Saying Goodbye to UNISON United Left

This is probably how it happened but will anyone notice? Or care? Or know what on earth I am going on about?

:)

Miserablist's moaning that no one listerns to them

Do young people really, really like this music? Or have I turned into my Dad?

Apologies to those who haven't a clue what this post is really on about :)

UNISON Pensions decision: jaw-jaw better than war-war (for now)

In a victory for common sense UNISON elected lay reps have voted to continue with negotiations

over Local Government and NHS pensions.

This morning there was a two hour Pension Summit with 250 senior lay reps present were it was clear that an overwhelming majority of branches, up and down the country, wanted negotiations to continue.  While reserving the right to call further action if these talks break down. Their was near unanimous agreement that there had been a significant improvement in the offer over pensions and that we had a duty to talk not walk.

Next there were separate detailed briefings on the Local Government and NHS pension schemes after which the different Service Group Executive's (SGE)  met and debated on what to do next.  I am really pleased that all the SGE's voted to talk further. 

One sour point in an otherwise positive and constructive day is that it is clear that certain "individuals" outside the union have been telling completely despicable lies about UNISON and trying to interfere in our internal democratic process.  Now while I can respect the opinion of those who genuinely feel that UNISON have made a wrong call.  This is the decision of our democratically elected representatives. What many UNISON reps will not tolerate is unrepresentative, ultra left sects playing out their toy town revolutionary fantasies at our expense. We will not do what we are told to do and think by rule or ruin wreckers and splitters.

"Battle of Cable Street" Veteran Urges Support for TUC March on 26th

Max Levitas who marched against the fascists in Cable Street in 1936 joined our Labour Party and Trade Union stall in Stratford on Saturday to pledge support for the TUC March for an Alternative on the 26th.

Max (picture) is now 95 and was a Communist Party Councillor in Whitechapel from 1945 to 1958. At Cable Street he marched alongside Phil Piratin (on of the first Communist MP's and father of one of my former UNISON branch secretaries).

He still comes shopping to Stratford twice a month and takes the 25 bus here and back.

I have seen Max speak at events in the past and once even knocked on his door while canvassing for Labour.  He is still proud to be a Communist but says he would usually vote for Labour if there was not a real Communist standing and is pleased to see the Labour Party out campaigning.  He will be there on the TUC March on the 26th.

Max warned us about the threat to the Labour Movement from those who have their own agenda and will try their best to wreck and split us.  Of course, I haven't a clue who he means?

LGA LG Spring conference 2011: Return of the Wreakers and Splitters

During the lunch break at Saturday’s LGA Labour Group spring conference I wandered over to the main entrance of LGA house to have a look at the promised SPEW (Socialist Party of England & Wales) “mass national lobby”.  I looked out of the door and saw about 30 SPEWers ranting and raving incoherently. LGA Labour Group Leader, David Sparks, had agreed to accept a “petition” from the organisers.  This turned out to be a typical hate session against the Labour Party.    Well done for David for agreeing to even meet them and putting up with their childish and crank nonsense.

One of their skinhead organisers then immediately resumed the “Scum” chants at the top of his voice and the masturbatory finger waving.   This moronic and orchestrated “scum; scum; scum” chanting did obviously embarrass some of the more vaguely normal SPEWers but they did nothing to stop it nor did they seem to mind their lobby turning into something akin to an EDL rally. 

This is just Kamikaze politics. If any English Council did not set a balanced budget then the Chief Officer’s would be legally obliged to do so regardless of any political considerations.  If they refused then Pickles would do it.  Does anyone really want Eric Pickles to set their Council budget?

I do believe that if we unite and build - we can defeat this Tory-led government over policies and it is possible we may even bring them down as a government before 2015.  Yet at the first major labour movement political test we find the tiny and unrepresentative ultra left extremists attacking not the ConDems - but Labour Councils!

Instead of working together we see them in the finest Monty Python Life of Brian traditions do their best to wreak and split.  In London Town Halls Council reception staff have been beaten up by these yob protesters and even disabled Councillors attacked.  For what?  What did they think they would gain? Despite the fact that they could not get any one of the 4500 Labour councillors to publicly support their view they went ahead with their completely divisive and sectarian campaign anyway. 

What mandate have these tiny telephone kiosk sects to dictate to anyone what they should do?

Why were they not demonstrating in Cardiff that day at the Tory Spring conference?

