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The Militant Tendency was a Trotskyist faction within the Labour Party in the United Kingdom, accused of entryist tactics. They were most powerful during the 1970s and 1980s, and after a series of expulsions from Labour, many of the members participated in the formation of the Socialist Party in England, and the Scottish Socialist Party.

Contents 1 Foundation 2 Newspaper 3 Growth in the 1970s 3.1 Background 3.2 Growth 3.3 Progammatic demands 3.4 Press attention 3.5 The Labour Government of 1974-1979: the 'winter of discontent' 4 The Militant in Liverpool 4.1 Background 4.2 Programme 4.3 Electoral success 4.4 Success in 1984 4.5 Issues redundancy notices 4.6 Regeneration strategy 5 The Militant and the Labour Party 6 The Militant and Neil Kinnock 7 The Poll Tax 8 The 'Open Turn' 8.1 Party members expelled 9 Notes 10 External links

The tendency originated from those former supporters of the Revolutionary Communist Party who continued to look to Ted Grant for leadership. After he was expelled from Gerry Healy's group The Club in 1950 they reorganised as the Revolutionary Socialist League in 1953 and affiliated to the International Secretariat of the Fourth International in 1957.

The newspaper The Militant was founded in 1964, and the group soon became known as the Militant Tendency. In the following year the majority of the group broke politically from the United Secretariat of the Fourth International with the minority forming the International Group, which was to develop into the International Marxist Group. The tendency drifted out of the Fourth International after the Eighth World Congress in 1965.

Militant had a period of steady growth during the late 1960s and the 1970s. They spent much energy building sister organisations in such countries as Sri Lanka, South Africa (where they tried to work within the African National Congress, but were repeatedly expelled and harassed), the Republic of Ireland, and Spain.

In 1970, after the departure of competing tendencies, they won a majority in the Labour Party's youth movement, the Labour Party Young Socialists (LPYS), and in the early 1980s they started gaining strong support in various local Constituency Labour Parties, which they continued to dominate until their expulsion from Labour in the 1980s. On this basis Militant succeeded in eventually having three of their supporters elected as Members of Parliament - Dave Nellist, Terry Fields and Pat Wall.

The newspaper Militant was founded in 1964 as the newspaper of the Revolutionary Socialist League, with Peter Taaffe as its first editor^[1]. The name of the paper was the same as that of the American publication The Militant, and as a result "most of the pioneers of Militant were not enthralled by the choice of the name" writes Peter Taaffe. "But it was accepted at the time , largely because no other viable alternative was on hand...Militant did stand for what its proponents intended: the aim of winning in the first instance, the most conscious, combative, fighting, i.e. militant, sections of the working class."^[2]. It began as a four page monthly, but was eventually turned into a 16 page weekly.

The paper was the central organ of the Militant Tendency as they organised activities, campaigns, intervened in labour disputes and moved resolutions in Labour Party branches and at annual conferences.

In 1997, Militant was replaced by a new weekly, The Socialist.

An extensive archive of the early years of the Militant newspaper, as well as some of the Militant Tendency's "internal" publications, can be found at Warwick University. A sister publication was the more theoretical Militant International Review.

The first half of the 1970s was a convulsive period in UK politics and industrial relations, which coincided with a period of rapid growth of the Militant Tendency. It began with the election of a Conservative government in 1970, a year in which days lost in strike action had risen to almost 11 million. In 1972 this had doubled to over 22 million. In 1974, support for the miners' strike, particularly of the electrical power workers, and other mounting industrial trade union activity gave rise to a state of emergency, petrol rationing and power cuts. The government introduced a three day working week, and called a sudden general election in February 1974 to "let the voters decide who governs the country". ^[3]The Conservative government fell and a minority Labour government was elected. In 1975 the Observer newspaper ran the first 'exposé' of the Militant ^[4].

In 1970 the Militant bought premises belonging to the old Independent Labour Party, one of the founding parties of the Labour Party (which was originally a coalition of parties around a trade union base) and which originally had a Marxist element in its leadership. In September 1971 the Militant became fortnightly, although still just four pages, and in January 1972 it became weekly. By the end of 1972 the Militant newspaper became an 8 page paper.

