Organising the left on the 19 October march

Submitted by AWL on 23 October, 2019 - 11:02 Author: Cathy Nugent
selling

The “Let Us Be Heard” demonstration on Saturday 19 October felt bigger than the previous march against Brexit in July.

In face of Johnson’s shocking disregard for democracy, Remainers felt obliged to turn out. Organisers claimed one million, and there were certainly many hundreds of thousands on the streets.

We had an anxious wait for the vote from Parliament’s Saturday sitting, followed by cheers for the Letwin amendment.

Socialists don’t normally celebrate Tory-sponsored amendments, but this one meant we were still “in the game”: Johnson had failed in his first attempt to bounce Parliament into a panic vote for his stitch-up.

We focused on helping with the Left Bloc. Such blocs have been a feature of all the recent anti-Brexit demonstrations, and have helped to mobilise leftists in Labour and the Greens to join these protests. They have differentiated the “Remain and Transform” position from a bland cross-party consensus.

In turn the campaign for that position by Another Europe is Possible, Labour for a Socialist Europe and others has helped to push Labour towards a public Remain position. John McDonnell’s speech to the rally on Saturday was a welcome indication of that.

As well as helping to steward the Left Bloc, leafletting, distributing stickers, and using sign-up sheets, Workers’ Liberty activists sold over 300 papers and many pamphlets on the day. We argued hard for people to join Labour and get involved in changing Labour’s stance, and for those already members to join Labour for a Socialist Europe.

On Twitter, we got a little bit of welcome feedback: ″Got this newspaper yesterday [Solidarity] at the #PeoplesVoteMarch for 50p — it′s a fantastic read and shows exact reasons why lefties should support remaining in the EU.”

Labour for a Socialist Europe

Labour for a Socialist Europe (L4SE) will organising in the coming general election for a pro-Remain, pro-socialist-Europe, left-wing voice within the Labour campaign.

In London on 29 October (7.30 p.m. at the Marchmont Centre, 62 Marchmont St, WC1N 1AB) it is calling an open organising meeting to discuss that effort.

L4SE will organise leaflets and other materials for Labour activists to use on street stalls and the doorstep.

L4SE was part of the push for a Remain policy at Labour conference on 21-25 September, and worked closely with the Labour Campaign for Free Movement there for the victory there for defending and extending free movement.

L4SE produced independent pro-Labour, anti-Brexit publicity for the Euro-elections in May 2019. Tens of thousands of leaflets totalling were taken by local Labour campaigns and by individuals.

L4SE has been fighting to stop Brexit and build a socialist resistance to the right-wing forces and ideas driving it ever since it was launched from the Another Europe is Possible conference in December 2018.

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