Keir Starmer has left about 70% of the landscape of historic western political and economic thought vacant to his left. It is unsurprising that a new party will arrive to claim the unoccupied ground.
A meeting at the weekend discussed a new party provisionally called The Collective, which may be led by Jeremy Corbyn, who addressed the meeting. That was strangely secretive but seems to have been an adjunct of Corbyn’s Peace and Justice Movement international conference, which occurred simultaneously and featured many of the same cast.
The Collective is not new. This name was used for a loose coalition of independent candidates in the last general election, although it did not register as a political party so the name was not on the ballot paper. I had expected it to join forces with the Workers Party for which I stood, which did not happen. I think a non-aggression pact was broadly observed, though I recall grumbles.
My general attitude is positive – I think a new left party is urgently needed as it sinks in to people just how right wing Starmer is. He is also becoming massively unpopular very quickly, while the Tories still are.
But I believe these practical points are important on the detail of what needs to be done on the left in the UK today.
1) Corbyn and Galloway must come together.
The Workers’ Party got 210,000 votes at the General Election, which is a good start that cannot be ignored, and is building a membership and organisational base.
I count both men as friends and I know they get on fine on a personal basis. Jeremy remains the leader who gained three million more general election votes in 2017 than Keir Starmer did in 2024. George Galloway has a large base of dedicated support.
The failure to come together as a united left in the 2024 general election was a historic opportunity lost. The blame for this did not lie with Galloway, who in January 2024 himself put a motion to the Workers Party conference enabling such merging. I did not discuss it direct with Jeremy, but I believe he thought his best chance of election was as an Independent.
My own belief is that a Corbyn-led party might have won several seats and this was a tactical mistake by Jeremy; whereas George needs to tone down his populist social conservatism, which alienated many around Jeremy, if the aim is for a united left.
The biggest mistake of all would be for the two parties to refuse to unite; which sadly is far from impossible. Initially any new party needs to be led by Jeremy to establish itself. George should be Deputy Leader. Neither man would wish to serve for an extended period.
I would like to see Andrew Feinstein eventually lead, not least because he most definitely would not want to do it.
2) The party must be anti-Zionist.
The destruction of Jeremy’s very real prospects of being Prime Minister by the utterly ludicrous, Establishment-organised slur of antisemitism cannot simply be ignored.
The truth is, I am very sorry to say, that as Labour leader Jeremy was far too willing to attempt to appease the Zionist lobby, by throwing people who would have walked through fire for him under the bus. Tony Greenstein, Jackie Walker, Ken Livingstone and Chris Williamson are among the scores of people who come to mind.
A great many of the expelled activists were Jewish.
A new party of the left should make plain that these anti-genocide activists are positively welcome, and celebrated.
3) The party must avoid cliquishness
If the new party is essentially Jeremy’s project, this is a problem. He does tend to surround himself with a very tight and unchanging group. If you will allow me a moment of delusion of grandeur, the fact that they held a conference on forming a new party of the left and did not bother to contact Craig Murray is an indicator they are not reaching out widely.
According to the report in the Canary, the Director of the new party will be Pamela Fitzpatrick, who is Director of Corbyn’s Peace and Justice Project, unelected to either position.
I exclude Ms Fitzzpatrick from this next, because I simply do not know in her case. But one irony, and the reason so many decent activists were stabbed in the back when Corbyn was leader, is that many of the close Corbyn clique are in fact Zionists.
They are “soft” Zionists, you know, the ones who want to treat the natives kindly, pat Palestinians on the head and build them cultural centres in their reservations. But Zionists they are. They support the continued existence of the terrorist entity in the Middle East.
The Peace and Justice Project has laudable aims and does advocacy and campaigning work worldwide, with a focus inter alia on South America, influenced by Jeremy’s impressive and underrated wife Laura. But I am obliged to say it is not the most transparent of organisations.
The Peace and Justice Project Ltd is a private company. I believe it has a very serious membership income but I am not entirely sure what it is. The published accounts tell you next to nothing, certainly not its income or membership figures.
There are a number of linked organisations – Progressive International is another – which appear to primarily exist to pay their staff to do stuff that other activists do for nothing, only with added layers of self-importance and entitlement.
Perhaps the paying bit is a good thing, and doubtless the abuse is much worse in the world of right-wing think tanks. But there is just something about it all that does not quite sit right with me, and makes me think it is not a good basis for a mass political party.
So, in short, a genuine new party of the left cannot just automatically get run by the bunch around Jeremy Corbyn, as appears to be the presumption.
4) The party must avoid British Unionism
I have always found it very strange that there are those who support Irish unification but oppose Scottish Independence. The current support of the UK state for the genocide in Gaza is just one example of its malevolence, which is a feature and not a glitch.
In Scotland the large majority of the left wing are pro-Independence; while the right, including the Starmerite right, are overwhelmingly Unionist. The space for a radical left unionist party is very small indeed.
The desire to break up the imperialist UK – whose continuing Imperial instincts have helped devastate Iraq, Afghanistan, Syria, Libya and Palestine in recent times – is a perfectly decent left-wing impulse.
The Alba Party in Scotland is already anti-NATO and anti-monarchy, among other left-wing markers.
Ideally, a new left party should simply leave Scotland (and perhaps Wales) alone. If it does wish to campaign in Scotland, it should take the line that Independence is for the Scottish people alone to decide, and support the unfettered right of the Scottish people to choose, at a minimum.
