Inevitable roughhouse at Manchester Partisan!

Background to anarchist bookfair antics

THE promoters of the Partisan venue in Salford on Cheetham Hill Road and within sight of Strangeways Prison, have declared in their mission statement as follows:

“The aim of Partisan is to create a space in Manchester for grassroots or DIY music, political and cultural events,” explains Kate Hardy, one of the founding members. “The aim is to make somewhere that everyone can go to, even when they don’t have much cash.”

Not so at the Manchester Anarchist Bookfair today when a few folk hitherto associated with the Northern Anarchist Network, attempted to gain entrance and enjoy the event at around 1pm.

First of all the veteran anarchist Barry Woodling and several others mingled peacefully with folk buying books untroubled, but then the tall man Barry who stood out like a sore thumb with his garish black and red fleece was spotted by one of the organisers.  Since the 2012 bookfair, when this same bookfair bod, who hides behind the name 'Veg', had accosted and abused Barry accusing him of being an 'anti-semite', there has been much bad blood between anarchists in Manchester over the events at this 2012 event.  This was entirely provoked by the 'Veg' attack on Barry Woodling and particularly because having called Barry an 'anti-semite' and pushed him, Barry had to leave the premises of the bookfair venue, the People's History Museum, using a fire escape.  The manager of the People's History Museum later told me that Barry had to leave the premises by this strange route in the interests of 'his own safety', a baying mob having assembled including the leader of the local Solidarity Federation, Ronny Marsden and the national leader of the Anarchist Federation, Nick Heath.

Today's events followed the usual uproar seemingly now common at anarchist bookfairs nationally, and which this year, following a confrontation between radical feminists and trans activists, has led to the organisers of London Anarchist Bookfair to abandon plans to have a London bookfair in 2018.

This is the background to what happened at today's Manchester Anarchist Bookfair, and we hope to have more news on today's events as soon as we have more information of what went on.

Meanwhile, the Marxists in Manchester and beyond are laughing their socks off.

Ukip Scrap & Political Violence at Freedom

Donald Rooum Ruminates on Trotsky's violent death & 'Scuffles' in politics

MR. Hookem, the Ukip MEP, who is alleged to have been involved in an altercation with another Ukip MEP, Steven Woolfe, in the European Parliament last week described it as a mere 'scuffle'.  Donald Rooum, a Friend of Freedom Press (anarchist), similarly told Northern Voices in last month that the scrap at Freedom Press, the anarchist HQ, at the time of the Friends of Freedom Press Annual General Meeting on the 22^nd, June (the day before the referendum vote), was 'only a scuffle', and he added that the police should not have involved.

Violence seems to be becoming more common in politics in the UK these days!

The Ukip  'punch-up' at the European Parliament had something to do with the struggle for control of Ukip; likewise the problems at Freedom are about who influences the management of the administration of Freedom Press and the sale of the building on Whitechapel High Street. 

Some people describing themselves as 'The Freedom Collective' wanted to prevent the directors on the Friends of Freedom of Press from considering proposals presented by a group from the North of England who describe themselves as 'Our Friends in the North'..

Donald Rooum, is an octogenarian veteran of English anarchism, who has been associated with Freedom since the 1940s, despite that it is only relatively recently become a Friend or director on the board of the Friends of Freedom Press.  Last month, he engaged in a correspondence in Private Eye's Pedantry Corner discussing Trotsky's death:

'... Robert Thomson's cartoon (p5, Eye 1425) depicts a man with a mountaineer's ice axe in his head.  'Could this be a misunderstanding of a historical account of Trotsky's death?

'Trotsky was killed with an ice pick, a stiletto used by bartenders in the 1930s, when refrigerators houses supplied ice in big blocks, for picking out bits of ice to put in drinks.  Nothing to do with mountaineers.'

Donald Rooum, who is a supporter of the 'Freedom Collective' group occupying the premises and has recently taken on the role of their sugar-daddy even financing them out of his pension, told Northern Voices that 'I am not interested in any suggestions from you!'

Presumably he was referring here to our practical program for the sale of the building being presented by a group calling itself 'Our Friends in the North', and he wants to protect his own babies on the so-called Freedom Collective.

