Tomás Ó Flatharta

Looking at Things from the Left

The ULA: two reports and an article

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Two report of the ULA Forum on 25th June can be found at:

(from the SWP) http://www.swp.ie/editorial/after-united-left-alliance-forum/4602

and (from the ‘Weekly Worker’ [CPGB]) at:

http://www.cpgb.org.uk/article.php?article_id=1004455

In issue 44 (June 2011) of Red Banner magazine, ‘The vote changes nothing: the struggle continues’ by Aindrias Ó Cathasaigh “offers a view of the political landscape for the left following February’s election”.  This long and interesting study of the ULA manages to never mention the ULA by name.

Des Derwin



Written by tomasoflatharta

Jul 4, 2011 at 1:18 pm

Posted in Ireland, United Left Alliance

AFTER ULA MAKES A DIFFERENCE FOR LOWLY PAID, 300 PACK LIBERTY HALL FOR ULA FORUM

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From Paddy Healy 086-4183732. For a detailed discussion on way ahead in Trade Unions, read “How ICTU Failed Us, The Necessity for Election, Re-Election of General Secretaries” on my Blog:http://wp.me/pKzXa-gw

AFTER ULA MAKES A DIFFERENCE FOR LOWLY PAID, 300 PACK LIBERTY HALL FOR ULA FORUM

On Thursday last Richard Bruton announced that the bill to cut the pay of shop assistants, cleaners, agricultural labourers and others on JLC rates and those covered by Registered Employment Agreements was being deferred until the Autumn. This followed the discussion in the Dail of a private members motion from the ULA calling on the government to abandon the measure. The Labour Party and Fine Gael voted down the motion, but the array of deputies voting for the motion frightened the Labour Party. Voting for the motion were Seamus Healy , Joan Collins T, Joe Higgins, Richard Boyd-Barrett, Clare Daly (all ULA), Thomas Pringle, John Halligan, Catherine Murphy, Maureen O’Sullivan, Finian McGrath, Luke Ming Flanagan, Tom Fleming (All Technical Group). Sinn Fein and Fianna Fail also supported the motion. On the proposal of Cllr Declan Bree (ULA), Sligo Co Council had already passed the motion.

There was a “robust discussion” after Bruton addressed the parliamentary Labour Party on the following day. Bruton then announced the deferral. Clearly the ULA are in a position to exert serious pressure on government on behalf of the poor and employees generally due to the threat posed to the Labour Party. ULA will remain highly vigilant in order to be in a position to resist the bill when and if it is introduced. Meetings on the issue in several centres will continue. The next public meeting will be held in Hearns Hotel Clonmel on Thursday June 30 at 8 pm. The meeting will be addressed by Seamus Healy TD, Pat Neill, President of Clonmel Trades Council, and Paddy Healy , Steering Committee ULA Read the rest of this entry »

Written by tomasoflatharta

Jun 27, 2011 at 9:00 am

Posted in Ireland, Low Pay, United Left Alliance

Minutes of ULA Forum 25th June 2011

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Such industry! What a service! lenihanm has posted minutes of the two ULA Forum plenary sessions over on the ‘Rank Savage Spit’ blog. At a quick glance they seem eerily accurate. Between these and Paula’s films the internet will have expanded Liberty Hall to all.

http://ranksavagespit.wordpress.com/2011/06/26/minutes-from-the-united-left-alliance-forum/

DD

Written by tomasoflatharta

Jun 26, 2011 at 10:48 pm

Posted in Ireland, United Left Alliance

ULA forum: a resounding success

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The ULA Forum yesterday was a resounding success. It filled the Theatre in Liberty Hall all day and the official registration list for the day was announced as 320. Four features of the gathering were the number of new faces, the number of non-aligned people, the number of young people and the delegations from outside Dublin (Cork, Tipperary and the North to these ears in particular).

There was a great sense of achievement, potential, departure and, for most of the time, camaraderie. The Socialist Party were rather too forthright in pressing their perspective of a more ‘revolutionary’ programme (with the emphasis on the use of the word ‘socialism’). The SWP were more sensitive, yet perhaps more arrogant,  in pressing their ‘Enough!’ campaign on the gathering and on the ULA.