Is it not bad enough that opinion polls show that the majority of ordinary people actually think these cuts are necessary.  Now, thanks to the SPEWers, SWPers, LRC and the rest of the Heinz 57 trots – even more people will accept the Tory lies that Councils do not need to slash and burn if they were just a bit more efficient. Well done comrades!

How can the Broad Left now work with these idiots. Who obviously don’t give a toss about the interests of ordinary working people and who think that all you have to do to bring about their revolution is to foam at the mouth and scream abuse.  Grow up - you are just helping the Tories get off the hook.

Talk about Tory fifth columnists.  Pickles must be laughing his ample socks off at his new best mates ever.

Wrecker of the Week

I've decided to start a new regular blog feature called "Wrecker of the Week".  This will be awarded to individuals and organisations who have done their best to wreck and split the Labour movement instead of uniting us to oppose our natural enemies, the ConDem Coalition.

Obviously the most recent winner would have been SPEW (Socialist Party of England and Wales) for organising rallies to undermind official TUC events and then trying to shout down speakers.

However this week's prize goes to its democratic centralist rival, the SWP, for this superb bit of pointless and completely childish sectarianism by one of its full time paid bosses.  (Please note that I waited until the UAF march was over before posting this).  This email was sent by trade unionists in Newcastle.

"Open Letter to UAF re: Northern March Against Racism 2010

To the leadership and members of UAF (Unite Against Fascism):

Cc: Ken Livingstone, UAF Chair; Sabby Dhalu, UAF joint Secretary; Weyman Bennett, UAF joint Secretary; Martin Smith, SWP National Secretary

We are writing from the organising group of the Northern March Against Racism 2010, which is due to take place in Newcastle upon Tyne on 20 November. The march has been called by TCAR (Tyneside Community Action Against Racism), and is supported by over a dozen other organisations and trade union branches. We are writing concerning attempts by a leading UAF member and SWP regional organiser, Yunus Bakhsh, to undermine the Northern March.

On Monday 18 October, TCAR supporters put posters in the following shops in the Arthurs Hill area of Newcastle to publicise the Northern March:

Crossley Wine Centre; Brighton Oriental Food Stores; Fenham Call Centre; Mishti Mukh Sweet Centre
Tanveer Gents Hairdresser; M.A. Travels; Kamran’s Barber Shop; Geordie Hairdressing Salon; Persian Delights; Aanchal Fashions; Sanam Travel; Heera Jewelers

By Wednesday 20 October, most of these had been removed and in their place were UAF posters advertising the march in London on 6 November. We then put up more posters for the Northern March in the same shops on 20 October, of course leaving the UAF posters in place. The Northern March posters remained until the morning of Tuesday 26 October, when someone again removed the posters from shops including:

Crossley Wine Centre; Brighton Oriental Food Stores; Fenham Call Centre; Tanveer Gents Hairdresser;
M.A. Travels; Kamran’s Barber Shop; Aanchal Fashions; Sanam Travel; Heera Jewelers.

On enquiring with shopkeepers, several were able to confirm that a man had entered the shop, removed the posters for the Northern March, and in some cases replaced them with a poster for the UAF march. These shopkeepers confirmed from a photograph that the individual who removed the posters was Yunus Bakhsh. We have access to a shopkeeper’s CCTV footage, which clearly shows Yunus entering the shop at 14:48:26 on 26 October, removing the poster for the Northern March Against Racism, before going to the counter and handing the shopkeeper a flier for the 6 November UAF march.

We are sure you will agree that this is an appalling and unacceptable act of sectarianism, which damages the integrity of the wider anti-racist movement in the region. How can any serious socialist justify this sort of behaviour? We urge you to take measures to ensure the members involved end such acts of sabotage immediately.

The Northern March Against Racism is a vital part of building positive anti-racist unity in the region. It is being organised on an open and democratic basis. The local branch of UAF were first invited to participate in building the Northern March on 14 July, including full rights to distribute their literature, display banners and have a speaker. This offer has so far been ignored, but remains open. We hope that you will take immediate action to end the removal of our posters by your members, and that UAF will start to make a positive contribution to the Northern March. We await your response, and wish you well in London on the 6 November.
Fraternally, Organising Group; Northern March Against Racism 2010"

North Korea celebrates Socialist diss-Unity coming 11th in Total Politics Tory guide

It must be true - See Labour Party reformists list here!

Rule or Ruin 2

Last week I posted here on the attempt by paid officials of the Socialist Workers Party (SWP) and their new best Comrades ever in the Socialist Party (SPEW) to take over the grass roots North East Shop Stewards Network (NESSN) and turn it into one of their pointless “fronts”.

