Quote, Unquote
"There are plenty of reasons to dismiss political blogs as trivial or ephemeral, with a depressingly low standard of debate." says this near-blog. "Take a randomn visit to Harry's Place, which supports the Euston Manifesto and is regarded as one of the more significant and respectable examples of political blogging. You may be lucky to find a thoughtful piece about world events. Or you may find a bit of puerile sniping at Ken Livingstone, Polly Toynbee or George Galloway (all right. some people do deserve puerile sniping)".
"Even if you found a thoughtful piece, click on the 'comments' link (especially if it shows there are more than about thirty comments), and you'll find that only a couple of the early responses involve to-the-point criticism. Indeed, you'll be lucky if you don't find the comments descending into point-scoring, ad hominem attacks, apparently irrelevant asides (usually referring to separate arguments elsewhere on the site) and a good deal of personal abuse. It is unlikely to make you want to get involved."
The Best Is Yet To Come
The above is a quote from an article in the current issue of "Democratic Socialism" by Bernard Hughes. It also, of course, appears on the site to which I supplied my initial link. The article is entitled "Return to Euston", but it is a fun read on blogging on top of its analysis of the Euston Manifesto.
It supplies a great set of 44 mainly lefty links, so it has been placed straight into my "favorites" box. Whilst its "with-it" nature is shown in its definitions box on the "Decent Left", "Fisking", "Stoppers", "Muscular Liberals" and "Moonbat".
As a consequence of Bernard's strictures I will escue puerile sniping and stop calling the Crud the Crud. And I will no longer enter boxes crowded with more than 30 responses. (I must say that I soon noticed the point he makes.)
Why do I get involved in these things Bernard? Well it is easy after 18 years of bobbing up at down on the green benches in the Commons. At least I can now say what I want without having to catch someone's eye, even if I do receive less hits than past observations from those deserted green benches or from the even emptier press gallery.
Tuesday, January 09, 2007
Monday, January 08, 2007
Clicking for Democratic Socialism
Me and the ILP
Before I was ensnared by parliament, I spent a decade or so involved locally and nationally in the work of Independent Labour Publications (ILP). They published at least 60 articles of mine.
Although my links with them never entirely disappeared, I was invariably swamped by the usual M.P.s' passing trade. I soon, however, re-established closer contact with the ILP on retiring from parliament.
I am, therefore, pleased that my article "Iraq: The Third Big Issue" appears in the current issue of their journal "Democratic Socialism". I am equally pleased that it appears alongside such worthy contributions. The ILP prefers to present challenging material.
Peter and the Crud
The first person it challenges is me. I tend to have been using people's comment boxes to blow raspberry's at Jon Cruddas and his campaign for the Deputy Leadership of the Labour Party . Even christening him "The Crud". But now my old friend Barry Winter has set me thinking with both a serious interview with Jon and a thoughtful review of the pamphlet Jon wrote with John Harris, entitled "Fit for Purpose: a programme for Labour Renewal". Jon is using his campaign to centre upon a need to democratise and revitalise the internal life of the Labour Party. A point he hammers home by insisting that he is standing exclusively for Deputy Leader and not for Deputy Prime Minister.
We then have articles on the role of faith in public life, why anti-Americianism must not be a pillar of left-wing thinking, whether the Euston Manifesto is as new a political development as it initially appeared to be, plus how far the analysis by Compass in "The Good Society" was reflected on the fringes of Labour's Conference.
If that does not grab you, then what of its breathless tour of Labour Blogs?. That should get everyone clicking.
It is appropriate that my "Democratic Socialist" came through the letter box this morning, for I have arranged for Will Brown one of its regular writers to address our Local Labour Party Discussion Group this week-end on "Labour, the Left and the Leadership." I wonder what he will make of my "Will The Real Peter Hain Please Stand Up?".
Before I was ensnared by parliament, I spent a decade or so involved locally and nationally in the work of Independent Labour Publications (ILP). They published at least 60 articles of mine.
Although my links with them never entirely disappeared, I was invariably swamped by the usual M.P.s' passing trade. I soon, however, re-established closer contact with the ILP on retiring from parliament.
I am, therefore, pleased that my article "Iraq: The Third Big Issue" appears in the current issue of their journal "Democratic Socialism". I am equally pleased that it appears alongside such worthy contributions. The ILP prefers to present challenging material.
Peter and the Crud
The first person it challenges is me. I tend to have been using people's comment boxes to blow raspberry's at Jon Cruddas and his campaign for the Deputy Leadership of the Labour Party . Even christening him "The Crud". But now my old friend Barry Winter has set me thinking with both a serious interview with Jon and a thoughtful review of the pamphlet Jon wrote with John Harris, entitled "Fit for Purpose: a programme for Labour Renewal". Jon is using his campaign to centre upon a need to democratise and revitalise the internal life of the Labour Party. A point he hammers home by insisting that he is standing exclusively for Deputy Leader and not for Deputy Prime Minister.
We then have articles on the role of faith in public life, why anti-Americianism must not be a pillar of left-wing thinking, whether the Euston Manifesto is as new a political development as it initially appeared to be, plus how far the analysis by Compass in "The Good Society" was reflected on the fringes of Labour's Conference.
If that does not grab you, then what of its breathless tour of Labour Blogs?. That should get everyone clicking.
It is appropriate that my "Democratic Socialist" came through the letter box this morning, for I have arranged for Will Brown one of its regular writers to address our Local Labour Party Discussion Group this week-end on "Labour, the Left and the Leadership." I wonder what he will make of my "Will The Real Peter Hain Please Stand Up?".
Sunday, January 07, 2007
Who Will Be Taylor's Dummy?
The Other Matthew Taylor.
It isn't the Lib-Dem M.P. nor the Portsmouth footballer, bit this Matthew Taylor was Tony Blair's Chief Adviser on political strategy until recently. In an article in today's Observer he points out that in September he "was charged with developing a plan for a fundamental policy review to be overseen jointly by Downing Street and the Treasury." He only makes two points about the review, but they are enough to spread gloom and dispondency.
1. Its Grasp.
"It will grasp some tough nettles, envisaging a radically reformed central state - smaller, more strategic, less controlling, focused more on the causes of poverty, ignorance and sickness than the Sisyphean struggle to ameliorate their consequences"
That looks like kicking away more safety nets and passing the new plans over to the free market.
2. On the way to the Forum.
It will also make use of "a high profile citizens' forum."
Which sounds like more old-hat focus groups. The problem with New Labour is their trying to think of something that is still new.
Ye Passing Trade.
Taylor soon rushes on in his article to deal with the problems of the passing trade - Northern Ireland, Iraq, Palestine, Africa, Climate Change, NHS waiting lists and the in-your-face problem of ethics in public life. But he tells us that we can forget about academies and trust schools as these have all been sorted. I don't think so somehow.
Waiting for Gordon
It seems that when (or if?) Gordon takes over, he will have his pathway pre-determined. It is just going to be the heritage of old New Labour.
The problem with constructing a political straightjacket for Gordon, is that he knows that once he is in the job he can immediately burst free from it. The only fear I have is that it will be the type of straightjacket he always wanted and has helped shape himself. With Gordon it has always been a question of the ownership of the straightjacket and not thoughts of a Houdini act.
It isn't the Lib-Dem M.P. nor the Portsmouth footballer, bit this Matthew Taylor was Tony Blair's Chief Adviser on political strategy until recently. In an article in today's Observer he points out that in September he "was charged with developing a plan for a fundamental policy review to be overseen jointly by Downing Street and the Treasury." He only makes two points about the review, but they are enough to spread gloom and dispondency.
1. Its Grasp.
"It will grasp some tough nettles, envisaging a radically reformed central state - smaller, more strategic, less controlling, focused more on the causes of poverty, ignorance and sickness than the Sisyphean struggle to ameliorate their consequences"
That looks like kicking away more safety nets and passing the new plans over to the free market.
2. On the way to the Forum.
It will also make use of "a high profile citizens' forum."
Which sounds like more old-hat focus groups. The problem with New Labour is their trying to think of something that is still new.
Ye Passing Trade.
Taylor soon rushes on in his article to deal with the problems of the passing trade - Northern Ireland, Iraq, Palestine, Africa, Climate Change, NHS waiting lists and the in-your-face problem of ethics in public life. But he tells us that we can forget about academies and trust schools as these have all been sorted. I don't think so somehow.
Waiting for Gordon
It seems that when (or if?) Gordon takes over, he will have his pathway pre-determined. It is just going to be the heritage of old New Labour.
The problem with constructing a political straightjacket for Gordon, is that he knows that once he is in the job he can immediately burst free from it. The only fear I have is that it will be the type of straightjacket he always wanted and has helped shape himself. With Gordon it has always been a question of the ownership of the straightjacket and not thoughts of a Houdini act.
Thursday, January 04, 2007
How Do We Tackle That Delusion?
My Old Style Religion
In criticising those who draw their main argument for the existence of God from the scriptures, Richard Dawkins in his "The God Delusion" takes on those who claim that the Bible is the literal truth. He is so frustrated with the views expressed by such people, that he even doubts whether many of them can actually have studied the scriptures.
"Do these people never open the book that they believe is the literal truth?", he asks on page 94. He then goes on to spell out numbers of serious inconsistencies in its texts.
As I pointed out in "A Gentle Atheism" , I was an active Methodist in my youth. From at least 14 to 18, I went to Chapel 3 times each Sunday and during the week, especially to what was termed the Christian Endeavour. I became Secretary of the latter and once recognised that the preacher had picked a particular line of argument from the preface of a play by George Bernard Shaw!
The Methodism I was used to seldom took on the form of the evangelical brand which Dawkins is criticising within the above section of his book. Except that an occasional meeting would arise where efforts were made to get people to come forward to express their faith. These worried me and I would hold onto my seat to ensure that I would not be carried away by an emotioinal spasm against my better inclinations.
If someome had ever asked me what arguments I had for the existence of God, I don't know what I would have said. I listened to scripture readings, sang hymns (which I still enjoy doing) and heard sermons in which the scriptures were referred to. I even achieved a low level certificate in the scriptures.
But what struck me about the Dawkins quote is that it was correct about me as an individual, even if I was not really the sort of character that he was criticising. I did not read the Bible.
A God Read or A Good Read?
I happen to hold a list of the books I read over the first nine months of 1952 when I was 15 and partly 16. The list ended when I started work for the first time as a railway clerk. Neither the Bible, nor any works propounding the supposed truths of the scriptures make the list. My mother was as active in the Chapel as I was, initially going at my request and in a return to her own youth. She read three novels a week from the local library, but not the Bible or the like.
I read 50 books over the above period (outside of my school work and Sexton Blake booklets). 19 were by John Buchan. 8 were by George Bernard Shaw and were mainly single plays or collections of plays with prefaces. 3 by Conan Doyle. 2 by Henry Williamson. There were 18 others all by different authors. Some of the latter were plays or collections of plays by writers such as J.B Priestly and Oscar Wilde, whilst most others were novels and included George Orwell's "Animal Farm". The main non-fiction work was H.G. Well's "Short History of the World".
I remember starting to read the latter seated on the terraces at the Roker End of Sunderland's football ground waiting for the kick off. Many of the books I read were paperbacks often bought in Sunderland on the way to watch Shackleton play his magical soccer. Although the bulk of the John Buchan's were hardbacks in the Nelson series and were purchased at equivalent of almost 23p , two to three times the cost of most of the paperbacks.
So what room was there for God, apart from all that Chapel attending? Not much really.
Thinking of these things afterwards, I have felt that all that Chapel attending (for most of us) was more of a social activity than a religious one. This seemed to me to be the case in the 1992 General Election Campaign when I was one of the candidates who went to a hustings at the Evangelical Church in Clay Cross to answer questions on "moral" issues such as abortion and euthanasia. Each line I took upset the Church Elders, but most of the congregation that listened to me nodded kindly and I did not appear to be losing their votes. I suspect that as with my Methodism, their evangalism had more to do with sharing a social bond than from religious conviction.
If what I say is widespead, then perhaps involvement by atheists in social work would have more impact upon the behaviour of active Christians, Muslims and others than Dawkins barnstorming rationalism will. Perhaps socialisation and socialism are the cure for religious extremism.
In criticising those who draw their main argument for the existence of God from the scriptures, Richard Dawkins in his "The God Delusion" takes on those who claim that the Bible is the literal truth. He is so frustrated with the views expressed by such people, that he even doubts whether many of them can actually have studied the scriptures.
"Do these people never open the book that they believe is the literal truth?", he asks on page 94. He then goes on to spell out numbers of serious inconsistencies in its texts.
As I pointed out in "A Gentle Atheism" , I was an active Methodist in my youth. From at least 14 to 18, I went to Chapel 3 times each Sunday and during the week, especially to what was termed the Christian Endeavour. I became Secretary of the latter and once recognised that the preacher had picked a particular line of argument from the preface of a play by George Bernard Shaw!
The Methodism I was used to seldom took on the form of the evangelical brand which Dawkins is criticising within the above section of his book. Except that an occasional meeting would arise where efforts were made to get people to come forward to express their faith. These worried me and I would hold onto my seat to ensure that I would not be carried away by an emotioinal spasm against my better inclinations.
If someome had ever asked me what arguments I had for the existence of God, I don't know what I would have said. I listened to scripture readings, sang hymns (which I still enjoy doing) and heard sermons in which the scriptures were referred to. I even achieved a low level certificate in the scriptures.
But what struck me about the Dawkins quote is that it was correct about me as an individual, even if I was not really the sort of character that he was criticising. I did not read the Bible.
A God Read or A Good Read?
I happen to hold a list of the books I read over the first nine months of 1952 when I was 15 and partly 16. The list ended when I started work for the first time as a railway clerk. Neither the Bible, nor any works propounding the supposed truths of the scriptures make the list. My mother was as active in the Chapel as I was, initially going at my request and in a return to her own youth. She read three novels a week from the local library, but not the Bible or the like.
I read 50 books over the above period (outside of my school work and Sexton Blake booklets). 19 were by John Buchan. 8 were by George Bernard Shaw and were mainly single plays or collections of plays with prefaces. 3 by Conan Doyle. 2 by Henry Williamson. There were 18 others all by different authors. Some of the latter were plays or collections of plays by writers such as J.B Priestly and Oscar Wilde, whilst most others were novels and included George Orwell's "Animal Farm". The main non-fiction work was H.G. Well's "Short History of the World".
I remember starting to read the latter seated on the terraces at the Roker End of Sunderland's football ground waiting for the kick off. Many of the books I read were paperbacks often bought in Sunderland on the way to watch Shackleton play his magical soccer. Although the bulk of the John Buchan's were hardbacks in the Nelson series and were purchased at equivalent of almost 23p , two to three times the cost of most of the paperbacks.
So what room was there for God, apart from all that Chapel attending? Not much really.
Thinking of these things afterwards, I have felt that all that Chapel attending (for most of us) was more of a social activity than a religious one. This seemed to me to be the case in the 1992 General Election Campaign when I was one of the candidates who went to a hustings at the Evangelical Church in Clay Cross to answer questions on "moral" issues such as abortion and euthanasia. Each line I took upset the Church Elders, but most of the congregation that listened to me nodded kindly and I did not appear to be losing their votes. I suspect that as with my Methodism, their evangalism had more to do with sharing a social bond than from religious conviction.
If what I say is widespead, then perhaps involvement by atheists in social work would have more impact upon the behaviour of active Christians, Muslims and others than Dawkins barnstorming rationalism will. Perhaps socialisation and socialism are the cure for religious extremism.
Wednesday, January 03, 2007
All My Yesterdays
This gives access to a telling twenty minute film about Iraq made in 1953. Whilst it is a romanticised, sanitized British Pathe News "propoganda" film; it does show something of the great potential of Iraq then and now.
I undertook my National Service at the RAF Movements Unit in Basra in 1955 and 1956. The film shows the docks in Basra which I visited at least once a week. There is coverage of one of the railway staions in Baghdad. I visited the equivalent in Basra on almost a daily basis. The buses are of a style that is recognisable, whilst the plane shown at the start and the close is not unlike the RAF Hastings in which I flew into and out of Habbaniya. At the time Habbaniya was a huge RAF base close to Fallugah, containing some 3,000 troops.
When I arrived the British bases were British Crown Territory and were on land we held sovereignty over. Many Iraqis fear that there will be attempts by Britain and America to extend such practices into the future. It is important for us to show that when we go we do so fully.
Above all it is the people of Iraq who appear throughout the film, but not in the context in which I saw exploited labourers and people living in poverty. I attempted to explain some of this in the first half of the item I posted under the title "Then and Now".
I thank Iraqi Mojo for presenting this historical material. In April I flew the length of Iraq from Arbil in the north, past Baghdad and Basra. Whilst in 1956 as I flew to be demobbed, we went out over Iraqi Kurdistan then via Ankara. The closing and opening sequences of the film bring back these memories. In between, there is much more which transports me to my yesterdays.
I undertook my National Service at the RAF Movements Unit in Basra in 1955 and 1956. The film shows the docks in Basra which I visited at least once a week. There is coverage of one of the railway staions in Baghdad. I visited the equivalent in Basra on almost a daily basis. The buses are of a style that is recognisable, whilst the plane shown at the start and the close is not unlike the RAF Hastings in which I flew into and out of Habbaniya. At the time Habbaniya was a huge RAF base close to Fallugah, containing some 3,000 troops.
When I arrived the British bases were British Crown Territory and were on land we held sovereignty over. Many Iraqis fear that there will be attempts by Britain and America to extend such practices into the future. It is important for us to show that when we go we do so fully.
Above all it is the people of Iraq who appear throughout the film, but not in the context in which I saw exploited labourers and people living in poverty. I attempted to explain some of this in the first half of the item I posted under the title "Then and Now".
I thank Iraqi Mojo for presenting this historical material. In April I flew the length of Iraq from Arbil in the north, past Baghdad and Basra. Whilst in 1956 as I flew to be demobbed, we went out over Iraqi Kurdistan then via Ankara. The closing and opening sequences of the film bring back these memories. In between, there is much more which transports me to my yesterdays.
Tuesday, January 02, 2007
Hope Amidst Despair
Despair
I am not religious, but I am struck by the feeling and despair expressed in this song from Iraq. Here is a second presentation together with the words.
Hope
A high water mark of hope for Iraq occurred on May Day 1959 when over half a million marched in peace in Baghdad. The Iraqi population was less than 7 million at the time, spread from the mountains of Kurdistan in the north to the port of Basra in the south.
The celebrating of May Day reflected a strong secular, pro-democratic and human rights tradition. This was seen in some of the political parties of that time and in newspapers, women's organisations, youth and student bodies and the Trade Union Movement who had organised the event.
