ALP and left — 1
I empathise with George Georges' return to social democratic politics (GLW #159). Left communities outside of the ALP are disappointingly fragmented. Life on the far left is like a concert with no audience or a party without guests.
However, anyone attempting to enter or re-enter the ALP faces two obstacles. First, there is the faction system itself, which has disenfranchised local branches and turned them into nothing more than recruiting pools for left and right. The second obstacle is the bloc vote of the trade union officials which underpins the growing dominance of a neo-liberal agenda in the party.
The problem with far left socialists who enter (or re-enter) the ALP is that they do not see the factions or the bloc votes as problems in themselves. Prosecuting socialism is only seen as a matter of policy. Questions of organisational practice are subordinated to policy. Socialists generally end up joining a faction or sub-faction or attempt to set up their own faction (by and large a futile exercise). They attempt to prosecute their policies by making deals between factions instead of working to empower ordinary members in local branches. In playing the factional game socialists become a part of the problem by destroying democratic practice within social democracy.
Moreover, many socialists continue to hang on to the mythology that the union bloc vote constitutes some sort of link between the working class and the party. In my view, the distance between union members and the decisions of union officials in the ALP hierarchy is so great and so mediated by sectional, bureaucratic and self interest that the bloc vote cannot be said to be a meaningful form of class representation in the party.
If socialists feel that they must return to the "mother" party, then let it be with the aim and intention of increasing the authority of the local branch and the ordinary members of the party (regardless of whether those members choose right or left policies). We ought to have sufficient confidence in working people to support the view that democracy and pluralism are basic preconditions for a party that commits itself to socialism.
Jeff Richards
Prospect SA
ALP and left — 2
The debate over whether or not it is possible to build a socialist left inside the ALP that is capable of leading the way toward a society that rejects capitalism is as old as the ALP itself. I wish I could say that Roger Clarke's article (GLW #162) held any hope that the position to the contrary was a waste of time. Sadly I cannot.
While Roger raises a number of valid points in regard to democracy, the relationship that left parties have to working people and the like, his criticism of Jim McIlroy's example of the Alliance in New Zealand as being an alternative seems to miss a number of quite important issues.
While it is true that Jim Anderton, Matt McCarten and friends stayed in the NZ Labour Party, they stayed in a party where a high profile member of that party (Anderton) openly opposed from the very beginning the right-wing policies of the Lange Labour government, thus giving the New Labour Party momentum when it formed and instant credibility when the split took place. I search in vain for a single left ALP figure who has played such a critical role in the federal ALP.
Indeed many of the most repressive aspects of the Labor government have had leading left figures as their greatest supporters, such as George Campbell's support for the Accord process and the BWIU's Andrew Ferguson's support of the deregistration of the BLF. The list of sell-outs by the left of the ALP is long and depressing but requires historical perspective in analysing why this is so.
Key among them is the ALP's reliance on parliament as the agent of change in Australia. At this late stage in a conservative Labor federal government there is neither the will, nor the history or the credibility for left Labor to bring anyone rallying to their call.
As Roger correctly observes, smaller socialist parties need to be less doctrinaire in their approach to an alternative, but building democratic and empowering alternatives to Labor is surely our only hope.
Colin Hesse
Marrickville NSW
[Edited for length.]
ALP and left — 3
Get off the horse, George — it's dead.
George Georges' futile attempt to breathe life into the Australian Labor Party (GLW #159) would be comical if it were not so tragic. The social conscience of the ALP evaporated on November 11, 1975, and has not been sighted since.
The naive reformism of the Whitlam years had a head-on collision with the reality of Australian capitalism at that time and the ALP emerged with a horror of further hostilities. The Wran government became the prototype of all future Labor governments. Wage justice, full employment and free education gave way to the rhetoric of Australian conservatism.
Terms like micro-economic reform, privatisation, enterprise bargaining and user-pays became part of Labor's push for political respectability; a status conferred by the conservative elite.
The perceived need to obtain the Packer-Murdoch stamp of approval for Labor policy marked the end of Labor's Fabian pretensions.