But any genuine left-wing party should wish to break up the rogue UK state.
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Why is independence judged good for Ireland and bad for Scotland? An interesting question. The answer seems to stem from Marx, for whom Irish nationalism was a means to undermine the aristocracy and hasten the socialist revolution in England. (Marx to Engels, 1869: “The English working class will never accomplish anything before it has got rid of Ireland. The lever must be applied in Ireland.”)
The more heavily industrialised Great Britain was a unit of class struggle, one and indivisible, with workers, not peasants, at the forefront. Specifically Scottish aspects did break through, such as the Scottish CWS and different expressions of the NHS and nationalised industries, but Britishness, if you could get it, was somehow preferable. More internationalist, modern, and progressive, less Balkan-like, feudal, and backward-looking. So how’s that worked out?
The Left clings to unionism partly out of innate conservatism but also because of the electoral arithmetic at Westminster. Scotland helps Labour to power; otherwise, it would have to work harder to persuade England of its merits. Ireland had rejected that all-in-it-together big British tent before Labour even existed. Labour’s Irish policy has been the outside looking in, albeit with diaspora interests to weigh; its Scottish policy feels much more personal.
Are Jon Lansman, Andrew Fisher and James Schneider still influential with Corbyn?
Lansman was a very shifty character who did enormous damage last time. Schneider and Fisher I don’t trust at all either.
We can safely assume that any new party that may serve as a potential threat to the status quo will be infiltrated by spooks and/or Israelis. Trust no-one, particularly disaffected refugees from the mainstream parties.
I bow to your presumably greater knowledge and understanding, but James Schneider doesn’t seem even the tiniest bit Zionist to me, judging from his every statement I’ve seen, including these:
https://x.com/schneiderhome/status/1717921325086343281
https://x.com/schneiderhome/status/1732795295090479451
https://x.com/schneiderhome/status/1782349393288409336
https://x.com/schneiderhome/status/1792940947753361643
I have always found him very impressive. What, objectively, do you have against him?
He is close friends with Integrity Initiative spooks Ben Judah & David Patrikarakos. Maybe that isn’t significant but when it mattered most he made it his business to try & legitimise the Labour AS ‘crisis’ (like Owen, Mehdi, Aaron, Ash etc, etc.)
‘No! That wasn’t the real James!!’ Ok…
There’s a detailed account of Schneider’s positions along with his response here, so you can judge for yourself:
https://www.unitynews.co/not-just-bad-advice/
and a later article by Bevin here:
https://electronicintifada.net/content/why-did-labours-left-leaders-buy-israels-lies/36876
Excellent links, thank you Jim Matthews.
First time I’ve come across some of those names and their KingRat nexus tied by their tails.
I always shied from the young guns that came from nowhere. Now we know they are oxbridge type DS next gen tyros. It’s very instructive to see many of the pieces and actors so expertly tied together.
Novara and Bastani and Ash with their supposed lefty baiting of their international ‘lefties’ i.e Bernie. Momentum always sat like that with me – too shiny, too slick, too good to be true … pied pipers is what it seemed like and now I can see why.
The Lecarre’ian inferences are interesting to note, of course the young Turks of the Circus are in constant reinvention , their covers grown, the journalistic careers etc not much surprise there. Interesting in a historical sense. I get some more understanding now when considering the likes of the Anti imperialists who hundred years ago chose to fight against their type and gave rise to the various oxbridge double agents – they of course now stand out as true Multipolarists, anti imperialists and peaceniks, that undoubtedly stopped the world progressing to nuclear Armageddon when their fellow Great Gamer Boys Own cadres aristo martial family scions were all Gung Ho about winning such a nuclear war!
They saw the Ziofascist/Nazi plans early enough to reject them. Constructively.
The destruction of the Stop the War and CND forces, anti apartheid and now Palestinian Justice – their dilution into the fake ‘Green’ and Woke agendas, funded by the Industrial Complexes and their pseudo scientific academia bullshitters capturing the nextgen young minds, like Hitler youths, is where we are now.
It is clear as daylight that the existential battle is right here, right now. It is against our establishment and the some narratives they have extended around the issue of the Human Condition of the Many for the continued benefit of their Few. The ‘useful idiots’ we see regularly here being actually hard core Narrative Enforcers. They Shine like radioactive watch faces.
New book has come out, it concerns reforming the UN not the UK, but since it´s by Richard Falk and von Sponeck, both highly invested in the Palestine cause, here the recommendation, I assume it´s in some public libraries:
Liberating the United Nations: Realism with Hope
by Richard Falk and Hans von Sponeck
Stanford University Press, 2024
https://sup.org/books/title/?id=36084
Given that the corporate billionaire-owned media and the semi-corporate Tory-run-and-controlled BBC have more-or-less total control of the narrative, Jeremy was always in a no-win situation. And then there were the 80% of Labour MPs working against him. And the Zionist propaganda outfits of course.
Jeremy is Jeremy, and he can’t be something different, and it’s precisely because he IS one of the few politicians with integrity and principles that he is so popular among people on the left. The fascists ‘transformed’ him into an antisemite (and much else besides), and upped their game and trebled down on their smear campaign after the 2017 general election. The only way forward for the left in my opinion is to show the millions who have been deceived and duped and manipulated and cheated by the so-called elite and their propaganda machine that they HAVE been deceived and duped and manipulated and cheated by the so-called elite and their propaganda machine, AND millions have died as a consequence. If we, on the left, don’t do it, no-one else will.