During the period 1969 - 1972 Militant supporters began to win a majority in the Labour Party Young Socialists (LPYS), and by 1972 had a clear majority on the LPYS National Committee. The Labour Party Young Socialists grew rapidly. In 1973, the Labour Party Young Socialists conference attracted one thousand delegates and visitors. "Militant, however, still only had 397 organised supporters by March 1973 despite its growing influence. By July of the same year it had grown to 464." ^[5]

The Militant Tendency became known by its trademark transitional demand for the nationalisation of the commanding heights of the economy, usually a specific number of the biggest companies in the UK, under workers' control and management, and the establishment of a socialist plan of production. At first, in 1965, this demand was for the nationalisation of 400 monopolies ^[6]. At the beginning of the 1970s the Militant called for the nationalisation of the top 350 monopolies, and by the end of the 1970s, 250.

At Labour Party national conference in 1972 a resolution moved and seconded by well known, long standing Militant Tendency supporters, Pat Wall and Ray Apps, was passed by "3.5 million votes to less than 2.5 million." It demanded that the Labour government commit itself to enacting "an enabling bill to secure the public ownership of the major monopolies". The conference agreed to call on the Labour Party executive to

“

formulate a socialist plan of production based on public ownership, with minimum compensation, of the commanding heights of the economy. [7]

”

Militant supporter Pat Wall declared: "No power on earth can stop the organised labour movement!" and "called for Labour to win the workers to a programme of taking power by taking over the 350 monopolies which controlled 85 per cent of the economy." The Militant newspaper commented "This is an answer to those who argue for a slow, gradual, almost imperceptible progress towards nationalisation."^[8]

The vote of leading Militant supporter Peter Doyle, the elected representative of the Labour Party Young Socialists on the National Executive Committee (NEC) of the Labour Party, gave the left a majority on the NEC and enabled a successful vote in 1972 to adopt the programmatic demand of the left-wing Tribune newspaper in the Labour Party, for the public ownership of 25 of Britain's top companies. However, "The day after the NEC, Harold Wilson threatened that the shadow cabinet would veto its inclusion in the next election manifesto."^[9]

In 1973 Militant quoted comments from right winger Denis Healey:

“

We are all agreed with the need for a massive extension of public ownership... establishing comprehensive planning control over the hundred or so largest companies in Britain... and to extend public ownership in the profitable manufacturing industries. [10]

”

These events, Militant argued, contrary to the attacks on its legitimacy of the period beginning with the Observer article of 1975 (see section below on Press Attention) demonstrated its legitimacy as a genuine current within the Labour party. ^[11] During this period Militant supporters debated with the Tribune newspaper supporters about whether, at first, to nationalise a minority of the corporations which dominated British society, as the Tribune argued, or whether to proceed immediately to nationalise the commanding heights, as Militant held. Articles in both newspapers reflected the discussion.^[12]

In 1975 the Observer newspaper ran the first "exposé" of the Militant with the headline: "Trot conspirators inside Labour Party" by Nora Beloff, who wrote that the Militant was a "party within a party", with the implication that this was illegitimate. (Observer, 31 August 1975)

In October 1976, there were a series of press articles attacking the Labour Party National Executive Committee's decision to appoint well known Militant supporter Andy Bevan as Labour Party Young Socialist Youth Officer. The Daily Express wrote: "Just five men have Labour on the Trot... Express dossier of the unknowns behind the Red challenge to Jim." ^[13] The Times carried three articles and an editorial about the ‘danger’ of Militant, ‘exposed’ as wanting to ‘establish a group of MPs’ ^[14]

Observer journalist, Michael Davie interviewed Peter Taaffe, the Militant Tendency general secrtary, in December of 1976. He wrote,

“

'No country constitutes a genuinely democratic workers’ state,' Mr Taaffe said. He spoke of the ‘monstrous police apparatus’ in Russia, and the dictatorships of China and Cuba. Why would not the same thing happen here, if everything was taken over by the state? "Because Britain has a long democratic tradition, and there is no possibility of a socialist society being attained here without the working class, and the middle class, being convinced of the necessity of the change." I left Mr Taaffe thinking that Militant and Andy Bevan between them have got Transport House over a barrel.[15]