Mr. Rooum, excusing the attack on me at the Friends of Freedom Press AGM, said: 

'You shouldn't go getting the police in, it gets people in trouble, it may sometimes be necessary to bring in the police but not just for a scuffle.'

Rooum's reputation and legacy now rests upon the survival of the 'Freedom Collective' as his baby. When the long-term owner of Freedom, Vernon Richards, withdrew from direct active involvement in Freedom newspaper in the late 1990s shortly before the Millennium, he had apprenticed Charles Crute to takeover as editor.  It now seems that Donald had been doing much to undermine Charles' position at one point trying to stir things up over a joking remark I made about Vernon Richards going off the cultivate tomatoes at his home in East Anglia.  That attempt misfired, perhaps because Donald wouldn't know a 'Gardener's Delight' from a  'Super Marmande' beefsteak tomato, but then Donald's opportunity to overthrow Charles came later when a dispute broke out over our attempt to produce an issue of The Raven on Noam Chomsky's politics and linguistics.  Harold Sculthorpe (an old Friend of Freedom Press) and myself had arranged with a group of Manchester academics involved in the Manchester Ethnography Group to help produce an issue on Chomsky ultimately entitled 'Chomsky & his Critics' (2001), but when I sent Chomsky an article and a covering letter to the MIT, the great man Professor Chomsky took exception to one of the articles by Rupert Read now in the Green Party, and his former 'political secretary' intervened to stop this publication of The Raven after Charles Crute had given it the go-ahead.   Because Charles had OK'd the original article by Rupert in a letter and said it would be published, Donald Rooum was then able to install his own man, Toby Crowe*, a 'lapsed' Marxist from the Socialist Party of Great Britain, who was to ultimately become  the editor of Freedom newspaper when Charles Crute was forced out.  Mr. Rooum later referred to Toby as 'a big' strapping lad who quickly got rid of  what Donald called the 'wasteful practices' such as paying Charles Crute a small salary and then forcing him out of Freedom to seek work at a supermarket.  Toby Crowe failed to benefit Freedom, and has now been identified as the start of the decline which ultimately resulted in its closure in 2014


*  Mr. Crowe left his job as Freedom editor and after a period of study was later to be appointed as the now Revd Toby Crowe a Rector of Elmdon Church in 2012.  In that capacity according to a website he seems to have been more successful than he was at Freedom Press.  Donald Rooum has told me that he is still in contact with the Revd. Crowe, but he does not seem to have kept up any contact with poor Charles Crute.

A Modest Proposal for Freedom Press

'It is hard to tell someone who is shortsighted how to get to a place.  Because you can't say “Look at that church tower ten miles away over there and go in that direction".'

Ludwig Wittgenstein (Manuscript 107 70 c: 1929)

THE modest program below sets out to sets out to provide a signpost for the forthcoming Annual & General Meeting of Friends of Freedom on the 23rd, June.  The four advocates of this modest program for change at Freedom Press are Barry Woodling; Martin Gilbert; Brian Bamford and Christopher Draper.  

In 1962, Vernon Richards for the then editors of FREEDOM addressed the readers in a Preface to a volume of Selected articles: 

'You, our readers, will, we hope, agree with Mr. Colin McInnes when he described FREEDOM as “about the only authentically polemical weekly surviving in our country” (New Statesman 7/9/62) for this very reason, and in fairness to our correspondents, comrades and sympathisers, we must mention that these Selections reflect the editorial approach of FREEDOM, an approach which on certain issues has been hotly contested, by comrades we esteem as anarchists and friends.'

Like the philosopher Wittgenstein quoted above, Vernon Richards was the son of a foreign businessman.   Both also had European origins.  The Austrian, Wittgenstein carried Tolstoy's Gospels in his pocket and Vernon Richards identified with the Italian anarchist Erico Malatesta.  James Pinkerton, a former International Secretary of the Syndicalist Worker's Federation (SWF) and a severe critic of Freedom, had to admit that Vernon Richards and Freedom's position on civil liberties was a distinguished model of radical journalism in the UK in the 1950s and 60s.

