18 responses to “Respect Parliamentary Election – Summary of Results”

1. 

   Liam

   May 7, 2010 at 5:33 pm

   If you contrast Respect’s results in the parliamentary seats and the council seats to the -1% that was scored by the bulk of left candidates it seems to prove two things.

   The first is that Respect is bigger and has more social weight than the others combined.

   The second is that there is a definite politcal space for a party to the left of Labour. This requires years of building and the strengthening of Respect’s structures. Nonetheless it is evidently a very viable organisation.

   The comparison with the here today gone tomorrow marriages and flags of convenience is striking.

   LikeLike

   Reply
2. 

   daveinstokenewington

   May 7, 2010 at 6:11 pm

   But what provides this ‘social weight’, this ‘political space’? Answer: communalist mobilisation on a religious basis.

   Respect has gone from one MP to no MPs. It could come second or third in maybe half a dozen seats with a strong Muslim community. End of chat.

   The Marxist left would be mad to drift away from class politics to chase this vista.

   LikeLike

   Reply
3. 

   Stuart King

   May 7, 2010 at 8:47 pm

   Liam is giving a very optimistic gloss to Respect’s results. Doesn’t it speak volumes when George Galloway doesn’t even bother to turn up to the Poplar count, leaving his party and party workers in the lurch? Clearly GG has no intention of spending “years building and strengthening” Respect structures. Salma is being wooed by Labour and has hinted on various occasions that she could find a home there if it became a bit more progressive. Outside of three constituencies the results show there is little support. Without an MP respect will disappear within a year or so – will Socialist Resistance be left sifting through the ashes?

   None of this is good news. Just look at the results of TUSC. Thirteen years of a neo-liberal Labour government and the far-left has failed to mount a credible alternative and has itself got smaller at the same time. Worse it has shown itself incapable of working together for any length of time, being more concerned about growing its own groups than re-building working class organisation.

   Surely this is a time not for illusions about building Respect or TUSC as a “party to the left of Labour” but to sit down and ask “where did we go wrong?”, “what are the lessons?” If we don’t it will be onto the next big thing or as Cliff used to say “if the bicycle wobbles, just peddle harder”.

   LikeLike

   Reply
4. 

   GT

   May 7, 2010 at 9:41 pm

   Respect has retained one council seat in Tower Hamlets in Shadwell – as well as Salma’s in Birmingham.

   LikeLike

   Reply
5. 

   Liam

   May 7, 2010 at 10:53 pm

   Stuart – the Respect vote in significant numbers of local government and some Westminster seats is of a different order of magnitude than the other left of Labour challenges. It’s an open question whether or not George Galloway will opt to remain a central figure in Respect but in a volatile new situation the party can easily find a role as a focus of opposition to the impending attacks on the working class.

   LikeLike

   Reply
6. 

   Rachel

   May 8, 2010 at 8:43 pm

   A view from Tower Hamlets:
   Yesterday in the playground a parent governor at my children’s school told me about the one and only time that the Respect councillor who is the local authority governor for the school showed up at the governors meeting. The purpose of his visit was to demand that the school close for Eid (many schools in TH close for Eid because if they don’t it hurts their attendance figures. Others stay open and the few non-Muslim kids play and watch videos while the teachers catch up). This was voted down btw– it’s not a big demand at the school (most Bengali Muslims being more socially progressive than many Respect activists).

   Real Daily Mail stuff, but there’s much more like it. Respect hasn’t been all bad They have been very active or supportive in two things I’ve been involved with, the anti-transfer campaign and the teachers struggle at Tower Hamlets College. There are some good people involved in Respect.

   But all the good work of was more than cancelled out by the promotion of communal politics – the insistence that ‘Muslim’ people have a certain set of interests and follow a certain politics – which Respect allowed to be defined by reactionary ‘community leaders.’ Respect promoted some of the least progressive elements of the Bengali Muslim community. People who pointed this were called Islamophobic and racist.

   Respect’s campaign in TH was a disgrace. How you think you can of going forward without some serious soul searching and self-examination is beyond me.

