Sheffield Left statement
All socialists know – or should do – that General Elections are conjuring tricks, designed to deceive working people into believing that they have some control over the system that rules their lives. At the same time, the run up to a General Election is a period when working people are most open to considering political ideas, even where the issues for debate are closely controlled by the capitalist main-stream media. This gives socialists an unusual opportunity to offer alternative political, social and economic ideas to a wider audience. It is important, therefore, that socialists should intervene in a General Election, even though they know that a General Election by itself is not going to create a socialist society run by working people for working people.
The question is how best to intervene in the General Election campaign in a way that puts across the clearest socialist message, particularly when there is an ideological difference the size of a toenail paring between the major political parties! It seems almost certain that Starmer’s neutered Labour Party will win this election and form the next government and that this government will not fundamentally alter the capitalist status quo, reverse the decline and privatisation of the public domain, put in measures that would effectively combat climate change, counteract the scapegoating of migrants and other marginalised members of society or end the UK’s support for NATO imperialism and its associated wars.
In these circumstances, the main task for socialists will be to galvanise working class opposition to Starmer’s reactionary policies from the very beginning of his administration. An important preparation for this, however, would be to promote those candidates who we will be supporting in the General Election campaign by explaining why we are supporting them. Sheffield Left has been discussing these issues for some weeks now and has recently completed an exhaustive, democratic exercise to decide how we would advise other socialists to vote in the UK General Election on 4th July 2024.
Sheffield Left believes that it is very important to support Socialist candidates, including independents such as Corbyn and Feinstein, wherever they are standing, not because they are going to form a government or even get elected (though a few might), but because they are publicly declaring the basis for a left opposition to the thoroughly compromised and reactionary manifesto of the Labour Party, both inside and outside Parliament.
Sheffield Left does not include Galloway’s Workers Party of Great Britain in its list of Socialist organisations. While its manifesto has much that appears immediately attractive, it is also riddled with a clearly anti-LGBTQIA ideology and its approach to immigration, the military and Britain’s international role is unacceptable. We also harbour deep doubts about its leaders’ political credibility. His unsavoury relationships with kleptocrats and dictators such as Putin and Gaddafi are a case in point.
Sheffield Left is fully committed to the Liberation of Palestine and supports the call for an immediate ceasefire. However, it is not sufficient for the Green Party, various Labour MPs and others just to call for a ceasefire and expect us to support them, when they also collude with implementing austerity measures which viciously attack the living standards of working people.
In constituencies where no independent Socialist candidates are standing, however, Sheffield Left will support Labour Party candidates who are genuinely to the left of the party and oppose the genocide in Palestine. This is because these potential Labour MPs will need to be encouraged and supported to stand up to Starmer in Parliament once Labour is in power. Finally, we do not think that it is useful for comrades to vote for candidates merely because they are opposing the Tories. In constituencies where no candidate meets our criteria for support, abstaining or spoiling a ballot paper is acceptable and does not confuse the issue.
The following is the position that Sheffield Left has now adopted:
‘Vote Socialist where they stand (e.g. TUSC, Corbyn, Abbot, Feinstein etc, but this does not include Workers’ Party candidates) and Labour where no socialist is standing, as long as the Labour candidates have consistently shown themselves to be on the left of the Party, including supporting an immediate ceasefire in Gaza; otherwise they should abstain or spoil their ballot papers.’