It was originally founded in 1976 by the merger of two Trotskyist groups: the International Communist League, associated with the United Secretariat of the Fourth International and the Mexican Morenists. No. 451, April 15, 1995 By the age of 22 he was reporting from the parliamentary press gallery in Canberra, and three years later he took his chances and left for London, where he quickly found work with the Sunday Times then at the height of its liberal investigative powers. No. 9, February 1, 1986 458, June 24, 1995 66, March 14, 1987 The WRP had been living beyond its means for some time, maintaining an HQ, a chain of bookshops, a school, a print shop, and a number of youth centres, as well as satisfying Healys obsession with acquiring expensive technology. It preferred working with impressionable actors, inexperienced youth and the permanently unemployed, while keeping a relationship with left-leaning trade union leaders. WRP 2019 Election Manifesto", "Desperate Tories frantically witchhunt Corbyn put them out on June 8th! 25 May 2021 The Undercover Policing Inquiry (UCPI) has provided a carefully managed account of state infiltration in the Workers Revolutionary Party (WRP). 73, May 2, 1987 Workers Revolutionary Party. The Founding of the Workers Revolutionary Party. 481, December 16, 1995 Much of his analysis is questionable and reflects the fact that he divided his time between the hothouse atmosphere of the WRPs Clapham HQ, addressing public meetings and jetting around the Middle East, but had little knowledge of the consciousness of workers or the state of the rank and file. No. No. 111, February 6, 1988 The WRP grew out of the faction Gerry Healy and John Lawrence led in the Revolutionary Communist Party which urged that the RCP pursue entryist tactics in the Labour Party. Pages in category "Workers Revolutionary Party (UK) members" The following 33 pages are in this category, out of 33 total. No. In 1987, former MI5 agent Peter Wright published his memoirs, Spycatcher, which revealed the far and wide left was one of the agencys priorities in the 1970sthe WRP is specifically named. It led to the exposure of the network of GPU and American intelligence agents within the Fourth International that ensured the success of Stalins conspiracy against Trotskys life. [citation needed]. Colin Smith and Robert Chesshyre, "Vanessa and the Red House Mystery". 68, March 28, 1987 Another split in the pro-Healy ICFI and WRP developed when the American section of the ICFI led by Workers League National Secretary David North revolted against Healy's leadership and split to form its own rival movement also called the ICFI. Revolutionary workers follow the communist norm set out by Trotsky: to "say what is", to explain the revolutionary dynamic of the transitional program and the general . 24, May 17, 1986 No. The SLL leadership claimed in 1963 that they had identified a revolutionary situation in Britain. During this period, the SLL did experience considerable internal tensions. No. 146, December 24 Special Supplement, 1988, No. No. [40] It supported Brexit in the 2016 referendum. 510, July 20, 1996 62, February 14, 1987 447, March 18, 1995 No. News Railworkers strike for pay! Neither of the police officers who it is admitted infiltrated the WRP have been named. 47, October 25, 1986 Powerful start to month-long St Mungo strike! State infiltration is a life-or-death question for the revolutionary movement and must be guarded against and exposed by the working class. No. 466, September 2, 1995 Despots dont tend to like bad news, so the reality of the WRPs financial crisis was kept from Healy, and he was fed grossly exaggerated membership figures by assistant general secretary Sheila Torrance. No. No. 420, August 27, 1994 Having been catapulted into the leadership, his relationship with Marxism was mediated through the person of Gerry Healy. No. 72, April 25, 1987 455, June 3, 1995 UK Foreign Secretary Cleverly is egging on the Ukrainian regime to continue its attacks on Moscow! No. 483, January 13, 1996 However, as historian Spencer M. Di Scala tells us, industrial growth came with turbulence between workers and employers. Healy called for a massive educational effort within the organisation, which angered the old leadership. No. [19] In 1981, The Sunday Telegraph alleged that News Line was financed by money from Muammar al-Gaddafi's government. The foundation of the SLL was formally announced at the end of February 1959, Membership was "open to all who want to see the vigorous prosecution of the class struggle and the achievement of working class power". Healys claim to infallibility began to be questioned. 118, June 11, 1988 [1990/1991/1992: issues 163-347 are missing], No. No. 485, January 27, 1996 No. No. This website uses cookies, you can find out more and set your preferences here. No. But he also says that relations with the Iraqi Baathists had cooled in 1979 and ended in 1981 as a result of the Iraq/Iran War although not before the WRP had published a sycophantic pamphlet entitled Iraq under the Leadership of the Arab Baath Socialist Party. No. 508, July 6, 1996 No. [13] The jury found that not all words in the article were substantially true, but that the complainants' reputations had not been materially injured. No. No. No. 500, May 11, 1996 Similarly, we find coverage of the ongoing decomposition of the WRP (Workers Press) itself as various groups, tendencies and prominent individuals split away. The SLL formed the All-Trade Unions Alliance, supporting the replacement of the police with a workers'militia. In 1975, Corin Redgrave bought the White Meadows Villa in Parwich, Derbyshire, and the WRP used the house as a venue for training, under the name 'Red House', run by television director Roy Battersby. It also laid the basis for exposing continued state operations against the Trotskyist movement in the United States and other countries. Journalist and former teenage member Gary Younge wrote:[8], Communist Party of Great Britain (Marxist-Leninist), Communist Party of the Russian Federation, "Revolution betrayed - the Workers Revolutionary Party and Iraq", http://www.islamophobia-watch.com/islamophobia-watch/2005/10/22/bob-pitt-watch.html, http://www.marxists.org/history/etol/writers/healy/1986/07/1-contradiction.html, Behind the Smokescreen: An analysis of the sectarian politics of the Workers Revolutionary Party, https://rationalwiki.org/w/index.php?title=Workers_Revolutionary_Party&oldid=2450303, Pages using DynamicPageList parser function. No. In May-June 1986, the . 94, October 3, 1987 No. [27] Other expulsions, including those of Vanessa and Corin Redgrave, soon followed. 513, August 24, 1996 No. This book is available for purchase from Mehring Books. Mitchell does acknowledge a limited amount of Arab gold via Gaddafi and the PLO and some Gulf state funding of Vanessa Redgraves documentary The Palestinian, but in nothing like the quantities that have been widely alleged. In spite of official disinterest I succeeded in building the organisations most effective industrial group in Londons largest health authority. 