Over a year ago Chris Draper and Northern Voices* played a major role in re-establishing the Friends of Freedom Press as a functioning body and helped to install David Goodway as a new Friend.  What everyone of goodwill now wants, including the Friends of Freedom, is that some tidying up is required at 84b, Whitechappel High Street, and that the Trustees must now fulfil their obligations: the requirement under the Memorandum of Association is for the Friends to ensure that 'the anarchist journal “Freedom” ' is published properly.  For this reason we believe all the signatories to this modest program below should now be elected to the board of Freedom Press at the forthcoming AGM:

*  The publication Northern Voices was founded on the initiative of a former Friend of Freedom Press, Harold Schulthorpe, and others in 2003.

OUR FRIENDS in the NORTH      June 2016:

* For over a century FREEDOM was uniquely important in the exchange of ideas between anarchists and the wider promotion of anarchist ideas and activities
* “Friends of Freedom Press“ (FFP) exists “To assist financially the printing and publication of the anarchist journal “Freedom” (Memorandum of Association; para 3(A)1).
* Despite this unequivocal obligation to ensure FREEDOM maintains its historic role, FFP (as currently constituted) has proved ineffective
* FREEDOM’s assets currently facilitate some positive activities but these assets are legally required to be used for maintaining FREEDOM as a lively, inclusive and effective Anarchist Journal (in print or web form). The existing website and recent print offerings have proved wholly inadequate and exemplify regrettable and embarrassing indulgence. 
* Having initially been instrumental in the revival of FFP and subsequently witnessed a demonstrable lack of progress towards re-publication, “Our Friends in the North” (OFIN) now propose a slate of four well-qualified candidates committed to resurrect FREEDOM with a clearly articulated programme;

** Within 12 months, selling the 84b Whitechapel High Street property to liquidate FREEDOM assets
** The creation and maintenance of a new, professionally designed, sophisticated FREEDOM website within 6 months of liquidation  
** A Webmaster-Editor to be formally appointed on a bi-annual basis by a newly created FFP Publications Sub-Group (PSG) with an annual budget of 15K (1% of liquidation capital), to include a modest stipend
** A three-person PSG to be appointed from within, and responsible to, FFP (by secret ballot if excess volunteers)
** Furthermore, to challenge London-centricity OFIN proposes convening all future FFP meetings in Birmingham
** All future FFP agendas and minutes to be published online

If appointed, all OFIN candidates commit to working cooperatively and constructively with existing FFP members to revive the fortunes of FREEDOM.  On this basis we ask you to endorse the following;

Brian Bamford – Rochdale

Christopher Draper – Llandudno

Martin Gilbert – Ulverston

Barry Woodling - Salford 

Pale-faced Reply by Irrelevant Old Man!

Dear Adam Lawrence-Barr,

NICE to hear from you.  I only became aware of you after someone drew my attention to your spat with Nick Heath over your interview with the Catholic Worker.  I think he accused you of returning to the 'Big Tent' approach to anarchism, and you humbly said that Freedom had no intention of returning to the 'Big Tent' approach.  I don't know what the alternative is perhaps it amounts to proclaiming what Orwell called the 'smelly little orthodoxy' of left wing politics.  Whatever is the case, Northern Voices would be more than happy to publish your ideas on the NV Blog.

 You mention a few groups or tenants of Freedom that are doing 'work', implying that by offering rooms or collecting rents and standing in their shadows Freedom is somehow made more significant by its proximity to these bodies.  It's a curious argument to pursue, especially when at the last meeting of the Friends of Freedom you revealed that the inmates at Freedom had managed to 'squander' a large sum of money left to Freedom by a benefactor some 7-years ago.  You did say 'squander' didn't you?  And did you go on to absolve yourself by saying:  'It was before my time'?  Also, is it true that a member of the Friends has been financing the Collective out of their own pocket? 

None of these misdemeanours seems to inhibit you from taking that moral high ground in your e-mail and accusing Northern Voices an 'attempt to steal away the means of production from the workers using it by a bunch of old irrelevant white men'.  I'm glad you raised the matter in this for it suggests that you have not read a word of the Freedom archives or even of Northern Voices.  By couching your profound critique in such terms I suppose that you are claiming that you are more in touch with the shop-floor and the world of work?  And that your record in anarchist politics is somehow superior to mine and the other three supporters of the 'Modest program'?

