“The central belief that has underpinned my politics since my late teens is that ordinary working people, here and abroad - and including teachers - should have the right to run their own affairs, lead their own lives and make democratic decisions, free from manipulation by the economically rich and politically powerful – or by “we-know-best” factions in their own organisations.”

 

On Thursday 11^th November 1965, Rhodesia declared UDI. Flouting the law, they declared their racism ‘constitutional’. “The decision which we have taken today is a refusal by Rhodesians to sell their birth-right, and even if we were to surrender, does anyone believe that Rhodesia would be the last target of the Communists and the Afro-Asian bloc? We have struck a blow for the preservation of justice, civilization and Christianity,” said Ian Smith, their ‘leader’.

The next day a Union Jack appeared over the Army Cadet hut in my school playground, and a painted bedsheet pinned to the side wall read, “Good Luck Rhodesia!” By dinnertime a few of us had unpinned and destroyed it. At 14½ it was my first political act. I was – and remain – very proud of it.

I was brought up in a Christian socialist household. My Dad was an elder in the Presbyterian Church, while my Mum was an Anglican, who took on the Sunday School at my Dad’s church. She had a very relaxed attitude towards her Christianity: the important thing for her was a strong sense of justice and support for the downtrodden, and a belief in people’s potential – and I learnt it from her in early childhood.

 

She had grown up in South East London knowing real poverty. Her father, returning from WW1, went through long periods of unemployment, going from door to door offering to blacken door knockers and clean steps for a penny. He and his brother made - and sold - toys from scraps of wood they ‘acquired’. He then became a ‘casual’ on the London docks, walking over an hour each way to stand in line and hope to be picked out for a day’s work. When the family was rehoused to the brand new council housing estate in Morden, they couldn’t believe their bathroom, inside toilet, garden and outside coal bunker – though it was even further for her Dad to walk and hitch rides to work, and she often saw him fall asleep while eating his meal at night

 

When my Mum was 12 or 13, she asked her mother why a young man down the road often appeared on the street all dressed in black. Her mother told her that he was, “…a bit touched in the head…” and that she should keep clear of him. When my Mum found out what he believed in, she didn’t know whether to pity him or hate him. He was the only Blackshirt in her area as far as she knew.

 

At 14 she had the opportunity to stay on at school, but the family couldn’t afford it, and she went to work in an office in Soho. It was 1937. In 1940, at 17, she joined the ATS and started her war service. She hated Hitler as much as anyone - and still does. She despises homegrown fascists, and still regards them as “touched in the head.” Her experience in the 30s and during the war led her to be a big supporter of the post war Labour Government and trade unions.  Now, at 84, ‘New Labour’ makes her angry. If she’s up for it, I’ll have her sitting by my side on the first day of ‘my’ Conference in 2008.

 

My Dad was lowland Scottish, and a very principled, gentle, polite, law-abiding man who always hated a fuss. Fighting in the Burmese jungle against the Japanese – only getting out when he contracted malaria – must have scarred him. He’d wanted to be an architect, but the war put an end to that. He ended up working in the building trade as a sales rep, which he enjoyed and in which he took great pride. He worked hard, bringing his paperwork home every night.

 

I was born in 1951, 3 years after my sister, in New Cross, London. We lived in a rented flat in a terraced house backing onto Millwall football ground. My Dad did well, and we moved to our own house. He liked his work, and really respected the family firm he worked for. He knew they respected him too. By the time I was ripping up racist bedsheets, he had a sales rep’s car, a nice house and a decent income.

 

He didn’t really like my writing to local newspapers about developing anti-racist views and activities - I had exactly the same name as him, which led some of his fellow Presbyterians to think that he was leading a bit of a double life, as the letters to the press became increasingly radical. It was the source of a lot of arguments between us, which came to a head when I went demonstrating against Enoch Powell and ran into a little trouble with his supporters – some of whom, unfortunately, were in the police. My Dad couldn’t believe that policemen could act in an aggressive manner, and simply would not listen to me. At 17 I left home. It was 1968.