16, March 22, 1986 No. COCA-COLA continues to violate the fundamental rights of workers in Haiti, Indonesia, Ireland and the US. No. The revolutionary workers' party is the historical organ of class consciousness: workers develop revolutionary consciousness only in the fight for the revolutionary party. By 1981, Gaddafi became more distant as a result of British government pressure. No. No. They started a daily paper, Workers Press, in the early 1970s and increased the turnover of membership, and began to fear police infiltration. He rubbishes claims that Healy raped dozens of women and believes that only lower level abuse took place. 414, July 2, 1994 No. 40, September 6, 1986 141, November 19, 1988 The Workers . The Workers' Revolutionary Party (Spanish: Partido Revolucionario de los Trabajadores, PRT) was a Trotskyist political party in Mexico.It was founded in 1976 by the merger of two Trotskyist groups: the International Communist League, associated with the United Secretariat of the Fourth International and the Mexican Morenists. No. No. No. The Workers Party of Britain was founded in response to the Labour Party's landslide defeat at the 2019 United Kingdom general election and the resignation of Jeremy Corbyn as Leader of the Labour Party. After Thornetts expulsion, the WRPs industrial work was chaotic. No. How the Workers Revolutionary Party Betrayed Trotskyism demonstrated that the crisis in the WRP was bound up with its retreat from the principles that the British Trotskyists had previously defended in the founding of the ICFI itself and, later, in their struggle against the unprincipled reunification carried out by the American Socialist Workers Party with the Pabloites in 1963. 150, January 28, 1989 THE REVOLUTION BETRAYED Elsewhere in this issue, in a dramatic exclusive, we publish a damning extract from the secret report of an internal inquiry into corruption within the Workers Revolutionary Party. It cost the party 8 per vote. No. 476, November 11, 1995 No. Apart from the efforts of the revolutionary party to introduce Marxist theory into the workers' movement, the predominant form of mass working class consciousness will remain at the level of . 459, July 1, 1995 No. 56, January 3, 1987 No. 99, November 7, 1987 79, June 20, 1987 For the next 15 years, he was one of Healys closest confidantes, and acted as the WRPs roving Middle Eastern ambassador, conducting bilateral contacts with, among others, Yasser Arafat, Colonel Gaddafi and Saddam Hussein. 105, December 19, 1987, No. 473, October 21, 1995 426, October 8, 1994 No. No. No. [2] In October 2011 the party's website declared that Gadaffi "died a hero". 522, October 26, 1996, ETOL Newspaper and Publication Page [36] The Marxist Party in turn experienced another small split after Healy's death which formed the Communist League. The advocacy of an increasing state of crisis would become a prominent part of their public profile. No. He was replaced by others in the leadership of the WRP. Activists and friends of Workers Liberty attended the annual fte organised by the French UCU congress narrowly votes to turn its back on Ukrainian trade unions and socialists. In their view this meant the most important activity was building the party. 113, February 29, 1988 While a SLL-organised meeting at the Alexandra Palace, London in February 1971 had an attendance of 4,000, the SLL and the other Trotskyist groups had a very limited industrial presence incapable of organising such a level of protest, according to a contemporary report by Paul Routledge in The Times. Brian Behan also severed his involvement with the group after a confrontation with Gerry Healy. No. No. Three of the published documents inform the SDS of the composition of the WRPs leadership. 97, October 23, 1987 117, May Day Edition, 1988 42, September 20, 1986 117, April 9, 1988 No. 144, December 12, 1988 No. David North @davidnorthwsws. Following Scargill, Healy insisted that the miners were undefeated, but the reality was there for all to see. We produce a daily paper, the News Line and a weekly youth paper Young Socialist. The 1972 summary notes that the then Socialist Labour League is gaining support for its indoor meetings. The 1973 summary refers to the party going all out with their recruitment campaign and to real progress being made by the WRP in the trade unions, which does not bode well for future industrial harmony. The 1974 summary describes the WRP as being heartened by its recruitment campaign and by its growing financial support, adding that the party is likely to be in the van of industrial unrest. 254260", "Workers Revolutionary Party Vote 'Leave' Bring Down Cameron Forward to Socialist United States of Europe! No. 85, August 1, 1987 71, April 18, 1987 81, July 4, 1987 114, February 27, 1988 The Workers Revolutionary Party is a Trotskyist group in Britain once led by Gerry Healy. The Bolshevik Revolution in 1917 smashed the Russian capitalist state and brought a workers' party to power for the first time in history. Other parts of the WRPs internal regime and politics were lifted wholesale from third-period Stalinism leadership elections conducted by approving a recommended list en bloc; unanimous decision making; and the slogan of a workers revolutionary government. No. 408, May 28, 1994 In each of these, an autocratic government encountered a revolutionary challenge during 1848. These include a report showing internal knowledge of the WRPs plan to reorganise its press and another on the suspension of a Central Committee member. The group sued Observer editor David Astor over the report, in a case marked by discussion of an armed police raid of the building in which bullets were found. No. In the mid-1980s, it split into several smaller groups, one of which retains possession of the name. No. In the controversy surrounding the Socialist Workers Party, and the way it has dealt with accusations of rape and sexual harassment by a leading member, the break-up of the Workers Revolutionary Party in 1985 has been referred to as a worst-case scenario. Already an active opponent of the Vietnam War before he left Australia in 1967, Mitchell was becoming steadily radicalised in the London of the late 1960s. 124, July 23, 1988 143, December 5, 1988 [14], In 1976, the WRP launched an inquiry into the details of Trotsky's death, following claims from Joseph Hansen that Harold Robins, a founding member of the American Socialist Workers Party might have been a Soviet agent. - no rise since 2016. No. No. Both groups fragmented further over the following years. There are huge gaps in the narrative. Workers Revolutionary Party (Workers Press) As the Workers Revolutionary Party split in two, each of the warring factions, at first, sought to publish their own version of the daily Newsline. No. No. 18, April 5, 1986 432, November 19, 1994 Remember those at university in the later 60s attempting to recruit.. One can only bring to mind that these members were yound I e, pedinced of life and totally brain washed. No. No. The first 200 pages are genuinely entertaining and engaging. Having been cut loose from the International Committee- both the North and Healy claimants to that mantle- the WRP (Workers Press) sought to develop its own international contacts, a process which led to the formation of the Preparatory Committee for an International Conference of Trotskyists an attempt to re-found the Fourth International. The Workers Revolutionary Party (WRP) is a Trotskyist political party in the United Kingdom which was founded in 1947 by Gerry Healy and Josh Lawrence.The WRP originated as "The Club", a group of communists who sought to use entryist tactics to infiltrate and take over the Labour Party.In 1959, the Club morphed into the "Socialist Labour League", which united Trotskyists, trade unionists, and . 