It seems that NESSN is seeing off this threat. Even though it now appears that there are two NESSN Facebook groups and that there has been the usual ultra left problem with their financial accountability!

Elected NESSN regional secretary Dave Harker reports “Some hopeless sectarians are seeking to rule or ruin NESSN, but they will fail, and there is no cause for alarm. However, comrades should note the following: …Hannah Walter (SPEW - grayee comment and emphasise) has removed Tony Dowling as an Administrator of the NESSN's original Facebook site. (I was removed a week or so ago.) The real NESSN Facebook site is now (here). This underlines the urgent need for an umbrella organisation like the real NESSN. In solidarity with those in solidarity with the Corus workers and all workers in struggle. Dave Harker, Regional Secretary, North East Shop Stewards' Network.

Minutes: NORTH EAST SHOP STEWARDS’ NETWORK
Committee: Geoff Abbott, Sue Abbott, Dave Ayre, Paul Baker, Ross Carbutt, Derek Cattell, Alan Docherty, Tony Dowling, Dave Harker, Peter Murray, Hannah Walter, Shirley Winter
Regional Secretary: nessnsec@googlemail.com or NESSN, c/o Newcastle TUC Building, 4 Cloth Market, Newcastle, NE1 1EE http://www.nessn.org.uk/

Minutes of the NESSN Committee meeting held in Darlington Town Hall on 2 December 2009
1. Present Alan Docherty, Dave Ayre, Dave Harker, Paul Baker, Ross Carbutt, Shirley Winter
2. Apologies Geoff Abbott, Sue Abbott, Peter Murray, Tony Dowling
Absent without an apology: Hannah Walter (grayee emphasise)
3. The Way Ahead
Dave Ayre was elected to the chair. He remarked that ‘there had been a crude attempt to undermine NESSN’ and that ‘the rest of the Committee deserve a handslap for leaving so much to the Secretaries’.
a) The Regional Secretary reported that several documents had been circulated to the Committee, but he had received no evidence to support any allegations made against him at the 19 November ordinary meeting.
It was AGREED that
(i) the NESSN Constitution includes the NSSN ‘Founding Basis’;
(i) only comrades with an elected lay union office can propose, second and vote on motions at any meeting, including the AGM;
(iii) only comrades with an elected lay union office can propose, second and stand for the Committee at the AGM;
(iv) the attempt to turn the 19 November meeting into an AGM and the ‘motion’ were unconstitutional;
(v) any meeting not called by the elected Regional Secretary is unconstitutional.
b) Alan Docherty tabled a document by Fran Heathcote (as a Socialist Party member) and Elaine Brunskill (as Socialist Party North Regional Secretary), and another from Alan Docherty and Tony Dowling in their personal capacities.
It was AGREED that since both documents were not sent to the Regional Secretary, as stipulated in the invitation to all Networkers, they were out of order.
c) Derek Cattell had thanked Alan Docherty for speaking to GMB stewards about NESSN.
It was AGREED that we invite Derek to join the Committee. (He subsequently accepted the invitation.)
d) Ross Carbutt had circulated a statement as Secretary of Tyne and Wear branch of the IWW. The IWW would seek to change NESSN policy at the AGM in spring 2010 and the event organised by Dave Douglass was a solo initiative.
It was AGREED that the event organised by Dave Douglass in spring 2010 could be advertised on the NESSN website.
e) The former (SPEW - grayee comment and emphasise) Treasurer, Hannah Walter, had been elected at the AGM in spring 2009 and resigned on 12 October 2009. She had not given the Acting Treasurer any documents until 19 November, and did not hand over the chequebook or paying in book. The Acting Treasurer had asked the Regional Secretary to stop the cheque book and spent hours trying to make sense of the incomplete data. The Committee was extremely concerned about his ‘Provisional Financial Record’.
It was AGREED to ask the Acting Treasurer to
(i) circulate a ‘Provisional Financial Report’ to all Networkers;
(ii) send Hannah Walter (SPEW grayee comment and emphasise) a list of queries about the missing documents, receipts, and so on; and (iii) report to the next Committee meeting.
f) Various proposals for future NESSN events were discussed.
g) The next meeting of the elected and co-opted members of the NESSN Committee will take place at 6.00-8.00pm on 13
January 2010, and the Tees Valley District Secretary was asked to book a room in Darlington Town Hall.