Jeremy was a gutless poltroon who sold his supporters down the river. He gave an abject display of capitulation so nauseating that he might as well have been the ultimate infiltrator.
Didn’t you notice?
No. Why deine left and right if you want to be inclusive?
Why the obcession with leaders and party politics?
Is it so hard to contemplate that public opinion on this that and the other could galvanise the 5 most important issues and act upon it, with randomly chosen people who are standing up for their constituencies, grouping around the top issues and developing policies with civil service guidance?
not that of self interested individuals or multinational agendas or warmongering Land grabbers such as the current Zionist regime in Palestine.
I’ve had enough of make shift wannabes and bickering self servers and career politics/titians who act up to a shitty electoral system, cheat, lie and betray the public….again and again and again.
We need one chamber to enact policy, we need representatives to be corruption proof and dedicated for 1 year, before we choose another random dedicated individual taking over said policies.
The House of Lords needs abolishing, the bbc needs breaking up and our security services need to be controlled.
Any media spreading agendas that divert from what the public via their randomly chosen reps decide, the policies of public opinion and need, will be fined heavily and curtailed.
Free speech should not determine change of policies unless it comes from the bottom up and represents a public need, for example a sustainable future and an educated young generation that learns at school how to feed themselves and their communities.
Playgrounds are well adapted to be growing food to nourish schools and practise sports, not to develop for housing.
Our lives need changing, why girate between old trodden out models that have failed us all.
By all means call it the no more political parties movement
Nevermind the system that we have works because the legislative chamber and the executive chamber have different roles and responsibilities. The Commons creates laws it wants to enact and parliament votes on the drafts and redrafts of Green and White papers. The Lords then votes, based on compatibility with currently existing laws and legislation. Once a law is accepted in principle it has to be fine toothcombed to ensure it is compatible with existing laws and legislation. This is the work of cross-party committees, chaired and debated in detail until rigorous attention to wording is legally binding. Then the voting can go round again.
Once all this has been completed it all goes to the King and he then carefully checks that everything is as it should be. Privy Council meetings with the PM happen frequently. Finally the monarch signs new laws into being. All this is conducted with respectful formality to ensure no corners are cut. The people doing these tasks may be elected, appointed, delegated work placement volunteers, lords, ladies, and counsellors to the King, and they are just doing their jobs conscientiously.
We may not have a written constitution but we have a Constitutional Monarchy and much of the fabric of the nation is embodied in the roles they conduct themselves to fulfil. It works well. Abolishing hereditary lords from the committees in favour of party donors elevated with peerages doesn’t seem such a smart idea to lose the decades of experience in favour of greedy businessmen and women, but this has been voted through.
The biggest flaw in our democracy is the Party Whip. Representative Democracy should allow elected members to vote according to the priorities of their constituents, but it doesn’t. The PLP has too much control of the Labour Party. Blair and Mandelson still decide national priorities, and they key into international influencing agendas, including the Zionist agenda.
But our UK democracy is still better than most. Law Lords have to ensure the Law can be robustly challenged and still pass muster. Don’t knock it.
That is so well explained Alyson. I have always been mystified by how the whole system works and you have explained it at last. Thank you.
Come off it! Britain is a republic with a unicameral legislature and an executive president.
“Bagehot began his book by saying, in effect: do not be fooled by constitutional theories (the ‘paper description’) and formal institutional continuities (‘connected outward sameness’) – concentrate instead on the real centres of power and the practical working of the political system (‘living reality’). He dismissed the two theories of the division of powers (between legislature, executive and judiciary) and of ‘checks and balances’ (between the monarchical, aristocratic and democratic elements of the constitution) as ‘erroneous’.”
See Walter Bagehot
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_English_Constitution
“What was crucial, he insisted, was to understand the difference between the ‘dignified parts’ of the constitution and the ‘efficient parts’ (admitting that they were not ‘separable with microscopic accuracy’). The former ‘excite and preserve the reverence of the population’, the latter are ‘those by which it, in fact, works and rules’.
The lady doth protest too much, methinks.
I’m not saying the system isn’t being undermined and penetrated by powerful individuals, and its failure was proved by Boris proroguing Parliament. We are not taught how it ought to work and so no-one, not a single MP or Lord, protesteteth Boris usurping the Royal Prerogative in order to crash us out of Brexit without a Deal. In tiny paragraphs in the Times and Telegraph it was reported that She was angry, but it was a masterful piece of drama that Boris pulled off. He should have been sent to the Tower for that treason, but nobody knew or cared.
Liars and greedy sleaze buckets get bought and put into position to pursue an agenda which the electorate would not buy into if they were told the truth.
I, naively back then, actually thought the Queen might use Her prerogative to prorogue Parliament and put Corbyn in charge of Brexit, because the purpose is for when a Minority Government cannot get legislation voted through in Parliament, and Theresa May’s Deal wasn’t accepted.
And anyway what was Brexit really about? All those lies to take away matched funding for the poorest regions in Europe, which are even poorer now. The big red bus covered with lies about a better Health Service. Promises of a seamless transition – to what? Who is really better off than they were before Clegg gave away our democracy? Before Cameron gave us a referendum to take away our European freedom and we voted for it. A lot has happened since then.