474, October 28, 1995 380, October , 1993 No. No. 38, August 23, 1986 Revcom.us/ Revolution is the guide, the pivot, the crucial tool in drawing forward, orienting, training, and organizing thousands, and influencing millionsfighting the power, and transforming the people, for revolutionhastening and preparing for the time when we can go for the whole thing, with a real chance to win. No. No. The officer provided copies of proposed amendments to the constitution. No. No. No. No account is given in the 1975 report of why the WRPs potential for, in the polices words, public disorder was suddenly considered to be diminished. By continuing to use this website, you agree to our Privacy Policy and Terms & Conditions. 126, August 6, 1988 When the majority in the RCP rejected the policy in 1947, Healy's faction was granted the right to split from the RCP and work within the Labour Party as a separate body known internally as The Club. [22] While only a small proportion of this is alleged to have come from Saddam Hussein's Iraqi government, it draws particular attention to photographs which it claims WRP members were instructed to take of demonstrations of opponents of Saddam Hussein, and it states that those photos were later handed to the Iraqi embassy. [citation needed]. The full report, which has been leaked to us, chronicles an astonishing tale of abject perfidy by leading members of the group. No. A year later the majority faction of the RCP decided to join The Club in the Labour Party. Similarly, the WRPs behind the scenes alliances with various nationalist movements could be a minefield for members. [11] In 1979, a smaller group split from the WRP to found the Workers Party. From a high point of 2-3,000 members in 1973, the WRP was reduced to a shell of a few hundred by 1979. David Pallister, "Trotsky's death ripples down the years". No. It was run through the "centre" in Clapham, the SLL's HQ, in a doctrinaire and almost militaristic fashion. 102, November 26, 1987 No. No. But if there are lessons to be drawn from the history of the WRP they are almost all negative and Mitchell is incapable of supplying them. 156, March 11, 1989 A similarly thorough 18-page account was given of the first party conference in January 1975, again recounting the conditions of extraordinary security under which the event was held, the course of the debate and votes, and any indications of bad blood between leading members. Patrick Bishop, "How Ms Redgrave took over church". 16th issue of the 1980s London Solidarity Journal, including an expose on the Workers Revolutionary Party. In 1948, The Club joined with Labour left-wingers and trade unionists to organise The Socialist Fellowship as a vehicle for left-wing Labour Party members. No. Members were often forbidden to have contact with other people/ groups / liaisons or relationships. No. I. 464, August 19, 1995 153, February 18, 1989 No. 106, January 2, 1988 [35], Healy and his followers continued to claim to be the WRP, and for a time two versions of the group were in existence, each publishing its own daily News Line paper. In 1990, then Labour MP Ken Livingstone claimed in a public meeting of the Marxist Party, set up by former WRP leader Gerry Healy, that high level MI5 agents had infiltrated and been tasked with breaking up the WRP. 10, February 7, 1986 No. Referring to the undercover report on White Meadows, Counsel to the Inquiry David Barr QC acknowledged, there is also a document which suggests that the intelligence was passed on to the Security Service, who were appreciative of the White Meadows operation.. The youth section of the WRP, the Young Socialists, organises young workers and students in the struggle for socialism and a future. 135, October 8, 1988 Among other recruits at this time were Cliff Slaughter and Brian Pearce. Information provided by the two police spies gave the SDS access to lists of attendees at private WRP meetings, internal party documents, factional disagreements and splits, party security protocols, plans for upcoming public events and campaigns, figures for sales of the WRPs newspaper and money raised in fundraising drives, and personal details about the lives of party members. 502, May 25, 1996 No. THE government yesterday defied the 4pm deadline for handing over unredacted messages and notebooks to the Covid inquiry. Its 60 candidates in the 1979 general election polled a disastrous total of 12,631 votes. Theres nothing new on the shooting of PC Yvonne Fletcher outside the Libyan Embassy in 1984. 419, August 20, 1994 No. No. 123, July 16, 1988 A big gap exists between 1989 and 1993 which we will endeavor to acquire. 402, April 9, 1994 No. As is the case with so many political memoirs, the most interesting parts are those covering the formative years. Nigeria - Democratic Socialist Movement, Movement for a Socialist Alternative. No. Alongside polemic with their erstwhile comrades, Workers Press opened its pages to a wide range of British and international Trotskyist groupings and, in its pages we find debates, polemics, articles and letters from and to Workers Power, supporters of the United Secretariat and its British section, adherents of the Lambertist tendency and many others including the Workers International League which had itself decamped from the Newsline side of the split. Bigger problems lie in what Mitchell doesnt say. No. No. No. This version the Workers Press was the continuation of News Line, the publication of the Workers Revolutionary Party in Britain, in 1985. 9 December 1988. Aslef train drivers are. The party was founded by Atti Buques in May 1989 as the Party of Revolutionaries. No. 438, January 14, 1995 No. Cliff Slaughter, the political . The Socialist Fellowship launched a paper called Socialist Outlook, with John Lawrence as the publication's editor. As you point out it was part Cult, part sect . He writes that Ted Knight was expelled from the Socialist Labour League in 1954 five years before the SLL was launched. The youth section of the WRP, the Young Socialists, organises young workers and students in the struggle for socialism and a future. He credits the Queen Mother for dragging George VI away from appeasement, when history records she was an enthusiastic appeaser herself. 