The following statement was adopted by the Woodside, Glasgow, Constituency Labour Party at its last meeting.
Throughout the Tory years 1951-1964, Scotland traditionally returned a much higher proportion of Labour M.P.s than other parts of the U.K. The loyalty of the Scottish working class to the Labour Party was apparently much deeper than that of their English counterparts. The figures for the Glasgow municipal elections over the last four years demonstrates what has happened in the following period. Already the Labour Party is obliterated as a membership organisation, If the present trend continues we shall also be obliterated at the polls.
No one should underestimate the seriousness of this. The future of the Labour Party in the country is bound up with its future in Scotland. If a large number of constituencies return SNP members at the next election a Tory majority at Westminster will be assured, Then we shall suffer all the consequences in terms of harsh action against trade unions, further racialist legislation and cutbacks in welfare too, Objectively, therefore, the increased in the nationalist vote brings with it a threat of renewed Tory rule.
Many reasons have been put forward to account for the rise of nationalism. There is an element of truth in most of them, We can accept for instance that Scotland possesses a degree of cultural distinctiveness, that people are searching for a cause to campaign for, that our society has produced a bureaucracy which appears to render the individual powerless against manifold injustices perpetrated by authority. All these and many other points can show why people are receptive to nationalist ideas. But they are all either permanent factors or long terms trends. They do not explain why 'the SNP has grown at such a phenomenal rate at this specific point in time.
This can only be seen in relation to political events and therefore to the performance of the Labour Government since 1964. It cannot be denied that it is precisely in this period of office, that the SNP has grown at an unprecedented rate, In short, the wage freeze coupled with price escalation, rent increases, welfare cutbacks, etc, in general the failure to appear in any way different from the Tories, is what has shattered the loyalty of the Scottish working class to the Labour Party. The nationalists have capitalised on this. In England, incidentally, many voters have moved direct to the Tories,
There is no solution to be found in attacks on the calibre of SNP members, their organisational shortcomings, etc. Nor is there any point in tail-ending their initiatives by producing compromise programmes for regional government and expecting this to head off their demands. Since the reason for their growth does not lie specifically in the issue of self-government but rather in a general [illegible]ution" would prove to be no solution at all.
The challenge of the SNP can only be met by eliminating the necessity for it. This means taking over its role by once again turning the labour movement into a crusading campaign. Concretely this involves discussing alternative policies to those implemented by the Government - socialist alternatives - and campaigning for their acceptance by the movement and the population at large.
We do not attempt to lay down a blueprint for such a policy, although we have our own ideas on the lines it should follow. Rather, we are interested at this stage in establishing the necessity for its production and then involving all sections of the labour movement in its formation.
A number of prominent comrades around TRIBUNE have given a lead in this through the "Socialist Charter" (See TRIBUNE, 7/6/68). Many will want to modify this or to add points. Perhaps regional devolution will be included amongst them, Pursuing it in such a context would give it a validity and seriousness it does not possess as an isolated demand,
In summary:
1. The Labour Government's performance in office is the proximate cause of the rise of the SNP.
2. A critique of this performance and a campaign for alternatives within and without the labour movement is the only guarantee against the rise of nationalism in Scotland, Tory rule nationally and the extinction of the Labour Party.