What do Florence + the Machine, Candi Staton and Jamie Principle have in common?

As it is Christmas something different is in order.

Things on the left have not been great over the last year. It is a times like this that one needs to think about other things as well, to have as Dennis Healy defines it, “a hinterland”And I have found myself listening to more music.

The music in this case being old skool house.

I found myself going back to the start, to the music I listened to as a teenager, when it was still startlingly new and only just seeping across the Atlantic into London’s clubland, spawning a bacchanalia that was to last for years.

I have gone back to tracks that have rolled around my head without ever really knowing who did them, their inter relationship, or where they all came from in the first place. Such arcane knowledge was not really of great interest to me then.

Obviously it is of more interest to me now as I reach a certain age.

It is by mere happenstance that in the charts (can you really say that anymore?) is yet another re-imagining of You Got The Love by Florence and the Machine

The original called Your Love and is generally considered to be the first house tune (if not record, the first to be actually pressed was On and on by Jesse Saunders).

It was. remains on of the most perfect dance records ever made. It is often credited to Frankie Knuckles, but is actually by Jamie Principle. A lot of the early work of Frankie Knuckles is intertwined with Jamie’s so often confused. But then Frankie Knuckels was Chicago’s most important DJ at the Warehose club (which gave house music its name) and Jamie principle was just a kid in his bedroom.

Which makes it all the more extraordinary that this was the work of a youngster who’s musical background was more church music and glam rock than disco and electronica.

He would go onto create some other seminal tracks such as Bad Boys, Waiting On An Angel and of course the very early Baby Wants To Ride, one of the oddest dance tracks ever committed to vinyl with its mixture of ecstatic sexuality and agitprop. Its a great tune, maybe I’ll post about it another time.

Anyway, Your Love was an overnight sensation in the clubs of Chicago but only circulated on tapes and wasn’t issued until some time afterwards. It has never really had the recognition it deserves.

It did became a world wide hit under a new guise. This time it was when a DJ under the name of The source laid vocals on top of it by Candi Staton (best know for Young Hearts Run Free) to create You Got The Love.

It was a smash hit has been regular feature on the radio ever since.

This all came as something of a surprise to Candi Staton when she was told that she had an international hit. She said that she couldn’t remember recording any such record. then she remembered, she had recorded it for the soundtrack of a documentary about a very obese man trying to lose weight.

So one of houses greatest records being released by Florence And The Machine (a purveyor “soul inspired indie rock”) is not the strangest thing that could have happened with this track.

Its still quite a nice cover and she belts it out in a way that does just to its ecstatic nature.

And if anyone wondered what You Got The Love without Jamie Principle sounds like, here it is..

The end of the right to strike? Or, £68m of Ingratitude

The BA strike has been, as was expected, ruled illegal by the courts.

As the law on strike ballots stands it is practically impossible to organize a ballot that does not trip up on something or other.

The union has announced that there will be another ballot, which means that any strike action will not happen for a considerable time. They will also have missed their chance to take action when it would be most effective.

This has not stopped BA from implementing the changes that the workers oppose in the meantime

Workers seem to be angry, but also increasingly disillusioned. And who can blame them?

Though obviously a grievous blow to the union it is hard not to wonder how serious the union’s leaders ever were about actually striking.

Strike action has just become a threat that union negotiators bandy about in a dance with management.

Ballots increasingly seem to be organized to be kept in their pocket for safekeeping.

How else can Tony Woodley go on television and say that he could “guarantee” that if management come back to the negotiating table (and that’s it, not even that they withdraw the changes already made) the strike would be off?

Well that’s democratic isn’t it. Workers as a stage army to be marched up to the top of the hill and down again at the behest of the Grand Old Duke of Wallasey.

Reports in The Guardian suggest that workers are angry at the union’s legal team for their inability to organize a legal ballot.

For once it the union has to be defended on this one. It is now practically impossible to organize a ballot that doesn’t get caught out on at least one failing.

To give an idea of how byzantine the regulations have become one should listen to Bob Crow on his union’s battles with the courts (its about three minutes into the clip).

To have lost the right to organize effective legal strikes, a basic human right, is shocking in itself.

But what adds insult to injury is that this situation exists after 12 years of rule by the Labour Party, the party set up by the unions a hundred years ago to guarantee the right to strike.

The present Labour Party has done nothing to restore our trade union rights.

And Unite has just become another victim of them.

And how much does Unite pay into the Labour Party?

Since 2001 the unions that now make up Unite (TGWU, AEEU, MSF, GPMU) have paid £68 million to the Labour Party.

What have they got back?

To see donations by trade unions to the Labour Party click here

Who’s squeezing the Freedom Pass?