Corbyn tells the truth and this is unacceptable to the powerful individuals who have power via their lobbies and influence groups.
The royal prerogative is the Prime Minister’s executive power. Dennis the constitutional peasant understood this better than you.
i should have explained that I am not a Royalist Alyson. Nor have I got this masochistic colonial gene in me that demands that you bend over and ask, ‘please can I have some more of your whip?’
This system does not work for people; anybody who overlooks the poverty and deprived communities is only counting their own pennies, a priviledged person.
To say that our environment, rivers and agriculture are in good health and sustainable is nothing but a big fat lie.
Nice story Alyson, but fiction aside we live the reality, and that is, that democracy is a scam set up by the establishment to protect the establishment and to give the plebs the illusion of having a say. From the Greeks, through Rome up to 1066, we have been and still are right royally screwed.
Stevie Boy
The purpose of the Establishment is to try and work out if the evil of a colonial empire can be hidden from the public eye thus protecting Britain’s fine, moral reputation.
Today, Britain should be championing the Palestinian people who are being genocided by our ally. The Establishment presents British policy as incurring Netanyahu’s wrath by pretending to comply with the ICC and ICJ.
The Establishment is a worm of hypocrisy, covering up the constitutional criminality of colonialism. Thatcher averted our attention from Britain’s colonial adventures in Europe by creating a bubble of Feminism. Then Multiculturalism. Now that has morphed into LGBT.
West Asia is low hanging fruit and you will never see a British Prime Minister turn away from low hanging fruit.
The hypocrisy must be air-brushed away by the processes Alyson describes.
Do we, Alyson? Can you show me this “Constitutional” Monarchy?
I do not believe this “Constitution” actually exists. It’s just that we have been told about this ghostly concept so many times…and the British are the creators and senior practitioners of the Big Lie technique, that so many accept it as such, and seemingly nobody ever takes pause to consider the actual logic behind a constitution unspecified.
Go back to first principles and ask “What is the purpose of a constitution”?
Then ask “Can this purpose be achieved by an ephemeral, uncodified concept?”
The answer is no, it cannot. Just as the world is ruined by means of a “Rules-based international order” in which there are no rules but the whim of the Hegemon, so Britain and its Empire are ruined by means of a “Constitutional Monarchy” in which there is no constitution but the whim of the Sovereign.
Corbyn? After his contemptible performance as partei leader? Not a chance.
“Partei” is German for “party,”. Is there a reason why you use that spelling?
Yes, it’s a satirical jibe at political organisations that talk democracy and act like fascists by participating in undemocratic franchises.
You could call him “Partei Fuehrer”. Perhaps there are those who do.
He was far from a fuhrer, which was why his tenure was worse than Ramsay MacDonald’s. I wrote him off after a few days and was proved right (not that I wanted to be).
Corbyn was much less of a fascist than Starmer.
Yes, he was inept, gutless and ruthless with his allies.
Just because Corbyn did not behave like a Dictator doesn’t mean he is not a good Leader. Corbyn prefers to persuade people, rather than force people. Starmer forces compliance. Being a strong Leader does not mean enforcing people. I don’t think there is anyone who showed more strength than Corbyn: strength has many facets – Corbyn stood strong against a barrage of lies and smears about him, every day, for years. Corbyn was treated appallingly.
I judge people on policies and in that respect Corbyn was excellent; also Corbyn showed tremendous strength of integrity and commitment.
There are bound to be one or two policies that people disagree on, however, the essential policies to improve our lives are agreed on. There is no point in falling into the lethal divide-and-rule, such as was caused by the Brexit/Remain Divide: people became very blinkered. I looked on in horror knowing that people were not giving a second thought to vital issues – such as the NHS, the cost of living, the exploitation, loss of rights, lack of truly affordable housing, corruption, etc. – they were just blinkered on Remain or Brexit. As a Remainer I have a long list of how my personal life was adversely affected by Brexit; however, in the sea of things, Brexit was only one issue – and I certainly wasn’t going to vote for Boris and horrendous other policies just because of Brexit/Remain. We were all sick to the teeth of the Brexit/Remain Debate, thus the ‘Get Brexit Done’ idea held some appeal, but voters could not see that in their wish to get Brexit done – they were all going to get done on numerous other policies.
No Politician is perfect, but people of the calibre of Corbyn, Galloway, Chris Williamson, et al., are as close as it gets. Starmer is authoritarian, but that does not make Starmer a good Leader. Anyone who knows anything about Starmer knows he totally deceitful, untrustworthy and self-serving.
No. Why define left and right if you want to be inclusive?
Why the obsession with leaders and party politics?
Is it so hard to contemplate that public opinion on this that and the other could galvanise the 5 most important issues and act upon them, with randomly chosen people who are standing up for their constituencies, grouping around the top issues and developing policies with civil service guidance?
Not that of self interested individuals or multinational agendas or warmongering Land grabbers such as the current Zionist regime in Palestine.
I’ve had enough of makeshift wannabes and bickering self-servers and career politics/titians who act up to a shitty electoral system, cheat, lie and betray the public … again and again and again.
We need one chamber to enact policy; we need representatives to be corruption proof and dedicated for 1 year, before we choose another random dedicated individual taking over said policies.
