Revolution Festival (Socialist Appeal)
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Is there going to be an SPGB presence at this event?
This is the wing of the old Militant Tendency that stayed in the Labour Party after the other lot left and tried to steal our name and who are now appropriately known as SPEW. But they were prescribed by the Labour Party last year after Starmer revived the “bans and proscriptions” of a previous Labour Party era.
Might be interesting to go along to see what they are up to but not sure about paying to hear Trotsky regurgitated.
Judging by their paper sellers at demonstrations, they seemed to have attracted quite a few young people. I can’t think why. But as somebody once quipped, “left to themselves, students can’t develop beyond a Leninist consciousness.”
I found out about this through one of my daughters, who knows someone in this organisation. She was pleased to have found someone among her friends she can actually talk to about politics.
But – she knows his brand isn’t the real thing, and to my total surprise one day she started to ask me why people didn’t get the point about socialism. It was the first time she’d mentioned it and it turns out she’s fully convinced about it all, so some of my ramblings over the years have obviously rubbed off on her.
I certainly hope her generation manages to get it sorted.Somebody left a copy of “Socialist Appeal” at Head Office so I started to read it.
On page 2 under the heading “Who are we? and What are we fighting for?”, it says:
“The capitalist system is in a complete impasse. It cannot be reformed. It must be overthrown.”
Then follows a list of 18 proposed reforms to capitalism.
These people — Trotskyists — are just louder-mouthed than the common or garden reformists.
Trots know capitalism can’t be reformed. They keep telling workers to support reforms & vote for the Labour Party because they think workers will find out for themselves that it can’t be reformed, and so decide to help the vanguard party to take over the country.
What’s the deal with SPEW stealing our name, anyway?
The Electoral Commission says that if you’re creating a new political party, you’re not allowed to have the same name as another, or a name that is so similar to another party that it causes confusion between the two.
Adam will clarify it but the Electoral Commission will not let them register for elections under the name of the Socialist Party.
They run their candidates under the name Socialist Alternative.
We can’t stop what other groups seek to name themselves or what the media call them but we can legally protect our name for election purposes.
Our comrades in the Socialist Party of Canada face a similar problem with their name being hijacked.
Yes, that’s right.
Any party can call itself what it likes except on the ballot paper. The only name a party can use on the ballot paper is the name and its variants registered with the Electoral Commission.
We are registered as “The Socialist Party of Great Britain” with the variants:
The Socialist Party (GB)
The Socialist Party (SP-GB)
The Socialist Party GB (World Socialist Movement)Only we can use these on the ballot paper.
SPEW tried to register as the “Socialist Party” but were refused on the grounds that this was too near to that of an already registered party, ie, us.
They were therefore forced to register another name for use on the ballot paper which, as Alan says, is “Socialist Alternative”.
However, that does not prevent them or any one else calling themselves what they like even on their election leaflets. I am not sure if they have ever contested under their registered name as they generally stand as TUSC but on TUSC election leaflets they state that TUSC is supported by the Socialist Party.
They are legally free to do this and to call themselves “the Socialist Party”, one of the names by which we have been known, and called ourselves, since 1904.
They knew this when, in 1991, they changed their name from Militant Labour. So they are making a deliberate attempt to “steal our name”.
That explains this: http://search.electoralcommission.org.uk/English/Registrations/PP108
Thanks Alan & ALB for your very helpful information. 🙂
This might be an apt moment to draw attention to Glenn Morris’s upcoming talk on Zoom
What’s in a Name
February 24, 7:30 pmA look at how we see our politics in terms of the party names and perhaps how helpful, or otherwise, these names are. Also, how simple words tend to colour our view of each other both in this and other countries.
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