In last year’s mayoral election there was something of a push on the left to support Ken Livingstone to keep Boris Johnson out of City Hall. This was a push that inevitably spilt over into a general “vote Labour” to keep out the Tories.

Personally, like all on the left, I did not want to see Boris elected and the Tories to winning in the assembly. And so I gave my second vote to Ken for the mayoralty.

I did not think this was a reason not to stand against him, nor did I think this was a reason to fall into a back Labour position.

When Labour is the party implementing pro-big business policies is not the time to start pretending that there are real qualitative difference between their policies.

It should not move from giving grudging electoral support as the lesser evil into political support. If you tell people that Labour will be better you only court disappointment when it turns out otherwise.

One of the reasons much put about to back Ken against Boris was that he wanted to get rid of the Freedom Pass. Something he does not actually have the power to do, but hey that’s politics.

So it came as no great surprise when I was informed that there is a threat to the Freedom Pass, and that it comes from the Department of Transport, and the Secretary of State, Sadiq Khan, Labour MP for Tooting.

At present the Freedom Pass in London is funded one third by local authorities and two thirds by central government (elsewhere it is fully funded by the government).

At present this costs the Treasury £29m, a drop in the ocean of state spending.

The Department of Transport is now proposing to pay only half of the cost rather than two thirds. More will have to come out of the already straightened budgets of local councils, at a time when, due to the recession, their services are more in demand than ever.

So the party we were meant to vote for (Labour) to defend the Freedom Pass is the party now squeezing it.

Dave Nellist announces the new left coaliton at the Conference on politcal representation

Dave Nellist  announces the new coaliton of the left to fight the General Election at the conference on working class politcal representation held in London on 9th November.

For more on the coalition click here

Part 1

Part 2

The Communist Party and the General Election

There has been some speculation in the blogosphere on the role of the Communist Party of Britain in the successor initiative to NO2EU and standing candidates in the general election.

The article below is a report on last weekend’s meeting of the CPB Executive Commitee.

It appeared in today’s Morning Star. It also appears on the CPB website.

‘Time to resist ruling-class offensive,’ say communists Sunday 18 October 2009 Printable Email “Whichever government is elected at the next general election, the ruling class offensive will continue to unfold,” Communist Party general secretary Robert Griffiths told a special meeting of the party’s executive at the weekend.

“Big business and its politicians are determined to maximise monopoly profit, cut and privatise public services, undermine trade unionism and further restrict democratic rights to make workers and their families pay for getting Britain out of capitalism’s crisis,” he pointed out.

“But a Tory victory would deepen demoralisation within the working class and a Cameron government would go even further than new Labour in its reactionary policies,” Mr Griffiths argued.

“A Labour victory, on the other hand, might produce a government more amenable to mass pressure for policies such as those in the People’s Charter, enabling the labour movement to go on the offensive instead,” he said.

The Communist Party executive called for the formation of local grass-roots campaigns for the charter and its policies for public ownership, wealth redistribution, a greener economy and full employment, urging a big turnout for the People’s Charter conference in London on November 21.

“It is not too late to compel the Labour government to change course, ditch neoliberal policies and challenge big business profiteering in the interests of the mass of ordinary people,” Mr Griffiths insisted.

The special meeting also decided, with only one vote against, to pursue further discussions with a range of left and labour movement organisations to establish a general election coalition to fight leading new Labourites and the fascists, as well as the Tories.

“The struggle against reactionary ideas and policies in the labour movement, including in the Labour Party, needs to be sharpened, not compromised or avoided,” the CPB executive committee declared. Britain’s communists will also stand independent Communist Party candidates and take part in the Unity for Peace and Socialism alliance with domiciled communist and workers’ parties from overseas.

The special executive also urged active solidarity with the postal workers due to take national strike action on Thursday and Friday. It also called for protest letters and actions against the BBC for inviting BNP fascist leader Nick Griffin to appear on Question Time later this week.

Christine Bucholz: Revolutionary in the Bundestag

One of the newly elected members of the Bundestag for Die Linke is Christine Buchholz.

She is a Die Linke acitivist in Hesse and is a supporter of Marx21, a network that was formerly the Linksruck orgasnisation, connected to the SWP in this country.

The success of Die Linke in the recent elections was stunning, but the fact that there are now revolutionary socialists (she was not the only one eleted  for Die  Linke) sitting in the national parliament  of Europe’s largest economy is of some signifcance in itself.

There is an interview with her in this week’s Socialist Worker. To read it click here

“Make Capitalism History” dielinke.SDS

This weekend DieLinke.SDS, the student organisation of Die Linke is having a conference “Make Capitalsim History”. I thought the video was rather nicely done.

For the Make Capitalism History site click here

For the Die Linke.SDS click here

For their Youtube channel click here

Indefinite Strike at Tower Hamlets College

Teaching staff at Tower Hamlets College have gone on all-out indefinite strike against 13 compulsory redundancies in the English as a Second Language Department.

