Tony Kearns of the CWU and George Galloway on climate change

February 8, 2008

1–2 minutes

These two videos were recorded at last night’s Campaign Against Climate Change meeting in Bethnal Green. It was attended by around sixty people. As far as I’m aware it was the only attempt at organising a local meeting to build for tomorrow’s CACC trade union conference and on the platform were Tony Kearns, Deputy General Secretary of the Communication Workers Union, Phil Thornhill, the driving force behind CACC, Romayne Phoenix, a Green Party councillor from Lewisham, George Galloway and Robin Sivapalan who had been invited to speak about the Heathrow climate camp and briefly did.

The speakers represented much of the spectrum that has been involved in organising tomorrow’s conference. What was striking about their contributions was how far to the left mainstream discussion in the climate change movement now is. All the speakers were unambiguous in locating the capitalist model of development at the heart of the problem and in the need for mass action as part of the solution.

Rather disappointingly the SWP branch of Respect chose neither to advertise the meeting nor send anyone along to participate.

There was a full and frank exchange of views in the discussion that followed which there’s not much point going into mainly because I’ve long since given up taken notes at meetings and can’t be relied on to accurate report what was said.

Did the meeting have any significance? Yes. It was the first attempt to organise something of the sort in the area on the issue that I know of. Even though the publicity for it was pretty low key the audience was a very respectable size and showed the potential for setting up locally based campaign groups to get active on what will be the principal political issue of the 21st century

I strongly recommend listening to Tony Kearn’s contribution. He has been actively involved in planning Saturday’s trade union conference.

George Galloway

31 responses to “Tony Kearns of the CWU and George Galloway on climate change”

Martin Ohr

February 8, 2008 at 4:10 pm

Liam,

Is it true that Galloway denounced climate camp activist Robin Sivapalan as a sectarian Trotskyite for suggesting that sharp debate and democracy might be important to any environmental movement?

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Kevin Ovenden

February 8, 2008 at 4:51 pm

Martin Ohr

No. That is not true. What is true is that AWL member Robin Sivapalan attempted repeatedly to introduce a sour note of division in the meeting (including heckling).

At one stage he segued, bizarrely, onto denouncing two Hindu schools in north west London and invoking the massacre of Muslims in Gujarat – all of which seemed to have more to do with abstract anti-religious preaching than it did with the political, theoretical and practical issues at the heart of the campaign.

His efforts to find irrelevant points of division and his explicit criticism of the call for and spirt of unity went down very badly with the audience and with everyone on the platform.

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martin ohr

February 8, 2008 at 5:47 pm

so galloway didn’t denounce him as a trotskyite then ?

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Liam

February 8, 2008 at 6:19 pm

If he did it didn’t register with me and anyway we’ve all been called much worse. Though some of the AWL’s participation in the meeting was a little quixotic.

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Kevin Ovenden

February 8, 2008 at 6:42 pm

No. George Galloway did not denounce him as a Trotskyite. The issue of fissiparous character of British Trotskyism was introduced in a light-hearted way by Tony Kearns as part of a useful argument that we should not wait for something called left unity before uniting around issues such as climate change, that we should nuture that unity and that we should not allow it to be squandered by artificial or extraneous lines of division.

I hope that’s that cleared up now.

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Dear Koba

February 8, 2008 at 9:05 pm

So were they denounced as fissiparites?

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charliemarks

February 9, 2008 at 2:15 am

Good to see George talking about the nature of the capitalist system and its incompatibility with environmental sustainability.

Tony Kearns made a key point – that trade unions can’t just focus on the 9-to-5 aspect of being a worker. As there is not a mass workers party to intervene politically, the unions must be a greater focus on issues such as housing, inflation, etc.

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S

February 9, 2008 at 10:54 am

“There was a full and frank exchange of views in the discussion that followed which there’s not much point going into mainly because I’ve long since given up taken notes at meetings and can’t be relied on to accurate report what was said.”

You should take a voice recorder or learn shorthand.

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Phil

February 10, 2008 at 10:13 am

You should take a voice recorder or learn shorthand.

Nice idea, but voice recorders are notorious for malfunctioning when meetings start to get unconstructive and tedious.

