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THE TROTSKYIST MOVEMENT IN GREAT BRITAIN.MEMORANDUM BY THE HOME SECRETARY.

OFFICIALS OF THE REVOLUTIONARY COMMUNIST PARTY.

PROGRAMME OF THE REVOLUTIONARY COMMUNIST PARTY.

Doctrine.

TROTSKYISM is a body of doctrine based on the teachings of Marx, as elaborated by Lenin and interpreted and applied to the conditions of the interwar period by Trotsky. The cleavage from official Communism, or Stalinism, originated in the opposition between Trotsky's doctrinaire views and Stalin's realism.. Trotsky denounced the supplanting of the " continuing world revolution " by Stalin's plan to establish Socialism in the Soviet Union as a prerequisite. He opposed the replacement of democratic discussion of party policy by the personal dictatorship of Stalin, the weakening of the influence of the Soviets (Councils) in the face of a rising bureaucracy, and the revival of economically and socially privileged classes. The Trotskyists do not regard theform of society which now exists in Russia as socialism—they believe that true socialism can be achieved only by more or less simultaneous revolution over the greater part of the globe; and they are bitterly hostile to the Stalinist regime because it has not only '' betrayed the revolution '' in Russia itself, but by using the national Communist parties as the instruments of its '' reactionary '' policy abroad has retarded the development of the working class towards world revolution.

The ultimate aim of the Trotskyists is the establishment by means of uprisings all over the world of Workers' Governments which will introduce common ownership and workers' control of the means of production. They believe that world revolution will once more become possible as a result of the war. Their immediate policy in the present '' pre-revolutionary period of agitation, propaganda and organisation " is to prepare for this revolutionary moment by fostering a militant spirit among the working class and establishing themselves as its leaders. This they seek to do, according to- the directions of the late M. Trotsky, by campaigning' alongside the workers on the issues which most closely concern them,, such as wages, employment and social, conditions.The Trotskyists, while hostile to " fascism," regard the war as a struggle between rival Imperialisms, a struggle which is being used by the capitalist, class as an excuse more-effectively to exploit and oppress the workers. The U.S.S.R., although degenerate, is still a workers' State and must.be helped in its resistance to fascism; but the Trotskyist believes that capitalist Governments cannot by their nature effectively oppose fascism, and that he can therefore only help the U.S.S.R. if he first overthrows his own Government.

Organisation.

The Trotskyist movement, has existed in. Britain since 1929,. the year of Trotsky's expulsion from the U.S.S.R. The movement originally consisted of several small groups, from which there emerged in. 1937' the Revolutionary Socialist League (the official British Section of the Fourth International) and the Workers' International League. The Revolutionary Socialist League was stultified by internal strife and the: Workers' International League outdistanced it in members and activity. The two parties have for some time been urged by the International Secretariat to unite, and on the 12th March, -1944, they at length did so. The new body has (to the annoyance of the Communist Party of Great Britain) taken the name '' Revolutionary Communist Party " and has succeeded the Revolutionary Socialist League as the British Section of the Fourth International. It is too early to say "what the relations of the party with the International will be, but the International is loosely organised and is not likely to have the will or the means to do more than advise the party on broad issues; nor is the party under its present leadership likely to submit to any attempt at dictation.

The leadership remains in the hands of the former leaders of the Workers' International League, James Haston, Mrs. Mildred Lee, Edward Grant, Roy Tearse and Harold Atkinson (see Appendix A). This group is in effectivecontrol of the organisation, which is strongly centralised. District Committees exist in London, Scotland, Tyneside, Merseyside, Yorkshire and the Midlands, but do not act without close consultation with Headquarters. No figures of the total membership are available, but in London, where the movement is strongest, there are 152 members, of whom thirty-two are in the forces. Outside London the party has about twenty branches. A branch rarely has more than twenty members and sometimes has less than ten, and the total number of members in the forces is unlikely to be more than a hundred. On this basis the total membership is probably well below a thousands Membership, however, is confined to those who have served six months' probation and proved themselves active workers, and sympathisers are probably more numerous than official members. Even allowing for people who are prepared to work for the movement from outside, the number of active Trotskyists in the country is very small. The party is strongest, outside London, on Clydeside, and weakest in the Midlandsand South Wales. It hardly exists outside the larger industrial areas.

The Trotskyists, like the Stalinists, attempt to increase their influence by penetrating other organisations. Attempts to penetrate Trade Unions have met with little success, but some progress has been made in the I.L.P., which the Trotskyists regard as the party commanding the largest following of militant workers. This progress is most marked on Tyneside, where the divisional representative on the I.L.P. National Committee is also a member of the Central Committee of the Revolutionary Communist Party.