The tradition re-emerged immediately in the open following the 2003 invasion. The people involved had opposed invasion, but moved into the openings it had provided. Those who sulk in their tents get nowhere.
No Illusions
We are all aware of the desperately destructive and difficult circumstances which terror and turmoil have created in Iraq since the invasion. If we look back at what has happened for almost half a century after that great May day event, then it will make us shudder further.
Soon after the demonstration, the Government closed down Trade Union newpapers and arrested thousand of trade unionists. Back and forth, oppression kept re-emerging in a series of coups and counter-coups from 1963 to 1968. Finally the Baathists were in complete control and trade union oppression, imprisonment, brutuality and murder were more fully on the agenda, except (in degree) for a short period when Saddam Hussein courted the Soviet Union for its military assistance. But Saddam also picked up information from Stalinism on how to run State controlled Trade Unions.
The economic improvement which Iraq had seen from its growing oil wealth was sent sharply into reverse under the impact of the massive Iraq-Iran War from 1980 to 1988. In 1987 Saddam banned Trade Unions in the public sector which accounted for 80% of the economy. What remained was absorbed into a State run movement under the absolutist control of Chemical Ali.
In 1988, Saddam also started his campaign of genocide against the Kurds. Then with his invasion of Kuwait, UN economic sanctions further hit the condition of the Iraqi people.
The well being of Iraqis was further smashed by the destructions of the Gulf War and Saddam's subsequent massacres against the Shia and Kurds for rebelling against his rule. The Marsh Arabs were also made destitute by his actions in diverting the waters of the Tigris and Euphrates.
When the deaths from invasion, military excess and (above all) the terrorism directed at the Iraqi people are added to this picture, we have a situation that too many will turn away from in despair.
Who Do We Support?
We can start by indictating those forces we don't wish to associate with. These include criminal gangs, Al Qaeda in Iraq, religious extremists and Sunni and Shia terrorist groups. These are all brutalised by their experiences under Saddam. Neither can we associate with any Western interests looking for financial rip-offs in the oil industry or for military bases and footholds for the future. Nor can we be on the side of those who would Balkanise Iraq, falsely arguing that it would fit into neat Shia, Sunni and Kurdish packages.
What remains? Well there are those who work within the framework of the 1959 May Day tradition; even if it means little to them. These include those who organise for women's rights, student interests, facilities for young people, for jobs, for decent wages and conditions, for improved hospital and electricity supplies, for communal self-help and the like. You know what I am on about. It happens the whole world over in different forms.
It isn't easy to focus our attention where it is needed. Nor are the two types of world I have mentioned always separated from each other. Terrorist groups also try to muscle in on social welfare provisions and self help for their chosen peoples. But even (and especially) in Iraq there are many with alternative understandings. Lets work with those who work with each other often irrespective of religous sect, ethnic or national background, family or tribal links, sex or sexual orientation, race or creed.
We can start out with cries of despair, but we need to move on to what is Iraq's best hope.
I am not religious, but I am struck by the feeling and despair expressed in this song from Iraq. Here is a second presentation together with the words.
Hope
A high water mark of hope for Iraq occurred on May Day 1959 when over half a million marched in peace in Baghdad. The Iraqi population was less than 7 million at the time, spread from the mountains of Kurdistan in the north to the port of Basra in the south.
The celebrating of May Day reflected a strong secular, pro-democratic and human rights tradition. This was seen in some of the political parties of that time and in newspapers, women's organisations, youth and student bodies and the Trade Union Movement who had organised the event.
The tradition re-emerged immediately in the open following the 2003 invasion. The people involved had opposed invasion, but moved into the openings it had provided. Those who sulk in their tents get nowhere.
No Illusions
We are all aware of the desperately destructive and difficult circumstances which terror and turmoil have created in Iraq since the invasion. If we look back at what has happened for almost half a century after that great May day event, then it will make us shudder further.
Soon after the demonstration, the Government closed down Trade Union newpapers and arrested thousand of trade unionists. Back and forth, oppression kept re-emerging in a series of coups and counter-coups from 1963 to 1968. Finally the Baathists were in complete control and trade union oppression, imprisonment, brutuality and murder were more fully on the agenda, except (in degree) for a short period when Saddam Hussein courted the Soviet Union for its military assistance. But Saddam also picked up information from Stalinism on how to run State controlled Trade Unions.
The economic improvement which Iraq had seen from its growing oil wealth was sent sharply into reverse under the impact of the massive Iraq-Iran War from 1980 to 1988. In 1987 Saddam banned Trade Unions in the public sector which accounted for 80% of the economy. What remained was absorbed into a State run movement under the absolutist control of Chemical Ali.
In 1988, Saddam also started his campaign of genocide against the Kurds. Then with his invasion of Kuwait, UN economic sanctions further hit the condition of the Iraqi people.
The well being of Iraqis was further smashed by the destructions of the Gulf War and Saddam's subsequent massacres against the Shia and Kurds for rebelling against his rule. The Marsh Arabs were also made destitute by his actions in diverting the waters of the Tigris and Euphrates.
When the deaths from invasion, military excess and (above all) the terrorism directed at the Iraqi people are added to this picture, we have a situation that too many will turn away from in despair.
Who Do We Support?
We can start by indictating those forces we don't wish to associate with. These include criminal gangs, Al Qaeda in Iraq, religious extremists and Sunni and Shia terrorist groups. These are all brutalised by their experiences under Saddam. Neither can we associate with any Western interests looking for financial rip-offs in the oil industry or for military bases and footholds for the future. Nor can we be on the side of those who would Balkanise Iraq, falsely arguing that it would fit into neat Shia, Sunni and Kurdish packages.
What remains? Well there are those who work within the framework of the 1959 May Day tradition; even if it means little to them. These include those who organise for women's rights, student interests, facilities for young people, for jobs, for decent wages and conditions, for improved hospital and electricity supplies, for communal self-help and the like. You know what I am on about. It happens the whole world over in different forms.
It isn't easy to focus our attention where it is needed. Nor are the two types of world I have mentioned always separated from each other. Terrorist groups also try to muscle in on social welfare provisions and self help for their chosen peoples. But even (and especially) in Iraq there are many with alternative understandings. Lets work with those who work with each other often irrespective of religous sect, ethnic or national background, family or tribal links, sex or sexual orientation, race or creed.
We can start out with cries of despair, but we need to move on to what is Iraq's best hope.
Monday, January 01, 2007
That Was The Year That Was
These are my personal highlights of the previous year. As my main careers were as a Lecturer in Politics and Industrial Relations then as an M.P., I now enjoy what is something of a synthesis between education and politics. It can be called "political education". I also have a continuing interest in the two subjects I studied at University - philosophy and (again ) politics. So Political Theory is that particular synthesis. Retirement also gives me the scope to follow some of my other intests more fully, including watching football. Above all, it has helped me to rediscover that I have a family.
1. Conference Visits. I went to a good number of Conferences over the year. They were mainly held in London, starting with the Fabians and ending with the Society for the Study of Labour History.
2. Attending and Organising Meetings. I seem to have been doing these things for most of my life. Early in the year I was made Political Education Officer for my local Labour Party. I organise monthly Sunday evening discussion meetings, which are held at the Dronfield Contact Club. Speakers have included past and present LabourM.P.s. I have also attended local Fabian, Constituency Labour Party, local Branch and Student Labour meetings and have addressed numbers of these. I also had the privilege of attending and addressing the Ruskin College Fellowship. As an ex-Ruskin Student, I am also a member of the Fellowship.
3. Trips South to meet the Family. Ann and I made numbers of visits to London, staying in hotels or with our son Stephen, daughter-in-law Rebecca and grandson Joseph. We also visited our daughter Joanne who works in Crawley. She also joined us in London for key get togethers such as Joseph's first birthday and my 70th.
4. Visit to Iraqi Kurdistan. With a group from both Labour Friends of Iraq (LFIQ) and the TUC's Iraq Solildarity Committee, I visited the Kurdish north of Iraq. Our hosts were the Kurdish Workers' Federation. Trade Unionists from the rest of Iraq came to meet us and presented me with a (much treasured) certificate of honourary membership of the Iraqi Federation of Trade Unions. With LFIQ, I also attended meetings in the Commons which are the only times I now revisit my former workplace.
5. Holiday in Turkey. Ann and I went on a memorable holiday to Turkey. When we arrived we joined a coach tour which included Anzacs, North Americans, an Indonesian and only one other British couple. Most of us keep in touch via circulated e-mails. We visited ancient and modern Turkey. It was quite an experience, especially as I previously had just been to Iraqi Kurdistan on Turkey's southern border.
6. Stage Productions and the Cinema. With Ann, these ranged from musicals such as "The Producers", plays such as "Embers" with Jeremy Irons, an opera Turandot and a concert with Joan Baez. The ones I have mentioned were first rate. We only made one visit to the cinema to see a memorable Iranian film "Offside".
7. Spectator and Fantasy Sport. The above film is about women in Iran who wish to attend football matches, but are banned by the authorities. I have a team in the Daily Telegraph Fantasy Football League whom I named after the main character in the film, called "Akrams Dream". Our son also runs a Fantasy League for his work mates and myself. I have also attended Rugby League games with him. The highlight was the Rugby League Cup Final at Twickenham. I also saw a range of football matches, mainly local. The greatest of all being my 60th Anniversary visit to see a Sunderland home game, and a 146th Anniverary match between the two oldest teams in the world - Hallam FC 1. Sheffield FC 3.
8. Home Pastimes. I list the best I have come across in each category in the year -
a. Book : Paul Foot's "The Vote - How it was won and how it was undermined."
b. Magazine : New Scientist's 50th Anniversary Special.
c. Double DVD : The Ramallah Concert by the West-Eastern Divan Orchestra.
d. CD Set : Barenboim - Beethoven's Nine Symphonies (Warner).
e. TV Programme : Bruce Springsteen's "We Shall Overcome/The Seeger Sessions".
f. Radio : Radio 3 morning programmes listened to when in the bathroom.
g. Via PC : Little Atoms interviews on Resonance FM 104.4.
h. Scrabble : Ann and I play regularly. She wins at least 2 to 1. I managed a tie last time.
9. Blogging and Surfing. This blog was a brilliant present from our son for my 70th Birthday. When he showed the blog to me it contained the initial two posts taken from earlier material of mine which had been published, plus my photo which he had just taken. Until very recently, I did not know how to post items and they were all placed for me by Stephen from attachments I had sent him. I have now acquired further limited skills and this (and the last three posts) have been submitted directly. I hope now to provide material both an a more regular basis and in shorter forms. The importance to me of surfing the net is explained in the postscipt. My blog "From Beano to Keono" has been republished in a four page spread in the Sunderland independent and prize winning football fanzine "A Love Supreme".
10. Happy Xmas. The whole family were home for Xmas. Nothing was better.
POSTSCIPT. The question arises as to whether I miss being an M.P. From the above, it should be clear that I don't. I meet most of the people I was close to through my work with LFIQ and at meetings and Conferences. Although being an M.P. was an important part of my life, I can only think of two things I regret in departing . First, I no longer have access to the telling provisions of the House of Commons Library and its expert Reseachers. Secondly, I enjoyed the discipline of writing a fortnightly syndicated column for three local free newspapers. On the other hand, surfing the net and blogging are great substitutes for these bits I missed. It helps that Dave Anderson the M.P. for Blaydon (a newly elected M.P.) spontaneously decided that he would work in the two areas that were my main final parliamentary commitments - progress in Northern Ireland and LFIQ's interests. Otherwise, I might have felt quilty about leaving and deserting the causes I pursued. But I now know that Dave will automatically cover these matters and will probably do so more effectively.
1. Conference Visits. I went to a good number of Conferences over the year. They were mainly held in London, starting with the Fabians and ending with the Society for the Study of Labour History.
2. Attending and Organising Meetings. I seem to have been doing these things for most of my life. Early in the year I was made Political Education Officer for my local Labour Party. I organise monthly Sunday evening discussion meetings, which are held at the Dronfield Contact Club. Speakers have included past and present LabourM.P.s. I have also attended local Fabian, Constituency Labour Party, local Branch and Student Labour meetings and have addressed numbers of these. I also had the privilege of attending and addressing the Ruskin College Fellowship. As an ex-Ruskin Student, I am also a member of the Fellowship.
3. Trips South to meet the Family. Ann and I made numbers of visits to London, staying in hotels or with our son Stephen, daughter-in-law Rebecca and grandson Joseph. We also visited our daughter Joanne who works in Crawley. She also joined us in London for key get togethers such as Joseph's first birthday and my 70th.
4. Visit to Iraqi Kurdistan. With a group from both Labour Friends of Iraq (LFIQ) and the TUC's Iraq Solildarity Committee, I visited the Kurdish north of Iraq. Our hosts were the Kurdish Workers' Federation. Trade Unionists from the rest of Iraq came to meet us and presented me with a (much treasured) certificate of honourary membership of the Iraqi Federation of Trade Unions. With LFIQ, I also attended meetings in the Commons which are the only times I now revisit my former workplace.
5. Holiday in Turkey. Ann and I went on a memorable holiday to Turkey. When we arrived we joined a coach tour which included Anzacs, North Americans, an Indonesian and only one other British couple. Most of us keep in touch via circulated e-mails. We visited ancient and modern Turkey. It was quite an experience, especially as I previously had just been to Iraqi Kurdistan on Turkey's southern border.
6. Stage Productions and the Cinema. With Ann, these ranged from musicals such as "The Producers", plays such as "Embers" with Jeremy Irons, an opera Turandot and a concert with Joan Baez. The ones I have mentioned were first rate. We only made one visit to the cinema to see a memorable Iranian film "Offside".
7. Spectator and Fantasy Sport. The above film is about women in Iran who wish to attend football matches, but are banned by the authorities. I have a team in the Daily Telegraph Fantasy Football League whom I named after the main character in the film, called "Akrams Dream". Our son also runs a Fantasy League for his work mates and myself. I have also attended Rugby League games with him. The highlight was the Rugby League Cup Final at Twickenham. I also saw a range of football matches, mainly local. The greatest of all being my 60th Anniversary visit to see a Sunderland home game, and a 146th Anniverary match between the two oldest teams in the world - Hallam FC 1. Sheffield FC 3.
8. Home Pastimes. I list the best I have come across in each category in the year -
a. Book : Paul Foot's "The Vote - How it was won and how it was undermined."
b. Magazine : New Scientist's 50th Anniversary Special.
c. Double DVD : The Ramallah Concert by the West-Eastern Divan Orchestra.
d. CD Set : Barenboim - Beethoven's Nine Symphonies (Warner).
e. TV Programme : Bruce Springsteen's "We Shall Overcome/The Seeger Sessions".
f. Radio : Radio 3 morning programmes listened to when in the bathroom.
g. Via PC : Little Atoms interviews on Resonance FM 104.4.
h. Scrabble : Ann and I play regularly. She wins at least 2 to 1. I managed a tie last time.
9. Blogging and Surfing. This blog was a brilliant present from our son for my 70th Birthday. When he showed the blog to me it contained the initial two posts taken from earlier material of mine which had been published, plus my photo which he had just taken. Until very recently, I did not know how to post items and they were all placed for me by Stephen from attachments I had sent him. I have now acquired further limited skills and this (and the last three posts) have been submitted directly. I hope now to provide material both an a more regular basis and in shorter forms. The importance to me of surfing the net is explained in the postscipt. My blog "From Beano to Keono" has been republished in a four page spread in the Sunderland independent and prize winning football fanzine "A Love Supreme".
10. Happy Xmas. The whole family were home for Xmas. Nothing was better.
POSTSCIPT. The question arises as to whether I miss being an M.P. From the above, it should be clear that I don't. I meet most of the people I was close to through my work with LFIQ and at meetings and Conferences. Although being an M.P. was an important part of my life, I can only think of two things I regret in departing . First, I no longer have access to the telling provisions of the House of Commons Library and its expert Reseachers. Secondly, I enjoyed the discipline of writing a fortnightly syndicated column for three local free newspapers. On the other hand, surfing the net and blogging are great substitutes for these bits I missed. It helps that Dave Anderson the M.P. for Blaydon (a newly elected M.P.) spontaneously decided that he would work in the two areas that were my main final parliamentary commitments - progress in Northern Ireland and LFIQ's interests. Otherwise, I might have felt quilty about leaving and deserting the causes I pursued. But I now know that Dave will automatically cover these matters and will probably do so more effectively.
Sunday, December 31, 2006
Just In Time - Good News in 2006.
Trade unions have always needed to develop contervailing powers to that of capital at the levels at which capital itself pulls its major levers. This came to be done reasonably well in Britain on the national stage, although Thatcherism as consolidated by New Labourism set the clock back.
But with the continuing growth of the power of capital at supranational and international levels, trade unionism now needs to expand to fresh levels. A great deal of dedicated work is already done in developing international links by numbers of individual trade unions in this country and elsewhere. The work of the International Committees of our own TUC and of similar bodies is to be supported and encouraged. There also already exists international structures such as those of the International Confederation of Free Trade Unions.
This news, however, that British, American and German Trade Union are moving to create a 6.3 million strong international union helps to take us into the essential next stage.
I realise that it is easier and more effective to base such a structure initially on Trade Unions in developed nations. But as a sign that such a form of Trade Unionism will need to embrace deprived nations, I hope that thought will be given to drawing in at least one Trade Union Movement which speaks for those at the real hard end of developments.
My suggestion? Derek Simpson and others working nobley for this new project, could do worse than contact the General Federation of Iraqi Workers and the comrades who work with them in the Kurdistan Workers' Syndicates in Iraqi Kurdistan.
Everyone involved could be onto a winner.
But with the continuing growth of the power of capital at supranational and international levels, trade unionism now needs to expand to fresh levels. A great deal of dedicated work is already done in developing international links by numbers of individual trade unions in this country and elsewhere. The work of the International Committees of our own TUC and of similar bodies is to be supported and encouraged. There also already exists international structures such as those of the International Confederation of Free Trade Unions.
This news, however, that British, American and German Trade Union are moving to create a 6.3 million strong international union helps to take us into the essential next stage.
I realise that it is easier and more effective to base such a structure initially on Trade Unions in developed nations. But as a sign that such a form of Trade Unionism will need to embrace deprived nations, I hope that thought will be given to drawing in at least one Trade Union Movement which speaks for those at the real hard end of developments.
My suggestion? Derek Simpson and others working nobley for this new project, could do worse than contact the General Federation of Iraqi Workers and the comrades who work with them in the Kurdistan Workers' Syndicates in Iraqi Kurdistan.
Everyone involved could be onto a winner.
Friday, December 29, 2006
When Is Second Best?