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Carole Swords

February 10, 2008 at 10:29 pm

It was quite an informative meeting.
There were some pathetic contributions from the floor and one member of the panel The peace camp guy he said LIKE a lot.
There was a little group that were on the attack,
(Anti George ) they all left together . they were very friendly with each other one idiot was harping on about overpopulation and sterilising women .
Robin LIKE had a tee shirt on saying women’s rights and made an attack on faith schools some woman teacher ( goodness no wonder kids are not meeting there full potential if she is the typical teacher coming through the ranks) was making a speech they tried to divert the meeting and push it off track they come with there own agenda,.
Terry Mcgennera from the floor made a good contribution and Tony Kern’s spoke how the unions have got a very important part to play in addressing climate change.
As always George Galloway saved the day with a rousing rendition about the universe and what we all could andcshould be doing now.
The lady from the Green party (X teacher) waved her arms around a bit but the policies from the greens suggests that all we need to enforce is fines and stealth taxes
George answered a gentleman’s rant on “what are you doing about it George ” He answered with his normal eloquent charm and said that the problem belongs to us all and this is a good start and we should be united .
I say it was a fair meeting well organised by Liam and it was a very good turnout for a Thursday night
It was nice to see so many new faces a lot were interested in becoming members of the Respect Party. all good.

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Paul

February 11, 2008 at 1:11 am

Carole wrote “As always George Galloway saved the day with a rousing rendition about the universe and what we all could andcshould be doing now.”

He saved the day “”as always!”) with a rousing rendition about the universe? Any chance of a summary, Carole? I am quite interested in the universe.This George chap that “always” sayes the day, and has an encyclopedic knowledge of the universe… He sounds a bit like God.

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Paul

February 11, 2008 at 1:29 am

In reply to Martin’s question as to whether or not Galloway denounced someone as a “Trotskyite”, Liam wrote “#
Liam, on February 8th, 2008 at 6:19 pm Said:

If he did it didn’t register with me and anyway we’ve all been called much worse.”

Liam, you miss the point. The term “Trotskyite” rather than Trotskyist is used by Stalinists, in the main. But if this was a mere linguistic difference lacking content, that would not matter. The point is that you recognise that if Galloway did throw this term around as an insult, we have been called worse. Indeed. Why should any supporter of Trotsky consider it an insult at all. The point is that for Galloway, this IS an insult, just as it is for Andy Newman, who claims Trotsky was at least as bad as Stalin, and possibly worse! Liam, the fact that you concede that he MAY have denounced people as Trotskyites proves that you realise that Respect Renewal’s only MP has nothing but contempt for Trotskyists, and the only issue is whether or not he was diplomatic enough to disguise this contempt. The fact that the AWL are making a big deal about this while you claim that it is possible that this did indeed happene but you failed to spot it confuses me. This is not the kind of exchange that I would have failed to notice. Either you must have been absent when this happened, or you observed it, and are too embarrassed to draw attention to it.

As for Kevin Ovenden’s denial, I don’t take this seriously.

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Liam

February 11, 2008 at 7:36 am

Paul what I said is true. I did not leave the room at any point and don’t recall him saying it.

The niche in the market for verbatim accounts of who said what at meetings has been dominated successfully for a long time by a weekly newspaper. I can’t compete with it and don’t try to.

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Carole Swords

February 11, 2008 at 11:26 pm

Paul what is your problem?

You sound really sad to me

– perhaps you are one of the ‘I want to be Respect SWPs’ and you are suddenly realising that you haven’t got any chance of getting elected to the GLA withour George Galloway and Respect

Why still pretend to be Respect?

If you have such a problem with George Galloway why are you still trying to stick the dagger into the Respect party
I cant understand you want to be Respect but you want to attack
can you tell me why you are so ashamed of saying what and who you are YOU ARE THE SWP
go get a life mate and if you had attended the meeting you would have witnessed what you thought was said which by the way was not

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Tina

February 12, 2008 at 5:43 pm

CharlieMarks said:
“Good to see George talking about the nature of the capitalist system and its incompatibility with environmental sustainability”

Yes I found that interesting until he made it clear that capitalism not being the solution to the problem it had created meant that the state had to step in. So its deregulated capitalism that is incompatible with environmental sustainability, not capitalism per se. But then Galloway is a reformist isn’t he.