In the Autumn of 1943 the Militant Workers' Federation was formed to co-ordinate the activity of militant groups which had arisen spontaneously among dissident Communists and members of the I.L.P. and the W.I.L. The Federation is directed by the Revolutionary Communist Party; its secretary is Roy Tearse, who claims that it now has nine regional Committees. The most important of these are the Clyde Workers' Committee and the London Militant Workers' Committee. There is a committee at Sheffield and possibly also at Huddersfield, Barrow and Rugby; and there are small groups of sympathisers on Tyneside, Merseyside and in Nottingham, which Tearse may count as committees. The Federation is not much more than a paper organisation, but it is useful to the Trotskyists as a source of contacts and as an instrument of their industrial policy, particularly among engineering workers.

The Revolutionary Communist Party has three papers, Socialist Appeal, a fortnightly publication of which 8,000 to 10,000 copies are printed, Workers' International News, a theoretical organ of which 2,000 copies are printed at irregular intervals, and The Militant Miner, a small local sheet which has been taken over from an independent group in Lanarkshire on its fusion with the Workers' International League. The Ministry of Supply refused last October to continue to supply the Workers' International League with newsprint pending the production of satisfactory evidence of their pre-war consumption. This has not been forthcoming, and the party has been forced to reduce both the size and the circulation of Socialist Appeal.

Finance.

There are no indications that Trotskyist organisations receive money fromabroad. The members are expected to contribute liberally and are apparentlyprepared to do so. Haston is reported in the Daily Telegraph of the10th April, 1944, as saying : 1 ' Most of our members pay 5s. a week when, theycan, and those who can afford it pay a 25 per cent, levy on their wages."The Movements income for 1943 was £2,654. Sales of Socialist Appealbrought in £781, and it is believed that Mildred Lee contributed most of her private income of £350. There were a few substantial subscriptions, includingsums of £30-£50, believed to have come from a Cumberland mill-owner, but thegreater part of the total was received from branches and anonymous individualsin amounts varying from a few shillings to £5.* The newspapers report that Haston said the membership was 1,500, and that on the sameday Mildred Lee said it was 2,000.3 8

Policy and Methods.

While the British Trotskyists follow the line of the sect in regarding the war as a struggle between rival Imperialisms, their policy is not directly aimedeither at stopping the war or at procuring the defeat of their country. Theypoint out that the suffering the war brings is the fruit of the greed and crueltyof the capitalist'' boss ''; but they do not agitate for peace, and their programme(see Appendix B) includes a pledge of full support for the Soviet Union. Theirpropaganda appears to be intended rather to stir up class feeling among theworkers than to have any direct effect on the war.

The main object of Trotskyist policy is to stimulate and focus discontent. and to obtain the leadership of the group of militants thus formed. - The party seeks not only to take the place vacated by the Communist Party as the leader ofthe normally discontented elements, but to attract to itself the larger body ofworkers who, while not yet ready to take up a militantly anti-Governmentattitude, are suspicious of their employers, doubtful of the sincerity of the Governments promises of post-war reform, and tiring of the industrial truceand the leaders who seek to enforce it. The' party's appeal to these groups issomewhat similar to that of the Communist Party before June 1941. There aret he same bitter attacks on the callous, profiteering "boss," on "anti-workingclasslegislation," on the sacrifices demanded of the workers, and on the" imperialist war." On the latter subject the Trotskyists are, however, lesspersistent and less defeatist than were the Communists.

To carry out this policy they campaign on issues and in areas where there isalready strong feeling among the workers, Although the party is always readyto exploit grieAnances in any factory or mine where it has contacts, it is too smalland scattered to be able to start trouble on any considerable scale by itself, andit can make more progress by clinging to the fringes of a big strike than byleading a small one. It secures a wider field for its propaganda, a field alreadywell prepared by the mere existence of a grievance strong enough to cause astrike; and in the bitter aftermath of a big dispute it may hope to start a newbranch of the party or a committee of the Militant Workers' Federation. Theparty's technique is accordingly to fasten on an area where a strike is threateningor has broken out; one of the leaders, or the local group if there is one, makescontacts among the strikers and sells literature; the cause and course of thestrike is reported in Socialist Appeal; and, whatever the outcome, the moraldrawn is that only by militant activity under new leadership can the workerssecure their rights. But the effect is small.

Socialist Appeal devotes a good deal of its space, though by no means all,to discussing strikes and industrial grievances. It attempts to discredit the Government, the employers and the trade-union leaders; but, while it undoubtedlyfans discontent and encourages strikers, it seldom explicitly incites to strike andit makes no attempt to foment sympathetic strikes. The party's slogan is not" Strike ! " but " Break the coalition.: Labour to power." It desires the establishmentof a Labour Government because it believes that any post-war Governmentmust fail to fulfil the workers' expectations, and that the failure of a LabourGovernment will produce a disillusion strong enough to throw the working classinto the arms of the extremists.