Anniversary Time
Whilst early forms of football were played in China 2000 years ago and in many other places subsequently, the two existing soccer teams which have the longest continuous existence are Sheffield FC (founded in 1857) and Hallam FC (founded in 1860).
As both Clubs are in the Sheffield area, they played each other in an initial challenge match on Boxing Day 1860 on Hallam's ground. Both teams now play in the Northern Counties East League, so where better to play each other in 2006 than on boxing day at Hallam itself? This splendid 146th annivery game was even played on the ground where the teams first met, for this has been Hallam's home ever since their inception.
Thanks to fellow Sheffield FC supporter Tom giving me a lift in his car, I went to see this historic contest. It was our first visit to Hallam's ground, although I used to live within a couple of miles of it at a time when I never even knew of the teams' existence.
I am now lucky enough to live only a 15 minute walk away from the ground which Sheffield FC moved into in 2001. In contrast to Hallam, Sheffield's Bright Finance Stadium (formerly the Coach and Horses Ground named after the neighbouring pub) is the first ground which Sheffield FC have ever completely owned.
Whilst 8 of my past posted items have covered reports of this season's Sheffield FC home games the game at Hallam is my first ever away visit. And what a venue.
The Perfect Setting
The ground is beautifully situated, surrounded by stone walls and with stone built houses nearbye which blend into the green of the neighbouring countryside.
The pitch is what can kindly be called "undulating" and has a significant slope from one goal to the other. You can imagine the gentlemen of 1860 trying out their newly acquired football skills on the hallowed turf. There would have been a rope for a cross bar, with the players in trousers which looked rather like the Long Johns I had put on to keep out the cold; plus at least a sprinkling of fine handlebar moustaches.
Soccer was not then what it is now - mainly a spectator sport. It was for the privileged few who could afford the fees to join a Club at which they could arrange to play football. So matches took on the form of the married man playing the single men. The 1860 challenge match (the first Club contest and the first ever derby) would set up a pattern elsewhere that would transform their initial objectives, ushering in mass working class crowds and teams of professional players normally from the same background and restricted to being paid at a maximum wage ceiling.
Today we have moved to a further stage and are dominated by Murdoch and Sky TV and (at the top end) with the millions shelled out by Abramovich and company. Unless, of course, we also discover as I have by accident, the living roots of the game.
Hallam's ground is certainly a stark contrast to Old Trafford and the like. It even has a little hillock which runs down sharply to a corner flag. The corner taker has to run down it and try to propel the ball into the danger area. It was an art which Sheffield FC (and I imagine all other away teams) have not mastered.
Hallam FC's fine web site is worth visiting here. See the link to two videos of extracts from games, which show the classic setting which I have attempted to describe.
Hitting The Bulldozer for Six
Yeovil (when a non-league team) had a famous slope on their ground as if the pitch had been tipped up sideways. Although it gave them a great home advantage and they captured some famous League scalps in the FA Cup, they eventually brought in the bulldozers to flatten it. So why don't Hallam do the same?
First, it would be an act of vandalism, for the ground is living history. Secondly, they probably can't afford it and would have to demolish high stone walls for access. Finally, it wouldn't just mess up ye olde football, there is a longer history at stake.
Hallam was first founded as a Cricket Club way back in 1804 and the ground doubles as a cricket pitch. There is a batting area neatly rolled out just past one of the football touch lines. Further over there is a score board and a pavillion. When the football season is over, the area of the football field doubles as part of the cricket outfield.
Its cricket status also accounts for the netting round the outsides of the ground. For it is much more problematic in a game if a cricket ball disappears, then if the same happens to a football.
Sheffield United's ground at Bramall Lane used to have similar characteristics. When I first saw them play in a mid-week match against Arsenal in the 1965-66 season, Bramall Lane had spectators on three sides of the ground only. There was a Hallam style score board and pavilion in the distance, but all on a grander scale. Yorkshire County Cricket Club played matches there and it had even hosted some test matches. It was only if the three sides of the ground were full, that latecomers (in the days of standing) were forced into the pavilion side of the ground.
Appropriately, George Eastham was playing for Arsenal on my first visit. He was the player whose legal action helped to smash the maximum wage provision and lead us into the modern era of the game, with sky high wages for some.
When Sheffield United modernised, they sent in the bulldozers and built their main stand on top of the wicket. I much preferred games in the atmosphere of the three sided ground at Bramall Lane and now only tend to go there if my beloved Sunderland are playing.
Sunderland's first choice strip is basically the same as Sheffield United's . Whilst when Sunderland were in the old Division 1 (then the top level of English football) they went down 2-1 on Yeovil's slope in the FA Cup in 1949. When I watched them the week before defeat Derby 2-1, (with another magical display from Shackleton) I never dreamt that a humiliation was only 7 days away. So perhaps Yeovil was a place where the bulldozers arrived too late!
The Game
350 spectators turned up for the game. This was the second largest crowd of the season so far for a Northern Counties match. The top crowd being at the equivalent fixture on Sheffield FC's ground, when 575 turned up. For my report on that one see my post of 18 October entitled "Ye Olde Footy Derby".
It was a large attendance partly because Boxing Day is a good day for crowds anywhere. Partly because Sheffield FC's leading position is adding to their following. And partly because some of us are suckers for history.
Hot drinks and food sold well, whilst the bar in the Club House was full before the kick-off and at half-time.
Tom and I tucked in overlooking the Sheffield FC dug-out near the half way line and had a fine view of proceedings. After 6 minutes James Tevendale, who played for Sheffield FC last season, broke down the slope and the left wing to put in a dangerous cross which Pete Davey turned into his own net. But Sheffield soon started to control the game.
Our Manager, Dave McCarthy played his three main strikers. Gary Townsend (as an attacking left side midfielder), David Wilkins (our recent signing, whom we all know as Wilko) and Vill Powell (an earlier signing from our rivals, Retford Town). It was Powell who had the chances. Two of them were sent wide, but he scored with a fine header and a powerful penalty.
The goal of the game, however, came from Chris Dolby. His skyward lob dropping exactly behind the goalkeeper who had only moved a few yards from his line.
A 3-1 win was was fine for Sheffield who have now won 7 League games in a row. Tom has seen the last 4 of these, his first ever Sheffield FC games.
Post Mortem
The kick off had been at noon and as Tom drove us back after the game we travelled directly past Bramall Lane where the crowd was moving in for the 3 pm kick off against Manchester City. I thought poor souls, not only did they experience a 1-0 defeat but they missed out on a chuck of the real history of their game.
For whilst Hallam are only the second oldest team in the world, they do have something that the oldest team can't brag about - the oldest ground. So they aren't only second best.
Whilst early forms of football were played in China 2000 years ago and in many other places subsequently, the two existing soccer teams which have the longest continuous existence are Sheffield FC (founded in 1857) and Hallam FC (founded in 1860).
As both Clubs are in the Sheffield area, they played each other in an initial challenge match on Boxing Day 1860 on Hallam's ground. Both teams now play in the Northern Counties East League, so where better to play each other in 2006 than on boxing day at Hallam itself? This splendid 146th annivery game was even played on the ground where the teams first met, for this has been Hallam's home ever since their inception.
Thanks to fellow Sheffield FC supporter Tom giving me a lift in his car, I went to see this historic contest. It was our first visit to Hallam's ground, although I used to live within a couple of miles of it at a time when I never even knew of the teams' existence.
I am now lucky enough to live only a 15 minute walk away from the ground which Sheffield FC moved into in 2001. In contrast to Hallam, Sheffield's Bright Finance Stadium (formerly the Coach and Horses Ground named after the neighbouring pub) is the first ground which Sheffield FC have ever completely owned.
Whilst 8 of my past posted items have covered reports of this season's Sheffield FC home games the game at Hallam is my first ever away visit. And what a venue.
The Perfect Setting
The ground is beautifully situated, surrounded by stone walls and with stone built houses nearbye which blend into the green of the neighbouring countryside.
The pitch is what can kindly be called "undulating" and has a significant slope from one goal to the other. You can imagine the gentlemen of 1860 trying out their newly acquired football skills on the hallowed turf. There would have been a rope for a cross bar, with the players in trousers which looked rather like the Long Johns I had put on to keep out the cold; plus at least a sprinkling of fine handlebar moustaches.
Soccer was not then what it is now - mainly a spectator sport. It was for the privileged few who could afford the fees to join a Club at which they could arrange to play football. So matches took on the form of the married man playing the single men. The 1860 challenge match (the first Club contest and the first ever derby) would set up a pattern elsewhere that would transform their initial objectives, ushering in mass working class crowds and teams of professional players normally from the same background and restricted to being paid at a maximum wage ceiling.
Today we have moved to a further stage and are dominated by Murdoch and Sky TV and (at the top end) with the millions shelled out by Abramovich and company. Unless, of course, we also discover as I have by accident, the living roots of the game.
Hallam's ground is certainly a stark contrast to Old Trafford and the like. It even has a little hillock which runs down sharply to a corner flag. The corner taker has to run down it and try to propel the ball into the danger area. It was an art which Sheffield FC (and I imagine all other away teams) have not mastered.
Hallam FC's fine web site is worth visiting here. See the link to two videos of extracts from games, which show the classic setting which I have attempted to describe.
Hitting The Bulldozer for Six
Yeovil (when a non-league team) had a famous slope on their ground as if the pitch had been tipped up sideways. Although it gave them a great home advantage and they captured some famous League scalps in the FA Cup, they eventually brought in the bulldozers to flatten it. So why don't Hallam do the same?
First, it would be an act of vandalism, for the ground is living history. Secondly, they probably can't afford it and would have to demolish high stone walls for access. Finally, it wouldn't just mess up ye olde football, there is a longer history at stake.
Hallam was first founded as a Cricket Club way back in 1804 and the ground doubles as a cricket pitch. There is a batting area neatly rolled out just past one of the football touch lines. Further over there is a score board and a pavillion. When the football season is over, the area of the football field doubles as part of the cricket outfield.
Its cricket status also accounts for the netting round the outsides of the ground. For it is much more problematic in a game if a cricket ball disappears, then if the same happens to a football.
Sheffield United's ground at Bramall Lane used to have similar characteristics. When I first saw them play in a mid-week match against Arsenal in the 1965-66 season, Bramall Lane had spectators on three sides of the ground only. There was a Hallam style score board and pavilion in the distance, but all on a grander scale. Yorkshire County Cricket Club played matches there and it had even hosted some test matches. It was only if the three sides of the ground were full, that latecomers (in the days of standing) were forced into the pavilion side of the ground.
Appropriately, George Eastham was playing for Arsenal on my first visit. He was the player whose legal action helped to smash the maximum wage provision and lead us into the modern era of the game, with sky high wages for some.
When Sheffield United modernised, they sent in the bulldozers and built their main stand on top of the wicket. I much preferred games in the atmosphere of the three sided ground at Bramall Lane and now only tend to go there if my beloved Sunderland are playing.
Sunderland's first choice strip is basically the same as Sheffield United's . Whilst when Sunderland were in the old Division 1 (then the top level of English football) they went down 2-1 on Yeovil's slope in the FA Cup in 1949. When I watched them the week before defeat Derby 2-1, (with another magical display from Shackleton) I never dreamt that a humiliation was only 7 days away. So perhaps Yeovil was a place where the bulldozers arrived too late!
The Game
350 spectators turned up for the game. This was the second largest crowd of the season so far for a Northern Counties match. The top crowd being at the equivalent fixture on Sheffield FC's ground, when 575 turned up. For my report on that one see my post of 18 October entitled "Ye Olde Footy Derby".
It was a large attendance partly because Boxing Day is a good day for crowds anywhere. Partly because Sheffield FC's leading position is adding to their following. And partly because some of us are suckers for history.
Hot drinks and food sold well, whilst the bar in the Club House was full before the kick-off and at half-time.
Tom and I tucked in overlooking the Sheffield FC dug-out near the half way line and had a fine view of proceedings. After 6 minutes James Tevendale, who played for Sheffield FC last season, broke down the slope and the left wing to put in a dangerous cross which Pete Davey turned into his own net. But Sheffield soon started to control the game.
Our Manager, Dave McCarthy played his three main strikers. Gary Townsend (as an attacking left side midfielder), David Wilkins (our recent signing, whom we all know as Wilko) and Vill Powell (an earlier signing from our rivals, Retford Town). It was Powell who had the chances. Two of them were sent wide, but he scored with a fine header and a powerful penalty.
The goal of the game, however, came from Chris Dolby. His skyward lob dropping exactly behind the goalkeeper who had only moved a few yards from his line.
A 3-1 win was was fine for Sheffield who have now won 7 League games in a row. Tom has seen the last 4 of these, his first ever Sheffield FC games.
Post Mortem
The kick off had been at noon and as Tom drove us back after the game we travelled directly past Bramall Lane where the crowd was moving in for the 3 pm kick off against Manchester City. I thought poor souls, not only did they experience a 1-0 defeat but they missed out on a chuck of the real history of their game.
For whilst Hallam are only the second oldest team in the world, they do have something that the oldest team can't brag about - the oldest ground. So they aren't only second best.
Thursday, December 28, 2006
Those Were The Days
"A Love Supreme" is the award winning Sunderland Football Fanzine. In its current issue (No. 152) it has re-printed a slightly edited version of my earlier blog item which I had called
"From Beano To Keano."
It is beautifully presented, using the general title of this blog. "Three Score Years and Ten".
First, as part 1 there is a double page spread covering my first visit to Sunderland's former ground at Roker Park in 1946, headed "The Beano Years". It includes a photo of Len Shackleton, the front page of a Beano and a picture of the ground. It is given the appearance of a past old black and white film.
The part 2 double pager bursts into technicolour, with a set of equivalent photos for "The Keano Years." It centres upon my 60th anniversary visit to Sunderland's modern ground at the Stadium of Light.
My thanks go to Martyn McFadden, the editor, and his team. If my memory serves me correctly, nearly 20 years ago I addressed a meeting in Birkenhead against the Poll Tax which Martyn's father organised. So it is all power to the McFaddens.
I have had another thought about my 60th anniversary visit to see Sunderland play. If at my very first visit in 1946, a 70 year old man (the equivalent of me today) had been next to me and it was his 60th anniversary visit, then he would first have seen Sunderland play on its Newcastle Road ground in the first ever season they wore red and white stripes. The match would have been in pre-League days and would have been an FA Cup first qualifying round game against Morpeth Harriers. We were 2-0 down at half-time, but went on to win 7-2.
Those were the days.
"From Beano To Keano."
It is beautifully presented, using the general title of this blog. "Three Score Years and Ten".
First, as part 1 there is a double page spread covering my first visit to Sunderland's former ground at Roker Park in 1946, headed "The Beano Years". It includes a photo of Len Shackleton, the front page of a Beano and a picture of the ground. It is given the appearance of a past old black and white film.
The part 2 double pager bursts into technicolour, with a set of equivalent photos for "The Keano Years." It centres upon my 60th anniversary visit to Sunderland's modern ground at the Stadium of Light.
My thanks go to Martyn McFadden, the editor, and his team. If my memory serves me correctly, nearly 20 years ago I addressed a meeting in Birkenhead against the Poll Tax which Martyn's father organised. So it is all power to the McFaddens.
I have had another thought about my 60th anniversary visit to see Sunderland play. If at my very first visit in 1946, a 70 year old man (the equivalent of me today) had been next to me and it was his 60th anniversary visit, then he would first have seen Sunderland play on its Newcastle Road ground in the first ever season they wore red and white stripes. The match would have been in pre-League days and would have been an FA Cup first qualifying round game against Morpeth Harriers. We were 2-0 down at half-time, but went on to win 7-2.
Those were the days.
Sunday, December 24, 2006
A Sobering Game
The Festive Season
Sponsors provided free mulled wine and mince pies for Sheffield FC's pre-Xmas game against Shirebrook Town. As a result, the Coach and Houses pub next to the ground did less trade than usual for this match. This was fine for those of us who prefer to select from the pub's five real ales, as we avoided the usual crush at the bar.
Our family are home for Xmas, so our son came with me for the game. The three bits of local knowledge I gave him instructions upon were all blown apart.
First, I claimed that it was inevitable that the ball would repeatedly be kicked out of the ground - into the car park, the main road, the field from which a horse normally overlooks the proceedings and the wooded area behind one of the goals. It looked like I was completely wrong, until a clearance finally made it towards the main road.
Secondly, I was adament that Dave McCarthy (the Sheffield FC Manager) would do what he always does and use all his three possible substitutions. For he likes to use as many of his squad as he can in order to keep them happy and on the books. But this also did not happen.
Finally, I said that we should slip out of a side gate to the pub for a half-time drink. The gate was sure to have been opened, as the Club now owns the pub. But when we made our way to the gate just before the half-time whistle, we found that it was still locked. We had to go the long way round. Perhaps we were expected to stay and make sure that all the mince pies were eaten up.
It was, however, a chatty Xmas atmosphere when we finally made it to the pub. I discovered a Shirebrook Town supporter who was a fellow refugee from the North East and had played for my father's old team, Stanley United.
Next I talked to a Sheffield FC supporter from Nottingham, who was on our side because his son (Jon Boulter) is our left back. Earlier Jon was a worthwhile utility player, then he started to be selected for his best spot.
Before and after the match, my son and I also met up with Tom and his wife Janet who are from Chesterfield. I had met Tom intitially at out last home game against Broddy (see my last posted item), but I didn't recognise him immediately this time, as he was wearing an Irish Football shirt. It turns out that his mother is from Dublin. My own links with Ireland are legion.
Tom is a newcomer to Sheffield FC games, but he has already chalked up three matches in a row, including a visit to the away game at Sutton. He claimed that we were lucky to win 2-1 at Sutton. They dominated the game and could have scored a few. But Sheffield moved in to steal the game with two late strikes.
I have now arranged for him to give me a lift to the Boxing Day fixture at Hallam. It is being held on the 146th Anniversary of the teams' first clash at Hallam on Boxing Day 1860. It is the oldest derby in the world and is played on their original ground , which is the oldest existing ground in the world. All of this is something that money can't buy - as long as no-one tells Abramovich.
Top Versus Bottom
Shirebrook Town are bottom of the League, having only won one match out of the previous 16. So when the game started to take on the characteristics of our last 5-0 home win over Broddy, I expected the inevitable. But I was wrong again.
Sheffield FC had the same 1-0 lead at half-time, as against Broddy. We then rushed into continuous attacking from the start of the second half and awaited the goal rush.
But Shirebrook hadn't read the script and got back into the game. Perhaps the effect of their half time mince pies had worn off, whilst Sheffield FC's mulled wine finally took its toll.
Shirebrook could well have snatched a result as the game went on. It was, however, Sheffield who settled matters with a second goal in added time and ended up 2-0 winners.
