A big loss to the labour movement

YEARS AGO, when the right-wing ruled the roost throughout the labour movement, complacency, opportunism and class-collaboration were the order of the day. Faction leaders spent their time advancing their own careers, and those of their followers, and did their best to marginalise or isolate any move from the grass-roots that threatened to rock the boat.

 The days when it could be said that all full-time officers are useless but some are more useless than others has now long gone. This was largely due to the efforts of rank-and-file movements to build militant unions with fighting leaders at the helm.  Arthur Scargill was one of them. Bob Crow was another.

Bob Crow, the general secretary of the Rail, Maritime and Transport union (RMT) was cut down by a fatal heart attack on Tuesday. He was just 52.  A few weeks ago he was on the picket lines defending London Underground workers jobs in a two-day strike that shut down most of the network and forced management back to the negotiating table. Now his members, and millions more in the wider movement, are mourning the loss of an outstanding trade union leader.

Bob Crow came from the East End of London and left school at 16 to join the P-Way teams that maintain and clear the tracks and cuttings on London Underground. He came from a communist family and he followed their footsteps into the old Communist Party and a life of militant work within the National Union of Railwaymen (NUR), the core of what has become the RMT. This was the path that led him to his historic election to the fore of RMT in 2002.

The unions are full of “former communists” who used the movement to help them climb up the greasy pole and then dump it when it was no longer any further use to their careers. Crow, on the other hand, left the Communist Party of Britain in 1995 to join Scargill’s Socialist Labour Party.

He later went his own way to found the No2EU platform to stand in the European elections with RMT support. But Crow never abandoned his core beliefs which he called “communist-socialist” and this was evident in the causes he supported which went far beyond the confines of the transport industry.

Bob Crow was, first and foremost, a union leader who ably deployed his union’s industrial strength in dealing with the railway companies and London Underground. The RMT defended and improved the pay and conditions of its members across the board and membership soared under his stewardship, making it one of Britain's fastest growing trade unions.

Passengers on London Underground also benefitted from the improvement of safety throughout the system fought for and won by the RMT under his leadership.

But he will also be remembered for his campaigning work in the broader movement in support of Cuba, Venezuela and the Palestinian people. He was on the streets helping the campaign to kick the fascist BNP out of Dagenham. He was a strident opponent of the European Union and a constant thorn in the flesh of the Labour leaders whom he derided for their constant sell-outs and betrayals.

Crow was frank, honest and open to everyone he worked with. He believed in what he was doing and he was afraid of nothing. He led by example and always worked for the unity of the class in all the struggles against the ruling class that he despised.

Now the time has come to take up the banner Bob Crow upheld throughout his life to advance the working class, trade union rights and the struggle for socialism in Britain.

WFTU MESSAGE OF CONDOLENCES ON THE LOSS OF COMRADE BOB CROW, GENERAL SECRETARY OF RMT

It’s with great sadness that the World Federation of Trade Unions received the shocking news that our comrade Bob Crow, General Secretary of the National Union of Rail, Maritime and Transport Workers (RMT) had passed away earlier today, at the early age of 52.

Comrade Bob Crow was born in 1961 and was a life long fighter, being active in the trade union movement for more than 30 years. In 2002 he was elected General Secretary of the RMT in the UK. During his life he has participated in and led several important union struggles, fighting for the rights and the interests of the working class, gaining the genuine respect and support of his colleagues and comrades. He was also an active militant of the class oriented trade union movement on national and international level.

Bob Crow’s demise is a great loss for the World Federation of Trade Unions (WFTU) and the international class oriented trade union movement.

The WFTU wishes to express its full solidarity with his union, the National Union of Rail, Maritime and Transport Workers (RMT), a WFTU affiliate, and its sincere condolences to his family, colleagues and friends. In honor of his memory, the WFTU promises to continue and strengthen our common struggles with the RMT.