53, December 6, 1986 This is a very good account of Healyism. Some were traumatised, no doubt, although many on both sides claimed that they had taken part in an epoch-making struggle. This grouping has since been renamed the Socialist Equality Party. He owns up to various doubts about the WRPs internal regime and politics: The trouble with the WRP was that internal discussion was confined to reaffirming the party line, not debating it, and certainly not challenging it. He hit a crisis in the middle of the miners strike, convinced that Healys line (that the strike would either end in a direct struggle for power or a military dictatorship) was completely out of sync with reality. No. No. No. 506, June 22, 1996 396, February26, 1994 No. No. 469, September 23, 1995 This page was last edited on 17 May 2022, at 20:01. No. No. Elections. To participate in the 1989 elections, the Workers' Revolutionary Party entered into a coalition with the United Democratic Front and several other political forces. Panama - Workers Party (Marxist-Leninist) Paraguay - Workers' Party. No. It was formed with a commitment to "defend the achievements of the USSR, China, Cuba etc." [1] The WPB labels itself as an opposition to . 427, October 15, 1994 445, March 4, 1995 In 1975, the year Special Branch claims it lost interest in state surveillance of the WRP, the International Committee of the Fourth International launched the first systematic investigation by the Trotskyist movement into the assassination of Leon Trotsky by a Stalinist agent in Mexico, August 1940. We demand the immediate release of information on all operations carried out against the SLL/WRP, the SEP and other political organisations, by all the state agencies involved. 383, November 13, 1993 Certainly, the WRP had accumulated major financial problems by the time it split, and this has often been attributed to its Middle Eastern funding drying up. MIA: History: ETOL: Document: British Trotskyism: The Workers Press. 465, August 26, 1995 [29] Shortly afterwards, a Newsline front page open letter by Aileen Jennings, Healy's former secretary, asserted that the real reason for the expulsion was that Healy had sexually assaulted at least 26 female members. 468, September 16, 1995 No. 423, September 17, 1994 No. 21, April 26, 1986 When the organisation printed an article reviewing Healy's contribution to Trotskyism, he concluded that his forced retirement was being finalised. No. An October Revolution celebration of the first successful Marxist-Leninist revolution and the creation of the Soviet Union. However, Lawrence objected to this and as a result was replaced as editor of the paper. According to Mitchells account, the WRP went from success to success building and recruiting in the 1970s and only hit serious problems in the 1980s. [24] Liberal Party MP David Alton claimed in Parliament that youths were being taught anti-police methods at the centres,[25] and when he repeated the allegations outside Parliament was sued by the WRP. According to the record presented by the UCPI, the sustained police interest in the WRP then came to an abrupt halt in the mid-1970s. No. No. Apart from the miniscule principalities of San Marino and Monaco, there were three kingdoms, three sovereign duchies, and the extensive temporal possessions of the papacy. No. 49, November 8, 1986 No. For all Healys toxic reputation, its worth remembering that he was not the only Trotskyist leader to have an exaggerated view of his own importance, surround himself with bodyguards and female admirers, and pursue insanely opportunist or sectarian policies. 112, February 13, 1988 No. Mitchell never had much grasp of either Marxism or Trotskyist history. Like all great British scandals, it took in sex and money. He claims the publication of former Sunday Times colleague David Kings Trotsky: A Documentary in 1972 lifted Trotskys name from political obscurity. In 1985, after a protracted process of political degeneration, the Workers Revolutionary Party, the former British section of the ICFI, broke decisively from Trotskyism. 46, October 18, 1986 51, November 22, 1986 No. The internal party life was demanding and rigid. No. 412, June 18, 1994 - no rise since 2016 31st May 2023 519, October 5, 1996 463a, July 29, 463-Bosnia Special issue, 1995 Healy was expelled from the party in 1989 following allegations of party members being physically assaulted and raped, and indecent ties between the party and Arab dictators. In what he does say, Mitchell generally comes over as a fairly honest witness. Foreword. 478, November 25, 1995 22, May 3, 1986 14, March 8, 1986 416, July 16, 1994 In fact, by penetrating the WRP, the SDS was infiltrating the ICFI, of which the SEP is now the official representative in Britain. 401, April 2, 1994 Ardent Theatre Company presents Strike! As for the allegations of sexual abuse against Healy, Mitchell perhaps truthfully professes to knowing very little, but he is nevertheless soft on the old brute. No. No. 511, August 10, 1996 No one from the WRP was afforded core participant status and given the opportunity to participate in the UCPI. No. Norway - Internationalist League of Norway, International Socialists. No. No. 145, December 17, 1988 No. No. No. Working Class, the construction of a class identity class and solidarity radical artisans and industrial workers gender the left and the right reformist and revolut February Revolution, February Revolution, 1848, French revolution that overthrew the monarchy of Louis Philippe and established the Second Republic. 152, February 11, 1989 509, July 13, 1996 1, December 21, 1985 It relates to a party training course undertaken by the undercover officer at the White Meadows WRP College of Marxist education in Parwich, Derbyshire. 110, January 30, 1988 No. No. He correctly records that the anti-Healy majority carried out a wave of deranged violence, and points out that after the split many of Healys most vociferous opponents simply evaporated, never to be seen in further political activity. [issues 349-352 are missing] With some honourable exceptions Dot Gibson of the National Pensioners Convention and Andrew Burgin of the Stop the War Coalition spring to mind few WRP members did much that was constructive in the labour movement after 1985. When the International Committee of the Fourth International (ICFI) was founded as a public faction of the Fourth International in 1953, it recognised The Club as its official British section. Among its policies was the immediate replacement of the police by a workers militia. No. The Revolutionary Workers' Party (RWP; Russian: ; ; Revolyutsionnaya rabochaya partiya, RRP) is a Russian Trotskyist organisation established in 1999.From 2002 to 2011 there were two active organisations called the 'Revolutionary Workers' Party'. 