Furthermore, it was Chris Dolby who scored. I had been expecting him to be substituted by Matt Roney to fulfil my pre-match prediction. It would have been a straight positional swap. Dave McCarthy probably held onto Dolby as he had particularly impressed everyone with his first half performance. It was his cross which put David Wilkins in a position to snatch that first half lead.
The strangest thing about the game was that the crowd which I estimated was around 230 in the first half, seemed to shrink by a third or so for the second half. Had some of the spectators been attracted by the mulled wine and mince pies and then left when these were comsumed? Or was the real ale having an impact on my own perceptions of what was happening?
Whatever it was, Stephen ushered me safely home after the match - but only after the inevitable post-match celebratory drink.
Sponsors provided free mulled wine and mince pies for Sheffield FC's pre-Xmas game against Shirebrook Town. As a result, the Coach and Houses pub next to the ground did less trade than usual for this match. This was fine for those of us who prefer to select from the pub's five real ales, as we avoided the usual crush at the bar.
Our family are home for Xmas, so our son came with me for the game. The three bits of local knowledge I gave him instructions upon were all blown apart.
First, I claimed that it was inevitable that the ball would repeatedly be kicked out of the ground - into the car park, the main road, the field from which a horse normally overlooks the proceedings and the wooded area behind one of the goals. It looked like I was completely wrong, until a clearance finally made it towards the main road.
Secondly, I was adament that Dave McCarthy (the Sheffield FC Manager) would do what he always does and use all his three possible substitutions. For he likes to use as many of his squad as he can in order to keep them happy and on the books. But this also did not happen.
Finally, I said that we should slip out of a side gate to the pub for a half-time drink. The gate was sure to have been opened, as the Club now owns the pub. But when we made our way to the gate just before the half-time whistle, we found that it was still locked. We had to go the long way round. Perhaps we were expected to stay and make sure that all the mince pies were eaten up.
It was, however, a chatty Xmas atmosphere when we finally made it to the pub. I discovered a Shirebrook Town supporter who was a fellow refugee from the North East and had played for my father's old team, Stanley United.
Next I talked to a Sheffield FC supporter from Nottingham, who was on our side because his son (Jon Boulter) is our left back. Earlier Jon was a worthwhile utility player, then he started to be selected for his best spot.
Before and after the match, my son and I also met up with Tom and his wife Janet who are from Chesterfield. I had met Tom intitially at out last home game against Broddy (see my last posted item), but I didn't recognise him immediately this time, as he was wearing an Irish Football shirt. It turns out that his mother is from Dublin. My own links with Ireland are legion.
Tom is a newcomer to Sheffield FC games, but he has already chalked up three matches in a row, including a visit to the away game at Sutton. He claimed that we were lucky to win 2-1 at Sutton. They dominated the game and could have scored a few. But Sheffield moved in to steal the game with two late strikes.
I have now arranged for him to give me a lift to the Boxing Day fixture at Hallam. It is being held on the 146th Anniversary of the teams' first clash at Hallam on Boxing Day 1860. It is the oldest derby in the world and is played on their original ground , which is the oldest existing ground in the world. All of this is something that money can't buy - as long as no-one tells Abramovich.
Top Versus Bottom
Shirebrook Town are bottom of the League, having only won one match out of the previous 16. So when the game started to take on the characteristics of our last 5-0 home win over Broddy, I expected the inevitable. But I was wrong again.
Sheffield FC had the same 1-0 lead at half-time, as against Broddy. We then rushed into continuous attacking from the start of the second half and awaited the goal rush.
But Shirebrook hadn't read the script and got back into the game. Perhaps the effect of their half time mince pies had worn off, whilst Sheffield FC's mulled wine finally took its toll.
Shirebrook could well have snatched a result as the game went on. It was, however, Sheffield who settled matters with a second goal in added time and ended up 2-0 winners.
Furthermore, it was Chris Dolby who scored. I had been expecting him to be substituted by Matt Roney to fulfil my pre-match prediction. It would have been a straight positional swap. Dave McCarthy probably held onto Dolby as he had particularly impressed everyone with his first half performance. It was his cross which put David Wilkins in a position to snatch that first half lead.
The strangest thing about the game was that the crowd which I estimated was around 230 in the first half, seemed to shrink by a third or so for the second half. Had some of the spectators been attracted by the mulled wine and mince pies and then left when these were comsumed? Or was the real ale having an impact on my own perceptions of what was happening?
Whatever it was, Stephen ushered me safely home after the match - but only after the inevitable post-match celebratory drink.
Sunday, December 17, 2006
Brooding over Broddy
From 1966 to 1987 I taught politics and industrial relations to trade unionists on courses run by the Sheffield University Extramural Department. The backbone of the courses were classes run for South Yorkshire and Derbyshire Miners.
One of the South Yorshire pits we covered was Brodsworth Main near Doncaster, which was closed just three years after I left the Department to go to parliament. To the locals Brodworth is known as Broddy.
I came across the Broddy NUM banner earlier this year. It was prominently displayed at the funeral service for Kevin Hughes the former Labour M.P. for Doncaster (known as Donny) North who was a colleague of mine from 1992 to 2005. I had known Kevin from 1978 when he was a member of one of the above Miner's classes and he worked at Broddy. He was a fine person and died of a varient of Motor Neurone disease at only 53.
So when Broddy came to play at the ground of Sheffield FC (which is a fifteen minute walk from my home) it was a game I had to attend. It was my first visit to see my local team since 14 October. Sheffield FC's fortunes had changed dramatically since then with 5 wins and a draw out of 7 league games, taking them to the top of the Northern Counties East League.
Poor old Broddy had dropped in the opposite direction. They started the season with two home wins. One against Sheffield FC. But in 15 League games since then, they had failed to win at all and had only managed 3 draws. Without a point away from home, their average away score was a 5-1 defeat.
As a consequence of their poor run, one of their home crowds fell to 18. And I only spotted the odd Broddy fan at the Sheffield game, where the home team's run had done little to boost the crowd beyond its normal couple of a hundred.
To be fair to Broddy, they had a massive crowd by non-league step-five standards of 1,251 for an FA Vase game. But they were playing FC United of Manchester in an all ticket match and only held onto 69 of the tickets for home supporters!
Another sign of the imbalance between Broddy and Sheffield FC is that just before the game, the latter had handed over an undisclosed transfer fee for a striker from fellow league team Arnold Town. Handing over (rather then receiving) cash is practically unheard of at this level of football.
Given the disparities between the teams, Broddy held out well until just before half-time when the Sheffield full-back, Gavin Smith, moved up into the six yard box to slot home a cross.
In the second half the flood gates could have opened; but the Broddy keeper, their rattled woodwork and missed opportunnities kept the score to 1-0 up to the three-quarter stage. Then on came David Wilkins, the new signing from Arnold Town, as super-sub. Although he missed an early chance, he soon had a hat-trick. He seemed to be everywhere in attack, but Sheffield were now in full flight.
My fellow locals, however, claimed that his fellow striker was the man of the match. He is Gary Townsend. He scored from a stunning shot from outside of the penalty area. After another crasher from him hit the post, it eventually returned for Wilkins to prod it home. Then another of Townsend's shots was a sure goal until Wilkins pounched to make it his own.
So in the end Broddy kept their unwanted record with a 5-0 defeat. In 18 league games they now have a 39 goal deficit. All that can be said in mitigation is that they were still in the game until around the 70th minute and 5-0 wasn't as bad as a recent 8-1 drubbing at Retford Town.
But all isn't lost for Broddy. They aren't bottom of the league. That distinction goes to Shirebrook Town. I also used to teach Derbyshire Miners from their local pit,
which was closed in 1993. They are due to play here on December 23rd. So with the family at home for Xmas, it looks as if we can boost the attendance.
It is beginning to look as if Thatcher's destruction of the coal industry also had a knock-on effect to Miner's local football teams. Perhaps this accounts for Sunderland's recent poor run - until Keane arrived. For it was when the North East was pock marked with pits that Sunderland was at its peak in the eras of Charlie Buchan and then Raich Carter. Sunderland were the Manchester United of those times.
No wonder Sunderland, Donny, Shirebrook and Broddy never voted in Thatcherites. In fact I can imagine Kevin Hughes standing at the Pearly Gates (which he didn't believe in) welcoming the arrival of Thatcher with the immortal words "Maggie, Maggie, Maggie. Out, Out, Out." !
One of the South Yorshire pits we covered was Brodsworth Main near Doncaster, which was closed just three years after I left the Department to go to parliament. To the locals Brodworth is known as Broddy.
I came across the Broddy NUM banner earlier this year. It was prominently displayed at the funeral service for Kevin Hughes the former Labour M.P. for Doncaster (known as Donny) North who was a colleague of mine from 1992 to 2005. I had known Kevin from 1978 when he was a member of one of the above Miner's classes and he worked at Broddy. He was a fine person and died of a varient of Motor Neurone disease at only 53.
So when Broddy came to play at the ground of Sheffield FC (which is a fifteen minute walk from my home) it was a game I had to attend. It was my first visit to see my local team since 14 October. Sheffield FC's fortunes had changed dramatically since then with 5 wins and a draw out of 7 league games, taking them to the top of the Northern Counties East League.
Poor old Broddy had dropped in the opposite direction. They started the season with two home wins. One against Sheffield FC. But in 15 League games since then, they had failed to win at all and had only managed 3 draws. Without a point away from home, their average away score was a 5-1 defeat.
As a consequence of their poor run, one of their home crowds fell to 18. And I only spotted the odd Broddy fan at the Sheffield game, where the home team's run had done little to boost the crowd beyond its normal couple of a hundred.
To be fair to Broddy, they had a massive crowd by non-league step-five standards of 1,251 for an FA Vase game. But they were playing FC United of Manchester in an all ticket match and only held onto 69 of the tickets for home supporters!
Another sign of the imbalance between Broddy and Sheffield FC is that just before the game, the latter had handed over an undisclosed transfer fee for a striker from fellow league team Arnold Town. Handing over (rather then receiving) cash is practically unheard of at this level of football.
Given the disparities between the teams, Broddy held out well until just before half-time when the Sheffield full-back, Gavin Smith, moved up into the six yard box to slot home a cross.
In the second half the flood gates could have opened; but the Broddy keeper, their rattled woodwork and missed opportunnities kept the score to 1-0 up to the three-quarter stage. Then on came David Wilkins, the new signing from Arnold Town, as super-sub. Although he missed an early chance, he soon had a hat-trick. He seemed to be everywhere in attack, but Sheffield were now in full flight.
My fellow locals, however, claimed that his fellow striker was the man of the match. He is Gary Townsend. He scored from a stunning shot from outside of the penalty area. After another crasher from him hit the post, it eventually returned for Wilkins to prod it home. Then another of Townsend's shots was a sure goal until Wilkins pounched to make it his own.
So in the end Broddy kept their unwanted record with a 5-0 defeat. In 18 league games they now have a 39 goal deficit. All that can be said in mitigation is that they were still in the game until around the 70th minute and 5-0 wasn't as bad as a recent 8-1 drubbing at Retford Town.
But all isn't lost for Broddy. They aren't bottom of the league. That distinction goes to Shirebrook Town. I also used to teach Derbyshire Miners from their local pit,
which was closed in 1993. They are due to play here on December 23rd. So with the family at home for Xmas, it looks as if we can boost the attendance.
It is beginning to look as if Thatcher's destruction of the coal industry also had a knock-on effect to Miner's local football teams. Perhaps this accounts for Sunderland's recent poor run - until Keane arrived. For it was when the North East was pock marked with pits that Sunderland was at its peak in the eras of Charlie Buchan and then Raich Carter. Sunderland were the Manchester United of those times.
No wonder Sunderland, Donny, Shirebrook and Broddy never voted in Thatcherites. In fact I can imagine Kevin Hughes standing at the Pearly Gates (which he didn't believe in) welcoming the arrival of Thatcher with the immortal words "Maggie, Maggie, Maggie. Out, Out, Out." !
Thursday, November 23, 2006
From Beano to Keano
Part 1 : Beano Time
I don’t know when I first graduated from reading the Beano and Dandy to the Wizard and the Hotspur. The latter were for older boys (I never saw a girl reading them) and they were dominated by stories instead of cartoons. So it is possible that I was still a Beano reader around the time I first saw a League Football match.
It is sixty years now since my father first took me to see Sunderland play at Roker Park. We travelled to Sunderland by bus from Easington Colliery and walked down to the ground.. On the way he showed me the terraced house he had been born in. It was a couple of doors away from a pawnbrokers which had the typical sign outside.
I was ten years old and I was sat upon a concrete barrier at the Roker end, having an excellent view in a crowd of 42,750. Nearly everyone stood in those days.
It was in the 1946-47 season, the first season after the Second World War and was an old Division 1 clash. Sunderland having played in no other Division than the top one. A proud record which only finally bit the dust on the last day of the 1957-58 season.
The match I saw was against Grimsby Town. Up to then Sunderland had won all their first four home games of the season, including a 4-1 defeat of Everton the previous week. In all Sunderland had had a good start to the season; with 6 wins, 2 draws and only 2 defeats.
Grimsby ended up at the bottom of the League and had lost all their away games up to then. Everything seemed set for a Sunderland victory.
We even had a new star signed from Sheffield Wednesday in Jackie Robinson, who had been bought to replace Raich Carter who had been transferred to Derby County for the start of the season.
But I was soon taught to be philosophical about my team. We went two down and a man in front of me turned to his mate to say the obvious - “we need THREE now to win!”. Only one of these was forthcoming . We lost 2-1.
Jackie Robinson got the consolation goal and was therefore always one of my heroes. The war had ruined what would have been the peak of his career. The crowd got on his back until he scored, shouting for Stan Lloyd (who I never saw play) to be returned.
Despite the defeat, I was now hooked. The team that day included three heroes from the 1937 FA Cup winning team. Mapson in goal, with the skills of Duns and Burbanks on the wings. Johnny Mapson went on to play for Sunderland until the 1952-3 season, when he was finally replaced by Threadgold, who the crowd knew as “threadbare”. No-one ever criticised Mapson, who I looked upon as a god when I later saw him sitting opposite our family when we were out having a meal at Jopling’s Restaurant in Sunderland.
The picture in my mind which I always have of Mapson is of him standing on the line in the middle of his goal with his feet together and his two hands stretched above his head to safely catch the ball. It always seemed to happen, as if he hypnotised those shooting at goal or crossing the ball.
Willie Watson, who went on play both cricket and football for England played at what in those days was called the “inside left” position, to Robinson’s “inside right”- seen nowadays as attacking mid-fielders. It was a position Watson occupied until the legendary Len Shackleton arrived on the scene. Watson was then moved to a deeper mid-field role at “right-half” and won his England football caps in that position. His gentlemanly and highly skilled performances led him to be my favourite Sunderland player, even above the great Len Shackleton.
Jackie Stelling was a tough right-back, with a sliding tackle which always disposed
the opposing winger. He became a great penalty-taker, hitting an unstoppable rocket of a shot just above the ground and inside the goalkeeper’s right hand post. Until , that is, Bert Trautman came to Roker Park in goal for Manchester City. After Stelling had beaten him with one penalty, he worked out what to do with the second one. He made an incredible save just inside the post, but was judged by the referee to have moved on the line before the ball was kicked (which in those days was an offence). Trautman threw the ball into the crowd in disgust, before going on to save the re-taken rocket.
The match against Man City was the Grimsby match written large. It was in 1950.
Sunderland were undefeated in 18 home games up to then, and Man City were bottom of the League without an away win. Of course, we lost again 2-1. If we had gained the points for a win, we would have won the League that year. Instead we finished third.
It is still our greatest achievement in the top flight in my 60 years as a supporter and I saw all of our home games that season.
I only saw four games in all over the first two season’s after the war, as I normally went to watch my father play in goal for a local team. Four of those who played against Grimsby were gradually replaced before I began to watch Sunderland play on a regular basis. They had all played war-time football with Sunderland - Jones, Willingham, Housman and Whitelum.
The remaining player was Fred Hall, the centre half. Teams didn’t use two central defenders then, and Fred was a no-sense stopper who cleared his lines. If the ball came back to him, he would again belt it up field. No wonder I have always had sympathy for route one soccer.
The game against Grimsby took place on 19 October, 1946. The nearest home match to the 60th anniversary of the first game I saw was on 21 October, 2006. The venue was now the Stadium of Light, with Sunderland under the management of Roy Keane.
Part 2 : Keano Therapy
My 60th Anniversary game was the one against Barnsley. It was appropriate that I should sit in the concessionary seats which were full of fellow oldies and young children. The lad sat next to me was 12 and had been attending since he was 6. So he will reach his 60th Anniversary game in the year 2060. I hope we win the Premiership by then.
My getting to the match at all was something of a pilgrimage. I was in Exeter the night before addressing a meeting. Even if I caught the first train on the Saturday morning to the North East, I couldn’t arrive in time for the kick-off. So I had to swallow my principles and add to the pollution of the atmosphere by joining a flight to Newcastle. The excellent Metro then took me to the land that is cut asunder by the Wear.
After soaking up the atmosphere and some Guinness at Yates, I walked to the ground past the railway station, where I had at one time worked as a clerk and where I had first caught sight of Ann whom I went on to marry. Then on approaching the ground, I walked past the end of the street where Edward Thompson’s works is. Ann became their first full time secretarial worker in the days when they started out as printers of bingo tickets.
I stopped off to purchase a football shirt produced by the “A Love Supreme” fanzine fanatics. It is the one that is half red and white stripes and the other half green . The latter showing Sunderland’s Irish connections with Roy Keane, Niall Quinn and the Irish firm who now own the Club. Once in the ground I popped into a toilet cubicle to slip into my new purchase.
“A Love Supreme” also had the wit to call Keane “Keano”. When Sunderland head for a win the fans shout this out. But they blame the players for a defeat. It is all built upon hopes and encouragements for the future.
The stage was now set for me . The Stadium of Light is even built upon the pit where my great-grandfather was killed. So that huge Miner’s lamp outside the ground means a great deal to me. Which is added to by the fact that my father and father-in-law were Sunderland supporters and coal miners.
Given that I started out watching us lose to a lowly team, it did not even matter if we lost. But glory be, we won 2-0. The icing on the cake was that Chris Brown of all people scored the second goal.
In explaining the importance of this to me, I draw completely on memory and have no record books to check. And I realise that memory is fallible. But if I am wrong on any points, then I hope that no-one will disillusion me.
Chris’s father Alan Brown also played for Sunderland. I first saw Alan play when he was a schoolboy, at Easington Colliery’s ground. I believe that it was a key cup game involving the Secondary School team from Easington and the School Team from Dronfield in Derbyshire where I now live and where our son and daughter went to school. My son Stephen was with me at the match and Alan Brown scored a hat-trick.