 

Shortly afterwards, Dad’s employers showed in what regard they held him and all their other workers – by making them redundant. He couldn’t believe it. He had thought that the family firm considered him as family too. But – unluckily for Dad – the firm’s factory and office site was just outside the perimeter fence of the new Heathrow Airport. Offered £3 million for the site – to build a hotel – the family snapped it up and said goodbye to their ‘family’ workforce. They gave every employee a farewell gift. All the men got the same – a green and white teacup and saucer with a transfer print of a man playing golf on the outside. My Dad had never played golf – apart from crazy golf with my sister and me on holiday. Nevertheless, he put the cup and saucer in pride of place on the sideboard. He soon got another job, but the building trade was in recession and the company folded. Another job came – and another redundancy. My Dad, who had always been fearful of unions “making trouble”, had a nervous collapse. My Mum took him to live on the Isle of Wight, where she had relatives, to recover. He did – and became a talented painter… and active in the Labour Party. He died some years ago now. I miss him very much.

 

Meanwhile, I had become increasingly active in the Anti-Apartheid Movement and the anti-racist movement.  I was struggling to understand how Apartheid could be supported by governments around the world that claimed to be democratic and to stand up for human rights. How the imprisonment of Mandela and others – then around its 4^th anniversary – could be supported by them. Why the only governments that really supported the struggle against Apartheid were those said to be undemocratic and tyrannical. Mandela then, of course, was always portrayed as a communist and terrorist. At the same time, the USA’s war in Vietnam was escalating, and I was becoming increasingly active in the anti-war movement.

 

I realised that there was a thread that ran through all the causes I supported, and another that ran through all the people who opposed them. I joined the Labour Party Young Socialists , and enjoyed several weeks of fascinating discussion, very little of which I understood. At this time of course, trade unions were big news. And the people who stood for the things I stood for, stood for the unions too. And those who opposed the things I believed in opposed unions too. A penny began to drop. I began to understand that my family’s history – both grandparents and parents – the situation in South Africa, the war in Vietnam, the trade union position in Britain… these things were all connected in some way – and that “some way” was directly to do with wealth, privilege, class and power.

 

When I raised these things with my LPYS friends they organised a discussion, attended by our Labour MP. He was, if anything, rather too honest! The Labour Party, he explained, could only achieve a limited amount as the ‘captains of industry’ had a great deal of power, and they had a right to it, just as we had a right to unions. We needed to try to balance their power and improve people’s living conditions. He explained how Prime Minister Wilson, elected in 1964, had been instructed to implement a whole series of economic measures by the Bank of England and though he protested, he hadn’t much choice. When elected again with a bigger majority in 1966, the Labour Party, he said, had grasped the nettle – and decided it needed to bring the unions into line. I asked why they hadn’t tried to bring the Bank of England into line. Our MP obviously thought this a very stupid idea – and I suppose it was.

 

Some of my Young Socialist comrades were involved in the same issues as me, but I came to realise that many of the people who were most consistent and committed in organising against racism, against Apartheid, against the war in Vietnam, and, I saw, in favour of the unions were of a rather ‘stronger brew’. Many of them were members or supporters of the Communist Party. And far from the terrible picture drawn of them in the media and conventionally held by quite a few people at that time, I found them – and still do! – to be thoughtful, well organised and committed to encouraging ordinary people to speak up for themselves, and to organise for their own priorities on their own terms.

 

Talking to them, and joining with them, I came to some conclusions that have stood me in good stead. Over the years, I have had no reason to reject these, or to regret my decision to join them. Tell me where I go wrong! We live in a class divided society, with unequal access to wealth and power. I saw it in the late 60s, and we see it every day in our work as teachers, and have highlighted it in "Bringing Down The Barriers". The Labour Party has discovered that if it does not challenge this wealth and power it cannot “legislate” socialism into existence. It believes that it cannot challenge the status quo in this way because the media would make it unelectable, and it fears the economic and political reaction of the rich and powerful at home and abroad. Therefore, it has become less and less ‘socialist’ – and now the word is not even used any more. New Labour has ceased to put a real alternative in front of people, and acts very similarly to the Tory Party. Working people need to act for themselves, through Trade Unions, against the re-emergence of the sort of injustices my parents’ and grandparents’ generations had suffered – and against the continuing inequalities and exploitation of our time.