87, August 15, 1987 77, May 30, 1987 [23], The group also set up youth training centres in various deprived communities across Britain. As a seasoned news hound, Alex Mitchell knows how to tell a story, liberally sprinkled with witty and revealing anecdotes. [2] The first applicant for joinder is a certain Mr. Willem Beukes who claims that he has been a member and the President of the Workers' Revolutionary Party ("WRP"), the . 24th April 2023. No. Mitchell was the editor of the WRP paper from the early 1970s until 1985. The Club was one of the ICFI's larger segments. No. Apart from cursory references to the 1984-5 miners strike, the great industrial battles of the 1970s and 80s and the riots of 1981 and 1985 barely feature. The party's origins lie in the Workers Revolutionary Party (WRP) until the majority of that party split from the ICFI in 1986. No. 147, January 8 Special Supplement, 1989 Pakistan - Socialist Movement Pakistan, The Struggle Pakistan. The truth is probably more prosaic. No. The Alliance for Workers' Liberty is an organisation fighting as part of the labour movement for a socialist alternative to both capitalism and Stalinism, based on common ownership and democracy. This was more success than Healy had experienced for some years. 388, December 18, 1993, No. 39, August 30, 1986 No. 431, November 12, 1994 2, January 4, 1986 No. No. 146, December 24 Special Supplement, 1988, No. No. Michael Scott suffered a prolonged bout of amnesia, repeatedly claiming I cant recall when asked about his undercover activities in the WRP or suggesting reports could have been the work of the conveniently absent Collins. For the bulk of ex-members, their allegiance had been primarily to a person rather than a programme or a set of ideas. - Tories step up war. 34, July 26, 1986 The truth behind the cryptic statements, redacted reports and scraps of anecdote must be uncovered. The two versions of the WRP soon became known by their newspapers, with the group led by Gerry Healy and Sheila Torrance being known as the WRP (Newsline). 19, April 12, 1986 No. No. 15, March 15, 1986 Some other organizations have attempted through their press to portray themselves as playing a significant role in this struggle. 55, December 20, 1986, No. 507, June 29, 1996 No. 413, June 25, 1994 Time for the working class to bring them down! We present here approx. 392, January 29, 1994 No. Within a short period the WRP splintered into a number of warring groups, most of which are now extinct, and very few of its former members remain politically active. Aside from the fact that Trotskyist groups across the world had published a large amount of Trotskys writings since 1968, it was surely Isaac Deutschers widely read three-volume biography which established Trotskys reputation among western intellectuals. 61, February 7, 1987 28, June 14, 1986 70, April 11, 1987 [1] It emerged from the 'Majority' faction of the Marxist-Leninist-Maoist Tendency, a group that had broken away from the Communist Party of Colombia (Marxist . The WRP (Workers Press) suffered a series of further splits including the International Socialist League and supporters of the Workers International to Rebuild the Fourth International and ended as a tiny organisation known as the Movement for Socialism. This paper published some of Trotsky's then hard-to-find books. (Workers Power, Red Action et al) had major . No. Neither a struggle for power nor a military government had materialised. No. In 1973, the SLL renamed itself to the "Workers Revolutionary Party". 58, January 17, 1987 The Workers Revolutionary Party is a British Trotskyist party founded in 1973 by Gerry Healy. The political implications of the on-going degeneration of the Workers Revolutionary Party was starkly revealed at the meeting on "Revolutionary Mortality," held on November 26, 1986 at . As the attendance at aggregate meetings during the split in October 1985 showed, the WRP had an active membership of barely 1,000. There is no rational reason to believe that only two agents were operating within the party, let alone that all undercover work ceased in the mid-1970s. Nicaragua - Workers' Revolutionary Party. In Workers Revolutionary Party. "Secret report on Redgrave party revealed". 59, January 24, 1987 115, March 5, 1988 121, July 2, 1988 The similarity with the method of Stalinist anti-fascism in the 1930s is striking. No. 23, May 10, 1986 No. The True Spies documentary, broadcast by the BBC in November 2002, implicated Special Branch in framing the WRP for the raid using an undercover agent. Within a short time, he had been fast tracked on to its Central and Political Committees, and became the papers editor. 136, October 15, 1988 The party organizes for a revolution to overthrow the system of capitalism and replace it with a socialist state, with the final aim of world communism. No. No. [2] One of their recruits from the CPGB was Peter Fryer, who had been the Daily Worker's correspondent in Budapest during the suppression of the uprising by Soviet troops, and who edited The Newsletter, a weekly which began publication in May 1958. 30, June 28, 1986 No. No. No. 437, January 7, 1995 50 GP surgeries in north of Ireland face closure! Read online at https://workersliberty.org/node/19159, Submitted by Matthew on 29 June, 2012 - 12:20, National and economic subjection in Irish history. No. No. We are Marxists and fight for the principles founded by Marx, Engels, Lenin and Trotsky. 436, December 17, 1994, No. The news in July 2020 that Claire Fox, formerly a member of the Revolutionary Communist Party (UK 1978 vintage; it was originally known as the Revolutionary Communist Tendency), was to ascend to the House of Lords proved to be the cause of an outpouring of inconsequential froth by British lefties. 26, May 31, 1986 Reports from two undercover police officers operating within the WRP cover the period January 1974 to December 1976. Currently there are different groups that claim to be a continuation of the historical PRT. No. It is a socialist paper and gives particular coverage to Trades Union and International news. 475, November 4, 1995 Fryer left in 1959 and in 1960 a group of members split away to form Solidarity, which became a theoretically influential, industrially oriented organisation strongly influenced by the ideas of Paul Cardan. Germany crashes into recession while EU banks face collapse socialist revolution the only answer to capitalist crisis! 43, September 27, 1986 No. 405, April 30, 1994 No. 44, October 4, 1986 No. No. No. 488, February 17, 1996 David Pallister, "50,000 for facts on foreign gold". No. 422, September 10, 1994 "JESUS FALLING OUT WITH GOD" The main charge against Gerry Healy was "gross sexual abuse" of women party members over a twenty year period. No. 104, December 12, 1987 [15] The eventual report exonerated Robins and claimed that Ramn Mercader was alive in Czechoslovakia. 