Not only that but Chris’s grandfather was in my class at the Infant School at Easington. There were two Brown’s : Dennis and Derrick. So I hope I am, not mixed up.
I believe that Chris’s grandfather was Derrick. Our families lived opposite each other,
separated by lengthy back gardens which tended to cut us of into different mixtures of streets. We lived in Harrison Terrace and the Brown’s were in Moncreiff Terrace. So I knew of Chris’s great grandparents. Consequently ,Chris’s goal against Barnsley is as important to me as Jackie Robinson’s against Grimsby in 1946.
My father’s support for Sunderland went back to his first visit to Roker Park when he was 11. Establishing a tradition, he was taken to his first match by his own father, my grandfather. It was a Cup Tie against Burnley in February 1920 in front of a then record crowd of 49,618. Sunderland won 2-0. From my Father’s story, on the way to the ground they crossed the Wear by an oar driven boat which almost capsized. One of Sunderland’s goals was scored by none other than Charlie Buchan.(whose “Football Monthly” I later devoured.)
I then took my son to his first game to see Sunderland play on Huddersfield’s old ground. Stephen was only four at the time, but he saw Porterfield score the equaliser in a 1-1 draw in the season in which Porterfield went on to get the winner against Leeds in the FA Cup final.
I then took my daughter Joanne with us for her first match at Notts County when she was eight. Stan Cummins got the winner in our 1-0 victory and we went on to gain promotion that season. Then Stephen and I witnessed another great 1-0 winner from Stan the following season (1980-81) at Liverpool on the last day to avoid relegation. The chant by the Sunderland’s ecstatic supporters as they left the ground was “pissed tonight, pissed tonight”.
When we take my young grandson Joseph to see his first game, we might need to put our hands over his ears. It is only my wife in this family (with her solid Sunderland links) who has never been to see them play. The worst of it is that she has seen Chesterfield play three times with me, twice in play-offs at Wembley.
My daughter-in-law Rebecca is from Tasmania and she has chalked up a respectable number of Sunderland home and away games, although living in London.
When I was an M.P. I had a question and answer session at a local infant school. A lad at the back asked who I supported. I explained that people support whoever their dad (normally) first took them to see play. I then asked who he supported. He and a pile of his mates at the back of the room shouted out “Manchester United”, whom they had never seen play. It seems that the old world is breaking up somewhat and Sky TV is taking over. But not for the 12 year old I sat next to at the Stadium of
Light.
I hope some of the old traditions live on, for it has been gripping being a Sunderland supporter. The defeat by Grimsby in 1946, followed by a 4-1 defeat by Liverpool on my next visit helped me prepare for the disasters we have seen over the past few seasons. But when we triumph it is magnificent.
Dreams live on. I am sure that I have seen those midfield qualities of Dwight Yorke somewhere before. Oh yes, it was Willie Watson. All we now need is a Len Shackleton and we are on our way. And who knows, given the magic of Keano Therapy.
I don’t know when I first graduated from reading the Beano and Dandy to the Wizard and the Hotspur. The latter were for older boys (I never saw a girl reading them) and they were dominated by stories instead of cartoons. So it is possible that I was still a Beano reader around the time I first saw a League Football match.
It is sixty years now since my father first took me to see Sunderland play at Roker Park. We travelled to Sunderland by bus from Easington Colliery and walked down to the ground.. On the way he showed me the terraced house he had been born in. It was a couple of doors away from a pawnbrokers which had the typical sign outside.
I was ten years old and I was sat upon a concrete barrier at the Roker end, having an excellent view in a crowd of 42,750. Nearly everyone stood in those days.
It was in the 1946-47 season, the first season after the Second World War and was an old Division 1 clash. Sunderland having played in no other Division than the top one. A proud record which only finally bit the dust on the last day of the 1957-58 season.
The match I saw was against Grimsby Town. Up to then Sunderland had won all their first four home games of the season, including a 4-1 defeat of Everton the previous week. In all Sunderland had had a good start to the season; with 6 wins, 2 draws and only 2 defeats.
Grimsby ended up at the bottom of the League and had lost all their away games up to then. Everything seemed set for a Sunderland victory.
We even had a new star signed from Sheffield Wednesday in Jackie Robinson, who had been bought to replace Raich Carter who had been transferred to Derby County for the start of the season.
But I was soon taught to be philosophical about my team. We went two down and a man in front of me turned to his mate to say the obvious - “we need THREE now to win!”. Only one of these was forthcoming . We lost 2-1.
Jackie Robinson got the consolation goal and was therefore always one of my heroes. The war had ruined what would have been the peak of his career. The crowd got on his back until he scored, shouting for Stan Lloyd (who I never saw play) to be returned.
Despite the defeat, I was now hooked. The team that day included three heroes from the 1937 FA Cup winning team. Mapson in goal, with the skills of Duns and Burbanks on the wings. Johnny Mapson went on to play for Sunderland until the 1952-3 season, when he was finally replaced by Threadgold, who the crowd knew as “threadbare”. No-one ever criticised Mapson, who I looked upon as a god when I later saw him sitting opposite our family when we were out having a meal at Jopling’s Restaurant in Sunderland.
The picture in my mind which I always have of Mapson is of him standing on the line in the middle of his goal with his feet together and his two hands stretched above his head to safely catch the ball. It always seemed to happen, as if he hypnotised those shooting at goal or crossing the ball.
Willie Watson, who went on play both cricket and football for England played at what in those days was called the “inside left” position, to Robinson’s “inside right”- seen nowadays as attacking mid-fielders. It was a position Watson occupied until the legendary Len Shackleton arrived on the scene. Watson was then moved to a deeper mid-field role at “right-half” and won his England football caps in that position. His gentlemanly and highly skilled performances led him to be my favourite Sunderland player, even above the great Len Shackleton.
Jackie Stelling was a tough right-back, with a sliding tackle which always disposed
the opposing winger. He became a great penalty-taker, hitting an unstoppable rocket of a shot just above the ground and inside the goalkeeper’s right hand post. Until , that is, Bert Trautman came to Roker Park in goal for Manchester City. After Stelling had beaten him with one penalty, he worked out what to do with the second one. He made an incredible save just inside the post, but was judged by the referee to have moved on the line before the ball was kicked (which in those days was an offence). Trautman threw the ball into the crowd in disgust, before going on to save the re-taken rocket.
The match against Man City was the Grimsby match written large. It was in 1950.
Sunderland were undefeated in 18 home games up to then, and Man City were bottom of the League without an away win. Of course, we lost again 2-1. If we had gained the points for a win, we would have won the League that year. Instead we finished third.
It is still our greatest achievement in the top flight in my 60 years as a supporter and I saw all of our home games that season.
I only saw four games in all over the first two season’s after the war, as I normally went to watch my father play in goal for a local team. Four of those who played against Grimsby were gradually replaced before I began to watch Sunderland play on a regular basis. They had all played war-time football with Sunderland - Jones, Willingham, Housman and Whitelum.
The remaining player was Fred Hall, the centre half. Teams didn’t use two central defenders then, and Fred was a no-sense stopper who cleared his lines. If the ball came back to him, he would again belt it up field. No wonder I have always had sympathy for route one soccer.
The game against Grimsby took place on 19 October, 1946. The nearest home match to the 60th anniversary of the first game I saw was on 21 October, 2006. The venue was now the Stadium of Light, with Sunderland under the management of Roy Keane.
Part 2 : Keano Therapy
My 60th Anniversary game was the one against Barnsley. It was appropriate that I should sit in the concessionary seats which were full of fellow oldies and young children. The lad sat next to me was 12 and had been attending since he was 6. So he will reach his 60th Anniversary game in the year 2060. I hope we win the Premiership by then.
My getting to the match at all was something of a pilgrimage. I was in Exeter the night before addressing a meeting. Even if I caught the first train on the Saturday morning to the North East, I couldn’t arrive in time for the kick-off. So I had to swallow my principles and add to the pollution of the atmosphere by joining a flight to Newcastle. The excellent Metro then took me to the land that is cut asunder by the Wear.
After soaking up the atmosphere and some Guinness at Yates, I walked to the ground past the railway station, where I had at one time worked as a clerk and where I had first caught sight of Ann whom I went on to marry. Then on approaching the ground, I walked past the end of the street where Edward Thompson’s works is. Ann became their first full time secretarial worker in the days when they started out as printers of bingo tickets.
I stopped off to purchase a football shirt produced by the “A Love Supreme” fanzine fanatics. It is the one that is half red and white stripes and the other half green . The latter showing Sunderland’s Irish connections with Roy Keane, Niall Quinn and the Irish firm who now own the Club. Once in the ground I popped into a toilet cubicle to slip into my new purchase.
“A Love Supreme” also had the wit to call Keane “Keano”. When Sunderland head for a win the fans shout this out. But they blame the players for a defeat. It is all built upon hopes and encouragements for the future.
The stage was now set for me . The Stadium of Light is even built upon the pit where my great-grandfather was killed. So that huge Miner’s lamp outside the ground means a great deal to me. Which is added to by the fact that my father and father-in-law were Sunderland supporters and coal miners.
Given that I started out watching us lose to a lowly team, it did not even matter if we lost. But glory be, we won 2-0. The icing on the cake was that Chris Brown of all people scored the second goal.
In explaining the importance of this to me, I draw completely on memory and have no record books to check. And I realise that memory is fallible. But if I am wrong on any points, then I hope that no-one will disillusion me.
Chris’s father Alan Brown also played for Sunderland. I first saw Alan play when he was a schoolboy, at Easington Colliery’s ground. I believe that it was a key cup game involving the Secondary School team from Easington and the School Team from Dronfield in Derbyshire where I now live and where our son and daughter went to school. My son Stephen was with me at the match and Alan Brown scored a hat-trick.
Not only that but Chris’s grandfather was in my class at the Infant School at Easington. There were two Brown’s : Dennis and Derrick. So I hope I am, not mixed up.
I believe that Chris’s grandfather was Derrick. Our families lived opposite each other,
separated by lengthy back gardens which tended to cut us of into different mixtures of streets. We lived in Harrison Terrace and the Brown’s were in Moncreiff Terrace. So I knew of Chris’s great grandparents. Consequently ,Chris’s goal against Barnsley is as important to me as Jackie Robinson’s against Grimsby in 1946.
My father’s support for Sunderland went back to his first visit to Roker Park when he was 11. Establishing a tradition, he was taken to his first match by his own father, my grandfather. It was a Cup Tie against Burnley in February 1920 in front of a then record crowd of 49,618. Sunderland won 2-0. From my Father’s story, on the way to the ground they crossed the Wear by an oar driven boat which almost capsized. One of Sunderland’s goals was scored by none other than Charlie Buchan.(whose “Football Monthly” I later devoured.)
I then took my son to his first game to see Sunderland play on Huddersfield’s old ground. Stephen was only four at the time, but he saw Porterfield score the equaliser in a 1-1 draw in the season in which Porterfield went on to get the winner against Leeds in the FA Cup final.
I then took my daughter Joanne with us for her first match at Notts County when she was eight. Stan Cummins got the winner in our 1-0 victory and we went on to gain promotion that season. Then Stephen and I witnessed another great 1-0 winner from Stan the following season (1980-81) at Liverpool on the last day to avoid relegation. The chant by the Sunderland’s ecstatic supporters as they left the ground was “pissed tonight, pissed tonight”.
When we take my young grandson Joseph to see his first game, we might need to put our hands over his ears. It is only my wife in this family (with her solid Sunderland links) who has never been to see them play. The worst of it is that she has seen Chesterfield play three times with me, twice in play-offs at Wembley.
My daughter-in-law Rebecca is from Tasmania and she has chalked up a respectable number of Sunderland home and away games, although living in London.
When I was an M.P. I had a question and answer session at a local infant school. A lad at the back asked who I supported. I explained that people support whoever their dad (normally) first took them to see play. I then asked who he supported. He and a pile of his mates at the back of the room shouted out “Manchester United”, whom they had never seen play. It seems that the old world is breaking up somewhat and Sky TV is taking over. But not for the 12 year old I sat next to at the Stadium of
Light.
I hope some of the old traditions live on, for it has been gripping being a Sunderland supporter. The defeat by Grimsby in 1946, followed by a 4-1 defeat by Liverpool on my next visit helped me prepare for the disasters we have seen over the past few seasons. But when we triumph it is magnificent.
Dreams live on. I am sure that I have seen those midfield qualities of Dwight Yorke somewhere before. Oh yes, it was Willie Watson. All we now need is a Len Shackleton and we are on our way. And who knows, given the magic of Keano Therapy.
Thursday, November 16, 2006
Will the real Peter Hain please stand up?
Peter Hain is standing for the Deputy Leadership of the Labour Party. In a recent speech which he then posted on his parliamentary web-site under the title “We must rebuild the progressive coalition”, he states that Tony Blair is “one of our greatest Prime Ministers”.
Does such a claim and the use of the Blairite terminology “progressive” indicate that Peter is himself a Blairite? Not necessarily. For one thing, it is possible to recognise Tony’s “greatness” merely by the fact that he helped to bring about the longest running Labour Government in history. It is the same sort of greatness we can grant to the lack-lustre Lord Salisbury who managed to serve 14 years as a Conservative Prime Minister at stages between 1885 and 1902. Neither is the word “progressive” the property of Tony; although as I will indicate later he does like to monopolise its use.
Peter’s also said “(w)hereas the last century was overwhelmingly a conservative century. Tony has given us the chance to make this century, Labour’s century.” This claim has great similarities to a claim Tony himself made at a meeting of the Parliamentary Labour Party immediately after Labour’s electoral victory in 2001.
He pointed out that whilst the 20th century had been the century of conservatism,
his audience had to help ensure that the new century would be the century of …….. .
He then hesitated to think of the word that would best express his meaning and came up with the notion of the 21st Century needing to be the century of “progressive politics.”
To Tony , but not I hope Peter, “progressive” is used as a code word for a wider political agenda. It involves opposition to a conservatism (with a small “c”) of not just the Conservative Party, but also of traditional Labour with its values of social equality and publicly controlled services. It spoke volumes that Tony would baulk at suggesting that a room full of Labour Parliamentarians should seek to usher in a century of Labour Party dominance. For what if such a Labour Party backtracked and drew ideas from its past ? Perhaps it would then be necessary (to Tony) for other forces to pick up the new progressive agenda of uniting the freedoms of the market with social justice.
The paradox of “progressive politics” is, of course, that it is as conservative (with a small “c”) as traditional Labourism is. For the freedom of the market adjusted to seek to provide some form of social justice is exactly what Lib-Labism and Social Liberalism were all about a 100 years ago. Thankfully that limited vision was then subsumed by democratic socialist ideas which, under Labour, managed to get us to a post-war settlement with a mixed economy and the welfare state. Much of which has now been surrendered, but which some of us hoped would have been built upon..
Nor is Tony‘s progressive politics unique in its call for “modernising” in an attempt to handle today’s problems of rapid technological change, globalisation and world-wide instability. All approaches to politics should adapt to meet modern conditions, be they for those who are on the side of social justice, or of free enterprise or of Tony’s attempt to guarantee the future of his own hybrid.
None of the approaches I have suggested have exclusive access to modernisation. I am in favour of a modern voice speaking out for a contemporary version of democratic socialism. This is where Peter might just come into the picture.
The question we need Peter to answer is whether he remains committed to the basic analysis he spelt out in his book “Ayes to the Left: A Future for Socialism” (Lawrence & Wishart, 1995)?
In this book he makes a strong and intelligent case for libertarian socialism, claiming it is an alternative which needs to be pursued in opposition to both state socialism and state capitalism. He stresses that an extra danger of the latter (in addition to its crude commitment to the injustices of unrestrained free enterprise) is that it requires a strong state with anti-democratic norms to police its operations (see pages 24 and 25.)
What does Peter feel that Labour has done about the problems of state capitalism since 1997 ? Have the Labour Governments which he has participated in
moved to break its hold ? Or have they basically just accepted or even solidified it. ?
Whatever factors we stress, Peter has to accept that Labour has not broken the Thatcherite mould of state capitalism.
Peter is still given to using the language of his alternative belief in “libertarian socialism”. It crept into an interview he gave to the Daily Telegraph as reported on 23 September. Indeed it is difficult for him to throw off such an approach, for he has had a belief in participatory forms of democracy , radical politics and anti-state power which go back to his expression of these ideas in works such as “Radical Regeneration” (Quartet Books. 1975) and “Don’t Play with Apartheid: the background to the Stop the Seventy Tour Campaign “ (London. 1971).
It would be a further paradox if Peter (who was at one time the leading light of the Young Liberals) should emerge as the person who could struggle to get the Labour Party to loosen the grip of a modern version of Social Liberalism which dominates Tony’s vision of “progressive politics”.
It is getting to crunch time. Peter needs to explain how close his book of 1995 will be to his manifesto for fighting for the Deputy Leadership. I don’t agree with all the books’ bits and pieces. I am not for compulsory voting, which doesn’t fit well with his libertarianism. Whilst I imagine that his own experiences in Northern Ireland will have altered his old extreme green agenda. But when he says that the “Re-distribution of ownership must remain a principle objective for socialism” (page 38) and goes on to stress the possibility of numbers of democratic structures, including municipal ownership; then I am with him.
If Peter himself wishes to be great, then we need him (a) to spell out his vision for the Labour Party (hopefully in line with his 1995 book), (b) to stand for the Leadership and not the Deputy Leadership of the Labour Party (for he can’t properly enter into a battle of ideas if his position is merely to seek to be the reserve), and (c) to do something beyond what even Robin Cook did. Not just to resign from the Government, but to do this in order to run a campaign for the soul of the Labour Party.
Even if he lost such a battle, he could set a process in motion which would establish a role for a feasible libertarian left in the Labour Party whose views would influence future developments.
I can’t see a democratic socialist alternative to Peter if he will only stand up in the way I suggest. Whilst Gordon Brown has been an economic maestro , this has essentially been directed to delivering Blair’s “progressive” and flawed agenda . Why should we kid ourselves that things will change under his leadership? And the last description we can apply to John Reid is that of being a “libertarian”.
What then of John McDonnell ? As a member of the Socialist Campaign Group in Parliament for 17 years, should I not be part of his campaign ? In Socialist Campaign Group News for this September, he lists a seven point programme mainly on matters where I have been alongside him in various past votes in the Commons. I also greatly admire John’s dedication, ability and personality. But, to tell the truth, I could only ask people to support him if I decided merely to fly a flag for some of my beliefs, rather than to seriously act for positive openings for democratic socialism in tomorrow’s Labour Party.