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tonyc

February 12, 2008 at 7:05 pm

Yes, George is a reformist, and will therefore propose reformist solutions. He may also propose that we make demands of the capitalist system until we get rid of it – in the same way that my union asks my boss for a pay rise, instead of merely demanding that the bosses just fuck off and die.

This is, of course, all entirely uncontroversial, unless you want to have a dig at George Galloway.

Which I’m sure wasn’t the only reason you posted that you found Galloway’s comments “interesting” until the point where we proposed exactly the sort of things you would expect a reformist to propose.

Of course, you’ve also deliberately misrepresented what Galloway argued, but given your motive in posting it’s hardly a surprise.

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bill j

February 12, 2008 at 7:29 pm

Touchy, touchy.
What do you mean Tina “misrepresented” George?
Given that you accept that George did indeed propose reformist solutions to the capitalist system as Tina says – which rather suggested Tina accurately represented George does it not?

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Tina

February 12, 2008 at 9:40 pm

TonyC
My motive in posting was to point out that what Galloway said wasn’t quite as radical as suggested. What other motive would I have?

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Liam

February 12, 2008 at 10:06 pm

“GG is a reformist” is as much news as “Earth found to revolve round Sun”. He has said it quite explicitly on a number of occasions and if someone can suggest a method of building a broad class struggle party that doesn’t include people who consider themselves reformists please let me know in less than 100 words.

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Tina

February 12, 2008 at 10:15 pm

Oh for gods sake. Take off last sentence of my post. Happy?

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Kevin Ovenden

February 13, 2008 at 1:10 pm

Does calling for the state to take measures in the face of the disasters unleashed by globalised capitalism make you not very radical and a reformist?

If that’s the claim, I think it speaks to a far left ghetto mentality based on doctrinal purity.

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Jason

February 13, 2008 at 1:59 pm

Not really, Kevin.

Galloway said, “Capitalism got us in to this mess but capitalism is not capable of getting us out of it.”

Good. He then calls on state action,”So the sate must treat this as a war” and curb gobal capitalists. Fair enough.

Part of the campaign must be to demand massive restrictions on emissions and punitive taxes on capitalists to pay for them. But it is the duty of a revolutionary socialist to point out that the capitalist state will not do this unless forced by the organised working class and indeed if we can do that then why not cut out the middleman and go for socialist democratic planning under workers’ control.

But as Tina points out, Galloway is not a revolutionary. Still fair enough to invite him to events such as this but don’t go pretending that he is a revolutionary.

It could even be possible to be in a political group with such a person as long as socialists like the ISG and the exSWP such as yourself Kevin made clear your criticisms of him.

That however you will not do and it is no matter of doctrinal purity to say that socialists should argue for what is necessary, the mobilisation of working class people, rank and file trade unionists, and communities for direct action to force the adoption of an emergency plan as part of a revived and refocused anti-capitalist movement.

Im sure you could sig up to that, Kevin.

Jason

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Clive Searle

February 13, 2008 at 2:46 pm

I’m prepared to criticise George when I disagree but I must say that his point about a war economy is well made in the context of climate change. It is obviously true that individual capitalists and firms are unable – on their own – to deal with climate change.

Competition precludes most from taking the necessary steps to curb their emissions It’s for that reason that some of the more far-sighted business ‘leaders’ have written asking governments to take firm action and create a ‘level playing field’.

Now it is prefectly resonable to argue that you can solve the environmental crisis, premanently (to re-engage humanity with nature in a sustainable way) without a socialist society. But is it the the fact that climate change cannot be tackled without the overthrow of capitalism? I used to argue this – back in the 1980s when I was doing my first meetings on global warming and no-one seemed to be listening to anything the scientists and metreorologists were beginning to say about climate change.

But I don’t believe that now. Of course I do believe that solving the problem would be infinitely more easy with a socialist society. But since we’ve got perhaps a few decades (if we’re very lucky, a few years if we’re not) to sort this problem out before catastrophic climate change become irreversible, we need to work on the basis that something must be done – whatever the social relations of production.