Nevertheless all involved must take credit for a phenomenon that would have been practically unforeseeable a year ago. It will be said that the day amounted to nothing because it was not a decision-making day. Decisions should come soon but yesterday did represent a step forward, an assertion of collectivity, arrival and belonging, and an amount of consensus about what needs to be done organisationally (membership, branches and internal communication) and actively (campaigning against austerity). There were admonishings on the responsibility that has come with the achievement and opportunity of the ULA.

The first speaker, Terence McDonagh, provided the perfect start with his proposal of an ‘Irish Big Bang’ on the crisis. Five steps: 1.Default 2.Leave the euro 3.Create a good public bank  4. Guarantee a job to everyone at the the minimum wage at least and 5. Nationalise the Corrib gas field. It was direct and refreshing, though not everyone agreed that the matter is so simple. I look forward to Paula’s film of the presentation and of Kieran Allen’s impressive economic presentation which followed, and to discussion of Terence McDonagh’s perspectives on the Irish Left Review, Notes On the Front, and elsewhere. Hopefully Paula will put up her film of all or most of the proceedings.

Declan Bree gave an excellent speech, left, radical and socialist, which was fully committed to the building of the ULA and a new party while recognising the reticence of some and that the party cannot be established overnight

Des Derwin

Written by tomasoflatharta

Jun 26, 2011 at 4:49 pm

Posted in Ireland

Gaza Flotilla Updates

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Paul Murphy MEP (Socialist Party / United Left Alliance) is one of the Irish volunteers sailing on the MV Saoirse to Gaza.

He has hit back at USA foreign affairs supremo,  Hillary Clinton, who has, according to the Electronic Intifada

effectively tells Israel it has the “right” to attack a boat carrying dozens of American civilians, including Hedy Epstein and Alice Walker.”

Dublin MEP hits back at Clinton flotilla comments Read the rest of this entry »

Written by tomasoflatharta

Jun 25, 2011 at 12:02 pm

Posted in Ireland

Build the ULA

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Guest post

In advance of the ULA Forum a statement on Building the ULA from Joan Collins TD, Eddie Conlon Steering Committee Member ULA and PBP and Dermot Connolly, Steering Committee Member PBP.

The Main Job Now is to Build the ULA

The ULA has been a success. It has brought together a variety of left and socialist forces and provided a framework whereby they can work together. It has led to a focus on what the left agrees on rather than what divides us.  It has shown that by working together we can have success and develop genuine and  radical political representation for working people.  With the election of 5 TDs the ULA has established a national profile and provided a pole of attraction for those who want to resist the attacks on workers, the unemployed and oppressed.

The key issue now is how we develop the ULA beyond being an alliance into a political force which can draw in new layers of activists and build commitment to a radical reorganisation of society.  The shift from an alliance to a new political formation will take time and cannot be rushed. But if the ULA is not seen to be moving beyond its current configuration, essentially an alliance of the Socialist Party, People Before Profit and the Tipperary Workers and Unemployed Action Group, its growth could be stifled.  Those attracted to it may only see at as a tool of the constituent groups. They will feel they cannot have a real say in what happens  without joining one of the groups. Read the rest of this entry »

Written by tomasoflatharta

Jun 24, 2011 at 10:04 am

Posted in Fianna Fáil, Financial Crisis (September 2008 onwards), Fine Gael, General Election 2011, International Political Analysis, Ireland, People Before Profit, Sinn Féin, Six County Elections 2011, Six County State, Socialist Party, Trade Unions, United Left Alliance

ULA: What kind of party do we need? 4

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ULA: What kind of party do we need? 4

Guest post

1. Publish and be damned.

At a People Before Profit Alliance Activists Meeting in May Kieran Allen of the SWP responded to Brendan Young’s call for a ULA publication – not a PBPA publication – by firmly ruling it out. His argument was that to have a publication you need to have agreement on what to say in it and the ULA was a diverse formation and therefore was not in a position to produce a publication. If that were the only obstacle it would be easily overcome by acknowledging that the publication should, in any case, carry debate within the overall context of the agreed message.