The attractions of a Peter4Leader Campaign is that I believe that he can ride two horses at once. He can relate what he proposes to his socialist values thus giving us the vision that is currently missing from Labour Party politics, whilst trimming in order to advance policies which are feasible in difficult sets of circumstances..
When I have been in Commons lobbies with John (and against Peter who voted in line with his Government) we were often trying to stop the advance of what was passing for “progressive” politics; such as tuition fees and further privatisation. How we then move in a fresh direction after losing such votes is, however, a complex matter. John gives the impression that we just pull the switch and change directions.
Nowhere is this more strongly illustrated than over Iraq. Of course, we should never have invaded and the consequences (aided by bad handling) have been counter-productive. But we don’t return to a pre-invasion situation by just removing our troops. We have to relate to ways of tackling some of the very problems our actions helped to create.
If, however, Peter will not act in the way I recommend; then it looks as if I am left with a choice amongst the two Johns and Gordon. So I will then have to decide whether I opt for an abstention or for a bit of what used to be called “revolutionary defeatism” with John MacDonnell. I doubt whether either approach would matter much.
But if Peter will stand up and relate his principles to the realm of what is practical, then we might be onto something. I don’t believe that he would win. But we do need someone who will be in a position to stir the conscious of the Labour Party. Who else can do this properly?
Does such a claim and the use of the Blairite terminology “progressive” indicate that Peter is himself a Blairite? Not necessarily. For one thing, it is possible to recognise Tony’s “greatness” merely by the fact that he helped to bring about the longest running Labour Government in history. It is the same sort of greatness we can grant to the lack-lustre Lord Salisbury who managed to serve 14 years as a Conservative Prime Minister at stages between 1885 and 1902. Neither is the word “progressive” the property of Tony; although as I will indicate later he does like to monopolise its use.
Peter’s also said “(w)hereas the last century was overwhelmingly a conservative century. Tony has given us the chance to make this century, Labour’s century.” This claim has great similarities to a claim Tony himself made at a meeting of the Parliamentary Labour Party immediately after Labour’s electoral victory in 2001.
He pointed out that whilst the 20th century had been the century of conservatism,
his audience had to help ensure that the new century would be the century of …….. .
He then hesitated to think of the word that would best express his meaning and came up with the notion of the 21st Century needing to be the century of “progressive politics.”
To Tony , but not I hope Peter, “progressive” is used as a code word for a wider political agenda. It involves opposition to a conservatism (with a small “c”) of not just the Conservative Party, but also of traditional Labour with its values of social equality and publicly controlled services. It spoke volumes that Tony would baulk at suggesting that a room full of Labour Parliamentarians should seek to usher in a century of Labour Party dominance. For what if such a Labour Party backtracked and drew ideas from its past ? Perhaps it would then be necessary (to Tony) for other forces to pick up the new progressive agenda of uniting the freedoms of the market with social justice.
The paradox of “progressive politics” is, of course, that it is as conservative (with a small “c”) as traditional Labourism is. For the freedom of the market adjusted to seek to provide some form of social justice is exactly what Lib-Labism and Social Liberalism were all about a 100 years ago. Thankfully that limited vision was then subsumed by democratic socialist ideas which, under Labour, managed to get us to a post-war settlement with a mixed economy and the welfare state. Much of which has now been surrendered, but which some of us hoped would have been built upon..
Nor is Tony‘s progressive politics unique in its call for “modernising” in an attempt to handle today’s problems of rapid technological change, globalisation and world-wide instability. All approaches to politics should adapt to meet modern conditions, be they for those who are on the side of social justice, or of free enterprise or of Tony’s attempt to guarantee the future of his own hybrid.
None of the approaches I have suggested have exclusive access to modernisation. I am in favour of a modern voice speaking out for a contemporary version of democratic socialism. This is where Peter might just come into the picture.
The question we need Peter to answer is whether he remains committed to the basic analysis he spelt out in his book “Ayes to the Left: A Future for Socialism” (Lawrence & Wishart, 1995)?
In this book he makes a strong and intelligent case for libertarian socialism, claiming it is an alternative which needs to be pursued in opposition to both state socialism and state capitalism. He stresses that an extra danger of the latter (in addition to its crude commitment to the injustices of unrestrained free enterprise) is that it requires a strong state with anti-democratic norms to police its operations (see pages 24 and 25.)
What does Peter feel that Labour has done about the problems of state capitalism since 1997 ? Have the Labour Governments which he has participated in
moved to break its hold ? Or have they basically just accepted or even solidified it. ?
Whatever factors we stress, Peter has to accept that Labour has not broken the Thatcherite mould of state capitalism.
Peter is still given to using the language of his alternative belief in “libertarian socialism”. It crept into an interview he gave to the Daily Telegraph as reported on 23 September. Indeed it is difficult for him to throw off such an approach, for he has had a belief in participatory forms of democracy , radical politics and anti-state power which go back to his expression of these ideas in works such as “Radical Regeneration” (Quartet Books. 1975) and “Don’t Play with Apartheid: the background to the Stop the Seventy Tour Campaign “ (London. 1971).
It would be a further paradox if Peter (who was at one time the leading light of the Young Liberals) should emerge as the person who could struggle to get the Labour Party to loosen the grip of a modern version of Social Liberalism which dominates Tony’s vision of “progressive politics”.
It is getting to crunch time. Peter needs to explain how close his book of 1995 will be to his manifesto for fighting for the Deputy Leadership. I don’t agree with all the books’ bits and pieces. I am not for compulsory voting, which doesn’t fit well with his libertarianism. Whilst I imagine that his own experiences in Northern Ireland will have altered his old extreme green agenda. But when he says that the “Re-distribution of ownership must remain a principle objective for socialism” (page 38) and goes on to stress the possibility of numbers of democratic structures, including municipal ownership; then I am with him.
If Peter himself wishes to be great, then we need him (a) to spell out his vision for the Labour Party (hopefully in line with his 1995 book), (b) to stand for the Leadership and not the Deputy Leadership of the Labour Party (for he can’t properly enter into a battle of ideas if his position is merely to seek to be the reserve), and (c) to do something beyond what even Robin Cook did. Not just to resign from the Government, but to do this in order to run a campaign for the soul of the Labour Party.
Even if he lost such a battle, he could set a process in motion which would establish a role for a feasible libertarian left in the Labour Party whose views would influence future developments.
I can’t see a democratic socialist alternative to Peter if he will only stand up in the way I suggest. Whilst Gordon Brown has been an economic maestro , this has essentially been directed to delivering Blair’s “progressive” and flawed agenda . Why should we kid ourselves that things will change under his leadership? And the last description we can apply to John Reid is that of being a “libertarian”.
What then of John McDonnell ? As a member of the Socialist Campaign Group in Parliament for 17 years, should I not be part of his campaign ? In Socialist Campaign Group News for this September, he lists a seven point programme mainly on matters where I have been alongside him in various past votes in the Commons. I also greatly admire John’s dedication, ability and personality. But, to tell the truth, I could only ask people to support him if I decided merely to fly a flag for some of my beliefs, rather than to seriously act for positive openings for democratic socialism in tomorrow’s Labour Party.
The attractions of a Peter4Leader Campaign is that I believe that he can ride two horses at once. He can relate what he proposes to his socialist values thus giving us the vision that is currently missing from Labour Party politics, whilst trimming in order to advance policies which are feasible in difficult sets of circumstances..
When I have been in Commons lobbies with John (and against Peter who voted in line with his Government) we were often trying to stop the advance of what was passing for “progressive” politics; such as tuition fees and further privatisation. How we then move in a fresh direction after losing such votes is, however, a complex matter. John gives the impression that we just pull the switch and change directions.
Nowhere is this more strongly illustrated than over Iraq. Of course, we should never have invaded and the consequences (aided by bad handling) have been counter-productive. But we don’t return to a pre-invasion situation by just removing our troops. We have to relate to ways of tackling some of the very problems our actions helped to create.
If, however, Peter will not act in the way I recommend; then it looks as if I am left with a choice amongst the two Johns and Gordon. So I will then have to decide whether I opt for an abstention or for a bit of what used to be called “revolutionary defeatism” with John MacDonnell. I doubt whether either approach would matter much.
But if Peter will stand up and relate his principles to the realm of what is practical, then we might be onto something. I don’t believe that he would win. But we do need someone who will be in a position to stir the conscious of the Labour Party. Who else can do this properly?
Sunday, November 05, 2006
A Gentle Atheism
When I arrived in Iraq as a National Serviceman in 1955, I was a practising Methodist. Back home I had attended Chapel three times on a Sunday as well as on a variety of other occasions, for instance as secretary of its Christian Endeavour.
Some of the lay preachers were ethical socialists and I remember being deeply moved by the socialist content of a sermon by the leading Methodist Minister, Donald Soper who eventually I was to come across on a regular basis in the pages of Tribune. I also lived in a solid Labour and Mining area, with some of the Methodist lay preacher’s being local Labour Councillors.
But there was probably no great depth to my Christianity for my Chapel attendance was mainly a social and communal activity. I was, therefore, pretty ill-equipped for the culture shock I experienced in viewing the lives of the people in Basra and Baghdad. I felt that I was in the midst of extensive areas of poverty and exploitation.
The question which came to my mind was how could an all loving, all perfect and all knowing creator permit such conditions to exist? I had no idea that this was a perennial philosophical question, nor that it would come to form part of my later studies and teachings at University.
In the forces, I never rose above the rank of Leading Aircraftsman and I only ever found one person to discuss my religious problems with. Corporal Murphy had “atheist” on his locker where we had to designate our religion. He was an ex-Catholic who thankfully introduced me to the works of James Joyce.
I was based in Basra and a local bookseller was also helpful. Not only could I order books from him, but he sold English books and had a handsome supply of Rationalist Press Association(RPA) titles such as “Let the People Think” and “Men Without Gods”. When I heard the Anglican Minister in Basra preach a sermon against the evil influence of such books, the ideas they expressed became even more appealing to me.
Unfortunately, both my bookseller and the Anglican Minister would today be stopped in their tracks by Islamic extremists.. But to my shame the religious ideas I never came in contact with 50 years ago were those of Islam. This is in part a reflection on the absence of any form of educational facilities at our small RAF Movements Unit.
New converts to a belief (or to a non-belief) are likely to become a little strident in its advocacy. So I let people back home know of my newly found lack of faith through a letter I sent to a local newspaper. I used my home address. There was then to be no doubt locally as to who I was and the RAF were unlikely to find out.( I still had “Methodist” above my locker and was disturbed about the problems my friend told me he had in changing his designation. - but it was a tough RAF Catholic Priest he had to deal with.)
My newspaper letter is now quite quaint. The Durham Chronicle gave it the heading
“Atheist’s Views of Premium Bonds”. These were just being introduced. I quoted from George Bernard Shaw and was keen to show that Atheists as well as Christians could have prickly moral principles in opposition to any State operated form of gambling. This puritan streak is still with me in my opposition to State sanctioned Casinos, although I now care little about Premium Bonds.
But I soon stopped my new form of preaching. This was partly because the Methodists I had grown up with (including my mother) were kindly people and not ranters. I had come to disagree with a key to their beliefs, but did not see the Christians I knew as an alien force. My newspaper letter had done enough to show I was no longer fully with them.
Added to this was an experience I had soon after I was demobbed. I went to a meeting of the South London Ethical Society to hear a talk on Nietzsche by Archibald Robertson. He was a member of the Communist Party and I had read some of his books in Basra, as published by the RPA. But the whole set-up made me feel that I was back into a form of Chapel. The final straw was when they passed around what looked like hymn books and we sang to the glory of reason. I decided that I had left one church and was not about to enter another.
In fact, as an M.P. I went to Civic Services and as an old man I keep going to funerals. I always join fully in the singing of hymns to the glory of God, more than I would ever be able to muster to the glory of Reason.
It seems to me that there is plenty of scope for dialogue between those who share similar moral and political values, irrespective of their differing approaches to religion and amongst religions. Indeed the dialogue should go much wider. I spent a considerable amount of my time as an M.P. in Northern Ireland discussing its problems with people right across the political and sectarian divides. No one ever asked me whether I was a Catholic, a Protestant or neither. Which is just as it should be.
As I type this I can look out onto the Baptist Church next door, where since retiring I have addressed Dronfield Churches Together on “Making Poverty History”. I don’t know if they knew that I am an atheist. For it should not matter, for there was considerable unity on the subject matter. If their religious feelings draw them into such campaigns, then that seems to me to be to the credit of their views - even if I don’t share them.
Oliver Kamm reminds us that the late Sidney Hook had something important to say on these matters in his book “The Quest for Being” (1961). In that it is possible to appreciate the nobler feelings some achieve through their religion, without then falling for the bedrock of their doctrines. Kamm also contrasts Hook’s approach with that of Richard Dawkins in his latest book “The God Delusion”. It is one thing for Dawkins to argue that religion is false, but it becomes sanctimonious for him to argue that religion in itself is a main source of oppression. It is theocratic movements (not religions as such) that have displayed such totalitarian tendencies - as did Stalinism. The fact that Stalinism was godless, doesn’t thereby turn other non-believers into his kin.
There is, for instance, a stark contrast between a Reverend Martin Luther King drawing from his religious values to help bring about an end to segregated schools and on the other hand creationists using their religious interpretations to try to undermine scientific investigations in schools.
Some of the lay preachers were ethical socialists and I remember being deeply moved by the socialist content of a sermon by the leading Methodist Minister, Donald Soper who eventually I was to come across on a regular basis in the pages of Tribune. I also lived in a solid Labour and Mining area, with some of the Methodist lay preacher’s being local Labour Councillors.
But there was probably no great depth to my Christianity for my Chapel attendance was mainly a social and communal activity. I was, therefore, pretty ill-equipped for the culture shock I experienced in viewing the lives of the people in Basra and Baghdad. I felt that I was in the midst of extensive areas of poverty and exploitation.
The question which came to my mind was how could an all loving, all perfect and all knowing creator permit such conditions to exist? I had no idea that this was a perennial philosophical question, nor that it would come to form part of my later studies and teachings at University.
In the forces, I never rose above the rank of Leading Aircraftsman and I only ever found one person to discuss my religious problems with. Corporal Murphy had “atheist” on his locker where we had to designate our religion. He was an ex-Catholic who thankfully introduced me to the works of James Joyce.
I was based in Basra and a local bookseller was also helpful. Not only could I order books from him, but he sold English books and had a handsome supply of Rationalist Press Association(RPA) titles such as “Let the People Think” and “Men Without Gods”. When I heard the Anglican Minister in Basra preach a sermon against the evil influence of such books, the ideas they expressed became even more appealing to me.
Unfortunately, both my bookseller and the Anglican Minister would today be stopped in their tracks by Islamic extremists.. But to my shame the religious ideas I never came in contact with 50 years ago were those of Islam. This is in part a reflection on the absence of any form of educational facilities at our small RAF Movements Unit.
New converts to a belief (or to a non-belief) are likely to become a little strident in its advocacy. So I let people back home know of my newly found lack of faith through a letter I sent to a local newspaper. I used my home address. There was then to be no doubt locally as to who I was and the RAF were unlikely to find out.( I still had “Methodist” above my locker and was disturbed about the problems my friend told me he had in changing his designation. - but it was a tough RAF Catholic Priest he had to deal with.)
My newspaper letter is now quite quaint. The Durham Chronicle gave it the heading
“Atheist’s Views of Premium Bonds”. These were just being introduced. I quoted from George Bernard Shaw and was keen to show that Atheists as well as Christians could have prickly moral principles in opposition to any State operated form of gambling. This puritan streak is still with me in my opposition to State sanctioned Casinos, although I now care little about Premium Bonds.
But I soon stopped my new form of preaching. This was partly because the Methodists I had grown up with (including my mother) were kindly people and not ranters. I had come to disagree with a key to their beliefs, but did not see the Christians I knew as an alien force. My newspaper letter had done enough to show I was no longer fully with them.
Added to this was an experience I had soon after I was demobbed. I went to a meeting of the South London Ethical Society to hear a talk on Nietzsche by Archibald Robertson. He was a member of the Communist Party and I had read some of his books in Basra, as published by the RPA. But the whole set-up made me feel that I was back into a form of Chapel. The final straw was when they passed around what looked like hymn books and we sang to the glory of reason. I decided that I had left one church and was not about to enter another.
In fact, as an M.P. I went to Civic Services and as an old man I keep going to funerals. I always join fully in the singing of hymns to the glory of God, more than I would ever be able to muster to the glory of Reason.
It seems to me that there is plenty of scope for dialogue between those who share similar moral and political values, irrespective of their differing approaches to religion and amongst religions. Indeed the dialogue should go much wider. I spent a considerable amount of my time as an M.P. in Northern Ireland discussing its problems with people right across the political and sectarian divides. No one ever asked me whether I was a Catholic, a Protestant or neither. Which is just as it should be.
As I type this I can look out onto the Baptist Church next door, where since retiring I have addressed Dronfield Churches Together on “Making Poverty History”. I don’t know if they knew that I am an atheist. For it should not matter, for there was considerable unity on the subject matter. If their religious feelings draw them into such campaigns, then that seems to me to be to the credit of their views - even if I don’t share them.
Oliver Kamm reminds us that the late Sidney Hook had something important to say on these matters in his book “The Quest for Being” (1961). In that it is possible to appreciate the nobler feelings some achieve through their religion, without then falling for the bedrock of their doctrines. Kamm also contrasts Hook’s approach with that of Richard Dawkins in his latest book “The God Delusion”. It is one thing for Dawkins to argue that religion is false, but it becomes sanctimonious for him to argue that religion in itself is a main source of oppression. It is theocratic movements (not religions as such) that have displayed such totalitarian tendencies - as did Stalinism. The fact that Stalinism was godless, doesn’t thereby turn other non-believers into his kin.
There is, for instance, a stark contrast between a Reverend Martin Luther King drawing from his religious values to help bring about an end to segregated schools and on the other hand creationists using their religious interpretations to try to undermine scientific investigations in schools.
Monday, October 23, 2006
Iraq: The Third Big Issue
Twin Divisions
In Britain, our minds are often focussed upon two big issues concerning Iraq. First, should we have been involved in its invasion ? Secondly, should our troops now be withdrawn ?
I will outline where I stand on these matters, before concentrating on a third key concern which I feel should engage the attention of those of us who have involvements in the wider Labour and Trade Union Movement. How significant are equivalent bodies to ours inside Iraq ? What are they aiming for ? And how worthy are they of our support ?
But first let me confront those first two big issues, which I in no way wish to run away from.
(a) First, there is the matter of the invasion
I opposed the 2003 invasion of Iraq in a fully fledged way and I stand by the position I adopted. For I was opposed to the invasion whether or not Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction. We now know that he did not hold such weapons and that the argument used for the invasion was spurious. But at the time, I argued that if he had held such weapons then an invasion still wasn’t justified as it would have been a highly dangerous exercise - rather like prodding a mad dog with a stick.