”

The Labour Government of 1974-1979, under the orders of a team from the International Monetary Fund in 1976, proceeded the following year to make cuts of £8 billion, or almost 5%, [1] the biggest single cut a UK government had made in government expenditure. ^[16]

The Militant argued that these cuts lost the Labour Party the 1979 election and gave rise to the "Winter of discontent" - a period of union struggle against the Labour government wage restraint of 1978-9. "Instead of carrying out socialist policies, the Labour leadership, attempting to manage capitalism in a period of crisis, embarked on attacks on workers' living standards, in particular through a series of pay policies...Through their policies during 1974-9, the Labour leaders paved the way for Thatcher." ^[17].

In Liverpool, the City Council was mostly under the control of coalitions of the Conservatives and Liberals in 1979-1983. But when, for a short period in 1980, the Labour Party gained minority control, it had reluctantly opted for a 50% increase in the rates to avoid further cuts in local services, which threatened, they claimed, due to central government changes in the rate support grant. The Militant criticised this approach. Labour lost control of the council with the loss of six seats in the subsequent 1980 polls, a significant punishment at that time, and the worst losses since 1964.^[18].

In July 1981, in the depressed area of Toxteth in Liverpool, serious riots broke out. Conservative Minister Michael Heseltine was appointed Minister for Merseyside, and £20 million of extra money was made available for the area by the government. However the housing charity Shelter, in its journal Roof criticised Heseltine's "professions of concern about the problems he has seen on Merseyside" since "it was he who savaged the Housing Investment Programme and re-calculated the Rate Support Grant to favour the shire counties at the expense of inner cities." ^[19].

The Militant Tendency highlighted the social deprivation in Merseyside. Total income for the city council between 1974 and 1979 had fallen by 18 percent, and expenditure fell by 14%, yet its rents were the highest outside London. In 1981 unemployment in Merseyside almost equalled the number unemployed in the whole of Wales. Householders also suffered. The Liberal-Tory coalition of 1981 raised rates for 1982 by 21.5%^[20].

It was the government's cuts to the Rate Support Grant for the city which the Militant Tendency claimed was unfair. It argued that £30 million was "stolen" from Liverpool by Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher's government. Prominent Liverpool Militant supporters such as Derek Hatton and Tony Mulhearn argued that the minority Labour Council of 1980 should have attempted to set an illegal "deficit budget", spending money on the needs of the people of Liverpool, even if it exceeded the council's income. It should demand that central government return the "stolen" money to balance the books. ^[21]

By 1982 the Liverpool District Labour Party and a broad alliance of left leaning Labour Party councillors in the Liverpool Labour Party adopted the policies which the Militant Tendency had been proposing for the city. It adopted the slogan "Better to break the law than break the poor" which had been the slogan of the Poplar council in the east end of London in 1919-20, which took on the unfair rating system of the time and won. The Labour Party's opponents in Liverpool made the most of the "far left" Militant basis of the policies of the Liverpool Labour Party. In the Vauxhall ward, a Liberal leaflet proclaimed "Why no Catholic can vote labour on Thursday" and carried a picture of the Pope. It claimed "Labour's Militants not only want to close our schools but would ban religion as well." ^[22].

In 1984 the Liverpool council, already widely seen as a "militant" council due to local and national media coveage, launched its Urban Regeneration Strategy to build 5000 houses, seven sports centres, new parks, six new nursury classes and other works, many of which were seen to completion. [2]

In the June 1983 general election nationally the Labour Party, which had just expelled the Militant Editorial Board (see The Militant and the Labour Party below) scored its worst post war defeat with 209 seats. In Liverpool, however, the newly Militant-led Labour Party won a substantial victory in the May local elections, and then again in the June general election. The Liverpool Labour Party, now committed to an ambitious regeneration strategy, whilst refusing to make any above-inflation rent and rate rises, gained 12 seats, including the seat of the Tory leader, and Labour took control of the council.