Hat-tip thingy Tynesider

“...the disorganisation of the Homeless left...” Sects play "Rule or Ruin"

It appears that the SWP and SPEW dominated “disunited Left” are up to their usual tricks of “Rule or Ruin”. Unusually they are working together on trying to wreak the North East Shop Stewards Network (NESSN). This is being led by their local full time paid staff (bureaucrats?). Their reasons for this are essentially sectarian and their methods completely divisive and destructive. Which I think the minutes of the meeting below prove. This brings the labour movement into disrepute. A good thing that at least UNISON activists in the north east do not have to experience any of this in our internal union democratic structures. This to me proves the importance of the union upholding its rules when unscrupulous elements organised by their political sects attack the union while defending the indefensible.

Check out also the public statement put out by the SWP about the secretary of NESSN who is one of their own members (not for long methinks). In the meanwhile the witch-hunting SWP have expelled a SOSA student organiser that I posted on before here.

Hat-tip thingy to Tynesider.

Report on the ‘Whither NESSN – Building the Network’ meeting, 19 November 2009
Sue Abbott declined to take her turn as chair and Alan Docherty volunteered.
1. Present:
With the right to vote: Sue Abbott, Alan Docherty, Bob Murdoch, Dave Harker, Ed Whitby, Fran Heathcote, Hannah Walter, John Malcolm, Julie Young, Paul Baker, Ray Smith, Simon Hall, Stuart Bracking, Tommy Gardner, Tony Dowling, Vicki Gilbert-Jackson
Without the right to vote: Elaine Brunskill, Kieran Picken (non-member), Norman Hall, Paul Phillips, Phil Wilson,
Simon Elliott, Trevor Bark, Yunus Bakhsh
2. Apologies:
Dave Ayre, Dave Hardaker, Geoff Abbott, John Gilmore, Kevin McHugh, Ross Carbutt, Shirley Winter
3. Secretaries’ Reports.
1. The Regional Secretary made the following points:
* This is an ordinary meeting of NESSN.
* The AGM takes place in spring each year and requires proper notice to the 111 comrades who are entitled to vote, propose and second candidates - and stand - for the Committee, and due notice of any motions and constitutional amendments.
* A small number of comrades did most of the work in NESSN.
* NESSN has grown to 205: 111 with full rights, according to the National Shop Stewards Network’s Founding Basis - which allows only those holding elected trade union positions to vote, and which NESSN abides by - and 96 with the right to use the email network and speak at meetings, but not to vote or proposes, second or be candidates for the Committee.
* NSSN is a voluntary body in London, dominated by one political group, and is largely a paper organisation.
* No regional SSN is anywhere near as big as NESSN, and most controlled by that same political group.
* The Northern TUC does little or nothing to support workers in struggle and Trades Councils barely exist.
* The NE left as a whole has built nothing of any size that has lasted, for at least forty years.
* All the organised left groups are very weak, and amount, at most, to 40-45 active comrades.
* The two larger left groups have ‘democratic centralist’ structures and appointed organisers.
* The voluntary structure of NSSN and the ‘democratic centralism’ of the larger political groups were bound to come into conflict with NESSN’s democratic structure, and this has now happened.
* There is a huge hole where sound rank and file organisation should be in the face of the growing attacks
on the working class, largely because of the disorganisation of the Homeless Left (grayee emphasis).
* NESSN is an information network, and this meeting has been called to discuss moving forward.
At this point a comrade who had no right to vote proposed a vote of ‘no confidence’ in the Regional Secretary, which was seconded by another comrade who had no right to vote. Both were appointed paid organisers of small political groups. The discussion that followed was often incoherent, but raised the following issues:
* One comrade complained that NESSN had ‘done nothing’ to support the CWU dispute.
* Several comrades pointed out that all the original platform and almost all the known organisers of the Public Service Not Private Profit event were Networkers, yet none of them had asked NESSN to help build the meeting or be represented on the platform. NESSN is a network, not a hierarchy, and the responsibility to network on such important matters is everyone’s. Why was this not done in this case?
* Three comrades, who had gone to the NSSN’s Annual Conference in London and ‘volunteered’ for the Steering Committee, claimed to have been ‘offended’ when Dave pointed out the fact that the Committee decided who should represent it at NSSN events.
* One of the ‘offended’ accused Dave of being ‘sexist’.
* Another of the ‘offended’ alleged that NESSN had ‘merged’ with the Tyneside Socialist Forum, but a leading comrade in TSF completely denied that was the case.
* Dave had challenged whether some events were really broadly-based, politically.
* Dave had allowed the ‘Morning Star’ event – a ‘Communist Party front’ - to go on the website. * Dave was ‘bureaucratic’ and his tone was sometimes tart.