The Secretariat
 Athens
 March 11th 2014

Nepali communists combat opportunism

 By Theo Russell

Theo Russell and Peter Tobin

THE COMMUNIST Party of Nepal-Maoist, which broke with the revisionist leadership of the Communist Party of Nepal (Maoist) in 2013, has emerged greatly strengthened after a successful mass boycott of imperialist-backed elections last November, Peter Tobin, a freelance journalist and sympathiser with the CPN-M, told a New Worker discussion meeting in London last week.

Tobin gave an eye-witness report on the complex situation in Nepal after spending six months there, during which a warrant was issued for his arrest for interfering in the election process after he spoke at a CPN-M election boycott rally. He began by explaining the background to current developments.

“In June last year a formal break took place after the leaders of the Unified Communist Party of Nepal (Maoist), [the name the Communist Party of Nepal (Maoist) adopted in 2008 after merging with smaller parties]     – so-called ‘Supreme Leader’ Prachanda and Baburam Bhattarai – agreed to a United Nations-backed settlement that saw and the People’s Liberation Army disarmed and disbanded, and the gains of a 10-year people’s war squandered.

“A new party, the CPN-M, emerged led by Mohan Baidya (alias Kiran), a veteran of the People's War and briefly vice-president of Nepal in the first Prachanda-led government. Prachanda’s wing continued to call itself the Unified Communist Party of Nepal (Maoist).

“The CPN-M has acquired the nickname ‘Dashists’, while Prachanda’s party is popularly known as the ‘Cashists’ due to their penchant for corruption and bribe-taking.

“Baidya told the CPN-M’s founding conference, which was attended by delegates from the Communist Party of China and the Workers Party of Korea, that ‘we will make a new constitution on the streets’. A strategy was adopted to launch a people’s revolution, based on a people’s war, and to rebuild the Red bases and the People’s Liberation Army.

“The CPN-M leadership have declared they will restore collective leadership and democratic centralism.

“The CPN-M also leads the 33-Party Alliance made up of smaller communist and ethnic minority parties which emerged after the announcement of new elections in 2013, and talks over the CPN-M merging with some of the smaller parties in the alliance are currently taking place,” Tobin said.

“The elections were an object lesson in ‘managed’ polls with the deployment of 74,000 international observers, 62,000 troops, 24,000 police, and 44,000 temporary police. A staggering 36 billion Nepali rupees was spent (compared to three billion for the 2008 election), much of which was siphoned off in a jamboree for thousands of observers and NGO [non-governmental organisations] staff.

“But despite claims by government and the international observer brigade that the election was a triumph with a 70 per cent turnout, the electorate was five million fewer than in 2008, and five million voters had somehow ‘disappeared’.

“The election turned into a humiliation for Prachanda, and in my estimate the boycott was supported by 50 per cent of voters and in some villages 100 per cent. The CPN-M, despite having a huge range of forces opposed to it, emerged from the election considerably strengthened.

“A 10-day strike called by the CPN-M was solid across the country with the exception of Kathmandu where it faltered after three days, and Prachanda was forced to campaign by helicopter due to protests and roadblocks.

“Despite standing in two constituencies as a safeguard, Prachanda lost his existing seat in Kathmandu to the great delight of the boycott supporters, and his party fell from first to third place nationally.”

The discussion looked at the background to Prachanda’s betrayal and Tobin recalled:  “During the people’s war, in 2005, Prachanda succeeded in pushing through a commitment for the CPN(M) to adopt the goal of ‘multi-party democracy’, arguing this would pave the way to gain access to the cities.”

Tobin said that events in Nepal had major implications for the rest of South Asia and many other developing countries, and called for the Left in Britain to follow events there more closely.

A Shining Star of Korea

By New Worker correspondent

Andy Brooks,Hyong Hak Bong and Dermot Hudson

LAST weekend Koreans marked the 72^nd anniversary of dear leader Kim Jong Il, who steered the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea through the difficult times that followed the death of great leader Kim Il Sung in 1994. Democratic Korean leader Kim Jong Un headed the solemn tribute at the mausoleum dedicated to the two great leaders of the Workers Party of Korea in Pyongyang while other ceremonies were taking place throughout the country.

 Kim Jong Il devoted his entire life to serving the Korean people.in the cause of building a human-centred society, a cause which is espoused by the democratic and anti-imperialist forces the world over.