Labour's local election vote in Liverpool increased by 40%, or 22,000 extra votes. In Broadgreen, Labour's vote increased by 50% and in the June 1983 elections, Militant supporter Terry Fields, standing on the slogan of "A workers' MP on a workers' wage", won the seat for Labour. The BBC had classed the seat as a marginal Tory seat in 1979. "It was the only Tory seat that was won by labour" the Militant reported. ^[23].

The Liverpool Labour Party's vote continued to rise: "In 1982 Labour got 54,000 votes in the city, in 1983 77,000 votes, and in 1984 this soared to over 90,000. In 33 of the 34 contested seats Labour's vote increased. Labour held all 14 seats it was defending and seven seats were won from the Tories." ^[24].

At first, during the Miners strike of 1984-85, the Liverpool City Council was successful in getting concessions from central government. The Times newspaper said on the 11 July 1984 "Today in Liverpool, municipal militancy is vindicated...a third rate provincial politician, a self publicising revolutionary...Mr Derek Hatton has made the government give way." The Council was in an alliance with left-led councils across Britain. The left leaderships of these councils favoured a strategy of delaying the setting of the budget, but one by one they found the means of setting a budget, leaving Liverpool and Lambeth to fight alone.

In September 2005 the Labour group on the council decided on the 'tactic' of issuing 90-day redundancy notices to the 30,000 strong workforce to "gain that period as a breathing space in order to build the campaign". Liverpool councillors were advised by the District Auditor that the council was about to break its legal obligations and would not be able to pay wages to its staff. The one legal loophole the District Auditor suggested, was to announce that all staff were being made redundant. In his autobiography, Deputy Council leader Derek Hatton acknowledges that taking this advice was an enormous mistake, from which the council never recovered. It was, the Militant's general secretary wrote, "a major tactical error." ^[25].

In the mean time, the Urban Regeneration Strategy of the Liverpool City Council continued to provide jobs and build houses, schools and sports facilities. Lord reg Underhill, a long-standing opponent of the Militant, wrote in a letter to The Guardian (25 September 1985)

“

I went to see the effects of Liverpool's regeneration strategy... The five year plan is to get rid of outdated and sub-standard housing, the crumbling tenements and soulless systems-built tower flats. Already 3800 separate homes have been built, with their own private gardens and nearby off-street parking... improved street layouts, with tree-lined residential roads are planned. We saw the start of the 100 acre park at Everton and of the initial development of other local parks. There are to be seven sport centres; three have just been opened. The scheme will provide work for 12,000 with side effects producing further thousands of jobs. Without commenting on the rating situation, how much is being saved to the Treasury by this employment?

”

Many leading Labour figures in the 1970s and 1980s saw the Militant Tendency as a primary reason for their "loony left" image, as portrayed by the right-wing press, although most of the councils attacked as 'loony' were in fact influenced by the soft-left ideas of Tribune.

The Militant organised a special conference against the "witchhunt" at the Wembley Conference Centre in September 1982 at which Ken Livingstone spoke, with an attendance from 1622 delegates from constituency Labour Parties, 412 trade union delegates and 1000 visitors, showing the considerable influence the Militant Tendency had at that stage amongst ordinary members of the Labour Party. Livingstone said "The people fighting to get rid of the Militant, were previously fighting alongside those who deserted to the SDP." ^[26]

However at the 1982 Labour Party conference, Militant was declared ineligible for affiliation to the Labour Party, and its application was refused.

After an investigation, on February 22, 1983, to enormous press publicity, the Labour Party's National Executive Committee expelled from membership the five members of Militant's Editorial Board, Peter Taaffe, Ted Grant, Keith Dickinson, Lynn Walsh and Clare Doyle. They appealed at the Labour Party national conference in October of that year. Peter Taaffe however notes that "80 per cent of the delegates from the Constituency Labour Parties and a considerable number of rank-and-file trade union delegates voted against expulsion." ^[27] The decision was however endorsed by the full conference of the party, to which the Editorial board appealed. The appeal was lost on a card vote: 4,972,000 to 1,790,000^[28]. "The votes, which had already been lined up by right-wing union general secretaries, were heavily in favour of the platform’s recommendation for expulsions" comments Taaffe.^[29]