This will also mean the cutting of the number of places on ESOL courses from 3,000 to 2,000. Tower Hamlets has got one of the highest proportions of speakers of other langauges in its school system in the country.

Nearly 100 people attended a public meeting on Thursday evening to hear speakers including local Respect councillor Dulal Uddin, Pul McGarr, a teacher at St Paul’s Way School and Neil Williams, a local fire fighter.

Attack on education

Since the removal of further education colleges from local authority control and their “incorporation” they have turned into ever more ruthless businesses. Colleges have cut staff and courses and forced down wages continuosly.

On the other hand at this time of year the amount they spend on advertisng and selling themselves, in the media, on buses, on hoardings, is unbelievable.

Every business has boom and bust. And this artificially created “business” is now apparently experiencing an equallly artifically created “bust” at the hands of the governemnt. It seems there is “over production” in education. The number of students needs to be cut.

All out action

Tower Hamlets College staff have done something that few others have done, go on all out strike to stop the attack. Not only that, they have walked out during the start of year registration. Stop entrollment and hit management where it hurts. The registration of the “customers”.

The other thing that they have done is go on indefinite strike. Strikes in recent years have been reduced to tokenistic displays. Union bureauctats call people out for a day, just to prove they still can. Then they get down to the real business of compromise. Compromise which is usually in large part sell out.

They can get away with this because at no point have members been mobilised. Union structures that have withered over the years are little built by such passive strikes. Workers are told just not to come into work.

An indefinite striek is different. It means striking for victory, a real way to stop and roll back the attack. not just to count a slightly less bad deal. Victory is not assured,but to do nothing nowadays is to be defeated. Management shows no mercy.

An indefinite strike involves people: pickets have to be organised, leaflets produced, other groups of workers met, money collected.

Workers organise themselves rather than someone from nion HQ telling everyone what to do (ususaly “go home and do nothing”). It also brings them into contact with other workers and the community. Workers come to find out who they can rely on: other workers.

This strike is an inportant strike. Mangement is facing up for a showdown as they and all other managements in the public services prepare for much bigger cuts after the election.

It is a strike that can show the way for others to win and not only turn back the bosses attack at Tower Hamlets college, but maybe show the way to rebuild workers organisation.

The dispute seems set ot run. Unison staff are now also set to ballot to join the action.

The lecturers union, the UCU is calling a day of action on Tueday in solidarity.

A demonstration will be held on a Saturday in the borough in the next few weeks.

We will bring you news of these events as it comes in.

Refinery workers set to strike again

Refinery workers organised by the GMB and Unite have been balloting for industrail action and look set to strike. Obviously the militancy displayed  earlier in the yet is continuing.

To find out more check out the article in today’s Guardian here

Rob Griffiths “Seizing the left initiative”

An interesting article by Rob Griffiths, General Secretary of the Communist Party of Britian, recently appeared in the Morning Star discussing how the left should respond to the crisis. Of particular interest are his thoughts on the forthcoming general election and the Labour Party.

The British ruling class is preparing a massive, wide-scale and co-ordinated offensive against public services, democratic rights and working-class living standards for the period after the general election, as British capitalism steadies and reorientates itself after the recession.

Indeed, the offensive has already begun on some fronts, albeit quietly and haltingly in places.

How should the labour movement and the left respond?

There have always been two main trends in the British labour movement.

The first derives from the history of craft unionism among the better-paid and more stably employed sections of the working class. With some exceptions, usually in the most dangerous industries, it is a trend which prefers using its bargaining power with employers rather than fighting them.

This trend believes firmly in the benefits of class collaboration or – expressed in today’s terms – “social partnership.”

At root, it believes that workers share predominant and fundamental interests with the bosses.

At the same time, it also seeks the best deal for workers within the confines of collaboration, while recognising that such collaboration can break down in abnormal circumstances, resulting in industrial action.

Politically, this trend is reflected in the approach and policies of social democracy, expressed primarily through the Labour Party with its gradualist policies of improvements and reforms.

Lenin referred to the comparatively privileged upper layers of the working class as the “labour aristocracy.”

He reserved special scorn for its leaders who are flattered and bribed by the ruling class, whom he described as the “real agents of the bourgeoisie in the working-class movement.”

These “labour lieutenants of the capitalist class” preached social peace, practised surrender and reinforced backward and divisive ideas among workers.

New Labour abandoned any notion of consciously representing the working class, seeking a better deal for workers and their families within capitalism…

To read the rest of the article on this blog click here

For a digest of statements on an electoral challenge by left (by Bob Crow, Salma Yaqoob, Southwark Respect, SWP, SP and CPB) click here

Thsi article appeared in the Morning Star