Militant Tendency chief set to rejoin Corbyn’s Labour
THE leader of hard-Left group Militant Tendency expects to be readmitted to the Labour Party if Jeremy Corbyn remains leader, it emerged last night.
The organisation was kicked out by Neil Kinnock more than 30 years ago in a purge of Trotskyite radicals. Any move to readmit it would plunge the party into chaos and be seen by moderates as a return to the dark days of 1980s division.
But last night Peter Taaffe, the veteran activist behind Militant, said he believed Mr Corbyn was prepared to open the party up to ‘all strands of socialist and working class opinion’ if he defeats Owen Smith in the leadership election.
The claim stoked the row between Mr Corbyn and Tom Watson, his deputy, who this week warned about the infiltration of Labour by Trotskyite ‘entryists’. Yesterday Mr Watson demanded the party leader rule out changing the rules to allow banned groups from re-joining.
He published what he said was evidence of Trotskyite infiltration and pointed to the circulation of an instruction manual by Momentum activists linked to Mr Corbyn on how to take control of Labour constituency parties.
On Tuesday, Mr Corbyn accused Mr Watson of ‘peddling baseless conspiracy theories’ and patronising party members. But yesterday, in a letter to his leader, Mr Watson wrote there was ‘no denying that tightly-organised factions are… organising within Momentum and the party.’
‘There has been an increase in members of proscribed organisations attempting to join the party, in particular members of the Socialist Party (formerly Militant) and the Alliance for Workers’ Liberty (formerly Socialist Organiser).
‘It’s not a conspiracy theory to say that members of these organisations are joining Labour. It’s a fact.
‘I attach a document, drawn up using publicly available information, which shows this to be the case. I
‘Embrace civil war’
assume that you still support the proscription of other political parties. If the position had changed, please just let me know because I think it would be useful to discuss this within the party.’
After it was banned from being part of Labour, Militant renamed itself the Socialist Party and has since been stuck on the political fringe.
But Labour has seen an influx of thousands of Left-wing activists under Mr Corbyn. Members of Militant have reportedly attended meetings of Momentum, the radical organisation behind the Labour leader.
Mr Taafe said he had made indirect attempts to push for an end to the ban, passed in 1982, and believed Mr Corbyn would respond. He said some in Labour would welcome him back.
‘People say: you were a long time gone, welcome back,’ he said. ‘I know Jeremy, he’s a good bloke. He’s principled. He’s on the Left.’
He added: ‘The lava of this revolution is still hot’.
On Tuesday the Socialist Party called for Labour to split and embrace ‘civil war’. In an editorial in the Socialist magazine, it said: ‘The worst response to Jeremy’s re-election would be to attempt to make peace with the Blairites. Many Labour sup- porters will fear that a split would weaken the Labour party. In fact the opposite would be the case.’
ONE of Britain’s biggest trade unions was accused of being Right wing by allies of Mr Corbyn last night after backing Mr Smith.
Nearly two thirds of GMB members who voted support Mr Smith in what was seen as a significant blow to the Left-wing Labour leader.
But a Corbyn aide told Sky News: ‘This is not unexpected, we heard that there had been a well-funded and orchestrated effort from certain right-wing political officers at the GMB close to Watson and Smith.’