   LikeLike

   Reply
7. 

   martin ohr

   May 8, 2010 at 8:50 pm

   “the party can easily find a role as a focus of opposition to the impending attacks on the working class”

   Liam, there is no party; respect was only ever an electoral coalition to provide a vehicle for galloway, and it’s now failed at that. It’s unlikely that galloway will even turn up to the next national council meeting.

   Socialist Resistance will be left as the bag carriers without any bags to carry. Still you could always dust off your copies of marx and lenin and trotsky and get back to being marxists until the next opportunist shyster needs a hand.

   LikeLike

   Reply
8. 

   Neil Williams

   May 8, 2010 at 9:42 pm

   This as a disasterous result for Respecct and failure to accept this and learn by it will lead to the collapse of Respect. with 18months.Respect came 3rd in both East London seats witha 19+% swig to Labour in Bethnal Green and Bow. A nd just what was all this about “when George Galloway doesn’t even bother to turn up to the Poplar count, leaving his party and party workers in the lurch? – is this true?

   George was so wrong not to stand in his old constituency and never to to put this to a vote in Respect at national level or a Respect conference.

   God help those of us in Respect if we are told the “way forward” is to back George Galloway as major of Tower Hamlets as if was the solution to Respects problems.

   Both Respect and TUSC as they are presently formed are failed projects. We need to sit down and calmly work out how Socialists can link up together and fight any attacks on working people by whoever forms the next government.

   LikeLike

   Reply
9. 

   Liam

   May 8, 2010 at 10:58 pm

   Martin / Neil / David / Rachel – that Respect took a hammering is not in doubt. “A disappointing night for Respect” is the lead article on the website.

   I have my own views on this, in particular on what happened in Tower Hamlets, and will post something on Monday or Tuesday about it. Yet you can’t deny that Respect failed better than every other left of Labour challenge and was able to count its votes in thousands rather than dozens.

   There’s a conference scheduled in a few weeks which will probably throw everything into the mix.

   LikeLike

   Reply
10. 

    Carole

    May 9, 2010 at 12:30 am

    Well well well!
    (Stuart ” Doesn’t it speak volumes when George Galloway doesn’t even bother to turn up to the Poplar count, leaving his party and party workers in the lurch?”)
    How do you know were you there NO in fact GG attended the count several times during the count but chose to spend most of his time with campaigners until six in the morning eight hours after the incompetent tower hamlets were spending counting the votes and they continued to count for another six hours by this time Respect candidates were being vilified by other parties at the count also by members of staff I KNOW BECAUSE I WAS THERE Georges reasons for not attending the media circus that had formed was his decision to make and the majority of members in attendance supported his decision if you look at the footage from Archer and Fitzpatrick about DISRESPECT Fitzpatrick’s words and the vileness and the heckling from the other parties it was a good thing that George was not there as things were very hostile and I am certain it would have been bad for all of the Respect people there awaiting there count which was not concluded until twelve midnight the next day
    When Abjol graciously accepted defeat and congratulated the victor he was drowned out by boos hisses jeers and vile comments so can you imagine the fiasco if GG had had been there

    You say “Clearly GG has no intention of spending “years building and strengthening” Respect structures.”
    how do you know perhaps we should look at what we have still and its a very strong base on the left with the possibilities of perhaps gaining momentum with this result

    Its a shame that George did not win in P&L but to say he lost his seat is not true it was never his seat to lose he respectfully vacated his seat as he promised to make way for someone local to step into and chose to stand in another much more difficult seat to win a seat where the Labour party gained its first ever seat so we all knew it would be a difficult road to climb but we done our best and produced a very impressive result! what with the state of the country at the moment and the fear of the Tories gaining the seat i am certain many supporters went for the devil they knew

    There is just to much speculating before any more comments lets look at the facts Respect did not face a disaster there are nearly twenty thousand people in tower hamlets who went out and voted for respect and look at the results from the wards and as you can see respect came very close in some and came third in many others pushing the mainstream parties well below them the Libs mage a huge gain in BG&B but Abjol held on to third place
    the P&L seat was a massive surge for Labour in a seat predicted to be won by the Tories the stories of voting fraud in these seats were rife and are under investigation
    but on the whole Respect suffered the scaremongering from Labour that respect would push in the Tories but if we look at the results the respect vote in the seat was up and with the present climate and the huge recession pushed out stopathome voters to vote for Labour

    LikeLike

    Reply
11. 

