[Marxism] Big Unions Save Blair on Iraq

[Yoshie Furuhashi <furuhashi.1@xxxxxxx>]

Big unions save Blair on Iraq

Michael White and Sarah Hall
Friday October 1, 2004
The Guardian

Leaders of the "Big Four" trade unions joined forces with
constituency activists to save Tony Blair from fresh embarrassment
over Iraq on the closing day of the Labour conference in Brighton
yesterday.

The emergency debate on the war and Britain's deeply divided attitude
towards it, which overshadowed much of the week, culminated in an
impassioned debate - notably free of the kind of personal
recrimination or rancour which used to galvanise such feuds.

However, delegates did revert to past traditions when the vote came.
After arm-twisting, the leaders of the TGWU, GMB, Unison and Amicus
-- left-leaning Blair critics who command 40% of the conference votes
between them -- rallied to protect the prime minister from calls to
set a date for the withdrawal of British forces from Iraq. With the
bulk of constituency delegates -- many of them opponents of the war
-- also persuaded, the vote to defeat the hardline anti-war
resolution was a thumping 86% to 14%.

Instead, the conference endorsed a national executive committee (NEC)
statement, recognising that British forces will stay as long as the
Iraqi government wants them there to help UN-backed efforts to build
"a federal, democratic, pluralist and unified Iraq".

Mr Blair, who paid a 30-minute visit to the Amicus delegation's hotel
to plead for unity, was present for much of the debate and
yesterday's closing rituals. He was roped in to help a steelworkers'
choir to sing Jerusalem, which followed the Red Flag. . . .

During the debate, an Iraqi exile who saw her family and friends
perish at the hands of Saddam Hussein begged Britain not to desert
Iraq.

Shanaz Rashid, the wife of a member of the interim Iraqi government
and member of the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan, received a standing
ovation after saying that Iraqis could not understand criticism of Mr
Blair, a prime minister with "courage in understanding our pain and
agony".

She pleaded with Labour members: "Please don't desert us in our hour
of need. Don't let the men of violence use terror to deny the Iraqi
people their freedom."

The mother-of-two, who fled Baghdad at the age of 18 and now lives in
Surrey, said: "Some of you may feel you can attack your leader over
Iraq, but it is Mr Blair who has stood up to Saddam and freed my
people, who for the past 35 years have suffered destruction,
humiliation, chemical weapons attacks, poverty, torture and rape.

"Yes, there have been difficulties. Yes, there have been mistakes;
perhaps many mistakes. No, you did not find weapons of mass
destruction. But for the great majority of Iraqis, WMD was never the
issue. We don't understand the criticism of your prime minister. All
we wanted was to be free; free - just free".

Shahid Malik, an NEC member who had opposed the war, moved the
executive's statement, saying the Iraqi people would not forgive
Britain if troops were pulled out. The west had long turned a blind
eye to Saddam's atrocities, but this was "precisely why we now have a
profound moral responsibility to right the wrongs of Iraq". He added:
"It was wrong to go to war but it would be equally wrong to abandon
the Iraqi people when their country needs us most."

Clair Wilcox, from Streatham constituency Labour party (CLP),
withdrawing her motion among suspicions she had been leant on, called
for unity. "We have to move forward together: conference, party and
government. It shouldn't be this conference that sets a timetable for
withdrawal. We want the Iraqi people to set the agenda."

But Pat Healey, from Regents Park and Kensington CLP, refused to
withdraw the motion calling for a date for troop withdrawal because
the situation in Iraq was worsening. A "proper exit strategy" was
required that would be "moderate, desirable, right and electorally
popular".

She added: "Some argue that withdrawal will lead to a bloodbath. But
the bloodbath is already happening. . . . It is unfortunate but a
fact that British forces are now part of the problem -- not the
solution."

Matt Keeler, a Romford delegate who opposed the war, argued the
situation in Iraq was now improving and "the immediate withdrawal of
troops in Iraq would be a criminal betrayal of the responsibility we
owe to the Iraqi people".

Alice Mahon, MP for Halifax and a trenchant war critic, said
delegates were "living in a bubble" if they believed the security
situation was improving on the ground.

"The rest of the country can see that. It is in front of them on
their television screens every day. We saw it when the two-year-old
child was dragged from the rubble of a US bombing in Falluja last
week. We see it in the desperate, desperate face of Ken Bigley as he
sits alone in that terrible cage. This gap between what the
government is claiming and the reality on the ground in Iraq is what
is fuelling the credibility gap that the prime minister has with the
electorate."

<http://politics.guardian.co.uk/labour2004/story/0,14991,1317333,00.html>
--
Yoshie

* Critical Montages: <http://montages.blogspot.com/>
* Greens for Nader: <http://greensfornader.net/>
* Bring Them Home Now! <http://www.bringthemhomenow.org/>
* Calendars of Events in Columbus:
<http://sif.org.ohio-state.edu/calendar.html>,
<http://www.freepress.org/calendar.php>, & <http://www.cpanews.org/>
* Student International Forum: <http://sif.org.ohio-state.edu/>
* Committee for Justice in Palestine: <http://www.osudivest.org/>
* Al-Awda-Ohio: <http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Al-Awda-Ohio>
* Solidarity: <http://www.solidarity-us.org/>

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