The opposition to the expulsions was widespread, and was even reflected in the Labour Party's own publications. In Labour's magazine, New Socialist (September-October 1982) an editorial denounced the 'witch-hunt' against Militant:

“

The expulsion of leading Militant supporters [is] wrong. The Labour Party always has been a broad collection that includes Marxists amongst its ranks. The Militant Tendency, drawing as it does upon Trotsky's critique of Stalinism, belongs to this Marxist tradition, and has a legitimate place within the Labour Party. The charges being levelled against Militant that it is 'a party within a party' is one that can be levelled with equal justification against any other groups within the Labour Party on both the left and right... The very existence of Militant and other groups within the Labour Party is a source of strength rather than a weakness. By working for the adoption of alternative policies and candidates, they assist the democratic functioning of the party.

”

This unusual history of the Labour Party, as one of a "broad church" of affiliated parties (such as the Independent Labour Party) and socialist societies, including Marxist leaning groups, for a while prevented Labour Party leaders such as Michael Foot from acting against the Militant.

Many Labour Party leaders, such as neil Kinnock and Tony Blair, attributed to Marxism their initial impulse to become active in the Labour Party. Labour Party Prime Minister Tony Blair, for instance, in a letter to Michael Foot written in 1982, said: "Like many middle class people I came to Socialism through Marxism (to be more specific through Deutscher's biography of Trotsky)." [3] Blair claims in the letter to be a member of the Labour Coordinating Committee.

Although as Marxists the Militant Tendency did not share the same analysis of much of the rest of the Labour Party, they were a visible component of that coalition. The Militant, who claimed to be nothing more than readers of a newspaper, were alleged to be members of a Leninist or else a Trotskyist political party, with an elected central committee and an internal regime based on democratic centralism, by organisations within the Labour Party such as the Merseyside Labour Coordinating Committee (LCC), which submitted a report to the labour Party leadership in 1985-6. However, this organisation rejected "large scale expulsions", commenting that

“

A theory of organisational conspiracy, however, has limited explanatory power. Militant has very deep roots in the Liverpool party, and has gained considerable respect for its commitment and its association with ridding the party of the discredited right-wing machine. Furthermore, its workerist, bureaucratic but anti-capitalist policies have a great appeal among many party members in the city. Many members see them as left – militant with a little 'm' rather than Militant with a big 'M'. This false image is naturally cultivated carefully by their organisation. More recently it has been strengthened by alliances made with local authority activists, mainly in the manual unions, for whom their top-down socialism has immediate appeal and material benefits in terms of jobs and conditions.

”

These alliances with the working class of Liverpool, based on support for Militant's policies, prevented any action against the Liverpool District Labour Party until 1986.

But while Michael Foot made no significant progress in removing the bulk of Militant supporters from the Labour Party, his successor Neil Kinnock carried on with more vigour. Many of those around Kinnock had held on to control of the National Organisation of Labour Students in the 1970s, whilst Militant gained increasing support in the Labour Party Young Socialists. The group around Kinnock did not accept Militant's claims to be no more or less well organised than any other grouping within the Labour Party. They did not accept the argument that an attack on Militant was primarily a political attack on a legitimate strand of opinion in the Labour Party - the claim of a witch hunt.

The tactical decision of the leadership of Liverpool City Council to issue redundancy notices to all their workforce backfired and handed a propaganda gift to a Labour leader who had made no secret of his contempt for Trotskyism. It was opposed by the City Council Shop Stewards - despite the committee being strongly influenced by the Militant Tendency - "after a long and bitter debate" on 7 September 1985, by 51 votes to 48. ^[30]

However, no member of staff was ever made redundant. On the reverse of the redundancy notices it was stated that the issuing of the notices was a legal manoeuvre to keep the Council solvent whilst the campaign for more funding continued. It also said that disciplinary action would be taken against anyone who raised the matter with the unions. The national leadership of the Militant Tendency immediately distanced itself from this tactic, whilst acknowledging the enormous pressure Derek Hatton and non-Militant Tony Byrne were under at the time, and whilst condemning what it called the hypocrisy of the attacks on the Liverpool leadership, since, it said, real cuts and genuine redundancies were being forced on councils and council workers all over the country.