Dave thanked his supporters and replied to the criticisms:
* There had been no serious political or organisational criticism of him, but there had been smears and lies.
* All but one of the critics belonged to ‘democratic centralist’ political groups, and the other was an embittered ex-member, and they clearly found it hard to accept genuinely democratic elections and accountability.
* They had tried to bully Dave to support their various front organisations, but had been unsuccessful.
* Their problem was not with ‘bureaucracy’, but with democracy.
* They had not recruited to NESSN, and were a brake on its development.
* All Networkers are entitled to email each other, without ‘going through the Secretary’, but the critics’ wanted a hierarchy that their small political groups dominated.
* NESSN had very few rules, but the Committee had to enforce them, and, between Committee
meetings, Dave bore that responsibility.
* All Networkers can complain to any elected comrade on the Committee, but not one had done so.
* Dave had received a complaint that the Youth Fight For Jobs event was not advertised on the websites of the unions it claimed to be supported by, and he found this to be true, so he asked for hard evidence to support the claim, which eventually arrived, and the event appeared on the website.
* After Dave gave his reasoned response to the YFFJ comrade’s vicious complaint, he received a second vicious message, which he also circulated widely, and at that point three Networkers resigned in disgust. This sort of ‘broadcasting’ was turning comrades away from NESSN, just as had happened in the past.
* Two NSSN Officers in the same political group as the YFFJ organiser had tried to bully Dave, but failed, so they refused to send NSSN documents to NESSN until the NSSN Chair took over that responsibility.
* Another event organiser was asked to provide similar evidence for the broad based character of his event, but said ‘don’t’ bother, so Dave didn’t.
* Dave tried to find out who Public Service Not Private Profit were, since all but one of those involved were in the same political group, but they had chosen to use their own name. The PSNPP website had nothing about the event and the email address on the leaflet did not work. Dave contacted several of those who advertised themselves as PSNPP and asked who was on its committee and how to contact their Secretary, but they all failed to respond. They were all in the same political group. NESSN took a stall to the meeting, where the chair, doorkeeper, bookstall organiser and ‘supervisor’ were in the same political group, and two speakers on the platform were in the same group as the YFFJ organiser.
* The decision to put the ‘Marxism Today’ event on the website was a close one, but it was organised by the People’s Press Printing Society, which includes many comrades not in the Communist Party, and the organisers had brought together a very broad-based political platform, including one leading Green.
* The false accusation of ‘sexism’ was beneath contempt.
* The allegation that there was any organisational link between NESSN and TSF was wholly untrue. Dave Ayre and Dave Harker had agreed to speak at the first Left Unity meeting in their personal capacities.
* NESSN had supported the principles for which the voteless seconder of the illegal no confidence motion had been attacked, and had incurred great displeasure in genuinely bureaucratic and right-wing quarters; so if this illegal motion were to be carried, the right-wingers would be laughing their socks off at their new allies.
* The illegal motion was designed to wreck NESSN, because a few members of two small political groups saw it as competition, and they wanted to take it over and ‘front’ it with a few fellow-travellers.
The Chair proposed postponing the vote until the 2010 AGM, but sixteen of those present (including several with no right to a vote) insisted on voting on what the Chair described as a ‘wrecking’ motion. Dave confirmed that the vote would be unconstitutional and illegal. If it was passed those voting for it would be seen by the 180 other Networkers as making an attempted ‘coup’ by a handful of people in two small sects; but the Committee elected at the 2009 AGM would remain in office until the 2010 AGM.
Several comrades without the right to a vote put up their hands, but among those who would be entitled to vote on a legal motion, the illegal motion of no confidence in Dave was passed by a majority of three. This took almost all of the two hours and the other Secretaries’ reports, and the rest of the agenda could not be discussed, so the Chair had to close a meeting designed to focus on Building the Network.
Dave Harker, Regional Secretary, North East Shop Stewards Network

(I'll post in "comments" a truly python alternative account of this meeting)

UPDATE: Andy Newman on Socialist Unity has linked to this post and it has set off an “interesting” series of comments on this issue.

SWP splitters and wreakers?

I’ve just had to interrupt a break from blogging to comment on this Workers Weekly (WW) post that the deposed former SWP central committee (CC) member and General Secretary of disrespect John Rees has formed a political faction within the SWP called “The Left Platform”.

