from Richard Fletcher . Cosop News of October 9th carried in its "Political Notebook" - a regular column by Geoffr Rhodes, M.P. ~ an article entitled "Blackpool Illuminations", The article is a very clear - if unpalatable ~ assessment. Here are the key passages: ".eeeClause IV, already virtually in the coffin, was firmly sealed in. Gone were the resolutions demanding more and more public ownership. Even stéel
re an ome ree ee ce Seay ed SRL nationalisation was no longer certain to be dealt with in this Parlianent. The anti-American rank and File lobby was firmly crushed. The “verwhelming majority of the party backed the Government on its immigration policies and had it not been for the Transport and General Workers! block vote the supp-~ orters of the critical resolution on immigration policy would have been virtually annihilated. Only on the incomes policy did the Government views look to be in danger and here the Constituency Party delegates, traditionally on the left, appear to have had a decisive majority in favour of the Government." (in fact, it has been calculated that 400,000 CLP votes were cast against the majority) ",eeeLabourts Left is basically weak - without a national leader of great calibre, with no room for manoeuvre in Parliament, and faced with a Party establishment more powerful than Hugh Gaitskell was ever able to command. The doctrines of the Party have been turied. The rebels are scattered to the winds. The largest social democratic perty_in_ the world is pledged_to a national plan based on the assumptions of a mixed economy, the bulk of