paign for Fair Votes'. Laird is joined in campaign by Roy - the Tory and Lord - ex-Governor of the Bank of The right wing on the AUEW executive are of course well aware of what is the 'political' purpose of the SDP the general campaign for proportional representaThe goal is to institutionalise a system of coalition government in Bri- of-Tory Frank Chapple puts the coalition issue openly and brutally. Laird and the SDPs backers in industry prefer a less abrasive approach. But the content is The The goal of such a business backed SDP campaign is made quite clear not -simply by the forces involved in it but cites, nortn also by te most senious journalsuc voices of British capitalism. For on this issue the two most widely read journals of British capital - the Economist and and the west. the Financial Times both speak with an identical voice no matter what their difBoth the sent.
Economist and the Financial Times endorsed Thatcher in the June election.
But both then went on to conclude by The Financial Times, in the special The Economist was even more unequivocal in its view. It anticipated Chapple's post-election analysis and quite explicitly called for a 'new division of British politics into two blocs -a dominant ory boc and a subordinate Labour-SDP-Liberal bloc. In its chief editorial in the last issue before election the economist noted: It is important that there should still be a believable and democratic lettforce in Parliament towards which by-elections and future general election can then swing. It is desirable that it should be of a sort that can form an effective parliamentary force with right-of-Foot Labour.
needs to tee secure enough at future by- and.general elections to help moderate Labour candidates to capture orv seats in the England and Scotland:
Labour should feel weak enough to give its help to the Alliance in the suburbs, south England, East Anglia Such a geographical coalition of a Southern Alliance and northern Labour seems fanciful at preThe worse Labour does in the and the better the Alliance does, the more possible such a desirable coalition of the left (and the dismantling of the Labour Party under its present constitution) will become.' Congress distancing themselves fro For the 40,000 stro Engineer's and Managers' Associati it entailed at its recent conference ur ing the TU to weaken its links w Labour and adopt 'realistic and pra tical policies which can be pursued w To show that it a proved of the TUC's new course t EMA invited Len Murray to addre their conference for the first time f eight years. Meanwhile the SDP is ste ping up its attempts to gain discussio with the unions and claims members the executive of sixteen trade unions At present, of course, those forc explicitly backing Labour-SDP coa tion politics are a minority within t trade union and Labour bureaucra But they are now very far from a sm minority. The EETU and the AUE right wings are powerful forces with the TUC and labour movement They have access to capitalist co have already created one new polit party in the SDP.
This drive to force Labour to acce coalition with the SDP-Liberals as only way forward, and to smash t links between the trade unions and t Labour Party, is the most powerful a concerted political attack mounted the labour movement for decades. It simply the political flip side of ti direct assault by Thatcher.
Socialist Action 28 October 1983
Socialist Action 28 October 1983.