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STANDING TOGETHER ON Alan Thornett
ahe Socialist Alliance is holding a very March 13 in London to give the membership of the Alliance the chance to endorse (or otherwise) the steps which have been taken to support Respect - both its launch as an organisation and its approach to the forthcoming elections in June.
Although this support is directly in line with the decision of the Socialist Alliance AGM to seek to create a broader alliance, the support of a special conference is now needed in order to go forward with the full authority of the Socialist Alliance as an organisation.
It is crucial that this conference is well attended and representative of the membership of the Socialist Alliance. Every member of the SA is entitled to attend
A resolution from the SA Task Group welcomes the establishment of Respect and calls on the SA to support its candidates in the elections in June. At the same time it calls for the continuation of the Socialist Alliance up until its AGM in the autumn, when a decision will have to be taken on the future of the Alliance itself.
If Respect has been successful there will clearly be a strong logic to dissolve the Alliance into Respect, but that is a decision which cannot, and should not, be taken until Autumn when it will be possible to assess the development of Respect in an informed and serious way.
The resolution puts it this way: "Conference reaffirms its commitment to maintain the Socialist Alliance at the national and local level. However, conference agrees that the SA must continue to review the development of Respect, and agrees to debate the future of the SA and its relationship to Respect at the SA AGM to be held before the end of the year".
On the local elections, which are also taking place on the same day in many places outside of London, the resolution calls on the Alliance not to stand candidates in its own name - consistent with the other elections taking place on that day - but where there is a case for standing, to seek to do so under the banner of Respect
"The NEC will raise the wishes of the local SA branch and the reasons with the EC of Respect for it to consider adopting the SA proposal to stand a candidate in the local elections under the banner of Respect."
There will be an organised opposition at the conference against support for Respect, of course. The Alliance for Workers Liberty has a counter-line resolution calling on the SA not to support Respect - which is consistent with their scandalous attacks on George Galloway. t does not stop there, however. The SA
Democratic Platform (DPSA) meeting
last weekend voted not to support Respect. The DPSA meeting of 35 people was comprised of the AWL, the Revolutionary Democratic Group, the International Socialist League and a number of independents
It also involved the CB, but its delegation walked out when the meeting - which also voted to establish a new public organisation the Democratic Socialist Alliance - voted to accept into membership people who were not members of the SA.
The DPSA resolution says the following: "The Respect conference did not resolve any of the issues the DPSA raised. Therefore the DPSA resolves not to join or support
The meeting then discussed how to relate to the SA conference - and decided it would stage a walkout if the conference adopted support for Respect
The main debate around this seems to have been whether to stage an orderly workout or cause as much disruption as possible - with the latter approach seemingly winning the day.
Members of the Socialist Alliance who recognise the opportunity represented by Respect need to ensure that a wrecking oper ation of this kind is not successful.