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New Communist Party of Britain |
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New Communist Party of Britain |
This is just one section of the Main Political Resolution adopted at the 2009 16th Congress of the New Communist Party of Britain.
An index to the other sections can be found here ->
[2009 Policy Documents]
The strategy of the British bourgeoisie since the establishment of the Common Market in 1957 had been that of straddling the Atlantic to play off Europe against America. But the development of the European super−state has sharpened divisions within the ruling class. These divisions became open during the Iraq war. Those who believe that British imperialism’s global interests can only be preserved by American might were dominant during the Blair premiership. Those in favour of greater European integration opposed them over the Iraq war. These include the elements of the ruling class who will profit from partnership inside the EU rather than with US imperialism. They believe British imperialist interests are best served in alliance with Franco−German imperialism within the European Union. They also want to revive proposals to adopt the single European currency to accelerate European integration.
The Blair leadership had aligned itself with the most reactionary and venal sections of the British ruling class — those who profit from British imperialism’s neo−colonial exploitation; those who know it can only be propped up by the guns of the American war machine. This war party includes most but not all of the Tory leaders. But it does not represent the views of that section of the ruling class that wants closer integration with the European Union. Nor does it represent the views of the mass of the Labour Party nor the mass of the working class.
The defeat of the neo−conservative war party in the United States in the presidential elections last November and the sub−prime crisis, which has plunged the capitalist world into the biggest slump since 1929, has weakened the war party. The Brown government has striven to restore the trans−Atlantic bridge, which they call the “special relationship” with the United States, while attempting to strengthen its position in the European Union.
The ruling classes of Europe are determined to put the entire burden of the slump on the backs of working people. They’re going to slash state welfare, pensions and social provision. They want to drive down wages through social dumping by closing down their operations in high−wage areas and setting them up in other parts of the European Union where labour is cheap or recruiting cheap labour from poorer regions of Europe to undercut existing rates for the job.
The development of the Common Market, and the EU that followed, was the choice of European imperialism and western European monopoly capital.
It promotes neo−liberal measures favouring the monopolies and the concentration and accumulation of capital. It cannot represent a genuine counterweight to the United States in favour of the people. With the Lisbon Treaty, new steps are being taken towards the configuration of the EU as an imperialist, economic, political and military bloc, contrary to the interests of the workers and the people.
The sovereignty and independence of peoples and countries are being further undermined. The attack on labour and trade union rights throughout the EU is escalating in the name of “modernisation”, “competitiveness” and “flexicurity” — and in order to ensure the profits of capital.
For years Labour and the majority of the leaders of our unions have elevated the EU as an instrument for social progress and economic advance. They say that the EU is becoming more representative through the authority of the European Parliament and establishment of regional autonomy. The social−democrats claim that the anti−working class “directives” and “rulings” can be reversed. The revisionist and left social−democratic circles that still pose as communists in some parts of Europe argue that the EU can be reformed to serve the interests of working people.
But the EU with its toothless parliament, ruritanian regional governments and farcical referendums that only count when the vote agrees with what has already been decided by the powers that be, hasn’t been reformed. Nor can it ever be under the Treaty of Rome.
The neanderthal section of the ruling class, who still dream of an independent role for British imperialism, is also opposed to the EU. That’s why some of their minions tried to divert the unofficial energy workers’ strike movement down nationalist and racist lines, to reduce it to the demand for “British jobs for British workers” that was shamefully resurrected by none other than Gordon Brown himself in September 2007.
These people, like the rest of the ruling class, have nothing in common with workers apart from the fact that they owe their entire parasitical existence to the labour of others. The real enemy of the working class is the employer, not the imported labour from abroad.
Now people see the European Union for what it is — an institution designed solely for the benefit of the oppressors and exploiters — and millions upon millions are seeing through the lies of the bourgeoisie. What few benefits the EU has brought, such as increased trade and open borders, could all have been achieved through separate agreements and treaties. The cost of the introduction of the Euro would be entirely borne by the working class and it must be opposed.
In fact the European Union is neither genuinely federal nor democratic and every stage of European integration has been financed by working people through higher indirect taxes, lost jobs and lost benefits. The European Union cannot be reformed. It must be dissolved and the Treaty of Rome, which established the Common Market in the first place, and all addenda repealed.