Following Kim Il Sung’s footsteps, Kim Jong Il led the Workers Party of Korea into the 21^st century to build a strong and prosperous democratic republic. Kim Jong Il was a leading Marxist thinker who made an important contribution to the modern communist theory as well as an astute statesman who led the Korean people through thick and thin to overcome natural disasters, the imperialist blockade and diplomatic isolation.

While ensuring the DPRK’s defence against the threats and provocations of US imperialism and its lackeys, Kim Jong Il worked tirelessly to ease tension on the Korean peninsula to pave the way towards the peaceful reunification of Korea.

In Democratic Korea Kim Jong Il’s birthday has long been known as the Day of the Shining Star. This year it is being celebrated at a time when the Korean people are racing ahead at a new fast speed of socialist construction, upholding the slogan put forward by the new young leader, Kim Jong Un:  "Let us raise a fierce wind of making a fresh leap forward on all fronts of building a thriving country filled with confidence in victory!"

Across the world overseas Koreans, progressives and communists held their own events in honour of Kim Jong Il, who was born on 16^th February 1942 and died at his post on 17^th December 2011.

British and Korean women get together

And in London comrades gathered at the DPRK’s London embassy to join the Korean people to honour the achievements of Kim Jong Il by laying floral tributes in front of the portraits of the great leaders Kim Il Sung and Kim Jong Il and meeting all the other friends of the Korean revolution.

 Andy Brooks, the chair of the Friends of Korea committee that had helped organise the reception, welcomed everyone to the event that had brought together so many of those actively involved in solidarity with Democratic Korea in London and the south-east.

In his opening the New Communist Party leader said Kim Jong Il had made an immense contribution to the arts as well as the theory and practice of the world communist movement. This was followed by a speech by DPRK Ambassador Hyong Hak Bong on the life and times of Kim Jong Il.

Dermot Hudson from the Korean Friendship Association talked about the meaning of Juché and Songun politics, then Michael Chant, the secretary of Friends of Korea and leader of the RCPB (ML) and Kath Cremer from the CPGB (ML) both spoke about the central role of the Korean revolution in the national liberation and world communist movement.

Finally Andy Brooks proposed a toast to the memory of the dear Korean leader to close the formal part of the proceedings and open the informal discussion that always flows between friends old and new at the bar and buffet.

Tube strike success

by Daphne Liddle

TRANSPORT unions RMT and TSSA last Tuesday suspended planned strike action by London Underground (LU) workers just a few hours before a second 48-hour Tube strike was about to begin.

The first strike worked; it force LU management to suspend drastic changes that would cut nearly 1,000 jobs and close all ticket offices to allow for a negotiation process with the unions at Acas (the advisory, conciliation and arbitration service).

The proposed changes have not been defeated but forcing the management, backed by London Mayor Boris Johnson, to delay the changes to allow the negotiations to take place is a significant victory for the unions.

It is a total rebuttal of Johnson’s high-handed approach and leaves him humiliated after his constant refusal to meet and talk with the unions.

Labour north London MP Emily Thornberry challenged the Mayor on the BBC’s Sunday Politics London show, saying: “How mad is it that you haven’t spoken to [Bob Crow] for five years? He has to call you up on LBC to talk to you. It’s not right.

“It’s nonsense why the leader of London is not talking to the leader of the Underground union.

“It’s just the most ridiculous bit of willy-waving I’ve seen. It’s just macho nonsense not to talk to the leader of the union.”

The result of the negotiations at Acas will probably be a compromise but it is a lot better than just giving into change by diktat.

RMT General Secretary Bob Crow said: “After two days of intensive and detailed discussions through the offices of Acas we have now received proposals that halt the implementation of the job cuts set out in the HR1 document which gives us the opportunity to discuss all of the issues away from the pressure cooker.

“We now have a golden opportunity to look again in detail at all of the concerns we have raised about the impact of the cuts on our members and the services that they provide to Londoners. That is exactly what we have been calling for throughout this dispute.