Nevertheless, Kinnock, coming from the left, believed he had an instinctive understanding of the ideology of the Militant that a previous generation of Labour leaders had not, and that made him only more determined to take them on. With Derek Hatton emerging as a bogeyman for the Tories and the right-wing press, there were also clear tactical advantages in being seen to take on the entryists.

In what many people have since come to see as a crucial stage in the move to the right by Labour, Kinnock then made a speech to the Labour Party Conference in 1985 that attacked Militant and their record on Liverpool Council:

“

I'll tell you what happens with impossible promises. You start with a far-fetched series of resolutions, and these are then pickled into a rigid dogma, a code, and you go through the years sticking to that, misplaced, outdated, irrelevant to the real needs, and you end in the grotesque chaos of a Labour council, a Labour council, hiring taxis to scuttle round the city handing out redundancy notices to its own workers. I tell you - and you'll listen - you can't play politics with people's jobs and people's homes and people's services.[31]

”

The speech split the conference. The reaction from sections of the conference was close to ecstatic while other delegates booed, Eric Heffer walked off the platform and Derek Hatton repeatedly shouted 'liar' at Kinnock from the floor. His speech caused fury on the left, who felt Kinnock should have supported the council and used his authority to make clear the tactical aims of the council in issuing the redundancy notices. Since Kinnock ruled out compensation for the Miners after their year long strike, some miners and miners' Women's Support Group members were in tears. ^[32]

Few trade union leaders had ever had much sympathy with the Militant and the supposed threat, whether a mistaken tactic or real, to sack every employee in the city had legitimised a hugely negative reaction from those trade union leaders who opposed the Liverpool council's strategy.

Kinnock's speech was played repeatedly all over the media, and spurred on by the positive media response, Kinnock subsequently suspended the operation of Liverpool District Labour Party and appointed Peter Kilfoyle as an organiser with a specific remit to remove Militant supporters from the Labour Party.

Kinnock's speech was used in the Labour Party's 1987 election broadcast, but Labour gained its second worst election defeat since the Second World War. The Labour Party gained 20 seats in the 1987 General Election, but still lost the election by a landslide of more than 100 seats. The Conservatives lost 21 seats overall, from what was in 1983 its most decisive victory since the Second World War, with 376 seats, down from 397, compared to Labour's 229 seats.

Militant candidates did well. The three MPs associated with the Militant (Pat Wall, Dave Nellist and Terry Fields) all increased their majorities. Labour also did particularly well in Liverpool, leading the Militant Tendency to again deny Neil Kinnock's claim that the Militant Tendency's policies were unpopular. The Militant's general secretary, Peter Taaffe subsequently wrote:

“

Without the attack on the Liverpool Militant supporters, and a subsequent witch-hunt against others on the left, the right wing leadership would not have been able to carry through a massive revision in party policy in the period 1985-7. The attack on Liverpool paved the way for the defeat of Labour in the 1987 general election.

”

This opinion was not restricted to the Militant Tendency. Others were vocal in their opposition to the attacks on the Militant. Michael Meacher MP had written in the Labour Party's Labour Weekly (18 February 1983) that John Golding, one of those prominent in pursuing the expulsions of Militant supporters, was 'bleeding the party's election prospects to death'.

Over the following years the Labour Party machinery continued to expel Militant supporters such as MP Terry Fields, often to the acclaim of the national media and many mainstream politicians seeking to regain control of the party apparatus from the entryist faction. After the closure of the Liverpool Labour Party, a broad left coalition began to stand independent "labour" candidates in Liverpool, which put pressure on the Militant Tendency to do the same. After much debate, Militant supporters in Liverpool stood Lesley Mahmood as a "Real Labour" candidate against Kilfoyle in the Liverpool Walton by-election, 1991, its first steps outside the Labour Party electorally, giving the Labour Party further grounds to continue with its expulsions.