The House of Lords needs abolishing, the BBC needs breaking up, and our security services need to be controlled.
Any media spreading agendas that divert from what the public, via their randomly chosen reps, decide – the policies of public opinion and need, will be fined heavily and curtailed.
Free speech should not determine change of policies unless it comes from the bottom up and represents a public need: for example, a sustainable future and an educated young generation that learns at school how to feed themselves and their communities.
Playgrounds are well adapted to be growing food to nourish schools and practise sports, not to develop for housing.
Our lives need changing, why gyrate between old trodden-out models that have failed us all.
By all means call it the ‘no more political parties’ movement
How can a new left-wing party co-helmed by George Galloway avoid unionism? He is the unionist ne plus ultra. Has he recently changed his spots??
I’ll add, regarding the name: the obvious choice is Independent Labour Party. Historically, the ILP was the home for Labour MPs who were too lefty or too heterodox to belong in ‘regular’ Labour (James Maxton, for example, the subject of an excellent bio by Gordon Brown) and was founded by Keir Hardie himself.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Independent_Labour_Party
Not for nothing has the ILP been called the “conscience of the left” in Britain.
See also the Common Wealth Party and the elections it won against Con-Lab-Lib during WW2:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Common_Wealth_Party
No. He changed them months ago. As reported inter alia by the Daily Record. In emerging from under a rock, you can always use a search engine.
Forgive my ignorance on this matter. I don’t think it warranted such a rude response! Perhaps you don’t need or want my subscription fee any more (I had just resubscribed after seeing your ‘crisis’ note about the blog, and realizing I was one of the accounts that had lapsed). Please let me know.
For a coherent economic framework I recommend this wholeheartedly. The time of the live online viewing is however a tad inconvenient, October 3rd, at 2.00am British Summer Time…
The economics of Sustainability
https://events.humanitix.com/the-future-of-mmt
I set up the Companies for both OCISA [+ sister Company; Community Initiatives] and for Andrew Feinstein’s campaign : Holborn & St Pancras Community Action. I noted at the time that the standard Articles adopted by JC’s initiative were wholly inadequate. No idea who advised him.
Interesting article, thanks. There’s no mention of the Green Party. Do you think it’s worthwhile to try and form an alliance with them.?
Since I mentioned O´Casey´s death yesterday, here a little biography from Germany´s last genuine left daily, JUNGE WELT, which is on the blacklist of German FBI:
“Literary history
Playwright of the Revolution
On the occasion of the 60th anniversary of the death of the Irish socialist and writer Seán O’Casey
By Jenny Farrell”
https://www-jungewelt-de.translate.goog/artikel/484087.literaturgeschichte-dramatiker-der-revolution.html?_x_tr_sl=auto&_x_tr_tl=en&_x_tr_hl=de&_x_tr_pto=wapp
p.s. For some reason I couldn´t archive it. I still hope the link works for others. I does for me.
On the hatred and desire for escalation by the Starmer administration against RU – rumour says that SAS encountered Russian Special Forces at Gostomel Airport in Feb. 2022 and got beaten up. They since hold an immense grudge and are out for revenge.
This is why in Britain perhaps more than any other country anti-war needs to be the cornerstone of any new left opposition party. Without political pushback at home the only hope is that Russian patience with all this remains infinite; that they are willing to be permanently bullied by a country like Britain and people like Keir Starmer.
I might be inclined to believe it if they’d got the name right. If you mean Hostomel Airport, it was the elite Russian forces that had the shit kicked out of them. Their failure to capture the airport intact meant that 18 Il-76 transports bringing in vital reinforcements were unable to land and had to turn back.
Pears M
Quite right.
The Russians won….
The Russian goal was to capture the airport quickly and intact so it could be used to fly in reinforcements. They failed in this, Ukraine cratered the runway with artillery and aerial bombs rendering it unusable. As a result the plan to ‘decapitate’ Ukraine by taking the capital, a tactic Russia had used before, had to be abandoned. Hostomel is now firmly back in Ukrainian hands.
An odd sort of win.
They captured the airfield and held it for long enough to be relieved by ground forces. Claims about why they wanted it that come from the west (which routinely exaggerates Russian plans to claim success in thwarting them) are untrustworthy. You ought to know this.
Gostomel and Hostomel are just different transcriptions of the original Гостомель.
Did anyone have the misfortune of catching the BBC’s so-called ‘flagship’ political show, Question Time, last night? Nothing better illustrates the decline in the quality of political debate and democratic values than this lumpen mess. For starters, Fiona Bruce is completely out of her depth and unsuited to chairing the show. As for the programme, besides the now infamous Biilly Mitchell audience rigging scandal – why didn’t the SNP demand answers? – the audience more generally has shrunk in size to a highly vetted right-wing rump. And the show has been pushed back to a time slot where only political nerds would bother watching.
As to the few questions they actually get through, of course Starmer’s propensity for taking lavish gifts came up. Is anyone surprised that a PM who holds the socialist values of the party he leads in contempt, has revealed himself as a grubby freebie king after just 10 weeks in office, by allegedly taking over £106.000 in gifts? The signs were all there in opposition, for anyone paying attention. There is also outrage over Sue Gray’s salary: she’s his boss, what do people expect? Besides, if the rumours are true, she’s been with MI5 longer than him, thus she’s senior. This experiment with military intelligence running the country seems to be going badly, doesn’t it? With Cabinet Secretary, Simon Case – GCHQ’s former Director of Strategy – quitting due to a neurological condition, according to reports.