“RMT is happy to discuss any issues with LU through the machinery of negotiation and we are glad that we have now got back to where we should have been right at the start of this process.

“It is unfortunate that we were forced and provoked into a dispute that we never wanted and we are now in a position to move on with the clear understanding that our action is suspended but if there is any further attempt to impose change from above the action will go back on.”

A statement from Acas read: “We welcome the news that the proposed industrial action has been withdrawn. Thanks all involved for their hard work/commitment over intensive talks with us.”

TSSA posted on Twitter: “We’ve suspended Tube strike as have agreed a process where all our serious concerns over safety and job losses can be addressed. Pleased that agreement on process lets us suspend strike immediately and cancel it later when agreement reaches us formally.”

In a letter to RMT members Bob Crow said that:

• LU had agreed a station- by-station review of ticket office closures, which could mean that some will stay open;
• LU will not implement its proposals until further consultations are held on 4th April;
• During the discussion period, LU will put on hold all voluntary severance applications received.

He said the negotiations would include a full equality impact assessment of the proposed changes.

Crow added: “This is what we were asking for all along and thanks to the support and solidarity you have shown, sense has finally prevailed. Nevertheless we remain firmly against these cuts which we will continue to resist in our discussions with management. I will be sure to keep members fully informed of any further developments.”

And he told reporters he had no regrets about the strike: “They weren’t taking us seriously until we called the strike action and we got more done over that period of time when the strike action took place,” he said. “I think having a two-day strike was absolutely crucial.”

One union official was arrested during the strike for calling a strike-breaker a scab. Mark Harding, the Branch Secretary of Hammersmith and City RMT was ordered to keep away from further strike action until the case is settled.

The union is calling for the charges to be dropped and accused the police of making the arrest in order to intimidate other strikers.

• Boris forced to back down -- New Worker editorial

The new European Communist Initiative

By New Worker correspondent 

Andy Brooks greets comrades

GREEK communists and their supporters met in north London on Sunday to hear a report by a leading member of the Communist Party of Greece (KKE) on the new European Communist Initiative and the ongoing struggle against reaction, opportunism and social-democracy at home and abroad.

            The meeting room at the AKEL Cypriot communist centre in north London was packed for the Sunday lunch-time meeting called by the British Branch of the KKE to mobilise their members in Britain to register at the Greek embassy and vote in the forthcoming local and European Union elections in May.

            Comrades were greeted by New Communist Party leader Andy Brooks who summarised the NCP’s role in the Initiative of the Communist and Workers’ Parties of Europe and the NCP’s consistent stand against the European Union. This was followed by a lengthy report from Kostas Papadakis, a member of the Central Committee of the KKE, on the current situation in Greece and the struggle against the bourgeois offensive throughout the EU.

Andy Brooks said that the NCP had opposed the European Union and the Treaty of Rome from the very beginning when the Party was founded in 1977 and that the Initiative was: “An important first step towards building a common front amongst the genuine communist forces of Europe to confront the ruling class offensive that is seeks to impose the entire burden of the slump on the backs of working people.

“The Initiative is also the first step in building a popular campaign to challenge the myth of the ‘super-state’ that Franco-German imperialism and its supporters within the British ruling class spread to popularise the anti-people and dictatorial policies of the European Union and build the progressive platform needed to launch the fight in all members states for the break-up of the EU.”

This was followed by a far-ranging KKE briefing that began with an analysis of the Greek political scene and the bogus choices offered by the mainstream conservative New Democracy party, the old and new social-democracy of PASOK and Syriza, and the fascist Golden Dawn. They all “trade in fear and dead-end hopes” while  “the consequences of the capitalist economic crisis and the anti-people measures of the government-EU-IMF are becoming more and more tangible, unbearable, even more suffocating for the workers, unemployed, the poor farmers, the youth and the women from the popular strata,”  Kostas Papadakis said.

But there was a way out of the crisis and that way was by mobilising and decisively strengthening the KKE, Kostas declared.

