Writing in the Red Mole in 1970, a few months betore the 'elections', Robin Blackburn dismissed the early Labour Party La 'bureducralic manoeuvre'.
Facility almost always has a knack of distorting the truth. The early Labour Party was not hatched (as Blackburn implies) in the committee rooms of the then equivalents of Harold Wilson or Reg Prentice, It was born despite such figures out of the escalating struggies of tha labour movement, of the century, at the turn ana ine nesitant understanding of ever-wider layers of a common interest to defend.
The creation of the Labour Party took place, interestingly enough, in a period similar to our own in several respects. its seeds were embedded in a decade of shocks & upheavals sparked off by the growing threat to Britain's dominance in world trade by the industrial powers of Germany and the USA. order to retain their slackening grip over the world market. British employers resorted to a well co-ordinated attack upon workers' living standards and rights almost identical to the one we nave witnessed over the past decade or so.
An intensive drive was heralded to lower working conditions, introduce 'speed-up' (productivity deals) abolish "resurcuve oracticesi and break the backs of the untons which nad grown enormous y in the preceding period among semi-skilled workers such ac 1890 alone, had tripled).
Such an offensive. attempt by the employers to create a r'eduy supory or 'scao laoour inine National Free Labour cave rise inrougnout ine 1890s to a whole wave of 'lock outs' & provoked sirikes• uniet among inese were the Lancashire cotton workers' strike of 1090, ine miners sirikes ot 1094 anc 1898 and the engineers' lock-out of 1o9r wnica resuttea in ine impositior of the humiliating York Memorandum. Taff Vale The impact of these struggles on the consciousness of the labour movement -particularly newly-unionised sectors who lacked the conservative approach ot ine ocer be minimised.
and hesitatingly, to a growing awareness among more militant layers of a common interest of the labour movement that had to be 'independently' defended. Up to that point in time, eager to point out, little concept of !labour! class in the community!, and there was often intense hostility between the semistitea ana older offensive launched by the employers, increasingly centralised through the creation of Employers' Federations, slowly began to overcome 'craft! Isectional! differences as the increasingly identified together around ine need to detend the cause of labour. Even though this process was most obvious, in the initial stages, among the newiy unionised, it gradually ine more cratt-conscious unions whose interests were clearly endangered by attacks reached a climax in the Taff Vale Judgestrike action, coupled with the wider implications.
Association, action, ually powerless.
Liberals Democratic Federation craft unions - should not They gave birth, slowly as Pelling is unions to Ithere had been of the Liberal Party.
as a distinct от ine craft unions. The In much ine same way as labour movement the Democratic Party.
and unions spread to of its class interests, pushed union autonomy which independent political voice.
was seen to have much It was clearly recognised as a threat not only to the railwaymen's union but to Itrade unionism' itself since, if any unior could be made to legally compensate a company tor losses incurred in a strike the unions were rendered virtRents, It was in response to such attacks, l response to attacks upon the unions no longer on a sectional but on a nationa basis, that the fertile ground was created on which the 'propagandal of the early soclallst groupings sucn as the Social and the Independent Labour Party (long strugglimg for a 'workingmen's party) was to fall. The deepening awareness among unions of common interests to defend - those of the labour movement - began to drive a wedge through the 'marriage of convenience which had hitherto caused the clutch at the apron- strings Up to that point in time, the majority unions ( particularly the craft unions) had trailed behind the Liberals today, the USA. in the USA supports The unions advocated support for the Liberals in exchange for the latters' policy of free trade (under which cheap food rates were quaranteed) and a less antagonist. ic attitude towards the labour movement.
The sharp offensive launched by the employers, however, cementing in the labour movement a arowing awareness growing layers in the unions to break from this alliance with 'Liberalism' and seek an They were
SOCIALIST ACTION
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First of a series of articles on the nat- ure and origins of the Labour Party..