Influence on Industry.

The influence of the Trotskyists in industry is still slight. In connectionwith the recent strike of engineering apprentices, there is evidence thatRoy Tearse and Heaton Lee, the party's organiser on Tyneside, advised anddirected the boys' leaders and that on the Clyde the apprentices were workingin conjunction with the Clyde Workers' Committee. At Barrow in -September1943 Trotskyists had some part in directing the strike committee during theearly days of the strike, but the cause of the strike was a strongly felt industrialgrievance and not Trotskyist agitation. Trotskyists also took some part in thestrikes at the Rolls Royce aircraft works, Glasgow, in August 1941 and July1943, in a strike at the Barnbow Royal Ordnance Factory in June 1943 and inthe Yorkshire Transport strike in May 1943, but their activity has consistedin advising and encouraging the strike leaders rather than in provoking the strikes.

Trotskyist influence in mining is considerably less than in engineering. Thereis no evidence that Trotskyists have ever started mining strikes or exercised anyappreciable influence on their course. They are drawn to the coalfields by a[27269] ' B 2desire to make converts and they are rarely in touch with strike leaders. In SouthWales the Workers' International League had at the time of this recent striketwo contacts, each of a fortnights standing, and no organisation. The interventionof the leaders was confined to two visits by Haston, one on the 10th March,four days after the strike had begun, the other on the 18th March, two days after the majority of men, including those in the area Haston visited, had returnedto work. The mid-March issue of Socialist Appeal, the smallest that has yet appeared, was devoted entirely to the strike but was not out until it was almost over.

In Yorkshire the Trotskyists have only two groups, at Leeds and Sheffield.Each has about twenty members, most of whom have no connection with mining.During the recent strike small-scale propaganda has been carried on in her sparetime by a local leader (Betty Hamilton) with a handful of assistants. Fivehundred copies of Socialist Appeal have been sent to the area, and pamphletshave been distributed. I\o national leader has covered the strike, but EdwardGrant, editor of Socialist Appeal, who is suffering from a break-down, interrupteda rest cure to address one meeting and do some canvassing. It was attended: byfifty people, few of whom showed any enthusiasm. Victory Gavzey—aged 19—theonly other person of Trotskyist sympathies who is known to have addressed meetings, moved a resolution at one of them that the men should return to workand then ask for an increase in pay.The Trotskyists were certainly not responsible for starting the strike, and there is no evidence that they have beenresponsible for prolonging it. Considering their limited strength in the areaand the small scale of their activity, their influence on the situation must havebeen very small.

The only Trotskyist mining group of any significance is that organised inLanarkshire by Hugh Brannan, secretary of the national miners' group of theI.L.P. and a Trade Unionist of standing. The group is, however, very smalland its influence is limited.

The Trotskyists are attracting workers whose discontent and desire to hitout at the employer and the Government can find no other outlet. They haveachieved a small and localised but recognisable influence; and: they are confidentthat the appeal of their militant programme will become stronger as the strainand friction inseparable from prolonged industrial effort increases. They have a closely knit core of energetic leaders and a membership which makes up inenthusiasm what it lacks in numbers. They are helped by the. absence ofcompetition, except from the I.L.P., which they hope to use as a conscious orunconscious ally, the lack of normal political and trade-union activity, and thesense of frustration which is alleged to be produced by the absence of markedprogress towards either victory in the field or reconstruction at home. These advantages are temporary and, unless the Trotskyists can exploit them muchmore rapidly than at present, it seems unlikely that they will ever rise to agreater position than that of sparring partners to the Communists, who wouldvery much like to see the Trotskyists and their small paper suppressed.

H. M.Home Office, Whitehall,13th April, 1944.

APPENDIX A.

OFFICIALS OF THE REVOLUTIONARY COMMUNIST PARTY.

James Ritchie Haston, National organiser, aged 32, describes himselfvariously as an aero engineer, a builder and a journalist. He has been an activeTrotskyist since 1936, and from August 1941 until the amalgamation wasemployed as National organiser of the Workers' International League. He isin grade 4. Several attempts by the Ministry of Labour to place him in otheremployment have failed.Mildred Lee, Secretary, aged 31, is a South African and a milliner's buyerby trade. She came here in 1938 with her husband, the founder of the Workers'International League, and she remained as the League's Secretary when herhusband returned to South Africa. She devotes most of an income of about£350 a year received from South Africa to the cause.,

Edward Grant, Editor of Socialist Appeal, aged 30, is also South Africanand has been connected with the Workers' International League since itsinception. He was posted to the Pioneer Corps but fractured his skull beforejoining up and was discharged. It has proved impossible, owing to the effectsof his injury, to find him alternative employment.