Cont…
There seems to be no clear demarcation between the world of ‘national security’ and civilian govt. Mark Sedwill was the previous Cabinet Secretary, before Case, he got the role after being National Security Adviser. Cabinet Secretary is arguably the most important cabinet position, as you’re at the centre of everything going on in govt. I’m not arguing the security folks shouldn’t have access to govt, but we need to get back to civilian control with clear separation. The same thing has happened in the MSM with things like the Integrity Initiative, you can’t serve two masters i.e. you can’t serve the security establishment and the public who entrust you to hold the security establishment accountable. The close relationship is pernicious and inconsistent with the transparency and openness democracy demands.
Will you acknowledge the media’s total silence on Britain’s outsized role in the Gaza Genocide? You appear a little suspicious otherwise.
For those unaware, Britain is a key player in the Gaza Genocide. Ha’aretz reported very early on that RAF Akotiri was the international hub for the slaughter, used not just by the British but by the US and by Israel itself.
Matt Kennard discussed all aspects of Britain’s role in the genocide (and the scrupulously silent complicity of the British media) on the latest Electronic Intifada live cast.
https://x.com/i/broadcasts/1RDGlyOEBOEJL
(Discussion of Britain’s role starts from the 1:05:00 mark).
Matt Kennard also posed these five questions to Keir Starmer, which remain unanswered:
1. Why did you meet the head of MI5, the domestic security service, for informal social drinks in April 2013, the year after you decided not to prosecute MI5 for its role in torture?
2. When and why did you join the Trilateral Commission and what does your membership of this intelligence-linked network entail?
3. What did you discuss with then US Attorney General Eric Holder when you met him on 9 November 2011 in Washington DC, at a time you were handling the Julian Assange case as the public prosecutor?
4. What role did you play in the Crown Prosecution Service’s irregular handling of the Julian Assange case during your period as DPP?
5. Why did you develop such a close relationship with the Times newspaper while you were the DPP and does this relationship still exist?
https://wikispooks.com/wiki/Document:Five_questions_for_new_Labour_leader_Sir_Keir_Starmer_about_his_UK_and_US_national_security_establishment_links
PH
Yeah, if we had a healthy media, they’d question both Starmer and Sue Gray as to their past links to the intelligence agencies. I think they’d be quizzed were they running for office in the US. In fact, former FBI and CIA people are open about it, and some have run for office.
And, needless to say, but the next Cabinet Secretary, shouldn’t have a national security background, if only to get a bit of balance.
One of the only investigative journalists in Britain deserving of the name.
Patrick Haseldine.
The millionaire knight of the realm – and leader of the Labour party – shuts down any uncomfortable questioning.
“Declassified’s reporter John McEvoy will not be allowed into the ruling party’s gathering when it starts in Liverpool on Sunday, Labour officials have decided.
The move has drawn condemnation from the National Union of Journalists (NUJ) and Reporters Without Borders.
It comes weeks after McEvoy exposed the influence of super-rich party donors and pro-Israel lobby groups over Keir Starmer’s cabinet.
Fiona O’Brien, UK director of Reporters Without Borders, commented: “For democracy to function, journalists must be allowed to report on matters of public interest – which includes party conferences. ”
https://www.declassifieduk.org/labour-bars-investigative-journalist-from-party-conference/
Adding to that list, there are a couple more questions that Matt Kennard could have asked Starmer:
6. Why did you not prosecute Jimmy Savile?
7. Why are you a cun*?
frankywiggles.
Palestine became a full member of the UN on September 10th – Israeli’s are now effectively illegal immigrants in the sovereign state of Palestine.
“The Palestinian Authority is no longer a provisional administration for the duration of a transition, but a government in the full sense of the term. The Palestinian territories are no longer “disputed areas”, but constitute the internationally recognised territory of a sovereign state.”
“It should be remembered that international law, unlike criminal law, is not based on a police force and a prison system. It is simply the obligation for governments to honour the signature of their state. In this case, Israel signed its charter by joining the UN [3]. Chapter XIV of the Convention commits each member “to comply with the decision of the International Court of Justice in any dispute to which he or she is a party”.”
Sadly Israel will not comply with International Law – only the Security Council has the ability to compel Israel to implement it.
https://www.voltairenet.org/article221244.html
Some may say what’s the issue, it’s all government, isn’t it?
But people involved in national security are obsessed with that area to the exclusion of other competing options govt should be presented with. Government decision making is meant to be objective, that requires hearing different opinions, then weighing up various options.
Israel, is a runaway ‘national security’ state; a state in which militarism dominates and civilian rule has been eroded to the point where elections have become solely arguments about who can best manage the state of permanent war, just as Netanyahu wanted them to be. For people like Netanyahu, a man whose whole political career has been based on belligerence and fearmongering, to quote Orwell ” The war isn’t meant to be won, its meant to be continuous”. Last year, he used ‘national security’ arguments to take control of the courts by removing the power of the Supreme Court (and lower courts) to cancel government decisions they deemed “extremely unreasonable”. This resulted in huge protests that looked like toppling him, protests conveniently silenced by Oct 7th and the war in Gaza. Permanent war means permanent wartime powers. Israel demonstrates why you need a barrier between national security officials and civilian controlled govt.
