Socialist Voice Review:
January – 2023
It is a shame that Socialist Voice begins the new year in the same way as it finished last year – plenty of commentary, many demands and few ideas. We are happy to note also that there are some rays of hope but first things first.
We start with the leading article by Eugene McCartan – “New year, same problems”. Never were truer words spoken. Here we go again, plenty of commentary and then a list of demands – and common demands no less – at the end of an article that gives no hint of how to work for them or achieve them. Utterly uninspiring.
However, there are two interesting and informative articles. “Your health is your wealth – But it depends on your class” certainly called out the false narrative that lack of various resources including money are the cause of the state of the health service, both sides of the border.
There is a curious statement included in the article that cannot go unchallenged: “Campaigning must begin for an all-Ireland health service, free at the point of need, from the cradle to the grave.” Campaigning must begin? Really? We have to wonder what would have been wrong with starting that campaign exactly two years ago when a proposal to that end was presented to the Betty Sinclair Branch of the Party? For context, the Betty Sinclair Branch straddles the border counties and at that time contained a number of medical professionals within its ranks. Extracts from that proposal are included below for your consideration. Judge for yourselves the sincerity of the Party in relation to doing anything about the health services:
Sent: Thursday 3 December 2020 13:31
(EXTRACTS)
Instead, at this point, I would ask you to consider the possibilities for the branch to engage in a specific campaign that I believe is entirely appropriate and manageable.
The party’s policy on an all-Ireland health service provides us with an ideal starting point:
- it is already an agreed policy
- the party attempted to launch a campaign on this issue earlier this year but it was stopped in its tracks when SF and PbP announced its ‘campaign’ on the issue (what happened to that?)
- the branch is in the perfectly geographical positioned to pursue such a campaign
- it will engage the branch in a campaign that has national and but especially local implications
Strategically, it has, among other advantages, the potential to:
- draw the branch members into a space where we get an opportunity to work together and apply our knowledge and skills to a collective activity
- gives the branch an opportunity to engage with a whole range of social and political organisations and individuals on a subject that it would be very difficult for anyone to raise any reasonable, rational opposition to
- put us in a position be seen to be promoting something positive rather than opposing some position or other
- to be seen to be taking a lead on a very important issue
From a purely party point of view I believe such a campaign has two main advantages:
- it involves the branch in promoting an important area of party policy
- provides an opportunity for the branch to become ………..”
In fact, that proposal did not get even the benefit of a discussion. The Party and the Betty Sinclair Branch should account for themselves. The Party keeps raising the issue of an all-Ireland health service, repeatedly demand that something be done and then they consistently do nothing – absolutely nothing – to work towards that objective. That may be acceptable within their own little self-congratulatory environment but it does not cut any ice in the real political and social world.
The next article is “Are unions ready to take a chance?” It is reproduced below for easy reference. Significantly, it contains real strategies and objectives. Not only does the article contain perfectly reasonable and workable strategies but it also contains some cautionary tales about officials outstaying their welcome in leadership positions.
Significantly also, is the fact that all those sensible approaches are directed at the trade union movement over which the Party has little influence. Read the article and imagine if the content had been directed at the CPI itself. Imagine if those ideas, strategies, objectives and the cautionary tales had been embraced by the CPI to start the process of becoming a functioning, effective organ of the working class.
Attempts within the Party over the past few years to do exactly that were rebuffed, obstructed, belittled and more sadly, openly opposed by every level of the leadership. It is fine to lecture and put demands to others but there will be none of that ‘disruptive’ nonsense within the Party itself.
And it shows.
Of course, if the CPI wants to dispute or correct or clarify any of the statements contained in this review, Guerrilla Communists will publish its response.
Imagine the content of the article below being addressed to the CPI itself rather than to the trade union movement:
Are unions ready to take a chance?
Written by Nicola Lawlor on 4th January 2023
In November’s Socialist Voice I wrote an article on the High-Level Report on Collective Bargaining, entitled “An opportunity, not a panacea.” In it I suggested:
“For this opportunity will only be of value if the movement invests significant time, resources and energy in the organisation, structurally, of workers in their work-place so that they are strong, willing, and able to invoke this mechanism.”
There are three areas in particular that Irish unions need to focus on if this potential legislation is going to have a positive effect on union density and power. Progress has been made in all three of these areas over the last two decades, but a renewed emphasis and vigour is required. So this is not starting from a standing position but from one of a positive trend.
Invest in specialist organisers
Organisers—those in unions specifically dealing with building union membership and structure—are still numerically too small a cohort. For a movement that says it’s about growing and rebuilding, it is incredible how few are actually dedicated to this challenge.
And even those who are in place are often spending time doing work that should be done by shop stewards or elected officers, many of whom have facility time, in employments with union recognition and collective bargaining. This work often involves very basic membership lists, increasing the union’s visibility, and recruitment at inductions. By taking this work into paid staff we hollow out our movement and waste workers’ resources.
We need many more organisers, and we need them to concentrate on building new union structures in unorganised work-places, training shop stewards to take action, build membership, build participation, and negotiate with employers. We also need to elevate our best organisers into positions of influence and power in the movement, so that these ideas and tactics become mainstreamed.
Change the focus of union officials
The most numerous role in unions remains that of the full-time official, largely dedicated to the act of negotiating with an employer and to representing individual union members, mostly on a very professional and diligent basis.
Full-time officials occupy the crucial position in the movement engaging with workers, employers, and the union’s leadership. But the role is largely one of advocacy, arguing for or against a particular issue, whether it is individual or collective. It is not one of organising and unleashing workers’ power in a strategically and tactically sound way.
Full-time officials are well entrenched in the movement, and many have occupied their position for a long time. They understand well how to resist change, and were often hired on their ability to do so. This does not make for an innovating cadre of leaders willing to evolve and adapt with new tactics and ideas.
But this role must change to concentrate primarily on the construction of support for workers’ power in employments and sectors.
Empower and train members
To do this we need to train and educate activists, and members more generally, in a trade unionism that emphasises their agency and their power. The results they want are dependent on them as workers, not on a full-time official or an industrial relations process.
If they are many, and disciplined, they’ll win what it is they want, in simplistic terms. Too much union training still deals with taking the issue off workers and then acting. Whether that’s individual representation, collective negotiations, or political lobbying, we often train to actually disempower rather than train to involve workers in the resolution of their own issue through their own activity.
The movement needs to push activity down through the layers of the structure, back to members and into the work-place. We need to train our layers of activists in much of the work now done by organisers and by full-time officials, both to improve the quality of union structure in the work-place and also to provide the resources for unions to organise the unorganised and take advantage of this potential opportunity.
In the July issue I wrote an article entitled “What is the trade union movement fighting for?” in response to a debate on “partnership,” essentially asking the question, What are we organising for? In this I argued against national wage-setting mechanisms and for keeping pay in the realm of the work-place, because, as I see it, the trade union movement,
“right now at this historical juncture in this balance of class power, must focus its energy and resources on rebuilding unions structurally at the work-place level and organising new sectors and workers into the movement. That is the immediate task that confronts us. Removing pay bargaining from this site of struggle and mobilisation will hinder, not assist, strengthening and building unions back up . . .”
Communists in the trade union movement must be to the fore in fighting for this change of movement. This will pit us against entrenched views, both staff and elected, happy to see out their time “servicing” a declining pool of members who they see as paying their union for a service.