Rallying against the expulsion of socialists outside the Your Party conference
Your Party members are fighting to turn it into a mass, democratic organisation of the left.
As the Your Party founding conference began in Liverpool on Saturday, members held a rally against the expulsion of Socialist Workers Party (SWP) members.
Several members of the SWP were expelled the previous day, including many who were already on route to the conference.
The witch-hunt is an attack on the left and democracy in Your Party
Independent socialist councillor Michael Lavalette and Mish Rahman from the Democratic Bloc within Your Party addressed the rally.
Mish told Socialist Worker, “Factional attempts to exclude parts of the left by the flick of a pen cannot be tolerated in a democratic socialist party.
“Dual membership should be up for debate at conference. Instead they’ve decided themselves already. It’s unacceptable.”
Michael was told councillors could attend as observers, but this was revoked. He said, “The Socialist Workers Party has no intention of standing against Your Party—it wants to be involved in Your Party.
“In fact you could say that there are lots of parties involved in Your Party. There are those that have got control at the top.
“There are those associated with Collective and they have certainly got a huge influence on the direction of the conference at this moment in time. There are lots of membership organisations who meet and coordinate their activities. And they are rightly welcomed as part of Your Party.”
“The criteria should be do you want to be involved in Your Party? Are you a member of Your Party? Do you want to be involved in building an insurgent, radical alternative to the Labour Party?”
Other speakers included former Green Party councillor Dan Hutchison, Stop The War convenor Lindsey German, and SWP national secretary Lewis Nielsen who was expelled.
Your Party members who have been selected to attend the conference are set to vote on whether to allow dual membership. This would allow people to be members of another organisation that doesn’t stand candidates against Your Party.
Rachael told Socialist Worker what attracted her to Your Party. She said, “It’s the chance for a mass, socialist party. We’ve got lots of groups on the left. But we’ve not got a mass movement that unites us.
“The left has been disenfranchised and we’ve been abandoned by Labour. It’s become the austerity and genocide party. We need a change.”
Rachael added, “No matter what your opinion of the SWP is, it’s unfair to purge members before we have voted on dual membership. And on the night before the conference as well. It’s not a good look.
“It’s been a shit show so far but hopefully we do get some good amendments passed. Infighting is not what we need when fascism is growling at the door.”
Scott said he felt a huge sense of responsibility due to being accepted to attend the conference. He told Socialist Worker he had always been a socialist but not been politically involved. “Now is the time for me to make things happen”, he said.
The new party “has got to be member-led and horizontal, not vertical, top-down politics”, he added.
The right wing media was full of reports that the SWP wanted to disrupt the conference by storming the stage.
The SWP doesn’t want to storm the stage and never planned to do so. Socialist Worker supporters have built Your Party on the ground—and argued for a radical, democratic vision of it.
A left that doesn’t just fight on the “bread and butter” issues but loudly and clearly says refugees and migrants are welcome and trans+ rights now. And a left that seeks to build mass movements and working class struggle which are key to winning change.
The other vision on offer is a Labour Party mark 2 that betrays the hopes of a socialist alternative.
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