Thank you for fearlessly addressing taboo topics and demanding higher standards in British politics and media.
How Israel lobbied English governments – to stop the arrest of Israeli war criminals when they landed in the UK – Tory PM David Cameron, passed an intervention, to stop them from being arrested when they set foot on UK soil – knowing fine well they had committed war crimes, against the oppressed Palestinian people.
It has to be noted that in (2011) – the Tories were in a coalition government with the Lib/Dems led by Nick Clegg.
Part of the implementation of the interventions (to stop Israelis from being arrested in the UK) was that the evidence of any war crimes would be sent to the DDP – where Keir Starmer, would look over it and make a decision on whether or not to issue a warrant for arrest or not – none were arrested.
https://www.declassifieduk.org/israel-lobbied-britain-to-change-law-on-war-crimes-arrests/
They own the entire British elite, including the Royal family.
“The Mask has Fallen: King Charles supports Israel”
https://www.mintpressnews.com/is-zionist-king-charles-behind-israel-genocide-in-gaza/286185/
(By one of the very few other British investigative journalists worthy of the name, Kit Klarenberg).
frankywiggles
King Charles III and Queen Camilla attended the celebration for the Life of the late Lord Jacob Rothschild, held at Waddesdon Manor on 13 June,
I don’t think any family has done more for the state of Israel than the Rothschild family, dating all the way back to the Balfour Declaration and that famous letter from the then Foreign Secretary Arthur Balfour to Lord Rothschild.
Jacob Rothschild was the chairman of Yad Hanadiv, the family foundation which gave the Knesset and the Supreme Court buildings to Israel between 1989 and 2018.
I believe it was the Rothschild family who bailed out the bankrupt, drunk Churchill just before WW2 kicked off.
Sir Nick Clegg is President, Global Affairs at Meta, the CIA cutout.
I’m not sure what everyone expects here.
If you are hoping for a British Lenin or a Welsh Castro then hell will freeze over first. Jeremy Corbyn accidently arrived in the job and I always thought he was reluctant to be any type of leader and only did the job out of duty.
He did well at first (40% – 2017) and once the PTB thought he was a genuine threat then efforts were re- doubled in the MSM and particularly within The Labour Party and his Labour party scored around a ‘disastrous’ 33% (2019) getting around 600k more votes than Starmer’s New No-Lefties-Here Party. He could have stayed on maybe, but the ever helpful John McDonnell volunteered Corbyn’s resignation on his behalf.
For myself the lesson to be learnt from all that is that you can’t Tik-Tok – Facebook – Twitter – Youtube, or even sing, your way to electoral success.
You also have to take control of the whole Labour Party apparatus. To do that you have to go to boring meetings and vote and listen to candidates who bore you even more but that’s how it used to be done back in the day. Done – T – shirt etc etc many years ago.
Good luck to Jeremy and his friends in their pressure group venture (not knocking it, but that’s what it is) but looking at allies to team up with then only some of the SNP will vote with them on any major issues.
The rest are a useless bunch many who will talk left but under pressure will still allow Starmer’s Labour Party to get on with further and deeper austerity. In fact (unlike Corbyn) it was the reason what the PTB gave him and No-Lefties Labour the green light to rule for a period.
Now all the PTB have to do is get the Tory party back into shape. And they will in time.
The problem with Jeremy being leader of any new left-wing party is that the fascists and their propaganda machine would just reignite the A/S black op smear campaign against him (and George and other people involved no doubt). And especially if it started to make headway. It’s for that reason that I said in a previous post in this thread that the only way forward for the (genuine) left is to expose the lies and falsehoods of the fascists and the MSM, and I would suggest – along with exposing the black op against Jeremy (and Ken and Jackie and Marc and Chris etc), but also the background that led to Russia invading Ukraine – ie that Russia was deliberately provoked by the US/Nato, and list and quote all the people who warned against expanding Nato eastwards during the past nearly thirty years – and the background to the plight of the Palestinians along with evidence that practically all the atrocity claims made by Israel were concocted and contrived and false, and atrocity propaganda, as such.
I’m sure there are lots of people who follow Craig who are more than capable of putting such a leaflet together (and then printing off a few hundred of course and sticking them through people’s doors). Four, or possibly six sides of A4 should do it (held together with a paper-clip – as opposed to stapled – so that folk can easily make copies to circulate).
Just came across this video clip (49secs) on Al Jazeera’s website, posted yesterday:
Lawmaker criticises US silence on thousands killed in Gaza
US Congresswoman Rashida Tlaib criticised her colleagues’ silence on the thousands killed in Israel’s war on Gaza after a 600-page document with the names of Palestinians killed was made public.
https://www.aljazeera.com/program/newsfeed/2024/9/20/lawmaker-criticises-us-silence-on-thousands-killed-in-gaza
All the personality clashes and character weaknesses of individual party members would be repeated ad infinitum in each generation. Its more important to consider the party’s constitution so that such things can be managed and damage limited. The early SNP seemed to have it right but they were infiltrated by spooks promoting neo-liberalism. You might want to consider how to avoid that. You certainly don’t want anything like the Labour party constitution with its affiliated organisations, which looks perfect for neutralisng any threat to power.
Count me in
That landscape was abandoned by Labour in the mid-1990s.
