Jeremy Corbyn is becoming more and more outspoken.
Last week Tom Watson, Labour’s Deputy Leader, warned that Trotskyists were infiltrating the Labour Party and manipulating the new members. Anyone who has been in the party since the 1980s knows the truth of this. And, as if to prove the point, Peter Taaffe, leader of the Socialist Party and founding member of the Militant Tendency, told the Guardian that he was hopeful of being allowed back into the Labour Party.
Corbyn went on to the offensive in an interview with the Observer attacking Watson: “Sorry Tom, it is nonsense – and I think he knows it’s nonsense. Let’s get on with campaigning Tom. Thanks.”
I'm putting forward our case for how the next Labour government under my leadership will rebuild & transform Britain pic.twitter.com/3Zpxus31nn
— Jeremy Corbyn MP (@jeremycorbyn) August 13, 2016
Not content with that, Corbyn then went out of his way to welcome people from other parties: “I want people to join for good motives. But if they have changed their political views or developed their political views, then surely that is a good thing… If someone has developed their politics to be members of the Labour Party, even though they were once members of the Lib Dems, or Greens or something, fine. Welcome aboard.”
Pressed on whether that sentiment included Taaffe, Corbyn was offered the opportunity to denounce infiltration by self-avowed Trotskyists, yet instead he doubled down: “I met Peter Taaffe many, many years ago. I have no idea if he has even applied to join. I have had no conversations with Peter. I look forward to a conversation with Peter at some point but, hey, let’s be happy for what we have got, this vast number of members we have got and let’s get on with campaigning.”
The message could not have been clearer: the Deputy Leader, and the Labour MPs who echo his concerns, are wrong. There are no enemies to the left. In this, as in so much else, Corbyn repudiates Labour’s heritage and the lessons of its history. From Ramsay MacDonald preventing the Communist Party from affiliating to the party to Neil Kinnock expelling the Militant Tendency, Labour leaders have been as insistent on defining themselves to their left as well as to their right.
Over 600 #CIA assassination attempts by #USA and he is still going strong #Cuba
Happy Birthday comrade Fidel! ???????????????? pic.twitter.com/Qcv6zggDSp
— Communist Party (@communist_party) August 14, 2016
This is not merely because of the desire of left-of-centre parties to win centrist swing voters, nor because of fear of the deeply electorally unpopular policies – like unilateral nuclear disarmament or large-scale nationalisation – that the extreme left propound.
It is the knowledge that the intention of the non-Labour left is to use the party and its voters for their own ends – and that is for revolutionary politics and, in particular, its theory of “vanguardism”.
It is often remarked that Corbyn supporters appear to feel little concern for traditional “electability”. They use many excuses: there is no potential Labour leader who could actually win a General Election; the compromises involved in winning are too great; the party is an unsustainable coalition and the UK needs proportional representation to allow the different parts to separate and flourish.
Jeremy Corbyn and his closest supporters have no time for such thoughts. They don’t care about electability because they are the vanguard – the most ideologically developed part of the working class movement. They see the true political potential of the moment in which we are, or as Marx and Engels put it in The Communist Manifesto:
“The Communists, therefore, are, on the one hand, practically the most advanced and resolute section of the working-class parties of every country, that section which pushes forward all others; on the other hand, theoretically, they have over the great mass of the proletariat the advantage of clearly understanding the lines of march, the conditions, and the ultimate general results of the proletarian movement.”
Understand this, and you understand Corbynism and its complete lack of fear in the face of electoral defeat. The loss of seats in the forthcoming Boundary Review or the loss of seats because of an unassailable Tory lead in the polls are unimportant. What matters is who the Labour MPs are. That’s why Corbyn and his supporters are focusing on reselection – the outcome they are happy with is, to quote the 1939 Hollywood comedy Ninotchka: “fewer but better Russians”.
It is a sign of how far backwards Jeremy Corbyn has taken Labour that long-forgotten Communist Party debates are now relevant to an understanding of the Labour Party in the 21st century.
It is truly back to the future.
