Party mention in today’s Guardian…
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Guardian Letters – 13th August
‘Mistaken identity could make folk Spew’
“I wish your front page story (11 August) had not referred to “the Socialist party” without qualification. As a sidebar clarifies, former Militant is “Socialist Party of England and Wales” (Spew!). There also exists the Socialist Party of Great Britain (SPGB) which is not Trotskyist – in fact it existed before the Soviet Union, which it always opposed. I am a member of neither but feel sorry for anyone in the SPGB if folk muddled them up with Spew.”
Bob Allaway London”
Thanks for making the Media Committee aware of this letter. It was good that it came apparently from a member of the public with no axe to grind.I don't suppose anything will come of it, but we submitted a follow-up letter. This is appended below, with a PS offering an interview with the SPGB. We also sent this offer direct to the politics dept. of The Guardian. I expect we will try issuing a widespread media statement on Corbyn once they have got bored interviewing Peter Taaffe.One issue we have in the Media Committee is we don't have time to read every significant newspaper, magazine and news website (and one of us spends much time overseas anyway). We are planning a mailshot to Party members for volunteers ('Media Watch') to help with this. Any offers in the meantime would be welcome (including The Guardian).Rob Cox, SPGB Media CommitteeHere is the letter we sent:"Thanks to Bob Allaway for spotting (Letters 13 August) that your earlier front page story may have caused readers to confuse The Socialist Party (GB) with the Trotskyite ‘Socialist’ party (SPEW).At least you took the trouble to give their full name in a side bar. Better than BBC TV, who broadcast an interview with SPEW during the campaign for the May 2016 elections, with no explanation given of which “Socialist Party” was represented. As we were standing in areas of well over 1 million voters (and hold the right to stand as The Socialist Party), we of course complained.From their response, the BBC appears to expect that because an item is not directly related to an election, viewers will draw a distinction between the content of a political programme on that basis. We think it’s like expecting a casual viewer of ‘Crimewatch’ to observe the rules of a Juror after doing so. But maybe the BBC also thinks all their viewers read ‘The Guardian’?Yours sincerely…Media Dept, The Socialist Party of Great BritainPS Your editorial staff may wish to request an interview with the SPGB, to find out why no members of Britain’s second-oldest political Party will be seeking to ‘enter’ the Labour Party, and why we do not believe that either Jeremy Corbyn or any other ‘leader’ can deliver genuine change that can truly benefit the majority of people."
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