Sir Kier Starmer, the freeloading, multimillionaire Zionist waging war on free speech and protest, cuts child benefit and pensioners’ heating allowances while accepting thousands of pounds of donations and posh clothing from millionaires who have bribed him.
Does anyone seriously think a new party will make the slightest bit of difference? Under FPTP, there’s no way they’d get enough votes to do anything. It’s time people woke up and stopped believing that the state is there to help them in any way whatsoever.
As Tolstoy said: “The people of the ruling classes for whom the State organization is advantageous speak most about the impossibility of living without State organization. But ask those who bear only the weight of State power, [and] you will find they feel only its burden, and, far from regarding themselves as safer because of State power, they could altogether dispense with it.”
He went on: “what intimidates men – the fear that without governmental power the worst men would triumph while the best would be oppressed – is precisely what has long ago happened, and is still happening, in all States, since everywhere the power is in the hands of the worst men; as, indeed, it cannot be otherwise, because only the worst men could do all these crafty, dastardly and cruel acts which are necessary for participation in power.”
I highly recommed the full essay: https://theanarchistlibrary.org/library/leo-tolstoy-the-state
Doesn’t this post (below) by @winteringham in the Skwawkbox btl comments, sum Starmer up:
” As Leader of the Opposition, apparently Starmer “needed” protection at football matches and hence a rich donor to pay for his corporate facilities which always includes food and drink for everyone in the party, including the security heavies. Meanwhile, the Prime Minister, Rishi Sunak, was able to sit in the stands at Southampton in perfect safety, as had Jeremy Corbyn at Arsenal ….. “
Lol, yes it does. The more one sees and hears about Starmer, the less likeable he is (and I didn’t like him in the first place).
Craig, I have great respect for you. But I disagree with the formation of a single party. It has been tried before with George Galloway – all respect to him – but he is a loose cannon who has divided previous anti-war parties he was involved in, like Respect. A preferable model is that of French, The New Popular Front (NPF) bringing together parties on the left and Greens.
Solidarity for your courage to speak out on all the causes that are dear to my heart: Assange, Anti-War, Palestine, etc.
BTW, Pam Fitzpatrick is a remarkable former Labour Party member (expelled). She has been a prominent figure on the ‘Not the Andrew Marr Show’ that you have attended. I have a great respect for her skills to bring folk together. She has advised folk about their right through a Community law centre for years.
It seems odd that Craig’s original article makes no mention of Trades Unions. These are among the very few institutions set up by the working class, and the only ones that have real power, which is why Thatcher was so keen to destroy them. In the whole reporting of the Mohammed Al Fayed scandal I’ve not heard one mention of the word “union” and I assume that Harrods staff was not unionised; if they had been then surely action would have been taken against Al Fayed’s sexual predation.
A left-wing party must be closely allied with the Unions, though that doesn’t necessarily mean the national leadership of each union (though there are some impressive national union leaders, e.g. in the RMT and POA). The connection needs to be established first at Branch level.
A worthwhile Party also needs to organise locally on local issues and collaborate with other local groups, based on actually caring about the issues, not just jumping onto every bandwagon in hope of recruiting members like the SWP used to do.
Building a grassroots organisation will take time, and the great weakness of parliamentary democracy is that parties are only interested in what they can achieve within one election cycle, which often means headline-grabbing announcements with little substance. A new Party should work towards taking power in about thirty years’ time. During this build-up they need to get their people into key positions within the police, armed forces, and communications networks. Because any genuinely radical movement will face ruthless and massive opposition if it actually forms a government. The powers-that-be will use terrorist attacks (as in the 2017 election), runs on the pound, instigation of riots, sabotage of utilities, concocted scandals and internet blackouts. A radical party needs to study carefully what was done in Chile in 1973 and in Venezuela more recently and work out exactly how they would counter these moves when they get elected.
Personally I would favour a policy of never talking to the mainstream media, even if this means waiting even longer to win an election. Organisation needs to be completely outside of the mainstream, even to the point of using CB radio and couriers rather than email.
From its foundation, the party must assume that
1) It has already been infiltrated by agents of the Establishment.
2) That at least one member has something scandalous to hide, which will eventually be revealed when it can do most harm.
3) That at least one member is a sexual or financial predator.
4) That the most charismatic leaders are at greatest risk of scandalous downfall and may need to be protected from themselves.
These issues should be discussed at all levels so that all members can participate in dealing with them. The phenomenon of Groupthink (studied by Irving Janis) should be studied closely at all levels.
Harrods staff are/were represented by Unite; in 2008 they balloted for strike action over pay.
I have to say though that in my own dealings with Unite they have been utterly useless.
Also just we’re all a type of Great Ape.
A coalition/hierarchy would medievally be called a shrewdness of apes, I believe.
At last a financial model for sustainable development is here. This documentary is now available to view. Even if only a very few actually bother to watch this I hope a seed will be planted. A grassroots economic growth with sustainable frameworks to manage reinvestment. The era of obscene inequality needs political challenge.
Bernie’s lead economist, Professor Stephanie Kelton is a wonderful teacher.
Here is the link:
https://findingthemoney.vhx.tv/products/finding-the-money
Thank you, Sir;
I have checked activity for donation, and it is up to date. As many of us find our ability to comment at all, nearly entirely censored, I do appreciate your efforts!