In 1988 Thatcher began preparations for a Community Charge to replace the rates. Instead of one payment per household, the poll tax was to be paid by all people who were 18 or over. Many large working class families faced bills four or more times higher than their rates bills. The rates bills themselves had been subject to significant increases, (such as the 50% increase in Liverpool cited above) and were popularly considered to be too high.

The Militant Tendency held meetings to argue for a strategy of non-payment, and began organising Anti-Poll tax Unions, beginning in Scotland. The anti-poll tax unions grew rapidly in 1989, and soon regional and national bodies were set up, which Militant organised and led. Militant supporters like Liverpool MP Terry Fields and Glasgow Councillor Tommy Sheridan were sent to prison for refusing to pay the poll tax.

The Militant organised one of the largest demonstrations London had seen that century, which led to a significant riot in Trafalgar Square. Non-payment rose to 17.5 million people in serious arrears, and central government began to consider the community charge unworkable. The poll tax was swiftly abandoned by the newly elected Prime Minister John Major.

Thatcher called the victory of the 14 million strong, anti-Poll Tax movement led by the Militant "one of the greatest victories for these people ever conceded by a Conservative Government" ^[33], and blames this movement for unnerving her peers in government, causing her downfall, in her autobiography. ^[34] Thatcher, who called the poll tax legislation her "flagship" policy, would give no ground and refused to repeal the poll tax legislation. As a result was forced to resign as leader of the Conservative Party. In her autobiography, Thatcher writes "Most people [in the Conservative Party leadership] were worried about the community charge...I intervened to say I could not pull rabbits out of a hat...I could not now credibly promise a radical overhaul of the community charge, no matter how convenient it seemed."

At a Militant special conference in October 1991, after a lengthy period of debate and discussion, 93% of delegates voted to support a "Scottish turn". They took the view that Labour policy was so far removed from its former socialist content that it was no longer desirable to work within the Labour Party.^[35] Thus in 1991 the Militant Tendency effectively abandoned the Labour Party, first calling themselves Militant Labour (and in Scotland, Scottish Militant Labour) and latterly in England the Socialist Party. The "Scottish Turn" became known as the "Open turn" and this abandonment of entryism led to upheaval and eventually a split.

The minority, led by its founder Ted Grant and by Alan Woods, went on to set up the Workers International League, better known by the name of their publication, Socialist Appeal. Soon afterward a majority of Scottish Militant Labour formed the Scottish Socialist Party with a number of other groups and broke with the majority of the former Militant in England and Wales, with only a small minority in Scotland remaining. Meanwhile in England and Wales the majority of Militant, now led by Peter Taaffe, formed the Socialist Party of England and Wales. This Party was involved in the formation of the now defunct Socialist Alliance but left it again in December 2001, stating that it was no longer an open coalition of Left forces, but controlled by the Socialist Workers Party (SWP), who they believed would eventually abandon it. When the SWP moved to set up a new left-wing coalition, known as Respect, the Socialist Party did not participate.

• June Johnson November 1985
• Chris Johnson November 1985
• Brychan Davies
• Keith Dickinson 1983
• Clare Doyle 1983
• Terry Fields September 1991
• Ted Grant 1983
• Peter Taaffe 1983
• Derek Hatton 12 June 1986
• Tony Mulhearn
• Dave Nellist
• Ian Lowes
• Tommy Sheridan 1989
• Lynn Walsh 1983
• Alan Woods
• Rob Sewell