Well, that is interesting:  how long have you been involved in Freedom?  The problem is that you seem to be representing the Metropolitan elite, and apart from David Goodway from Yorkshire, who is on the Friends of Freedom to represent the provinces?  Your own name sounds like something from the Home Counties and the middle-class, it doesn't have a proletarian ring to it does it?  It doesn't sound owt like someone who has been apprenticed in a factory, or has worked in the shipyards in Gibraltar like me, or has been a weighman in a Lancashire textile mill.  Or someone who has done time in Strangeways, or been detained in a dungeon in the province of Segovia in the summer of 1963, before even Stuart Christie went to Franco's Spain.  I'll not mention about the interviews I did for Freedom during the pyramid sales riots in Albania in 1997, and in Belgrade during the general elections there in December 2000.  What today seems to be held to be 'irrelevant' on the left of politics is the concerns of the blue-collar worker:  take the lack of interest in many quarters in the recent High Court case over blacklisting - that is the elephant which has somehow been left outside the room.  Where are the representatives of North & South Wales on the Friends of Freedom?  Where is the Scottish connection?  Where are the Northerners?  Where are the genuine Proles and blue-collar workers? 

 Come-on Adam Lawrence-Barr, who are you kidding? 

 Kind regards, 

 Brian Bamford

Whistle-blower Breaks Silence on Freedom!

by antigr0up on 18/06/16:

'A tenant acting as proxy for Andy's (Meike's) machinations (who pay little or nothing to Freedom) have sickened Richard Parry from staying? A pyrrhic victory. *slow hand clap* Unless Freedom can establish a viable financial plan Freedom will either fold or be forced to move to smaller premises within two or three years -which means the tenants are fucked. What's more the Freedom collective and their tenants have only themselves to blame. on FREEDOM - 'A Mausoleum'!'

Editor's Reply:

Yesterday, I was told that a couple of months ago buyer for 84B, Whitechapel High Street, had been round to the Freedom Bookshop to view the Freedom premises, and had been turned away by someone in the Bookshop.  Could it have been the Laughing Policeman?  If so, it has serious implications for everyone involved.  It would seem that the tenants are on a dodgy wicket here with the shakey situation over the rents (paid or unpaid), and even the Friends seem to have been asleep on the job.  Increasingly, it is looking like there could be tears before midnight unless the Friends clean-up their act and apply themselves to the task of carrying out what is required of them in the Articles of Association.  That is the simply reasoning behind the program of Our Friends in the North. 

FREEDOM - 'A Mausoleum'!

by antigr0up:

JUDGING from everything written so far the collective seem to have lost any sense of perspective. Now Andy and Adam are deploying flimsy, baseless claims towards those who are understandably calling to question the collective's chronic negligences. 

Word is the shop struggles to get five customers on any given day.  By that measure Freedom is more of mausoleum than anything else. It certainly feels like one, but only more miserable.

Five customers a day won't even pay staff wages never mind any of the other bills.  The place must be losing money every week.  Considering this situation has been allowed to operate like this over years it can only mean Freedom must be eating into the last of their financial reserves.  Put this into context:

- The shop is losing money.

- The collective let out spare space upstairs to groups who are unable to pay rent.

- The collective seem incapable of carrying out the basic requirements of any form of book shop, never mind the compulsory condition of doing a on 'Andy Meinke upholds the honour of Freedom!'

 NV Editor: 
ONLY this week we have been told that it is Donald Rooum - the cartoonist - a former member of the Collective himself and now a Friend of Freedom Press, who is bailing out the Freedom Collective to produce the Freedom free-sheets, and that he recently covered them for a debt that they had run-up. 


It may be of some interest that Donald was never made a Friend, while Vernon Richards was around.  Donald will be one of those Friends who as required by the constitution (Memorandum of Association) to stand-down at next week's Annual & General Meeting of the Friends. 


Richard Parry, the solicitor, is another Friend who is having to stand-down, but in this case it would seem that pressure has been applied behind the scenes by one of the insurgent 'tenant groups'.  Mr. Parry, it would seem, has put up some of the backs of those associated with Andy Meinke and the Collective, and they have used some underhand strategy to oust him.  It would seem that Mr. Parry has been doing too good a job for the likes of Mr. Meinke and his 'hangers-on' who enjoy his company.