387, December 11, 1993 460, July 8, 1995 408, May 21, 1994 No. 148, January 14, 1989 484, January 2o, 1996 So, we see the split of Michael Banda, the group around David Hyland, aligned with David Norths Workers League in the US which was to become first the International Communist Party and later the Socialist Equality Party and the International Socialist League which aligned itself with the Latin America based Morenoist International Workers League. Sections of the Romanian working-class, some miners for example, were prepared in 1989 to fight for Ceausescu. Later revolutions in China, Vietnam, Korea, Cuba and elsewhere would smash the existing state in those countries and bring parties of workers and peasants to power. The Workers' Revolutionary Party (Spanish: Partido Revolucionario de los Trabajadores, PRT) was a Marxist political party in Argentina, mainly active in the 1960s and 1970s. 134, October 1, 1988 399, March 19, 1994 The Workers Revolutionary Party is a British Trotskyist party founded in 1973 by Gerry Healy. This occurred after the historic leader of the WRP, Gerry Healy, was expelled from the party on charges of sexual predation. 491, March 9, 1996 No. No. It is a socialist paper and gives particular coverage to Trades Union and International news. 463, August 12, 1995 No. The raid followed a debate in the House of Lords on February 26 on the threat of subversion and extremism, held amid rising social and industrial unrest. One element of the operation was the placing of nine 22-cal bullets to be discovered in a stairwell. General dissatisfacti Mikhail Bakunin, Bakunin, Mikhail Premukhino, Russia . They were all workers, and therefore my remarks were objectively racist! No. No. 64, February 28, 1987 They trace his life from his childhood in Townsville, Australia through his rapid ascent up the greasy pole of journalism, from cadet reporter on the Townsville Daily Bulletin and a posting to the Mount Isa Mail in a grim outback mining town to the Sydney Daily Mirror run by a young and surprisingly liberal Rupert Murdoch. It shared many common features with the Peoples Temple of Jim Jones, whose members committed mass suicide in the Guyanese jungle in 1978: support for progressive causes and anti-racism; puritanical self-denial alongside the leaders special needs; ritualised self-criticism; the inflation of minor into major differences; the separation of members from family and friends. No. No. 138, October 29, 1988 In 1985, after a protracted process of political degeneration, the Workers Revolutionary Party, the former British section of the ICFI, broke decisively from Trotskyism. 130, September 3, 1988 They formed the Workers International League in 1987, which later evolved into Workers Action and away from the Healyism it defended when first founded. The "entryism," or "entrism" as it is sometimes called, that Mr Watson and others have warned about is the . 67, March 21, 1987 The Workers Revolutionary Party was the largest group on the revolutionary left until the mid-1970s, and a sizeable force until it collapsed in 1985. No. Anyone looking for major revelations from these years is going to be disappointed. 499, May 4, 1996 One incident saw Ernie Tate, a Canadian Trotskyist, attacked in public while distributing anti-Healy leaflets. No. No. [2] After this, The Club distributed Tribune. Special Branch most notably assists in MI5 spying operations. 122, July 9, 1988 The text is riddled with clumsy factual errors. Heroic Dunne's strike against Apartheid dramatised - must-see play at Southwark. No. No. The SDSs own annual reports indicate similar concerns. 109, January 23, 1988 No. Historica Wiki is a FANDOM Games Community. The News Line is our daily paper. It carried out virtually no student work, and scorned womens and gay liberation as diversions from the class struggle. Militant in Britain backed those Stalinist workers at the time, just as their predecessors in the Revolutionary Communist Party in 1948 publicly backed the Stalinist coup that put the airtight totalitarian lid on Czechoslovakia. No. 472, October 14, 1995 400, March 26, 1994 Internal repression in Iraq and Libya is only acknowledged in passing, as if it was a minor sub-plot of the global struggle against imperialism. 417, July 23, 1994 516, September 14, 1996 No. No. No. As the most prominent section of the international Trotskyist movement up to the mid-1980s, and with significant standing in British politics, the WRP was of serious interest to the British police and intelligence services. No. But he defends the WRPs close relationship with Ken Livingstone and Ted Knight, and its clandestine Labour Herald operation, because it extended the partys influence into the heart of the anti-Thatcher mass movement. Railworkers strike for pay! No. This must have been clairvoyance on Cohn-Bendits part because the Baader-Meinhof group wasnt formed until 1970, in a wave of disillusion with mass politics after the events of 1968! Mitchell seems to have forgotten the old newspaper adage that facts should be checked from two independent sources. 108, January 16, 1988 Two such provocations are the subject of the documents . The officers also reported on the marriage arrangements of a branch secretary, the pregnancy of the national organiser of the WRP Young Socialists and members employment details. No. No. 444, February 25, 1995 It was perhaps best known in the 1970s and 80s as the political home of actors Corin and Vanessa Redgrave, as well as some more minor British celebrities. No. No. As a result, the SWP is widely recognized in the Boston Black community as the revolutionary organization that fights for the rights of Black people. ", "Vote WRP on December 12! The UCPI is a damage limitation exercise by the British state, established in 2015 after the exposure of widespread use of undercover police agents against political organisations. Many thanks to Barry for loaning his holdings of Workers Press and to Keith S for scanning part of his own collection. [citation needed] Dave Bruce, who oversaw the printing press, claims that income from Libya mostly covered the cost of raw materials for printing work for them, including copies of The Green Book, and that the party could otherwise cover its own costs. With Corin and Vanessa Redgrave, he formed a minority tendency which called for a more pro-Soviet alignment, and split away in 1987 to form the Marxist Party. [issues 354-379 are missing] [5] Meanwhile, J.R. Campbell, by then the former editor of the Daily Worker, wrote in the Communist weekly World News in October 1959 that the SLL was an "anti-Soviet league" and "a disruptive, Trotskyist organisation", who were in favour of the overthrow of the Soviet government by an unaffiliated working class inside and outside the Soviet Union.[6]. No. The Labour Party proscribed the SLL, forbidding any of the SLL's members from being party members. 384, November 20, 1993 11, February 15, 1986 No. The section was expelled by the ICFI for its betrayal of Trotskyist principles and a new British sectiontodays Socialist Equality Partyestablished from the faction which supported the ICFI. In shorter memos, Collins and Scott relayed information about the WRPs campaign in defence of the Shrewsbury Twovictimised construction workers Des Warren and Ricky Tomlinsonand efforts to organise builders action committees, the partys work through the All Trades Union Alliance, its presence among British Leyland workers and work to win supporters among the Labour Party Young Socialists. 