1. ^ National Secretary Jimmy Deane's archive minutes. cf http://www.warwick.ac.uk/services/library/mrc/ead/325col.htm
2. ^ Taaffe, Peter, The Rise of Militant p8
3. ^ BBC ON THIS DAY | 7 | 1974: Heath calls snap election over miners
4. ^ Observer, 31 August 1975
5. ^ Taaffe, Peter, The Rise of Militant chapter seven
6. ^ Militant issue no.9, September 1965
7. ^ Militant 125, 6 October 1972
8. ^ Taaffe, Peter, The Rise of Militant chapter seven
9. ^ Peter Taaffe, The Rise of Militant chapter seven
10. ^ Militant issue 159, 8 June, 1973
11. ^ "It is significant that all these attacks, particularly that of the Observer, do not deal with the ideas of Militant, openly expressed, which have a great tradition in the labour movement and are the continuation of the ideas of the pioneers of the labour movement and of Marx, Engels, Lenin and Trotsky." Militant issue 269, 5 September, 1975
12. ^ For instance, Tony Benn and Jack Jones in Tribune, 18 October 1974, and Militant issue 255, 9 July 1975
13. ^ Daily Express, 10 December 1976. The five were Nick Bradley, Peter Taaffe, Ted Grant, Roger Silverman and Andy Bevan.
14. ^ The Times, "Special Articles": 1st, 3rd And 4th December 1976. The Times Editorial, 8 December 1976.
15. ^ The Observer, 19 december 1976
16. ^ Conservative Chancellor Norman Lamont said in Parliament in 1991, "We will not take any lectures from the Labour Party, the party which in 1977-78, cut national health service spending by 3 per cent., and which cut capital spending by no less than 22 per cent." House of Commons Hansard for 6 Nov 1991
17. ^ Taaffe, Peter, Liverpool: A City that Dared to Fight p48-51
18. ^ Taaffe, Peter, Liverpool: A City that Dared to Fight p56
19. ^ Cited in Taaffe, Peter, Liverpool: A City that Dared to Fight p52
20. ^ Taaffe, Peter, Liverpool: A City that Dared to Fight p51-2
21. ^ "In 1984-5 the total target figure in real terms for all English authorities was only 6 per cent lower than their expenditure in 1980-1, but Liverpool's target was 11 per cent lower than their spending in 1980-1. Liverpool's officials estimated that between 1978-9 and 1983-4, the city had lost between £26 million and £34 million in government grant as a direct result of penalties being imposed for spending over target. This was the £30 million that the council claimed the government had stolen." (Taaffe, Peter, Liverpool: A City that Dared to Fight p147-8)
22. ^ Taaffe, Peter, Liverpool: A City that Dared to Fight p79
23. ^ cf Taaffe, Peter, Liverpool: A City that Dared to Fight p82, p94
24. ^ cf Taaffe, Peter, Liverpool: A City that Dared to Fight p136
25. ^ Taaffe, Peter, Liverpool: A City that Dared to Fight p281
26. ^ Peter Taaffe, The Rise Of Militant’’, p201-2
27. ^ Taaffe, Peter, The Rise of Militant Chapter Twenty-three
28. ^ cf The appeal speech of Ted Grant to Labour Party conference 1983. Incidentally, Grant claims that Michael Foot was expelled from the Labour Party. It's likely he is referring to the fact that when an MP Foot had the Labour whip withdrawn in 1961, which is considered an expulsion from the Parliamentary Labour Party. See story at Labour's lost loves
29. ^ The union 'block vote' at that time was a vote cast by each union in one single block, in some cases of more than a million votes, often used at the discretion of the union general secretaries, and which at that time commanded the overwhelming majority of votes at conference.
30. ^ Taaffe, Peter, Liverpool, A city that dared to fight p282
31. ^ Quoted in the abstract of Greg Rosen, ed., Old Labour to New: The Dreams that Inspired, the Battles that Divided, Politico's Press, ISBN 1842750453. Accessed online 25 March 2007.
32. ^ James Naughtie, Labour in Bournemouth: Kinnock rounds on left's militants, Guardian Unlimited, October 2, 1985. Accessed online 25 March 2007.
33. ^ Margaret Thatcher, The Downing Street Years (1993) pp661
34. ^ Margaret Thatcher, The Downing Street Years (1993) pp848-9.
35. ^ Militant Editorial Statement, 24 January 1992

• The Rise of Militant - the official history
• Militant - official Militant tendency website
• The Socialist Party's Homepage
• In Defence of Marxism - homepage of the Minority
• How the Militant was Built – and How it was Destroyed
• Liverpool, A City That Dared To Fight - Book by Peter Taaffe & Tony Mulhearn on Militant & the Liverpool City Council
• News report of the suspension of the Liverpool Labour Party
• Liverpool 47: Socialism on Trial website of the Liverpool 47 councillors, the 47 councillors who formed the left-wing block on the Liverpool City Council.