Roy Tearse, Industrial organiser, is 25. He served for four years in theRoyal Navy and was discharged in 1937 on medical grounds. He suffers from theeffects of infantile paralysis. From 1941 to 1943 he was employed as an aeroengine tester at De Havillands, Edgware, but was again discharged on medicalgrounds and has been certified by the medical referee unfit for regular employment.He was for two years a secret member of the Workers' International Leagueunder an assumed name while acting openly as an energetic member of the I.L.P.but has lately resigned from the latter and. avowed his Trotskyist allegiance.He is secretary of the Militant Workers' Federation.

Harold Atkinson, Chairman and Treasurer, aged 31, has been associatedwith Trotskyism since 1938. He is employed as a draughtsman by Messrs.Griffin & Tatlock. He devotes most of his spare time to the business side of theorganisation but does not often appear in public.

Heaton Lee and Ann Keen, who have been associated with Tearse in theTyneside apprentice strike, are trusted and experienced Trotskyists; both arebelieved, to be members of the Central Committee. Lee was born in South Africaon the 19th January, 1916, and came to England in 1937 already a convinced.Trotskyist. He is a civil engineer by profession and since 1938 has been employedby Messrs. Wimpey on works in London, Glasgow and Tyneside. He is reportedto have met Mrs. Keen in the course of his voyage to England. She becameconverted to Trotskyism and has lived with Lee and collaborated in his Trotskyistactivities ever since. While they were in Glasgow Lee acted, as Workers' InternationalLeague district organiser and Keen as literature secretary; when theymoved to Newcastle they continued to work in these capacities. On account ofhis work Lee appears little in public, and confines himself to organisation, makingand developing contacts, and lecturing on political subjects under the auspicesof the National Council of Labour Colleges. Mrs. Keen regularly sells Socialist Appeal and other literature in the streets. (Heaton Lee is not believedto be any relation of Mildred Lee's husband.)

APPENDIX B.

PROGRAMME OF THE REVOLUTIONARY COMMUNIST PARTY.

An end to the coalition with the Bosses. Labour and Trade Union Leaders must break with the Capitalist Government and wage a campaign for power onthe following programme :—

Industrial and Economic Policy.

1. Nationalisation of the land, mines, banks, transport and all big industrywithout compensation, as the prerequisite for a planned economy and the onlymeans of ensuring full employment with adequate standards of living for theworkers, and the operation of the means of production under control of workers'committees.

2. Confiscation of all war profits,, all company books to be open for tradeunion inspection, control of production through workers' committees to end thechaos and mismanagement.

3. Distribution of food, clothes and other consumers' commodities underthe control of committees of workers elected from the Co-ops, distributive trades,factories, housewives' committees, and small shopkeepers, and allocation ofhousing under the control of tenants' committees.

4. A rising scale of wages to meet the increased cost of living with aguaranteed minimum; the rate for the job; and industrial rates for all membersof the armed forces.

Democratic Demands.

5. Repeal of the Essential Works Order, the Emergency Powers Act andall other anti-working class and strike-breaking legislation.

6. Full electoral and democratic rights for all persons from the age of18 years. Full democratic and political rights for the men and women in uniform.

7. Immediate freedom and unconditional independence for India, Irelandand all the colonies of Britain; immediate withdrawal of British armed forcesfrom these countries; full economic and military assistance to the Indian andcolonial peoples to maintain their independence against all imperialist attack.

Military Policy.

8. Clear out the reactionary, pro-Fascist, and anti-Labour officer caste inthe armed forces and Home Guard; election of officers by the ranks.

9. Establishment of military schools by the Trade Unions at the expenseof the State for the training of worker-officers; arming of the workers under thecontrol of workers' committees elected in the factories, unions and in the streetsfor the defence of the democratic rights of the workers from reactionary attacksby the enemies of the working class at home and abroad.

International Policy.

10. Against race, hatred and discrimination of all forms (Vansittartism,Anti-Semitism, and the Colour Bar); for the fraternisation and co-operation ofworkers and soldiers of all countries.

11. Unconditional defence of the Soviet Union against all imperialistPowers; despatch of arms, food and essential materials to the Soviet Unionunder the control of the Trade Unions and factory committees.

12. A Socialist appeal to the workers of. Germany, Europe, Japan and therest of the world, on the basis of this programme in Britain, to join the Socialiststruggle against Nazism, Fascism and all forms of capitalist oppression and fora Socialist United States of Europe: and a Federation of Asiatic Soviet SocialistRepublics.,