Laughter as Militants Mock English Anarchists

'ENGLISH anarchists,' declared blacklisted electrician Colin Trousdale, 'can't organise owt!'  Comrade Trousdale was speaking at a branch meeting of the famous Greater Manchester Contracting Branch 1400/7 in the Town Hall Tavern on Tibb Lane about the attack in October 2012 of a gang of members of the so-called Anarchist Federation (AF or A.fed) on a vendor on the Northern Voices/ NAN stall at the Anarchist Bookfair, and the consequent theft of trade union literature.  To laughter from the rest of those present he suggested that the anarchists ought to invent a salad cream bomb for throwing at their enemies.  The meeting which was mostly discussing important issues such as the blacklist and the behaviour of the Unite union in attempting to negotiate separately from the Blacklist Support Group and other unions, and to engage in talks with the very companies guilty of blacklisting in the construction industry, turned to the bizarre behaviour of Nick Heath and the Anarchist Federation (AF) as a bit of light relief under Any Other Business, when the Secretary of Tameside TUC gave a report likening the behaviour of A.fed. to an organisation on the far-right of English politics.  The meeting was reluctant to give even that degree of political seriousness to an organisation like A.fed. who were likened to clowns incapable of wiping their own arses.

In a year in which Freedom, the anarchist newspaper and perhaps the oldest left-wing paper in England, died of shame having been on the its death-bed for about a decade under a variety of weak editors.  Freedom, it is noted, never reported on any of the attacks on Northern Voices and even allowed itself in its dying moment, to be bullied by the superannuated boss of A.fed the cockney Nick Heath.  The anarchists had been condemn at a another meeting of the Greater Manchester County Association of TUCs (GMCA TUCs) for their behaviour on a May Day march.  It is getting difficult to defend anarchists these days at trade union meetings such among the Manchester blacklisted electricians, simply because they behave badly in a way which lacks an English sense of humour, and there was hearty laughter at the electrician's branch when it was learned that the pretext for the attack on Northern Voices and the theft of the trade union pamphlets was provoke after NV13 carried an obituary on the late Bob Miller describing him as a 'skedaddler':  many of the blacklisted lads read Northern Voices and their branch has been affiliated to Tameside TUC for years.  Yet, few would bother to read much of the other publications on the left.   

At last night's meeting the Socialist Party and Linda Taaffe came under attack when it was suggested that the branch affiliate to the National Shop Steward's Network (NSSN).  This was agreed, but Colin Trousdale pointed out that the NSSN had never had to same clout since the split when the syndicalists and other independent socialists left, and Colin said that the biggest loss had been the departure of Dave Chapple as the Chair of the NSSN.  Dave Chapple, who is a libertarian socialist, would never call himself an 'anarchist' simply because of the kind of corny behaviour already described at the Anarchist Bookfair, where the organisers refused to intervene and challenge A.fed., the electricians expressed disbelief about this.  The Socialist Party was criticised for divisiveness, but Colin claimed that the real culprit who caused the split in the NSSN was Peter Taaffe.  It was said that the split in the NSSN was caused by the Socialist Party who wanted their own 'sovereign' anti-cuts body separate from that of the SWP and others.  The supporters of the NSSN were asked how many cuts had been prevented by the NSSN since it set up its own anti-cuts organisation, and answer came there none.  It was even suggested that Nick Clegg and Vince Cable may have in truth modified more of the cuts than the NSSN and the Socialist Party put together.   

Dave Chapple and the paper Trade Union Solidarity are organising a conference on the 'Future of Working Class Education' in August.   

The electrician's branch discussed the bankrolling of the Labour Party by Unite and Len McClusky.  One member said that the Labour Party could not be saved, and this funding was a waste of the member's money.  What is interesting in all this is how nothing ever changes the unions throw money down the political drain of the Labour Party, the English anarchists live up to their standard barn-pot caricature, and English trotskyists still seek solutions to the problems of the world through eternal point-scoring and splits.