462, July 22, 1995 Paul Keel, "The vicarious road to revolution". 75, May 16, 1987 385, November 27, 1993 In 1973 the campaign was launched to transform the SLL into the revolutionary party. No. This proceeded in the face of bitter opposition by Pabloite and pseudo-left organizations, which denounced the exposure of spies placed inside the Trotskyist movement as agent-baiting. The Undercover Police Inquiry is further proof of the dangerous and politically criminal character of all such attempts to downplay the question of securing against state surveillance, infiltration and provocation. 381, October ,1993 We are the British section of the International Committee of the Fourth International, founded by Leon Trotsky. 93, September 26, 1987 8, January 27, 1986 386, December 4, 1993 100, November 14, 1987 No. No. No. No. The Socialist Equality Party condemns the operations against the SLL/WRP revealed by the UCPI and refuses to accept its potted account as the full story. How the Workers Revolutionary Party Betrayed Trotskyism This statement of the ICFI was written in August, 1986, in the immediate aftermath of the ICFI split with the Workers Revolutionary Party . Once their guru had fallen off his pedestal they were unable to reason independently and simply retired. Vietnam & Trotskyism is based on material published in a seven part series in Workers Press, weekly paper of the British Workers Revolutionary Party, beginning in December 1986.. Break with the EU! 101, November 21, 1987 463a, July 29, 463-Bosnia Special issue, 1995. This article originally appeared in the Bulletin on December 9, 1988. No. No. No. During the miners strike it was close to Arthur Scargill. 60, January 31, 1987 65, March 7, 1987 83, July 18, 1987 [2], The group's Newsletter, and the SLL itself, were proscribed by the Labour Party in late March 1959, which meant that anyone associated with Healy's group became ineligible for membership of the Labour Party. No. No. 116, March 12 , 1988 [on the Tiananmen Square massacre] China A Class Struggle Special Supplement [on the Tiananmen Square massacre] The party was known for being the only party to carry a banner of Joseph Stalin, including a quote from Stalin, every year, until 2019, on 1 May International Workers' Day march in London. 482, December 23, 1995, No. The WRP was part cult, part sect, with the cultish elements often winning out. In the middle of the 1982 NHS dispute I gave an enthusiastic report in which I mentioned how the dispute had united many different types of people in the pyramid of nations that made up the NHS in those days. 78, June 13, 1987 50, November 15, 1986 No. With the end of the miners strike, morale plummeted and recent recruits dropped out. In May-June 1986, the International Committee of the Fourth International met and made an exhaustive analysis of the theoretical, political and historical issues involved in the WRPs degeneration and collapse. No. 88, August 22, 1987 497, April 20, 1996 The first split in Healy's WRP (Newsline) came when a section of the London membership around full-timer Richard Price revolted and were expelled in due course. No. In the mid-1980s, it split into several smaller groups, one of which retains possession of the name. No. The report concluded that the WRP had collected information for Libyan Intelligence. No. By 1985 it employed albeit on small wages about 90 full timers. No. No. No. 96, October 17, 1987 No. The Workers Revolutionary Party was the largest group on the revolutionary left until the mid-1970s, and a sizeable force until it collapsed in 1985. Alan Smith, "Revolutionaries are breaking into a trot". 442, February 11, 1995 No. Internal and external dissidents were dealt with harshly. No. 63, February 21, 1987 30th May 2023. 439, January 21, 1995 Martin Bailey, "Vanessa's new party fuels Trotsky feuds", International Committee of the Fourth International, Learn how and when to remove this template message, Workers International to Rebuild the Fourth International, Some Reflections on the Socialist Labour League, How the Workers Revolutionary Party Betrayed Trotskyism 19731985, The Ceausescu of the British Trotskyist Movement, Workers Revolutionary Party (Newsline) Website, WRP election flyer for party candidate Deon Gayle (Streatham) in the run up for the parliamentary election on 7 May 2015, Catalogue of the SLL/WRP papers within Tony Whelan's papers, Modern Records Centre, University of Warwick, "View registration The Electoral Commission", "Labour Vetoes League and Newsletter: Socialist Group's Defiant Reply", "Trotskyist Cells in Labour: 'A Serious Nuisance' Says Mr. Phillips", "Labour's Differences in Straetham: Local Party's Appeal", "Attack On Socialist Labour League: Communist Labels It 'Trotskyist', "The Revolutionaries: Tactics and Strategy in Relation to the Industrial Relations Bill", "Vanessa Redgrave: A performer of passion, conviction and tragedy", http://www.workersliberty.org/node/view/1115, "Norman Harding, Staying Red, Index Books, 2005, pp. 518, September 28, 1996 448, March 25, 1995 125, July 30, 1988 This occurred after the historic leader of the WRP, Gerry Healy, was expelled from the party on charges of sexual predation. No. Proof from the UCPI that MI5 had an interest in SDS operations in the WRP adds to previous claims by multiple sources that the party was targeted by intelligence operatives. 394, February 12, 1994 The League united a number of different Revolutionary Union Movements (RUMs) that were growing rapidly among rank-and-file Black workers in the Detroit auto plants. But having had a quarter of a century to reflect, hes no better informed now, and doesnt refer to Bob Pitts The Rise and Fall of Gerry Healy (freely available on the net), or to Al Richardsons books on British Trotskyism. Having been forced to release certain documents, the state has ensured the UCPI obscures the full extent of its surveillance of the SLL/WRP. Numerous other examples of the work of state agents targeting left tendencies and the Irish republican movement in the UK and elsewhere were also documented. [4] By August, 23 people associated with the SLL in the Norwood Constituency Labour Party and eight councillors in Leeds, among others, had been expelled by Labour. No. [3], Bob Pitt of Islamophobia Watch is a former member.[4]. No. The proceedings of the UCPI investigation clarified none of these questions. 6, January 18, 1986 The party went on to fragment, destroying any real power it held. 433, November 26, 1994 86, August 8, 1987 The Workers Revolution Party resorted to crude provocations against the ICFI aimed at diverting attention from its opportunist politics. It was this policy more than any other which came close to wrecking the WRP in the 1970s. In 1968 he began attending private Friday night discussion meetings organised by prominent radicals in the media and theatre. As a result, Di Scala explains labor . In 1959, the Club morphed into the "Socialist Labour League", which united Trotskyists, trade unionists, and anti-Stalinist former CPGB members. 