To be or not to be?

Gordon Mackay

Now that Tony Blair has finally announced the ultimate timescale, but not yet the timetable, for his departure from Downing Street, the question that arises for the Labour left is whether or not to contest the vacancy for the Party leadership.

There are currently three mediums of thought on how the left should progress the issue of the leadership election when Blair ultimately stands down.

The first theory is that the left should not contest the leadership election at all. There is a belief that Gordon Brown has the leadership election sewn up and that the left would be better to try and reach an accommodation with Brown rather than challenge him simply to lose. There are two subsidiary threads to this argument which, according to those who propound it, give it more strength.

The first is that Gordon Brown would welcome the chance to take on and administer a heavy defeat to the left. This would allow Brown, so the story goes, to evidence that he is going to continue the New Labour project and show the electorate that the left is now simply an historical anachronism at the outer fringes of the Labour Party that no longer has any influence.

The second scenario is almost the obverse of the first. It is that the left should throw its weight behind Brown in the event that a Blairite such as John Reid challenges him for the leadership. Brown would then have to show at least a degree of gratitude with a few policy initiatives and possibly a Cabinet seat for a genuine voice of the left.
The next theory is that the left should put up a candidate, but only if a number of conditions are met. The candidate would have to be certain of attracting the forty-four nominations from Labour MPs to get on the ballot paper, they would have to have the support of at least one of the large trade unions and they would have to be convinced that they could achieve a certain proportion of the electoral college vote, with 15% being the absolute minimum required. This figure is probably based on the fact that the 10% achieved by Bryan Gould in the 1992 leadership election when he stood against John Smith was seen as a humiliation for Gould.

Those on the left who are arguing for this position see the campaign lasting only for the length of time between Blair announcing his departure and the election of a new leader, probably eight to nine weeks. In the event that all of the above criteria are achieved then the campaign would be about showing that the left are still alive and retain a level of influence. If the above three criteria could not be met, then this group would probably move to the position of not contesting the election at all, on the basis that it is more important not to be seen to do badly rather than taking the chance of doing well.

The third theory is that it is absolutely essential that the left put up a candidate come what may. There are a number of reasons for this but they include such ones as it is simply wrong to allow the leadership of the Party to be handed over from one individual to another without an election process. Secondly, a leadership election allows the Party and its members to reinvigorate itself by having a genuine debate on principles and policies. Next, by not challenging Brown the left in the eyes of the public ties itself inextricably to his pronouncements and voting record on nuclear weapons, health privatisation and Iraq to name but a few. Unlike when it voted for Blair in 1994, the Party know how Gordon Brown acts when in government. At the 2005 general election a significant number of socialist MPs won or held onto their parliamentary seats, against the national swing, by being known to have opposed Blair. In 2009 or 2010 it is going to be extremely difficult, if they have not challenged Brown, for those self same MPs to say "nothing to do with me guv" if Brown continues in the path that he has trodden over the last nine years.

The main reason why the left believe the leadership election should be contested is that it presents an opportunity to reclaim the Party for its members. The leadership campaign should not be an eight or nine week phenomena based on who wins and who loses. It should be a twelve month celebration of socialist values. It should be twelve months of politicians getting out of Westminster and Holyrood and speaking direct to the citizens of this country. Twelve months of arguing for a National Health Service to benefit all the people at the time of need, not one in hock to American multinationals. Twelve months arguing for a free and fair education system for all of our children, not a university system based on income and a school system based on streaming. Twelve months of arguing for a foreign policy based on ethical values and hope, not one based on nuclear weapons and fear.

It should be twelve months of recruiting people into the Labour Party who believe that this country can be a better place for us, our children and our parents, and bringing back to the Party those that left to join other parties, or no party, over disillusionment with New Labour, Iraq, or the public services.

It must be about twelve months of going out to workplaces and speaking to trade unionists and not only convincing them that they should not be supporting Gordon Brown, one of the main architects of the New Labour project, but should be actively supporting a candidate who wants to keep public services public, who supports a regeneration of the economy and who wants to put the trade union movement back at the heart of a partnership with Labour.
For these reasons the Scottish Campaign for Socialism fully supports the campaign of John McDonnell for the Labour Party leadership. Labour MPs have had twelve years to challenge Tony Blair but no one chose to do so. John McDonnell has now said "no more." The Scottish Campaign for Socialism see John McDonnell as the person who by his words, but more importantly by his voting record, as the individual most likely to re-energise not only current Party members but to bring people back into the Labour fold.

We have up to six months to go out and recruit genuine Labour supporters back into our movement in order for them to have a say in the election of the Labour Party leader, it is time enough. It's time to give the Labour Party back to its members and to give the Labour Party an opportunity once more to serve our country.