it is falling down the list of priorities. They are arguing about things like Brexit but we need them to act now on climate change because in 12 years we can’t turn anything back.”

During the last hundred years or more, irreversible damage has been done to the natural environment by human action than in any previous period in recorded history. Rarely a day goes by when our attention is not drawn to the various issues of environmental degradation and how the increase in human activity is impacting on large areas of the natural environment globally. There’s a lot of proposals in the pipeline, but when stripped of their jargon, in practice it means that capitalism has to go green. This shows a lack of understanding of the workings of capitalism. No sensible person is going to deny that the sooner we work with nature, rather than against it, the better. By increasing our understanding of the interaction between the natural environment and the impact of human activity, society will be in a better position to minimise the damage on natural resources, and be able to arrive at rational judgements on whether or not any interference in the natural environment is justified and warranted.

But capitalism is not a rational system when you consider that the capitalist class have their own agenda which is totally blind to the creation of a common interest. The only interest the capitalist class have is to obtain profits through the quickest and easiest way possible so that the accumulation of capital continues. A fundamental contradiction of capitalism is that although the capitalist has a common interest — as a class — to cooperate to keep the system going, by necessity they also have to compete within the market. If they don’t compete, they go under or are at best taken over by other capitalists. This built-in rivalry between the sections of the capitalist class always results in casualties in some form or another. It is these conditions of competition which make it extremely difficult to reach any regulatory agreement which can have a global application. But not impossible. When it has been in the common capitalist interest to facilitate an expansion in the global market capitalist governments have drawn up international agreements, for example on postal services, maritime law, air traffic control, scientific research at the poles, etc. These agreements are generally abided by, specifically because they do not reduce the rate of profit. It’s when any such proposals come into conflict with the rate of profit that the competitive self-interest of the various national sections of the capitalist class becomes focused on the problems of winners and losers appears. This is usually announced in the media as, “There was a failure to reach an agreement over who is to pay the bill”.

If market forces essentially cause and create environmental damage by literally encouraging an irrational human impact, how can you realistically expect those self-same forces to solve it? This conundrum will almost certainly intensify. When confronted by barriers of environmental legislation which are designed to diminish the rate of expected profits and the accumulation of capital, the capitalists will do what they have always done in their search for short-term profits: finding or creating loopholes, moving the goalposts, corrupting officials, trying to bribe the local population with empty promises, or shifting the whole concern to an area or region where a more favourable reception is expected and profits maintained. The simple fact is that businesses will not take the risk of falling behind in the struggle for profits and nor will any government enforce policy that will result in a drop in the profits of its respective capitalist class. Capitalist businesses survive by forcing out their competition, by cutting costs and sidestepping policies that hinder their expansion. They seek new outlets for their wares, to sell more and more, because this is the law of capitalism, and it is a law antagonistic to ecological concerns. It is the crazed law of capitalism that compels the big oil producers to pay teams of scientists to prepare reports that refute the findings of environmentalists who forewarn of the dire effects of current production methods.

The market economy demands that businesses only take into account their own narrow financial interests. Pleasing shareholders takes far more priority than ecological considerations. The upshot is that productive processes are distorted by this drive to make and accumulate profits. The result is an economic system governed by anarchic market forces which compel decision-makers, whatever their personal views or sentiments, to plunder, pollute and waste. They may well be loath to contaminate ecosystems, but the alternative is closure should they invest in costlier eco-friendlier production methods. Little wonder then that nature’s balances are upset today, and that we face problems such as melting glaciers, rising sea levels and the like due to global warming from carbon emissions.

Once the Earth’s natural and industrial resources have been wrested from the master class and become the common heritage of all humanity, then production can be geared to meeting needs in an ecologically acceptable way, instead of making profits without consideration for the environment. This the only basis on which we can meet our needs whilst respecting the laws of nature and to at last begin to reverse the degradation of the environment caused by the profit system. The only effective strategy for achieving a free and democratic society and, moreover, one that is in harmony with nature, is to build up a movement which has the achievement of such a society as its objective.