I was also opposed to the invasion whether or not it was sanctioned by the United Nations. For, to me, if the United Nations had been persuaded to back the invasion, that decision would still have been the wrong one. For with or without such backing, the likely consequences (as we have now seen) would be shocking in terms of the loss of life, the internal conflict in Iraq and the impacts in Palestine, the rest of the Middle East and throughout the Muslim World.
Whilst I don’t accept the estimates on post-invasion deaths which have twice emerged in the Lancet, I do recognise that the loss of life in this period from conflict has been (and increasingly is) horrendous and that something like it was predictable back in the period leading up to the invasion.
But those advocating an invasion did put forward a question which the rest of us needed to answer. “What would we do instead to tackle the manifest evils of Hussein’s Regime ?” My answer was that we should have been assisting those brave
people in Iraq who opposed the regime and who struggled to have it replaced by a humane alternative. The internal struggle was the one which should have been in the lead. An article by Mary Kaldor on the Open Democracy web-site on 21.4.05, entitled, Iraq: the wrong war has since spelt out what that option was in a section entitled “Was there an alternative?”
(b) Secondly, there is the matter of what we should now do about British and American troops in Iraq. Should they be withdrawn ? When and how ?
Many assume that if someone opposed the invasion in such a fully fledged way, then they must now and always since the invasion have been in favour of the immediate withdrawal of the troops. This does not, of course, follow either in terms of logic or morality. For there is a countervailing concern.
Terrorist groups and criminal gangs are murdering masses of Iraqi people going about their normal business without such people ever giving meaningful support to “the occupying forces” or to a claimed “puppet regime”. Iraqi troops and police need to have the ability to contain this hideous aggression. American and British troops play a role in helping to build up and to supplement this difficult internal security.
The great problem is that American Forces in particular (but not excluding the British) have been involved in a whole series of actions involving prison abuse, over the top military action and a failure to link with and aid Iraqis who could have helped build the alternative democratic society which Bush and Blair say they seek.
The question then arises as to how much terrorist activity would just fall away if the British and American troops left. And would any such drop in violence be sufficient to ensure relative peace ?
I have always answered this quandary by arguing that the decision on withdrawal should be made by the Iraqi Parliament. I argue this even though I recognise (and below stress) some of the shortcomings of the actions and omissions of the Iraqi Parliament and their Government . For as a Democratic Socialist, I would criticize aspects of decisions made by almost every parliament in the world. That does not mean that I would wish to abolish them !
The Iraqi people did not support the invasion, but they should at least use their new institutions to decide just when and how the troops should leave. All I would suggest is the need for a timetable for withdrawal plus plans for replacements of troops from acceptable Arab and other nations into non Kurdish Iraq, if these are needed. The Iraqi people need to know that Britain and America will be leaving.
But Why Not A Triple Alliance?
I do not wish to draw a line under the above matters, but I do wish to turn our attention to another concern which should be given a much greater priority by the Labour Movement. Furthermore, I would claim that whatever attitude we take on the first two big issues, we should be united on this one.
We should start by asking ourselves if there are forces in Iraq who are striving to advance the values which we share? Namely, those of democracy, civil rights, social justice and a secular State.
In fact there are many such forces, including those who mobilize to achieve a status for women, youths, the maimed and disabled, or for improved hospitals, schools, electricity and other services. But I will concentrate on the organisations I know the best and who seem to me to have a massive potential - Iraqi Trade Unions.
Iraq has a population of 27 million. It is dominated by young people and only 15 million fall within the ages of 14 to 65. Because unemployment is normally said to be in the region of 50%, whilst many women in fundamentalist Muslim areas are discouraged from working outside of their homes; those in steady employment could be as low as 5 million.
Yet over a million people are organised in Trade Unions. Which is likely to be 20% of those who can reasonably be mobilised. In Britain the equivalent figure is 29.1% and we have faced nothing like the traumas and controls experienced by the Iraqi working people over the past 40 years.
When it came to Saddam Hussein’s era, Trade unions were banned in the public sector which accounted for 80% of the workforce, whilst Chemical Ali was put in charge of what was left of Trade Unionism. The latter were what are normally called yellow Trade Unions, under strict and corrupt State domination.
Trade Unions Re-emerge
When Saddam Hussein banned Trade Unions in the public sector in 1987 he stated that workers no longer existed in Iraq, whilst he turned a body called the General Federation of Trade Unions (GFTU who had had a fine past) into a corrupt State-controlled body for the private sector. It spied on its own members and its offices were used for interrogation and torture.
Yet within a few weeks of the invasion, workers who organised in the docks in Basra took successful strike action to remove an oppressive Baathist Management and to obtain a pay rise. Thirteen separate bodies covering 200,000 members were quickly organised and formed the units of the Iraqi Federation of Trade Unions (IFTU).
How was this possible given the Baathist legacy ? As in any revolutionary turn around, it was a mixture of spontaneity and organisation.
Spontaneously, many workers in Iraq knew about the fine history of Trade Unionism in their nation and had an idea that it was needed and was now possible in the circumstances of uncertainty, disruption and confusion created by the invasion. The memory of many martyrs was also held onto firmly by their relatives and friends. Such networks are of great importance in Iraq.
When it came to organisation many activists who managed to survive, had operated in a clandestine fashion throughout the Baathist days and were in touch with comrades who had been driven into exile. Those in exile immediately returned or otherwise helped with the organisational work.
Things happen quickly when spontaneity and organisation are fused.
The Heritage
The pattern of Trade Union history in Iraq is a common one. Workers struggled for reasonable wages and conditions. They opposed Anti-Trade Union Laws. They engaged in strikes which at times had political implications. They struggled for the Labour Movement to be given a central role within their nation.
(a) When imperial interests established Iraq and it was placed under a British Mandate in 1920, we set about exploiting its resources. Railways, ports, cigarette and other factories were built. Whilst in 1927 oil was discovered.
This all led to the establishment of a downtrodden and exploited working class. So it did just what you would expect in such circumstances. The workers organised and industrial action took place in all the areas I mentioned above. The 1920s was also a good time to learn from the actions then being taken by the organised working class in Britain.
(b) Iraqi Trade Unions had a persistent battle with the law (and it is still happening today). When in 1932 Iraq technically became an independent nation, it was still under strong British dominance. It banned Trade Unions in 1936, with the inevitable reaction coming from the bodies it sort to eradicate.
(c) Industrial Action took on an even clearer political content when the Portsmouth Treaty was signed in 1948. This was an update of earlier Anglo-Iraqi Treaties which maintained British controls, including the continuation of air bases as British Crown Territories. I was to be one of the many National Servicemen sent to one of these.
The widespread nature of the 1948 struggle was possible because 16 new Trade Unions were formed between 1944 and 1946, with the Iraqi Communist Party playing a leading role in the conflict.
(d) It wasn’t until the pro-British system was swept aside in a Colonel’s led revolution in 1958 that Britain was finally obliged to leave its air bases. The mass GFTU (later to be subverted by Saddam Hussein) was established with Communists winning all ten seats on its Central Council in open elections.
They then organised a May Day March in Baghdad in 1959, with half a million people joining in out of a population of under 7 million. They were led by their Communist leaders in suits, shirts and ties as the nations leading advocates of establishing a bourgeois democracy as a means of giving the workers their place in the sun.
The March of Progress Murdered and then Reborn.
From 1963 coups and counter coups took place in Iraq until the Baath and finally Saddam Hussein came to take full power. The way the Trade Union Movement was forced into either clandestine activity, exile or was tortured and murdered is shown through the life of Hadi Saleh.
The TUC has produced a fine book entitled Hadi Never Died : Hadi Saleh and the Iraqi Trade Unions by Abdullah Muhsin and Alan Johnson (who is an academic and not the politician). I have already generously drawn details from the book in this article.
In 1969 (a year after a Baathist Coup) and at the age of 20, Hadi was imprisoned for Trade Union and Communist political activity, seriously maltreated and sentenced to death. He remained on death row until 1973 when under an armistice he was released and returned to his employment as a printer and again engaged in Trade Union and political activity.
The armistice arose because the Baath had signed a Friendship Treaty with the Soviet Union, especially to obtain arms. But in 1977, Hadi was obliged to flee the country and when in exile linked secretly with clandestine elements in Iraq.
He helped found the Worker’s Democratic Trade Union Movement in 1980. It called a strike at Sulymanyah in the Kurdish area in 1984, involving 4,000. The regime took harsh action and four of the activists were executed.
In 2003 Hadi returned to Iraq on the heels of the invasion. He was at the forefront of the establishment of the IFTU, who I mentioned earlier. He became their International Secretary, travelling widely from his base in Baghdad to develop crucial links with the International Trade Union Movement.
He was brutally murdered in Baghdad in 2005 by terrorists who deliberately target Trade Unionists. His Trade Union records were stolen and information used to seek out others. Some 2,000 of his comrades have been deliberately targeted and murdered, using a variety of sources of information.
Imagine our own Trade Union Movement withstanding such an assault.
I had the privilege of Chairing a meeting for Hadi in the Commons. He was a fine person and his murder came as a deep shock. In fact, in my life he is the only person I have been in such close contact with whom I know was later murdered. So you will imagine my reaction. I was privileged to address his memorial service at the TUC.
Thanks to his groundwork, the Iraqi Trade Union Movement has become a significant
force recognised by the Arab Federation of Trade Unions and working closely with bodies such as the TUC, the International Confederation of Free Trade Unions and the International Labour Office.
Iraqi Kurdistan
The first return to open and free Trade Unions came in Iraqi Kurdistan.
In 1991 after Saddam Hussein engaged in a campaign of genocide against the Kurds, who fled to the mountains in the north, a no-fly zone was established and conditions were then created for the Kurds to operate on a fairly autonomous basis.
Although the Kurds had their own period of internal conflict after this, they are now united and Saddam Hussein’s anti-Trade union legislation has bitten the dust, with Trade Unions having full recognition from the Kurdish Regional Government where numbers of Ministers and officials come from their ranks.
Today the Kurdistan Workers Federation has a membership of 200,000. Whilst the Kurdish Teachers’ Union has 100,000 members. Added to these are what are termed civic bodies catering for several tens of thousands. These are organisations with much in common with, say, the MSF section of AMICUS.
Iraqi Kurdistan covers mainly a population of Sunni Kurds, with minorities including Shia Kurds, Turcoman and Assyrians. Together, the area covers from 20 to 25% of Iraq’s population, depending on where we draw the boundaries for the region as the status of Kirkuk has yet to be determined.
When I visited Iraqi Kurdistan in April with Labour Friends of Iraq (LFIQ) and Trade Union officials, I became aware of numbers of factors including the following.
Outside of areas such as Mosul and Kirkuk, it is now reasonably safe to move around thanks to the Kurds operating their own tight security system. These involve regular road checks (where those questioning you can be trusted not to have links with terrorists), with key buildings being protected by huge concrete blocks and by guards.
The economy has characteristics of a command economy, but even the local Communist Party are aware of the need to attract inward investment. But in opening up the economy to the influences of capital, there is a keenness not to throw the baby out with the bathwater.
There is a building boom taking place covering private housing, rented flats, council housing, university students accommodation and public facilities. Road building, a hydro-electric project and plans for leisure provisions are to the fore. Cement factories proliferate.
But there are plenty of problems to overcome, including petrol shortages in an oil producing nation. This creates a huge black market for petrol smuggled over the borders. Hydro electric extensions are sort to overcome the regular breakdown in supplies. Whilst there is also a great deal of hidden unemployment. We visited a cigarette factory employing 600 workers which had not produced a fag for several years, but which the workers attended full-time in order to be paid.
The views of the Kurds about the invasion and the occupation tend to differ from those of the Arabs elsewhere in Iraq. The only people we spoke to who opposed these measures were those who shared the views of the minority Kurdish Communist Party, who had opposed the invasion and looked for a phased withdrawal of troops. They are, however, as opposed to terrorists tactics as anyone. There is, however, no feeling of being occupied by foreign troops in Iraqi Kurdistan as only 200 American troops are situated there.
Our visit to Iraqi Kurdistan was well publicised in the local media, but we were protected and closely guarded. If we had attempted the same activities in Baghdad then we would soon have been kidnapped. Our hosts from the Kurdistan Workers Federation looked after us well and carefully. They even arranged for us not to miss out on meeting the Trade Union leadership from the rest of Iraq. For eleven of these flew in from Baghdad to meet us in the Kurdish City of Arbil.
Arab Iraq
The IFTU which Hadi Saleh helped to found forms the backbone of the newly established General Federation of Iraqi Workers (GFITU). This body was established to allow for links with other bodies in order to have all the recognised Trade Unions in non-Kurdish Iraq joining together into its own TUC for purposes of affilation to the Arab Federation of Trade Unions. The exception being the large Teachers’ Union, with whom they enjoy close fraternal links.
Today the GFITU covers a membership of some 300,000, with 400,000 in the Teachers’ Union, which covers all education institutions. Apart from terrorists targetting Trade Unionists, these Trade unions face another serious problem which does not operate in Iraqi Kurdistan. The law is against them.
Saddam Hussein’s measure banning Trade Unions in the public sector has not been repealed. Employers are in a position to resort to the Courts and to offialdom to act upon the legal position. This has happened causing Trade Unionism serious problems.
Even if the practicalities on the ground differ from Saddam Hussein’s time and shop floor pressures can pursuade employers in specific circumstances not to make full use of these legal powers, another crippling Government Decree hit the Trade Unions on 8 August 2005. Under the Decree 8750, Trade Union funds can be taken over by the State whilst awaiting proposals on just how the State will allow Trade Unions to function, organise and operate.
The State’s powers to sequest Trade Union funds and their threat of future bans and prescriptions when added to the pre-existing ban on Trade Union activity in the main sector of the economy, place a crippling burden upon the GFITU, its affiliates and the Teachers’ Union.
Considerable efforts are being made by the International Trade Union Movement and especially the TUC to have these restraints on free Trade Unionism removed.
Iraqi Trade Unions concern themselves with numerous measures which go beyond their own organisational viability and those of the wages and conditions of their members. Economic development is a key concern and they are insistent that the dominant Oil Industry in Iraq should remain in public ownership and become subject to democratic control.
The status of women in society is another huge issue. For instance, along with women’s organisations and non-governmental bodies, trade unions were at the centre of action leading to the repeal of Saddam Hussein’s Law 137 under which
women were under male domination in families and marriages. There are also conflicting interpretations of the new Iraqi Constitution with its free status for women clashing with its Islamic commitments which some would use to justify Sharia law.
Whilst I was in Iraqi Kurdistan I entered into discussions with women Trade Unionists at factories, on a Trade Union Training Course as tutors and students and in Civic Society meetings; but I have also met female GFITU activists at the TUC and in the Commons. In Arbil, the visiting Trade Unionists included Hasimia Muhsin Hussein who is President of the Basra Electricty and Energy Union. So far she is the only major office holder in an GFITU affiliate who is a women. Yet all of these bodies have commitments to equal rights for women and struggle for this, especially within industry.
Solidarity
Understanding something about the commitments, scope and potential of the Iraqi Trade Union Movement is a prelude to working with and for them. I will first give an indication of what assistance the British Trade Union Movement is providing its brothers and sisters in Iraq. I will then suggest ways in which, as individuals, we can also assist.
(a) UNISON funds Trade Union Training Courses in Iraq. We visited one of these in Arbil and later came across shop stewards from the courses in their factories. We also met the co-ordinator running the national scheme. As a former tutor on Trade Union Courses myself, I was impressed by what I heard and saw.
As a consquence of our visit UNISON representatives also made a commitment to find resources to fund a workers radio station in Iraq.
In 2004 the FBU collected and delivered 600 kits of boots, leggings, tunics and helmets to fire fighters in Basra when they discovered that the Iraqi firefighters operated without essential equipment. Recently, they delivered two fire engines to Iraq and had to pay bribes to Turkish border guards in order to be allowed to cross into Iraq.
RMT, PCS and the GMB are amongst other Unions who have provided practical help in their areas. Many Unions have facilitated visits to and from Iraq with their equivalents. Iraqi Trade Unionists attend Trade Union Education Courses in this country.
In addition to making regular representations to our Government and that of Iraq, the TUC run a “Aid Iraq Appeal” which has sponsored a major project run by the International Federation of Journalists in assisting Iraqi Journalists to establish free Trade Unions. Whilst the NUJ is one of the Unions active in the works of the TUC’s important Iraq Solidarity Committee. The workers’ rights to free expression being crucial.
(b) How can individual Trade Union and Labour Movement activists help?
First, by getting up to speed on the issues involved and then spreading the word. The key source for such information is the TUC book on Hadi Saleh which I mentioned earlier. It sells at £10 and profits go to the TUC’s Aid to Iraq Appeal. The book also provides essential details on who to contact.
As part of the TUC’s Appeal, it also collects old mobile phones with their chargers for conversion for use in Iraq. These are important as travel is dangerous and landlines unrealiable. Unlike cash, mobiles are unlikely to be sequested by the State.
Within a person’s own Trade Union and Labour Movement Organisation questions can be raised to see if adequate support is being provided to bodies such as the TUC’s Iraq Solidarity Committee and Labour Friends of Iraq (LFIQ). The latter will provide speakers for meetings.
Links made to the web-site run by the LFIQ will reveal other groups that operate in support of these ideals. There is, for instance, a group called Books to Iraq (with their own web-site) who collect funds to purchase and export text books for the Iraqi School of Pharmacy.
In Conclusion
I started by commenting on the two big issues which often dominate our thoughts on Iraq - where did we stand on the invasion and where do we now stand on the question of “troops out”? I then said that whatever divided us over these matters, those active in the wider Labour Movement could and should still unite together over a third big issue; namely, support for an Iraqi Trade Union Movement that pursues workers’ rights, democracy, civil rights and a secular state. This Movement is one of the best hopes for a decent future for Iraq.
In fact, merely to concentrate on the invasion and on the current position of the Armed Forces is a rather Western-centred approach. These matters are, of course, also of key importance to the Iraqi people. But their daily struggles show that we need to go beyond our own two big issues if we are to link in with their needs. After all, whose side will we be on when the troops leave ? If the answer includes the Trade Unions, then shouldn’t we be active at their side already ?
In Britain, our minds are often focussed upon two big issues concerning Iraq. First, should we have been involved in its invasion ? Secondly, should our troops now be withdrawn ?
I will outline where I stand on these matters, before concentrating on a third key concern which I feel should engage the attention of those of us who have involvements in the wider Labour and Trade Union Movement. How significant are equivalent bodies to ours inside Iraq ? What are they aiming for ? And how worthy are they of our support ?