    Rachel

    May 9, 2010 at 8:15 am

    Liam I hope your conference provides an opportunity for real reflection and discussion, not just arrogance, blaming others and trying to put a positive spin on crummy numbers that we see above.

    LikeLike

    Reply
12. 

    skidmarx

    May 9, 2010 at 12:40 pm

    “The first is that Respect is bigger and has more social weight than the others combined.”
    Bigger in terms of having more activists, maybe not.
    Having more social weight, probably, but what sort of social weight?

    “The second is that there is a definite political space for a party to the left of Labour. This requires years of building and the strengthening of Respect’s structures. Nonetheless it is evidently a very viable organisation. ”
    But it seems obvious that those on the left attracted to Respect have done so because it seemed like a shortcut to left influence. Do you really think anyone outside Respect’s core constituency is going to hang around hoping that a second or third best option for the left that is focused on the elctoral cycle will at some point regain its momentum?

    “The comparison with the here today gone tomorrow marriages and flags of convenience is striking.”
    If Socialist Resistance wises up and moves on, you might find that is Nott the smartest thing to say.

    LikeLike

    Reply
13. 

    martin ohr

    May 10, 2010 at 7:47 am

    Liam: ” Yet you can’t deny that Respect failed better than every other left of Labour challenge”

    liam I fully agree, Respect and everyone associated with it failed much better than the rest of the left.

    Proud to have been outside it from the start.

    LikeLike

    Reply
14. 

    robm

    May 10, 2010 at 11:08 am

    Martin, I expect you are very pleased with the 75 votes achieved by your candidate in Peckham and are already scheming about how to follow this up with a whopping 50 votes, or even 25, next time.
    Pride, of course, comes before a fall but with from your lofty perch you needn’t worry about hurting yourself.

    LikeLike

    Reply
15. 

    martin ohr

    May 10, 2010 at 11:58 am

    robm, well we got as many mps elected as you did, in the meantime we talked politics to over a thousand people on their doorsteps, sold a hundreds of papers and have a contact list many pages long.

    so yes, I’m probably a lot more pleased than you at the results.

    Members of SR are not in a great position to do willy-waving about the size and impact of our organisations. But if you want to do top trumps, we can. Does SR membership even make it into double figures?

    LikeLike

    Reply
16. 

    robm

    May 10, 2010 at 12:08 pm

    Yes, Martin, it makes it well into double figures in my branch alone.
    You are right, though, about our inability as SR to have a huge impact- it is recognition of that fact which means we did not choose to do what the AWL, SEP, WRP, Communist League did and stand joke candidates.
    Instead, we put our limited resources into working hard for Respect- Salma in Birmingham. I’m just as happy to have a tiny stake in 12,000 left votes as you seemed to be to have a larger stake in 75.

    LikeLike

    Reply
17. 

    martin ohr

    May 10, 2010 at 2:02 pm

    Robm- at the end of the day we got the same number of MPs elected and for your lot as a mere electoral coalition- then that’s a pretty appalling result.

    Surely you remember somethings from when you used to be a marxist though; like using elections to give a platform for you politics?

    The only way that awl would havea chance of winning that seat would be in some pre-revolution turmoil,no suprises that we already knew that, but its much easier to knock on doors and get a hearing during an election campaign than at any other time, and that’s exactly what we did. You’ll hear no whining from us about getting squeezed, voting fraud, biased media coverage or any such rubbish.

    Will you still be campaigning for Salma when she joins the lib dems?

    LikeLike

    Reply
18. 

    GT

    May 10, 2010 at 6:45 pm

    The AWL can keep willy waving to themselves

    LikeLike

    Reply