13, February 29, 1986 [16] In 1979, the group purchased Trotsky's death mask to use as an iconic focus for events. 18 relations. After the American, Austrian, Chinese, Latin American and Swiss parties of the ICFI agreed to reunification with the FI in 1963 (forming the reunified Fourth International), The Club controlled the ICFI until its fragmentation in 1985. Manage all your favorite fandoms in one place! 487, February 10, 1996 No. Archive: Workers Revolutionary Party candidate Vanessa Redgrave concedes election defeat. No. The ICFI's understanding of Permanent Revolution was deepened yet further in the struggle it waged in the early 1980s against the Pabloite tendencies in the Workers Revolutionary Party (WRP . PDF courtesy of Sparrows Nest Archive, WRP: The Party's Over - Ken Weller Solidarity member Ken Weller reviews the new Workers Revoutionary Party chorus line and finds it parading the same . No. No. No. In 1979 I was put on the standing orders committee at the WRP Young Socialists conference and made the mistake of putting a fraternal speaker from Robert Mugabes ZANU on ahead of one from Joshua Nkomos ZAPU. No. Glimpses into Herstory: Women's Oppression. 493, March 23, 1996 No. Workers' Revolutionary Party or WRP (formerly CPN) [MPs Salmon FLEERMUYS and Benson KAAPALA] Definition: This entry includes a listing of significant political parties, coalitions, and electoral lists as of each country's last legislative election, unless otherwise noted. 489, February 24, 1996 [3] Morgan Phillips, then general secretary of the Labour Party, addressed the issue of SLL entryism. No. Thereafter the two groupings claiming the name Workers Revolutionary Party were known respectively as the WRP(Newsline) and WRP (Workers Press). 149, January 21, 1989 No. 20, April 19, 1986 No. No. 515, September 7, 1996 421, September 3, 1994 27, June 7, 1986 He was replaced by others in the leadership of the WRP. For a long period it had been the largest Trotskyist organisation in Britain, although it had been overtaken by the SWP in the 1970s and by Militant in the 1980s. 158, March 25, 1989 503, June 1, 1996 95, October 10, 1987 The expulsion of up to 200 supporters of Alan Thornett in 1974, which destroyed a large part of the WRPs industrial base, doesnt rate a mention. No. Just a few months before, in September 1975, the Parwich centre had been raided by Special Branch on the pretext of a defamatory article published in the Observer . The party has been registered with the Electoral Commission since 15 May 2001, with Frank Sweeney as registered leader. Martin Walker, "High spirits remain on the Tripoli-Gatwick run". . No. No. 411, June 11, 1994 [33][34] Banda was the leader of the majority on the party council, and was accused by Healy and Vanessa Redgrave of "unprincipled and unsupportable" deviation from the Trotskyist road to Socialism. 57, January 10, 1987 512, August 17, 1996 No. No. 452, April 22, 1995 No. 393, February 5, 1994 The WRP originated as "The Club", a group of communists who sought to use entryist tactics to infiltrate and take over the Labour Party. Here, Richard Price, a former member of the WRP, reviews Come The Revolution: A Memoir, by Alex Mitchell. No. This version the Workers Press was the continuation of News Line, the publication of the Workers Revolutionary Party in Britain, in 1985. 446, March 11, 1995 . 12, February 22, 1986 The political crisis which suddenly erupted inside the Workers Revolutionary Party in the summer of 1985 and which rapidly developed into a devastating split within its central leadership is an . As a " machine" it mobilised them in some important and not so important struggles. In 1977, the party and Libyan officials issued a joint statement against Zionism, US imperialism, and the Egyptian president Anwar Sadat. 139, November 5, 1988 But if the Arab gold dried up four years before the WRP split, then this is hardly a convincing cause. Warnings have been issued that, if the SWP is not careful, it will end up like the WRP. A former agent for the British Security Service (known as MI5) has alleged in a sworn statement that the agency received reports from a high-level spy inside the Workers Revolutionary Party during . Until 1986, the WRP was the British. 69, April 4, 1987 131, September 10, 1988 The "Party" recruited layers of youth and active trade unionists in small numbers and often with little political experience. Peter Collins was not called to testify on grounds of ill health. Access to such nationally known figures helped it grow slowly but steadily from 1981-4. 140, November 12, 1988 The truth is more complicated. No. No. The Revolutionary Communist Party, USA (also known as RCP and The Revcoms) is a communist party in the United States founded in 1975 and led by its chairman, Bob Avakian. All this is explained here, by the British Splits and Fusions blog who scanned these copies of Workers Press for their blog and had this to say about the whole thing: As the Workers Revolutionary Party split in two, each of the warring factions, at first, sought to publish their own version of the daily Newsline. No. No. No. [1] Specifically, in 1983 the BBC found that the party had taken 1.5 million from Colonel Gadaffi's government and that its paper, Newsline, had written approvingly of Saddam Hussein. 494, March 30, 1996 It was perhaps best known in the 1970s and 80s as the political home of actors Corin and Vanessa Redgrave, as well as some more minor British celebrities. He quit politics without explanation in 1986, returned to his native Australia, and made a career in mainstream journalism. No. Under British law, MI5 officers cannot lay hands on members of the public and generally relies on Special Branch to carry out arrests, interrogations and in preparing cases for prosecution. The Socialist Labour League (forerunner organisation to the WRP) is mentioned in the annual review of 1972 and is the subject of two specific reports from undercover officersone from February 1971 and another from April 1973. In truth, the WRP leadership instinctively feared organised trade union work because it might create a potential opposition to the partys ultra-leftism. 430, November 5, 1994 The WRP also abstained almost entirely from the struggle against the National Front, despite being the only far left group with a significant number of black members. So it was that we had the pantomime spectacle of rival papers under the same masthead- one proclaiming "Gerry Healy expelled" and the other replying . No. Moreover, in this era of revolutionary tumult, Milan's celebrated La Scala Theater became one of the places for expressions of anti-Austrian and Italian nationalist feelings.
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