Far from a party of reform, the ALP has become a political masonry dedicated to its own self-advancement. The ability to deliver the compliance of the working class in the face of massive cuts to its standard of living is the bargaining chip which has won the ALP the support of its former enemies.
Through this betrayal of the Australian working class, Labor has assumed the mantle of the natural political representative of Australian and international capitalism.
Stop kicking the horse, George; the party you knew is dead. Let's all sit under a gum tree and agree to build a new one.
Mick White
Brisbane
[Edited for length.]
Port Macquarie hospital
Figures released in the Sunday Telegraph article (October 16) clearly show that the worst fears of the Hospital Action Group in relation to privatisation have been realised.
Not only will Port Macquarie lose its public hospital but we now see clearly that the privatised model will cost the government more than it would have cost to build a new public base hospital.
The $130 million paid by the government over the 20 years of the contract is for the use of the building. It is called an "availability fee" which is another word for rent.
The government still has to pay the private operator for all the services provided for public patients. These costs will contain a profit margin for the operator.
These figures explode the myth that hospital privatisation saves the taxpayer money. The reverse is the case.
The government, instead of spending approximately $35 million to build a new public hospital, is prepared to pay rent of over $130 million over 20 years. And to make matters worse at the end of the 20 years the government owns nothing.
Wayne Richards
Port Macquarie Hospital Action Group, NSW
[Edited for length.]
Free education
As a student, I read Alison Dellit's piece about free education (GLW #162) with a certain amount of despair. It would seem that under this pseudo Liberal government, free education has not only disappeared, but that its desire to increase HECS repayments has not totally subsided.
It's very clear that our only political allies in halting the erosion of existing standards, poor though they are by comparison to those in 1974, are the Democrats. Not only do they find themselves the only party supporting increased university funding, but also free education. How novel!
The Democrats were also responsible for ensuring that second degrees were not charged at the massively increased rate the Keating government originally desired.
As least someone's on the students' side.
Tracy Anderson
Cremorne NSW
Safe seat
The Sydney Morning Herald (21/10/94) reports that ACTU Assistant Secretary, Jennie George, has confirmed her intention to run as a Labor Party candidate for the Senate at the next Federal election.
According to the report, George hopes to win preselection for the winnable third position on the Victorian ALP's Senate ticket, thus claiming her share of the 35% of safe Labor seats reserved for female derrieres.
"There has been increasing momentum inside the ALP in recent months for Ms George ... to enter politics", writes SMH journalist Brad Norrington.
"Senior ALP figures consider her capable and articulate and with a bright future in Canberra. She is also held in high regard by the Prime Minister, Mr Keating", he observes.
George proved herself both "capable" and "articulate" in July this year when she delivered a speech denying that the Federal ALP Government's introduction of Enterprise Bargaining had widened the gap between men's and women's wages in Australia — capable of stretching the truth and articulate in her defence of labour market deregulation at the expense of women workers.
The high regard of the Prime Minister is not easily won, and even with a 35% quota, neither is a safe seat. Jennie George has earned her supper.
Karen Fletcher
Bondi NSW
Telephone typewriter
It has recently come to my notice that there has been a drastic reduction in the service of the TTY (telephone typewriter) relay. This was previously a 24hr service providing deaf people and people with speech impediments a constant communication service with the hearing world.
I and many others find it very discriminatory that unless the families and friends of these people have a TTY personally, they are left without contact with family etc, between the hours of 6pm and 8am weekdays and all weekend.
Apart from the inconvenience of hearing people not being able to contact their deaf or speech impaired friends and family it could also have life threatening implications in an emergency for these people if they need to contact anyone who does not possess a TTY.
Why should deaf people be put through the added stress of not having constant contact with the hearing world? This could also carry over into the business world, as hearing people in business and their hearing clients often find it a necessity to have after hours access to telephone to conduct business. If you are deaf or speech impaired this could mean loss of business when it has been made so difficult to make contact after hours.
Sandra Warren
Melbourne
[Edited for length.]