 

The central belief that has underpinned my politics since my late teens is that ordinary working people, here and abroad, should have the right to run their own affairs, lead their own lives and make democratic decisions, free from manipulation by the economically rich and politically powerful - or by “we-know-best” factions in their own organisations.

 

My parents valued education highly, and so do I. I was the first in my family to stay on at school beyond the school leaving age and to go on to Higher Education, though my sister, Sue, certainly could have done, she chose FE training in Nursery Nursing. I regarded education as a liberating experience for myself – and wanted to be a teacher. When I fulfilled this ambition – even as a student teacher - I joined the NUT and became active in it straight away. My trade union membership was - and remains - very important to me… as important as my chosen profession.

 

The Union is as strong or as weak as teachers decide it will be – and no amount of wishful thinking or self-deception by the few in factions will make that any different. But that is our strength, because our members – both NUT and other unions – are very strong when they wish to be. It is within that context that National Officers need to work – of helping and assisting members to be strong, to express their views and be prepared and organised to back them up when necessary. That’s what I want to do…

 

Genuine progress is only made when ordinary people are freed up – “empowered” - to express their own views and priorities and act upon them – not follow some small group’s line. I also believe that false divisions weaken ordinary people, and are more often than not traceable to a devious ‘divide and rule’ strategy somewhere. We need unity within the NUT based on members’ priorities and an organising culture, and unity of the whole profession into a single, new education union. That’s my agenda for the NUT.

 

When I was elected to the Executive in 1998 I was surprised to find just how strong the factions were. Each met the night before the Executive to decide their “line” on the next day’s agenda, how they would vote, who they would put forward for committees or meetings, how they would scupper “the other side”. They still do this. (NB. This article was written as part of my election campaign, early in 2006 – and in the intervening time, the Executive factions have been largely marginalised  – and there is a completely new picture of real radical consensus and unity… a real success!)

 

Don’t get me wrong. Many of the people involved in each of the factions are very good people, and hard workers for teachers, for whom I have a lot of respect. But the continued existence of the old faction divisions holds back the work of the union, the cause of teachers and that of the children we teach.

 

As the factions largely decided what would occur at the Executive meeting, with a repetitive and routine voting pattern, I realised that, if I was to have an effect as an Executive member, I would need to take their influence into account, while at the same time trying to reduce it. I asked each of the factions if they would like to invite me to their meetings without me joining them or making any oaths of allegiance or learning strange handshakes.

 

The “Left Caucus” gave me very short shrift – I had just displaced one of their leading members as Executive member - though I was invited once or twice. The “Broad Left” aka “Broadly Speaking” invited me regularly, until they decided my speaking and voting was not ‘consistent’ enough with their decisions, and told me not to come back. Some months later, they again invited me to attend – which I did for some time - agreeing that I need make no promises or even suggestion that I would speak or vote in favour of their “line”.

It is difficult not to take part on this basis, as you feel rather “in the wilderness”. However, I’ve learnt to manage!

 

So, I have never been a member of either faction. Both are now internally divided and rather directionless. A number of Executive members of various views (including me) succeeded in a suggestion that all Executive members regardless of faction or view meet together on the evening before the Executive to consider a burning ‘strategic’ issue of the day and to knock it about in open, honest discussion. Following this, the factions still go off to their separate rooms – while the rest of us, a small but growing band of people with disparate ideas, go to a café, bar or restaurant to continue the discussion more informally, and just relate on a more human level!

Of course, all union activists - like anyone else - have a right to their political beliefs… with the notable exception of followers of the fascist parties like BNP whose beliefs are in my view incompatible with trade unionism and equality of opportunity. That said, there must be no manipulation of our Union by any organisation. Those who know my union work best - other Executive members and Local Association Officers in my Division and electoral areas – will, I am sure, confirm that this is my view, and my way of working. If any colleagues question it, I would like to know “chapter and verse”!

 

I hope this gives you some insight into my views as they have developed. I believe in education. I believe in teachers. And I believe in the right of working people – including teachers - to exercise democratic power without this being distorted by a powerful few.  Absolutely central to this is my belief in a united, independent trade union movement, controlled by and accountable only to its members.

I would be very pleased to discuss these issues further – either privately or publicly through this website as you prefer. I look forward to hearing from you.

 

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