“The workers, the youth, the toiling self-employed, the poor farmers, must help so that a dynamic labour-people’s opposition can be immediately revived in order to contribute to the struggle, in order to halt the anti-people offensive, the successive anti-people measures, in order to pave the way for the only path that can ensure the satisfaction of the people’s needs.

“And this can begin to happen with the participation in the battle of the EU parliamentary elections and the municipal elections, decisively voting for the KKE and the lists of the ‘People’s Rally’, which are supported nationwide by the party.

“The strengthening of the KKE is a guarantee for the working class and people’s interests. The KKE struggles, focused on the major and sharpening problems, for the regroupment of the labour-people’s movement, the People’s Alliance, in order to pave the way for an economy for the benefit of the people, with their own power.”

            The Greek communist condemned those pseudo-communists who revolve around the European Left Party and those like them who talk about winning office and reforming the EU.

“The way out is not to be found in ‘“Left governments’ on the terrain of capitalism” Kostas said.  “As the experience from the participation of communist parties in governments of EU member states shows, like the example of Cyprus, with the participation of AKEL in the government. This experience is in our assessment characteristic of the utopian view that the crisis can be halted or that there can be a pro-people management in the framework of capitalism. The same is true of Brazil where the Communist Party of Brazil participates in the government and manages capitalism with the people protesting in the streets.

“There is no room for the rationale of the ‘lesser evil’ which some people consider a possible Syriza government to be. Whatever evil, more or lesser, is now unbearable for the impoverished and lives of the workers deprived of rights.”

Meanwhile the Communist Initiative provides the basis to build a people’s movement in Europe against war, imperialism and capitalism.

Outlining the socialist alternative Kostas said the KKE programme was realistic and above all in the interests of the people and the service of the workers. “We have the power to overturn the situation today,” he declared. “With a strong KKE there is hope – there is a prospect.”

• Kostas Papadakis -- full text of speech

Sinn Féin calls for support for Haass proposals

By Theo Russell

SINN FÉIN MP Conor Murphy spoke to supporters in London last week at a public meeting in Westminster on the end of the Haass all-party talks, aimed at resolving challenging issues on flags and emblems, Orange parades, and dealing with the legacy of the past without any deal being reached.

He said last year had seen violent protests and intimidation by: “A small rump of unionism opposed to equality, sectarian marches, attacks on churches, homes and elected politicians” and he condemned “The failure, and in some cases complicity, of unionist leaders during all of this.”

There are 3,000 parades in the north every year but only a handful, in or near Belfast and Derry, cause problems and negotiations between communities in Derry have been successful.

Murphy said the two main unionist parties, afraid of alienating supporters with elections due in May, had refused to condemn the Loyalist outfits and effectively pulled the plug on the Haass talks using filibuster tactics.

“Both parties are openly consulting the views of these Loyalist groups, including people charged for disorder and violence. The Ulster Unionist Party no longer wants to discuss the issues, while the Democratic Unionist Party is trying to start a whole new process.” This would negate a year’s work including contributions from 600 community organisations.

Meanwhile Britain’s coalition government, which has done little in the north of Ireland apart from alienating a variety of groups while imposing savage austerity cuts, has failed to back the Haass proposals beyond a meek announcement that they “have merit”.

Murphy said: “Of course all of our communities in Ireland – just as in Britain – are facing the destructive impact of right-wing austerity policies, but we reject the farcical suggestion that the costs of implementation of the proposals should come out of the block grant to the north, which has already been cut by the coalition government.” 

But of greater concern to progressives in Britain is the disgraceful failure of the Labour Party to come out in support of the Haass process. Many at the meeting voiced concern at this, and Murphy called for Labour and other parties to put pressure on the coalition government.

Murphy said the Irish government was behind the Haass proposals, “But has done little in recent years to press for full implementation of the Good Friday Agreement.”

He welcomed a statement from the main church leaders, and a rally in Belfast on 31st January organised by the Northern Ireland Congress of Trade Unions, supporting the Haass process.

On the positive side, Murphy pointed out: “Instead of walking away from the process, Richard Haass issued a strong statement saying the proposals should be implemented,” while Gerry Adams has also said that despite widespread disappointment there was still a "basis for a deal".