On this site Mark P of the Socialist Party took issue with Brendan in response to his article ‘United Left Alliance “A Work in Progress” -Steps Towards a New Party’:

https://tomasoflatharta.com/2011/05/20/united-left-alliance-a-work-in-progress-steps-towards-a-new-party/#more-404

Brendan had asserted that “the production of an independent publication for the ULA – to give expression to our views and an independent identity to the organisation – remains an argument to be won”. Mark P did not agree and commented: Read the rest of this entry »

Written by tomasoflatharta

Jun 24, 2011 at 9:54 am

Posted in Britain, Fianna Fáil, Financial Crisis (September 2008 onwards), Fine Gael, General Election 2011, International Political Analysis, Ireland, Labour Party (Ireland), People Before Profit, Scotland, Sinn Féin, Six County Elections 2011, Six County State, Socialist Party, Trade Unions, United Left Alliance

ULA: What kind of party do we need 3

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ULA: What kind of party do we need? 3

Head, heart, hand and footwear.

A guest post

It would be a pity if people were less than enthusiastic about political discussion, education and development inside the ULA. Am I picking up such lukewarmth, fired with a little impatience for activity and against talk, from some of the party-members at ULA meetings? That would be an irony from comrades who organise public meetings on ‘Marx and the crisis’ and weekends on topics as diverse as Ancient Slavery and William Morris. But no more ironic than restless recruiters talking down formal membership or newspaper publishers opposing outright a publication for the ULA. Read the rest of this entry »

Written by tomasoflatharta

Jun 23, 2011 at 2:48 am

Posted in Financial Crisis (September 2008 onwards), General Election 2011, International Political Analysis, Ireland, People Before Profit, Socialist Party, United Left Alliance

ULA: What kind of party do we need 2

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ULA: What kind of party do we need? 2

A guest post

It matters less what word is used to describe the ULA than that it is allowed become an organisation in its own right. There is no point falling out over whether to designate the organisation a ‘party’, an organisation, a network, a league, a bloc, an alliance, as long as it has sufficient political coherence and presence, pooled resources and coordinated activity.

Language does have its effect though, or its expressive power. For example to stay with the term ‘alliance’ could underpin a notion of the ULA as a coalition of existing organisations rather than a complete and transcendent force embodying a new politics, a new left, which people who have not been, or would not be, members of the founding organisations can identify with, work within and feel ownership and control of. It’s too soon after Bloomsday to lose our imaginative way with words. Or we could emulate broad formations elsewhere by avoiding organisational handles altogether and adopting general names like ‘Respect’ or simply ‘Die Linke’ (The Left). Read the rest of this entry »

Written by tomasoflatharta

Jun 22, 2011 at 2:54 am

Posted in General Election 2011, Ireland, People Before Profit, Socialist Party, United Left Alliance

ULA: What kind of party do we need?

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ULA: What kind of party do we need?

A guest post

Thoughts, notes, extracts and a bibliographical background to the discussion on 25th June

Introduction

The title of the second ‘plenary’ session at the ULA Forum on Saturday 25th June is ‘ULA: What kind of party do we need?. In itself this willingness to discuss such an essential yet sensitive subject is a measure of some flexibility on the far left. This series of pieces, chopped for daily doses, is meant to be a personal contribution to the discussion. Beginning with some extracts and a bibliography. Then, on following days, some general discussion of particular aspects of the new party we need. The bibliography will focus on debate within the marxist left. The reviews to follow, of various elements of organisation actually facing us – all those coming into the ULA – now, will, hopefully apply to anyone giving thought to the nature and structures of what we setting out to build. Some of this material will apply also to the related discussion scheduled for the afternoon workshop, ‘New Workers’ Parties – Lessons from Europe’.

There is already a large body of literature carrying the international debate on the marxist left around the related questions of left unity, left regroupment and refoundation, a New Left, left alliances and organisation (in particular ‘broad parties’ v. ‘revolutionary organisations’). This debate goes back to the emergence of the anti-capitalist movement and is related to the discussion of strategy in the new conditions. The new movement, the anti-war mobilisations, the collapse of stalinism and the accommodation of social democracy to neo-liberalism have opened up new opportunities for the radical and revolutionary left. The economic and financial tsunami of 2008 added a quickening urgency to opportunity and, in our own case, stepped on the gas which led to the formation of the ULA. Read the rest of this entry »

Written by tomasoflatharta

Jun 20, 2011 at 6:16 pm

Posted in Financial Crisis (September 2008 onwards), General Election 2011, International Political Analysis, Ireland, People Before Profit, Socialist Party, United Left Alliance

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