Wake up call

Date: 8th June '01

Name: Lawrie Coombs

Country: UK

The general election results shouold act as a wake up call for the left.

The idea peddled by some that because the Socialst Alliance received a few hearings on the Channel four news and in the pages of the Guardian do not make it a household name.

The election campaign was led on an "old Labour" manifesto that failed to direct to the bigger vision and lacked bite frankly.

In my view standing remains the correct thing to do, if only for the reason that more people know of the allaince now. My own modest vote of 455 has not set the world alight, however has led to the situation where from a very low base of activists, we have more people on the ground...having 13 at the count last night.

Likewise locally we are convinced that the lessons on building an alternative need to be learn't and certainly some of the arguements on this list and presented by RA/AFA need taking seriously...namely becoming of relelvence and at the disposal of the class, as well as providing answers to the big ideas. The vaccum will be filled by the far-right if we continue as we have done. watching the results in Oldham...the biggest vote in a general election for a fascist party since the secound world war should make us sit up and get real...Oldham is not so very different from many other towns across Britain, I'm sure the BNP have clocked that...having bigger cells of the BNP in the North- west will be a major pain for socialsts there, we should act quickly to neutralise them before the cancer spreads.

Back to discussion page                    RA home page