So we are indeed in a war against time – and we do need, in George’s words, ‘a war effort’ to reolve it.

So we need to focus on what needs to be done – and that inevitably means campaigning for the state – which although is indeed a capitalist state is also one which is also threatened by climate change – to take the action which is needed.

That will include a massive investment in renewables, recycling and reuse of resources, home and business insulation and energy efficiency, a complete reorganisation of public transport, restrictions on flights, especially those in the stratosphere, a reduced reliance on concrete and cement in building materials, restrictions or bans on some high-carbon consumer goods, etc, etc.

Are these things impossible to deliver under capitalism? No. Will it be hard to acieve them? Yes. Will achieving them require a mass mobilisation? Some of them will be but others not. Will the campaigning take many of the campaigners closer to an understanding of the role of capital, the state and the need for revolutionary change in society? Yes, without a doubt.

Will that campaigning be made easier and more effective by prefacing our campaigns with criticisms of the likes of Galloway for their reformism and religious views. I don’t think so.

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Clive Searle

February 13, 2008 at 2:48 pm

Oops, Third paragraph should read….

Now it is prefectly resonable to argue that you CANNOT solve the environmental crisis, premanently (to re-engage humanity with nature in a sustainable way) without a socialist society.

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Jason

February 13, 2008 at 2:58 pm

Reasonable enough, Clive- agree that George’s metaphor of a war effort is a good metaphor. He’s a good speaker.

All I(and I think Tina) is saying is let’s highlight how capitalism is part of the problem and we need working class mass mobilisation at the very least to help solve it and overthrowing capitalism would make it much easier to solve- which you agree with, apparently.

Not sure if anyone brought his religious views into it- which now you mention it were weirdly prevalent but as you say that probably would be a distraction.

Talking about what sort of politics we need if done in the right way- as a comradely debate alongside joint action not as a barrier to it- is different I think.

Anyway must stop posting on here for today at least, stimulating as it is, as behind on my work.

Jason

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bill j

February 13, 2008 at 5:25 pm

But I think Clive is wrong to say that a socialist society would just make it easier to deal with climate change.
I think its more accurate to say that a socialist society is a pre-condition for dealing with climate change.
Certainly we may be able to win reforms in the struggle for a socialist society, emmissions targets, £25 charges on chelsea tractors etc.
But the record of these reforms over the last decade has shown that overall they make no difference. Emissions continue to climb, climate change gets worse.
Why? I don’t really need to spell this out surely? The lust of capitalist production for profits.
I think this is the crux of the issue, is socialism a better way of doing things (in which case its a tactical choice whether or not we raise it) or is it the only way of doing things (in which case it has to be raised as people need to be told things as they are).
I think the second.

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Clive Searle

February 13, 2008 at 6:41 pm

This is clearly where I disagree with you Bill. I do not think that “a socialist society is a pre-condition for dealing with climate change”. I do think it would make it easier – much easier.
The problem we have is a very simple one. We have perhaps ten or twenty years (I put it at the lower end of the spectrum but since no one knows for sure where the tipping points will kick in there’s little point debating it as the climatologists don’t know) to put in place a plan to radically restructure our economy away from carbon based fuels.

Now if we had the luxury of time we could simply wait for the oil to run out but unfortunatley the climate won’t wait for that. Equally, it’s not going to wait for us to achieve a socialist society – and we can all agree that we’ve been spectacularly unsuccessful at that aim for quite some time.

So we are trapped in a contradiction. If you think socialism is neccessary to stop climate change then I suspect we may very well give up and enjoy the oil while we can. Unless of course you think socialism is on the agenda in the next decade or so. Now I’d love to think it was but somehow my experiences of the last decade suggests it isn’t.

So what do we do? I’m for the biggest possible campaign over the issue of climate change that doesn’t start with where many disagree with me – ie the neccessity of revolutionary transformation of society – but starts with where I find myself in much broader agreement with the many over what needs to be done to, who can do it and who’s stopping us.

Now within that campaign there are specifically socialist methods of struggle and theory that will be essential, tactical, tools for success. Hopefully on that we can agree (after, of course, I’ve denounced you for ultra-leftism and you’ve denounced me for my capitualtion to reformism).