But first let me confront those first two big issues, which I in no way wish to run away from.
(a) First, there is the matter of the invasion
I opposed the 2003 invasion of Iraq in a fully fledged way and I stand by the position I adopted. For I was opposed to the invasion whether or not Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction. We now know that he did not hold such weapons and that the argument used for the invasion was spurious. But at the time, I argued that if he had held such weapons then an invasion still wasn’t justified as it would have been a highly dangerous exercise - rather like prodding a mad dog with a stick.
I was also opposed to the invasion whether or not it was sanctioned by the United Nations. For, to me, if the United Nations had been persuaded to back the invasion, that decision would still have been the wrong one. For with or without such backing, the likely consequences (as we have now seen) would be shocking in terms of the loss of life, the internal conflict in Iraq and the impacts in Palestine, the rest of the Middle East and throughout the Muslim World.
Whilst I don’t accept the estimates on post-invasion deaths which have twice emerged in the Lancet, I do recognise that the loss of life in this period from conflict has been (and increasingly is) horrendous and that something like it was predictable back in the period leading up to the invasion.
But those advocating an invasion did put forward a question which the rest of us needed to answer. “What would we do instead to tackle the manifest evils of Hussein’s Regime ?” My answer was that we should have been assisting those brave
people in Iraq who opposed the regime and who struggled to have it replaced by a humane alternative. The internal struggle was the one which should have been in the lead. An article by Mary Kaldor on the Open Democracy web-site on 21.4.05, entitled, Iraq: the wrong war has since spelt out what that option was in a section entitled “Was there an alternative?”
(b) Secondly, there is the matter of what we should now do about British and American troops in Iraq. Should they be withdrawn ? When and how ?
Many assume that if someone opposed the invasion in such a fully fledged way, then they must now and always since the invasion have been in favour of the immediate withdrawal of the troops. This does not, of course, follow either in terms of logic or morality. For there is a countervailing concern.
Terrorist groups and criminal gangs are murdering masses of Iraqi people going about their normal business without such people ever giving meaningful support to “the occupying forces” or to a claimed “puppet regime”. Iraqi troops and police need to have the ability to contain this hideous aggression. American and British troops play a role in helping to build up and to supplement this difficult internal security.
The great problem is that American Forces in particular (but not excluding the British) have been involved in a whole series of actions involving prison abuse, over the top military action and a failure to link with and aid Iraqis who could have helped build the alternative democratic society which Bush and Blair say they seek.
The question then arises as to how much terrorist activity would just fall away if the British and American troops left. And would any such drop in violence be sufficient to ensure relative peace ?
I have always answered this quandary by arguing that the decision on withdrawal should be made by the Iraqi Parliament. I argue this even though I recognise (and below stress) some of the shortcomings of the actions and omissions of the Iraqi Parliament and their Government . For as a Democratic Socialist, I would criticize aspects of decisions made by almost every parliament in the world. That does not mean that I would wish to abolish them !
The Iraqi people did not support the invasion, but they should at least use their new institutions to decide just when and how the troops should leave. All I would suggest is the need for a timetable for withdrawal plus plans for replacements of troops from acceptable Arab and other nations into non Kurdish Iraq, if these are needed. The Iraqi people need to know that Britain and America will be leaving.
But Why Not A Triple Alliance?
I do not wish to draw a line under the above matters, but I do wish to turn our attention to another concern which should be given a much greater priority by the Labour Movement. Furthermore, I would claim that whatever attitude we take on the first two big issues, we should be united on this one.
We should start by asking ourselves if there are forces in Iraq who are striving to advance the values which we share? Namely, those of democracy, civil rights, social justice and a secular State.
In fact there are many such forces, including those who mobilize to achieve a status for women, youths, the maimed and disabled, or for improved hospitals, schools, electricity and other services. But I will concentrate on the organisations I know the best and who seem to me to have a massive potential - Iraqi Trade Unions.
Iraq has a population of 27 million. It is dominated by young people and only 15 million fall within the ages of 14 to 65. Because unemployment is normally said to be in the region of 50%, whilst many women in fundamentalist Muslim areas are discouraged from working outside of their homes; those in steady employment could be as low as 5 million.
Yet over a million people are organised in Trade Unions. Which is likely to be 20% of those who can reasonably be mobilised. In Britain the equivalent figure is 29.1% and we have faced nothing like the traumas and controls experienced by the Iraqi working people over the past 40 years.
When it came to Saddam Hussein’s era, Trade unions were banned in the public sector which accounted for 80% of the workforce, whilst Chemical Ali was put in charge of what was left of Trade Unionism. The latter were what are normally called yellow Trade Unions, under strict and corrupt State domination.
Trade Unions Re-emerge
When Saddam Hussein banned Trade Unions in the public sector in 1987 he stated that workers no longer existed in Iraq, whilst he turned a body called the General Federation of Trade Unions (GFTU who had had a fine past) into a corrupt State-controlled body for the private sector. It spied on its own members and its offices were used for interrogation and torture.
Yet within a few weeks of the invasion, workers who organised in the docks in Basra took successful strike action to remove an oppressive Baathist Management and to obtain a pay rise. Thirteen separate bodies covering 200,000 members were quickly organised and formed the units of the Iraqi Federation of Trade Unions (IFTU).
How was this possible given the Baathist legacy ? As in any revolutionary turn around, it was a mixture of spontaneity and organisation.
Spontaneously, many workers in Iraq knew about the fine history of Trade Unionism in their nation and had an idea that it was needed and was now possible in the circumstances of uncertainty, disruption and confusion created by the invasion. The memory of many martyrs was also held onto firmly by their relatives and friends. Such networks are of great importance in Iraq.
When it came to organisation many activists who managed to survive, had operated in a clandestine fashion throughout the Baathist days and were in touch with comrades who had been driven into exile. Those in exile immediately returned or otherwise helped with the organisational work.
Things happen quickly when spontaneity and organisation are fused.
The Heritage
The pattern of Trade Union history in Iraq is a common one. Workers struggled for reasonable wages and conditions. They opposed Anti-Trade Union Laws. They engaged in strikes which at times had political implications. They struggled for the Labour Movement to be given a central role within their nation.
(a) When imperial interests established Iraq and it was placed under a British Mandate in 1920, we set about exploiting its resources. Railways, ports, cigarette and other factories were built. Whilst in 1927 oil was discovered.
This all led to the establishment of a downtrodden and exploited working class. So it did just what you would expect in such circumstances. The workers organised and industrial action took place in all the areas I mentioned above. The 1920s was also a good time to learn from the actions then being taken by the organised working class in Britain.
(b) Iraqi Trade Unions had a persistent battle with the law (and it is still happening today). When in 1932 Iraq technically became an independent nation, it was still under strong British dominance. It banned Trade Unions in 1936, with the inevitable reaction coming from the bodies it sort to eradicate.
(c) Industrial Action took on an even clearer political content when the Portsmouth Treaty was signed in 1948. This was an update of earlier Anglo-Iraqi Treaties which maintained British controls, including the continuation of air bases as British Crown Territories. I was to be one of the many National Servicemen sent to one of these.
The widespread nature of the 1948 struggle was possible because 16 new Trade Unions were formed between 1944 and 1946, with the Iraqi Communist Party playing a leading role in the conflict.
(d) It wasn’t until the pro-British system was swept aside in a Colonel’s led revolution in 1958 that Britain was finally obliged to leave its air bases. The mass GFTU (later to be subverted by Saddam Hussein) was established with Communists winning all ten seats on its Central Council in open elections.
They then organised a May Day March in Baghdad in 1959, with half a million people joining in out of a population of under 7 million. They were led by their Communist leaders in suits, shirts and ties as the nations leading advocates of establishing a bourgeois democracy as a means of giving the workers their place in the sun.
The March of Progress Murdered and then Reborn.
From 1963 coups and counter coups took place in Iraq until the Baath and finally Saddam Hussein came to take full power. The way the Trade Union Movement was forced into either clandestine activity, exile or was tortured and murdered is shown through the life of Hadi Saleh.
The TUC has produced a fine book entitled Hadi Never Died : Hadi Saleh and the Iraqi Trade Unions by Abdullah Muhsin and Alan Johnson (who is an academic and not the politician). I have already generously drawn details from the book in this article.
In 1969 (a year after a Baathist Coup) and at the age of 20, Hadi was imprisoned for Trade Union and Communist political activity, seriously maltreated and sentenced to death. He remained on death row until 1973 when under an armistice he was released and returned to his employment as a printer and again engaged in Trade Union and political activity.
The armistice arose because the Baath had signed a Friendship Treaty with the Soviet Union, especially to obtain arms. But in 1977, Hadi was obliged to flee the country and when in exile linked secretly with clandestine elements in Iraq.
He helped found the Worker’s Democratic Trade Union Movement in 1980. It called a strike at Sulymanyah in the Kurdish area in 1984, involving 4,000. The regime took harsh action and four of the activists were executed.
In 2003 Hadi returned to Iraq on the heels of the invasion. He was at the forefront of the establishment of the IFTU, who I mentioned earlier. He became their International Secretary, travelling widely from his base in Baghdad to develop crucial links with the International Trade Union Movement.
He was brutally murdered in Baghdad in 2005 by terrorists who deliberately target Trade Unionists. His Trade Union records were stolen and information used to seek out others. Some 2,000 of his comrades have been deliberately targeted and murdered, using a variety of sources of information.
Imagine our own Trade Union Movement withstanding such an assault.
I had the privilege of Chairing a meeting for Hadi in the Commons. He was a fine person and his murder came as a deep shock. In fact, in my life he is the only person I have been in such close contact with whom I know was later murdered. So you will imagine my reaction. I was privileged to address his memorial service at the TUC.
Thanks to his groundwork, the Iraqi Trade Union Movement has become a significant
force recognised by the Arab Federation of Trade Unions and working closely with bodies such as the TUC, the International Confederation of Free Trade Unions and the International Labour Office.
Iraqi Kurdistan
The first return to open and free Trade Unions came in Iraqi Kurdistan.
In 1991 after Saddam Hussein engaged in a campaign of genocide against the Kurds, who fled to the mountains in the north, a no-fly zone was established and conditions were then created for the Kurds to operate on a fairly autonomous basis.
Although the Kurds had their own period of internal conflict after this, they are now united and Saddam Hussein’s anti-Trade union legislation has bitten the dust, with Trade Unions having full recognition from the Kurdish Regional Government where numbers of Ministers and officials come from their ranks.
Today the Kurdistan Workers Federation has a membership of 200,000. Whilst the Kurdish Teachers’ Union has 100,000 members. Added to these are what are termed civic bodies catering for several tens of thousands. These are organisations with much in common with, say, the MSF section of AMICUS.
Iraqi Kurdistan covers mainly a population of Sunni Kurds, with minorities including Shia Kurds, Turcoman and Assyrians. Together, the area covers from 20 to 25% of Iraq’s population, depending on where we draw the boundaries for the region as the status of Kirkuk has yet to be determined.
When I visited Iraqi Kurdistan in April with Labour Friends of Iraq (LFIQ) and Trade Union officials, I became aware of numbers of factors including the following.
Outside of areas such as Mosul and Kirkuk, it is now reasonably safe to move around thanks to the Kurds operating their own tight security system. These involve regular road checks (where those questioning you can be trusted not to have links with terrorists), with key buildings being protected by huge concrete blocks and by guards.
The economy has characteristics of a command economy, but even the local Communist Party are aware of the need to attract inward investment. But in opening up the economy to the influences of capital, there is a keenness not to throw the baby out with the bathwater.
There is a building boom taking place covering private housing, rented flats, council housing, university students accommodation and public facilities. Road building, a hydro-electric project and plans for leisure provisions are to the fore. Cement factories proliferate.
But there are plenty of problems to overcome, including petrol shortages in an oil producing nation. This creates a huge black market for petrol smuggled over the borders. Hydro electric extensions are sort to overcome the regular breakdown in supplies. Whilst there is also a great deal of hidden unemployment. We visited a cigarette factory employing 600 workers which had not produced a fag for several years, but which the workers attended full-time in order to be paid.
The views of the Kurds about the invasion and the occupation tend to differ from those of the Arabs elsewhere in Iraq. The only people we spoke to who opposed these measures were those who shared the views of the minority Kurdish Communist Party, who had opposed the invasion and looked for a phased withdrawal of troops. They are, however, as opposed to terrorists tactics as anyone. There is, however, no feeling of being occupied by foreign troops in Iraqi Kurdistan as only 200 American troops are situated there.
Our visit to Iraqi Kurdistan was well publicised in the local media, but we were protected and closely guarded. If we had attempted the same activities in Baghdad then we would soon have been kidnapped. Our hosts from the Kurdistan Workers Federation looked after us well and carefully. They even arranged for us not to miss out on meeting the Trade Union leadership from the rest of Iraq. For eleven of these flew in from Baghdad to meet us in the Kurdish City of Arbil.
Arab Iraq
The IFTU which Hadi Saleh helped to found forms the backbone of the newly established General Federation of Iraqi Workers (GFITU). This body was established to allow for links with other bodies in order to have all the recognised Trade Unions in non-Kurdish Iraq joining together into its own TUC for purposes of affilation to the Arab Federation of Trade Unions. The exception being the large Teachers’ Union, with whom they enjoy close fraternal links.
Today the GFITU covers a membership of some 300,000, with 400,000 in the Teachers’ Union, which covers all education institutions. Apart from terrorists targetting Trade Unionists, these Trade unions face another serious problem which does not operate in Iraqi Kurdistan. The law is against them.
Saddam Hussein’s measure banning Trade Unions in the public sector has not been repealed. Employers are in a position to resort to the Courts and to offialdom to act upon the legal position. This has happened causing Trade Unionism serious problems.
Even if the practicalities on the ground differ from Saddam Hussein’s time and shop floor pressures can pursuade employers in specific circumstances not to make full use of these legal powers, another crippling Government Decree hit the Trade Unions on 8 August 2005. Under the Decree 8750, Trade Union funds can be taken over by the State whilst awaiting proposals on just how the State will allow Trade Unions to function, organise and operate.
The State’s powers to sequest Trade Union funds and their threat of future bans and prescriptions when added to the pre-existing ban on Trade Union activity in the main sector of the economy, place a crippling burden upon the GFITU, its affiliates and the Teachers’ Union.
Considerable efforts are being made by the International Trade Union Movement and especially the TUC to have these restraints on free Trade Unionism removed.
Iraqi Trade Unions concern themselves with numerous measures which go beyond their own organisational viability and those of the wages and conditions of their members. Economic development is a key concern and they are insistent that the dominant Oil Industry in Iraq should remain in public ownership and become subject to democratic control.
The status of women in society is another huge issue. For instance, along with women’s organisations and non-governmental bodies, trade unions were at the centre of action leading to the repeal of Saddam Hussein’s Law 137 under which
women were under male domination in families and marriages. There are also conflicting interpretations of the new Iraqi Constitution with its free status for women clashing with its Islamic commitments which some would use to justify Sharia law.
Whilst I was in Iraqi Kurdistan I entered into discussions with women Trade Unionists at factories, on a Trade Union Training Course as tutors and students and in Civic Society meetings; but I have also met female GFITU activists at the TUC and in the Commons. In Arbil, the visiting Trade Unionists included Hasimia Muhsin Hussein who is President of the Basra Electricty and Energy Union. So far she is the only major office holder in an GFITU affiliate who is a women. Yet all of these bodies have commitments to equal rights for women and struggle for this, especially within industry.
Solidarity
Understanding something about the commitments, scope and potential of the Iraqi Trade Union Movement is a prelude to working with and for them. I will first give an indication of what assistance the British Trade Union Movement is providing its brothers and sisters in Iraq. I will then suggest ways in which, as individuals, we can also assist.
(a) UNISON funds Trade Union Training Courses in Iraq. We visited one of these in Arbil and later came across shop stewards from the courses in their factories. We also met the co-ordinator running the national scheme. As a former tutor on Trade Union Courses myself, I was impressed by what I heard and saw.
As a consquence of our visit UNISON representatives also made a commitment to find resources to fund a workers radio station in Iraq.
In 2004 the FBU collected and delivered 600 kits of boots, leggings, tunics and helmets to fire fighters in Basra when they discovered that the Iraqi firefighters operated without essential equipment. Recently, they delivered two fire engines to Iraq and had to pay bribes to Turkish border guards in order to be allowed to cross into Iraq.
RMT, PCS and the GMB are amongst other Unions who have provided practical help in their areas. Many Unions have facilitated visits to and from Iraq with their equivalents. Iraqi Trade Unionists attend Trade Union Education Courses in this country.
In addition to making regular representations to our Government and that of Iraq, the TUC run a “Aid Iraq Appeal” which has sponsored a major project run by the International Federation of Journalists in assisting Iraqi Journalists to establish free Trade Unions. Whilst the NUJ is one of the Unions active in the works of the TUC’s important Iraq Solidarity Committee. The workers’ rights to free expression being crucial.
(b) How can individual Trade Union and Labour Movement activists help?
First, by getting up to speed on the issues involved and then spreading the word. The key source for such information is the TUC book on Hadi Saleh which I mentioned earlier. It sells at £10 and profits go to the TUC’s Aid to Iraq Appeal. The book also provides essential details on who to contact.
As part of the TUC’s Appeal, it also collects old mobile phones with their chargers for conversion for use in Iraq. These are important as travel is dangerous and landlines unrealiable. Unlike cash, mobiles are unlikely to be sequested by the State.
Within a person’s own Trade Union and Labour Movement Organisation questions can be raised to see if adequate support is being provided to bodies such as the TUC’s Iraq Solidarity Committee and Labour Friends of Iraq (LFIQ). The latter will provide speakers for meetings.
Links made to the web-site run by the LFIQ will reveal other groups that operate in support of these ideals. There is, for instance, a group called Books to Iraq (with their own web-site) who collect funds to purchase and export text books for the Iraqi School of Pharmacy.
In Conclusion
I started by commenting on the two big issues which often dominate our thoughts on Iraq - where did we stand on the invasion and where do we now stand on the question of “troops out”? I then said that whatever divided us over these matters, those active in the wider Labour Movement could and should still unite together over a third big issue; namely, support for an Iraqi Trade Union Movement that pursues workers’ rights, democracy, civil rights and a secular state. This Movement is one of the best hopes for a decent future for Iraq.
In fact, merely to concentrate on the invasion and on the current position of the Armed Forces is a rather Western-centred approach. These matters are, of course, also of key importance to the Iraqi people. But their daily struggles show that we need to go beyond our own two big issues if we are to link in with their needs. After all, whose side will we be on when the troops leave ? If the answer includes the Trade Unions, then shouldn’t we be active at their side already ?
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