In recent days, campaign stalls promoting upcoming meetings on “Your Party’s Collapse: Time to build the Socialist Equality Party” have taken place in London and Sheffield, alongside a party Supporters Campaign launched on June 15.
The party is campaigning to sign up hundreds of workers and young people as supporters of the Socialist Equality Party (SEP) over the next 12 months, based on a statement of socialist aims including: the fight for the international unity of the working class against war and austerity, the defence of immigrants, and the expropriation of the capitalist oligarchy to establish a workers’ government.
In the London Borough of Camden, workers and young people engaged in a wide-ranging discussion with SEP campaigners about what socialism is and how to fight for it.
Hundreds of leaflets headlined “Join the Fight for Socialism” were distributed on Saturday, alongside flyers for our public meeting in Archway, Islington on July 12. Several people asked about joining the SEP or becoming a supporter.
Mario, a teacher, said he wanted to join the party and donate. He told SEP members, “Socialism is where capital serves the people, not where the people serve the accumulation of capital for the ruling class.” He explained that his grandparents had fought in the Spanish Civil War of 1936-38, and SEP members discussed the role of Stalinism in betraying the Spanish working class, and the fight waged by Trotsky to prevent this.
Sahim, a young college student, approached the SEP campaign stall after reading the SEP’s Statement of Aims, pointing to the section headlined, “Stop the War on Iran, End the Genocide in Gaza! Dismantle NATO.” Sahim said, “I agree with this. All wars have to be stopped. I do not like people being killed.”
Mehmet, a Turkish student, stopped at the SEP’s stall and scanned the QR code to sign up as a Supporter. He said he was not impressed by Jeremy Corbyn’s Your Party and has been searching in the UK for a genuine communist and revolutionary organisation to join.
Andrew, a construction worker, agreed strongly with SEP’s call to “End the Rule of the Billionaire Oligarchy” and “For a Workers Government and Socialist Policies.” He said, “Money rules the world. There is a few percentage of people that have lots of money, and they would like to keep it. That’s why there is political control over the majority.
“What we need is to have an awakening by the people, the majority. The people do not realise how much power they have. The masses have to take the power. There needs to be a redistribution of wealth, and that is why I like socialism.”
Andrew opposed the imperialist war on Iran, saying, “It really makes me sick that innocent lives get slaughtered and killed and made to suffer because of money by the elite few. The wars are started by America and their allies. I think we are now getting to a time where we are realising that capitalism doesn’t work because of greed, because it comes down to just that small percentage.”
He said the Trump administration is “desperately trying to claw back some kind of economic control. The only way they can do that is by starting wars and poaching oil. I mean, let’s not even get started with Gaza… yeah, I think there needs to be big changes.”
Highlighting the SEP’s demand of “Billions for Social Programmes”, Andrew explained, “The one biggest change there needs to be is an international health organisation, not one that’s just dealing with COVID, but one that all of the countries contribute to, [for] world-class best technology and research” so that “everyone in the world gets to benefit from an equal level of good healthcare.”
Lucy, a young worker, agreed with the SEP’s statement of aims, singling out “Protect a Liveable Planet for All”, which calls for billions to reorganise the economy and combat climate change produced by capitalist profiteering. She said, “There is no long-term planning into anything like infrastructure, food, electricity network, anything like that. Climate change is happening; there is no doubt about it. As a society, we have to design for the changes that have already happened and try to prevent more.”
Aiden stopped to read the SEP’s statement of aims. Responding to the SEP’s call for a living income and secure employment, he said, “Guaranteeing a living income is probably the most important issue at the moment, I feel.
“If people do not feel they can get the basics of life—I’m talking about food, rent, even for potentially one night out a week—I don’t feel like we have the basis of a society.” Aiden added, “We need a living wage. We need something that enables people to have a basis of a standard of life. If you do not have that, everything else will collapse.”
Aiden added, “Also art, that is a really important thing. We are here in Camden… part of Camden is now owned by private equity, I believe by one man. Especially in London, which attracts so many tourists, we cannot have things like that getting degraded, getting taken away from us.”
Michael Barnes, SEP London branch secretary, told WSWS, “It was a successful day’s campaign, with seven of those we spoke with saying they would like to sign up as a supporter. We’ve already begun following up on this. We are encountering definite anti-capitalist sentiment and interest in socialism.
“Many of those we met were previously supporting Corbyn but are dissatisfied; they are looking for something more serious. They want to know why that failed—they’ve come to the right place!
“The shift in thinking from Corbynite reformist palliatives to revolutionary socialism requires the intervention of a genuine Marxist—that is, Trotskyist—party. It’s our job to show in practice who the real socialists are and to educate and prepare a new generation on that basis for the struggles ahead.”
Sheffield
In Sheffield city centre, SEP members campaigned for the party’s upcoming public meeting on Your Party’s debacle, seeking to draw the political lessons from Jeremy Corbyn’s betrayal of left-wing sentiment and advancing the SEP as the genuine socialist alternative for the working class.
A refugee from Afghanistan, Sham, said he was interested in the SEP, “I think equality is very important; the world is very dangerous and divided. You see all the wars taking place in the Middle East, which have been ongoing for years, as well as in Europe and Ukraine. I don’t think governments are for the working people. It is good to look for an alternative and build it in the communities. I would be very interested in finding out more.” He took a leaflet and said he would scan the QR code to get involved.
Anqelique, from Russia, was in Sheffield to see her son, who studies here. She took several pictures of the SEP’s stall and was intrigued to find socialists in the UK. When an SEP campaigner explained we were Trotskyists, she gave a thumbs-up and said she liked him.
She was opposed to the war in Ukraine and the senseless deaths of Russians and Ukrainians. “It’s all about money,” she said, explaining it was “hard in Russia for the working people. Lots of people think socialism is bad, but it can be good for working people. Putin is not a socialist; he is a capitalist.”
She said she would show the leaflet to her son and see if he was interested in attending the SEP’s public meeting in Sheffield on Sunday, July 19.
Ruby, also Russian, came over to the stall. She explained, “The USSR was much better for us than its breakup. We have all been divided now. There isn’t real socialism in Russia now; it’s capitalism.” When campaigners explained Leon Trotsky’s fight against Stalinism, she said, “Yes, he was good. He didn’t like the bureaucracy—they were in it for themselves.”
She also opposed the war in Ukraine: “I don’t support Putin. He is letting Russians be killed for his own interests, but I think Zelensky is just a puppet of imperialism. He is a ‘nothing’ as a political figure, like a little ant, and they are using him to carve up Russia and the former USSR, and he is the man doing this”.
When SEP members told her about the imprisonment of Ukrainian Trotskyist Bogdan Syrotiuk, imprisoned by Zelensky’s regime for calling for an end to the war and for the unity of Russian and Ukrainian workers, Ruby replied, “Zelensky is a dictator. There is no democracy in Ukraine. I believe there are lots who oppose him and suffer the same fate.” She was returning to Russia shortly and said she would look at the World Socialist Web Site.
Six new contacts signed up for further discussion and several pamphlets were sold, including on the SEP’s critique of Your Party, the lessons of the 1984-85 miners’ strike and opposing the Gaza genocide.
To sign up as an SEP Supporter and join the fight for socialism visit our Supporters page.
Tickets for the Socialist Equality Party’s public meetings are available on Eventbrite. If you would like to organise a meeting in your city, contact the SEP.