Hat tip thingy to Comrade Mecader who poses the question that does this mean that the other SWP Factions are called “The Right”? Considering the number of titled members of the English aristocracy who are leaders in the SWP then such a name would be very apt. See this post on the related bout of CC SWP internal witch-hunting

WW believes that this is the start of a split within the SWP and Rees with his Faction will eventually leave (or most probably forced out for heresy). Other interesting stuff in this report – the SWP CC members are in favour of debating with the BNP in the media and apparently they have the blooming cheek to refer to their estranged comrades in CPGB, Workers Power and AWL as “sects”(Oi! that's my job! also don’t they have mirrors in SW8?).

I spoke recently to a good comrade about rumours of a SWP split and he just shook his head and said “I’ve been active in the Left since I’ve been in school and this is just what happens time after time after time...”

Check out the AWL take here. Picture of John Rees in happier days in between his old mate Mahmoud Ahmadinejad´s Uncle and partner in crime “lockout” Lindsey German

SPEW ist das Opium des Volkes

The modern day Opium of the People is now apparently called SPEW - the Revolutionary Party formerly known as militant tendency now called the Socialist Party of England & Wales. Who are taking UNISON to court this week in order to prove that Trotskyism is a religious cult and they (and I suppose from their “logic” the Nazi BNP and NF?) are protected under British State religious discrimination laws.

Comrade Mercader investigates this and finds stunning new video evidence.

UNISON NDC – Wreckers at Work

United Left did what they do best and the card vote on the implementation of the structural amendments already agreed was lost. This was by about 550,000 votes to 500,000.

I appreciate that some delegates did have genuine doubts and concerns about the proposed changes and wanted (yet) more time to consider. But others still seem to think that THE REVOLUTION will only happen if there is an united front of all local government and health workers being led by some chosen vanguard.

Dream on comrades.

The leaflets put out by UL on this vote were completely misleading and scaremongering (IMO),

This decision will mean that some CVS activists will accuse branches of only wanting CVS subscriptions without willing to offer them effective representation. Which I think on the whole is not fair to most branches but such perverse decisions do mean that accusations will be made by CVS activists who are desperate to organise their sectors properly.

Well, two steps forward and one step backwards I suppose. Onwards and forwards to next year.

I was “bumped off” from speaking by a point of order so I will post next the speech I would have made.

(BTW to make sense of this - see previous 2 posts)

Pass the Sick Bag - United Left's Permanent Revolution circa 1979

In case some UNISON comrades wondered what United Left is really all about...(it’s on blogger and in wikipedia so it must be true!)...

“Permanent Revolution is a revolutionary Trotskyist group which was formed after 24 people were expelled from the League for the Fifth International (L5I) in July 2006. It takes its name from Leon Trotsky's theory of permanent revolution.
The group was founded after a two year struggle against the perspectives adopted by the L5I at its 2003 Congress [1]. It had first organised as a tendency then as a faction.[2]
The split followed a discussion of how to assess the impact, on class politics in general and the level of class struggle, of two changes:
the effect of the restoration of capitalism in the former degenerated workers states in 1990
and of the defeats of the working class movement in the 1970s/80s, particularly in the USA and United Kingdom.
The group gathered together a minority which argued that, almost without exception, the international left had undertaken no serious rexamination of world perspectives and economy since a "stagnation phase" in the 1970s and 1980s. [3] It felt that as a result, the international left had been unable to explain either the marginalisation of the left or the failure of important protest movements against capitalism (such as the anti-capitalist movement, anti-war movement and Social Forum movements) to sink significant roots into the world working-class.[4][5]
Permanent Revolution argued the L5I perspectives adopted at their Sixth Congress in 2003, that the engine of the world economy had “halted”, that world capitalism was in a “period of stagnation” and as a result the world faced a “pre-revolutionary period,” were fundamentally inaccurate and the refusal of the L5I to correct these perspectives in the light of experience, proved they had decisively broken from the method of revolutionary Trotskyism. In contrast Permanent Revolution argued that the integration of the former workers states into world capitalism, when combined with the defeats of the working class in the 1970s/80s, had allowed capitalism to revive itself through globalisation.[6]
Furthermore, it argued that while the working class movement was no longer in the counter revolutionary phase of the 1990s, the movement had still not fully recovered from those defeats and rather was in a transitional period, with uneven struggles, not yet usually generalised or sustained [7].

Yawn, yawn, yawn and yawn...God, these people are so boring and so full of themselves. What on earth are they going on about? What does this rubbish mean? it's a tendency, then a faction, they are all L5I, who are these degenerated workers? What are they on? and of course, what on earth are they trying to do to our union? (we can guess)