I first published this blog in April 2023 but I’ve done some further editing and revision since then, the last two paragraphs are new.

One compensation for spending a night in A&E on Monday was that I had time to read Chris Williamson’s Book Ten Years Hard Labour https://www.waterstones.com/book/ten-years-hard-labour/chris-williamson/9783944203485 Thanks to all comrades who sent me their best wishes while I was there 😊 It’s a complete coincidence that the title I chose for this blog, which I started writing about 3 weeks ago, is also the title of one chapter in the book. But it’s not really surprising as Chris and I have always tended to think very much alike.

We know who the the traitors are, they’ve been rewarded for their treachery with a seat in the House of Lords or have been re-admitted to the Labour Party after standing for another party. Luke Achehurts (I refuse to spell his name properly) is a paid employee of the Israeli government who’s finally managed to weasel his way onto the NEC, and it’s becoming increasingly evident that Keir Starmer takes his introductions from the Board of Deputies and is well rewarded for doing so. Starmer may be leader of the Labour Party de jure but the de facto leader is Marie van der Zyl!

I want to focus for now on the cowards in the Socialist Campaign Group. They’re fighting a lost cause if they think they can turn the party around with so little support, they need to stand up for their principles instead of backing down whenever Starmer dictates. They’re not working for socialism within the Labour Party, that boat has sailed, they’re muting their activity to preserve their own careers!

Diane Abbott is probably the most the most honest, as a Labour MP she couldn’t support Jeremy Corbyn if he stands as an independent in Islington North but says he’ld probably win. Now that she’s been suspended for a badly worded letter in The Observer she’s free to follow her conscience and perhaps stand as an independent herself in the next General Election. Her apology illustrates what Chris and I were saying when we were still members of the Labour Party and Chris was an MP – there have been too many apologies and you can’t appease someone who refuses to be appeased. Every concession made is seen as I sign of weakness and they always demand more. Chris is quite correct in saying that Jeremy is as guilty as any of them for his own downfall – he sacrificed his best supporters to appease his critics!

John McDonnell is wishy-washy and Barry Gardiner has said that he objects to Jeremy being blocked from standing as a Labour candidate AND to his standing as an independent! These people can’t accept that the Party’s over! The best thing the Socialist Campaign Group could do would be to resign from the Labour Party and sit as independents until the next election, by which time we may have formed a socialist coalition capable of challenging the major parties.

I believe that Labour will win the next General Election by default, just by waiting for a scandal-ridden Tory Party to hand it to them on a plate. It shouldn’t be like this, democracy should give us a real choice. We can’t vote for socialism if it’s not on the menu so we have to work that much harder outside parliament. To give the Socialist Campaign Group their due, they do join picket lines and rallies in defiance of Starmer’s objections, but they’re only too ready to lay down their arms at Starmer’s orders.

Starmer’s latest is to defund Young Labour and suspend their Twitter account because:

The account has recently become actively detrimental to the Party’s core objectives: to promote Labour candidates and policies, and to win elections.

I doubt if many young people joined the party merely to promote candidates and policies without having a say in selecting candidates or deciding policies!

It’s disappointing to see so many socialists, including union leaders, holding the view that we need to vote Labour to get the Tories out then hold the account afterwards. Unions should be disaffiliating from Starmer’s “Labour Party”, which has shown that it’s not on their side, expelling socialists on the slightest pretext and banning front bench MPs from joining picket lines. I resigned from Unite Community because of Sharon Grahams support for Labour and now Mick Lynch of the RMT is going the same way although, he thinks we should vote Labour unless we live in Islington North. RMT Assistant General Secretary Eddie Dempsey takes a different view, he won’t be voting Labour – it’s #NoCeasefireNoVote in his household.

The time to put pressure on “Labour” is before the election, not after, and we can’t trust Starmer to keep his word once he’s elected. We won’t get real change unless we change the way we vote, and there are plenty of other candidates to choose from in each constituency. There’s no party large enough to form a government, but we can take enough seats to form a broad coalition which will form a real opposition to whichever party is in power. And there’s a chance that Starmer could lose his own seat of Holborn and St Pancras to Andrew Feinstein.