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Jason

February 14, 2008 at 4:07 am

Actually re-reading this I think Bill is right and to think why this might be is quite interesting.

Capitalism as a system is geared to the exploitation of labour and the relentless pursuit of profits.
Particular capitalists or even groups of them may realise as conscious beings that they and the rest of humanity are f..ed unless we do something about climate change but so what- if they change their behaviour as capitalists they start to go under. Only systemic change can make a difference.

Particular reforms can of course be won by militant organisation of the working class but the idea that capitalism can routinely meet human need or, a particular subset of this, plan production for environmental equilibrium is an illusion- it is systemically incapable of doing this as Galloway recognises in his speech. That’s why certain demands such as democratic workers’ control are transitional demands because they cannot be met on any sustained basis by capitalism.

Clive thinks we’ve only got ten or twenty years to stop irreversible climate change- he may be right- but that we can’t achieve socialism in such a time. The task ahead is certainly great whichever one you are looking at and perhaps if you had to bet on it the results wouldn’t look too good! But as our very survival in the long term may well depend on it we better get on with it!

Of course we start with particular concrete demands- cuts in emissions, renationalise the rail, cheap, geographically accessible public housing, al, under the democratic control of working class communities- workers in and users of services.

By bringing in the popular participation of class struggle as a method to get these we also unleash the forces capable of overthrowing capitalism and as socialists say why these transitional demands of workers’ democratic control are incompatible with chaotic capitalism and can only be met by an economy geared to human need not private profit- socialism.

So what you term the tactical tools for success- ‘specifically socialist methods of struggle’- also turn out to be essential.
Jason

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Clive Searle

February 14, 2008 at 10:17 am

“the idea that capitalism can routinely meet human need or, a particular subset of this, plan production for environmental equilibrium is an illusion- it is systemically incapable of doing this as Galloway recognises in his speech. That’s why certain demands such as democratic workers’ control are transitional demands because they cannot be met on any sustained basis by capitalism.”

I agree with this Jason. My point is that the specific issue of climate change – caused by the concentration of anthropogenic greenhouse gases in the atmosphere – is not entirely outwith the capacity of the capitalist state to deal with.

It is here that the ‘war economy’ analogy fits well. At times of severe crisis the capitalist state can and has stepped in to direct the actions of individual capitalists and firms – up to the point of nationalising some companies and shooting some capitalists as profiteers.

The state – which is ultimately made up of human beings – can recognise that what is in the interests of some capitalists is not in the interest of the system as a whole. That’s why we don’t allow drugs companies to sell heroin to teenagers or less dramatically allow property developers to build on the greenbelt.

It is conceivable that our ruling class could – as some already have – recognise the dire threat of climate change. It is conceiveable that they take the action neccessary to reduce carbon emmissions – something that will have to be done soon anyway as the oil begins to run out. It is also possible that they take draconian action against the most polluting emitters.

Now this is made far less likely by the competition between individual capitalist entities and between capitalist states and by the ideological victory of neo-liberalism where market solutions are king. But it doesn’t make such an outcome impossible.

What is does require, however, is a real campaign from below to be the most effective.

I would target my fire on the neo-liberals first. You would gun for capitalism as a whole. It’s a question of tactics rather than principles.

Perhaps this is a good topic for disccussion at the Manchester Convention of The Left in September.

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Jason

February 14, 2008 at 11:29 am

I’ll agree on the last point and in the lead up to it!

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bill j

February 14, 2008 at 4:51 pm

I think the war analogy is really misplaced. The capitalists obviously do not regard climate change as a problem in the sense that they regarded say…the rise of fascist Germany and the threat it posed to their colonies…
Jonathan Neale has been peddling this in the run up to his book launch, personally I think its really fantasy island stuff, instead of drawing a comparison with how Roosevelt turned round the US economy, why didn’t he draw an analogy with how the Bolsheviks turned round the Russian one.
Far more of a whole sale transformation and not one that built illusions into our capacity to persuade the imperialists of the error of their ways.
There may only be 20 years to turn things round before the onset of catastrophe, all the more reason then to be honest with people now about the scale of transformation – socialism – required to stop it.

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