WHY WE ARE CONTESTING THIS ELECTION (1950)

WHY WE ARE CONTESTING THIS ELECTION

THE SOCIALIST PARTY OF GREAT BRITAIN IS PUTTING FORWARD CANDIDATES AT EAST HAM SOUTH AND PADDINGTON NORTH IN THIS GENERAL ELECTION. AN S.P.G.B. CANDIDATE CONTESTED PADDINGTON NORTH AT THE GENERAL ELECTION IN JULY 1945 AND AGAIN AT THE BY-ELECTION IN NOVEMBER, 1946. ON THOSE TWO OCCASIONS THE ELECTORS DEMONSTRATED THEIR UNREADINESS TO CONSIDER SOCIALISM AS A PRACTICAL ALTERNATIVE TO CAPITALISM; THEY GAVE THOUSANDS OF VOTES TO THE LABOUR AND TORY CANDIDATES AND REJECTED SOCIALISM WITH A FEW HUNDRED VOTES THEY CAST FOR THE SOCIALIST CANDIDATE.

Some of our opponents, not knowing the Socialist movement, expected that the results of the two contests at Paddington North would convince the S.P.G.B. that it is useless to carry on the struggle for Socialism. They thought we had misjudged the situation and would disappear from the political scene when the position was made clear.

THE FUTURE LIES IN SOCIALISM

We made no miscalculation and the result did not surprise us. It did not even add to our disappointment. We have had long years of propaganda experience to teach us that the number of convinced Socialists in this country is very small at present.

Strange as it may seem to those who belong to the large and wealthy Labour and Conservative parties we of the Socialist Party are supremely confident of our eventual triumph. The future does not belong to Labourism or to Conservatism but to Socialism.

Why are we so confident? It is because the Socialist movement has two strong forces ceaselessly at work on its side. One is the pressure of capitalism on the working class. The other is the thinking capacity of the workers who have to endure this pressure. Conscious that these forces are slowly working for us we cannot be dismayed by the magnitude of the present difficulties. Sooner or later the working class will understand that for the sake of their well-being and for the very existence of the human race they must join us to end capitalism and establish Socialism.

TORY, LABOUR, LIBERAL, COMMUNIST — AND SOCIALIST

You are asked in the election to choose between a number of parties and programmes but only the S.P.G.B. asks you to vote for Socialism and nothing but Socialism.

The CONSERVATIVE movement — though "movement" is perhaps hardly the word to describe that monument of inertia—would, if it could, leave capitalism unchanged. The wealthy men who are influential in that Party are quite satisfied with things as they are—but they need workers' votes and the working class are so dissatisfied that the Conservatives have to make a show of changing things. They pretend to believe in change but change is the last thing they really want.

The LABOUR PARTY does believe in change of a kind. It claims that you can change capitalism by cutting out the abuses and making it a more satisfactory scheme of things. It claims that you can have capitalism without war, capitalism without unemployment and capitalism without poverty. The Labour Party thus aims to achieve an impossibility, a sort of half-way house between Capitalism and Socialism. It was bound to fail disastrously.

They say they have done their best—and you can see the deplorable results.

The LIBERALS are a party of the past, they have no future and no claim to represent anything but capitalism. Their maximum hope is to provide a group of M.P.'s able to hold the balance between Labour and Conservative. They can be judged on their past record of Government. When in power for long years they never did anything to end the poverty and insecurity of working class life. Always—like the Conservatives—they sought to continue capitalism and to promote the interests of the capitalist class.

The COMMUNISTS are a group showing certain special but equally obnoxious features. They are not interested in Communism or Socialism any more than is the Labour Party. Their method of seeking influence among the workers is to outbid the Labour Party in the reforms of capitalism that they advocate. They take their cue always from Russia which they falsely represent as a country in which Socialism has been established. If they were to gain power they would seek to introduce here the same detestable system of State capitalism and dictatorship as exists in Russia.

"LABOUR" HAS FAILED — NOW FORWARD TO SOCIALISM

The Socialist movement really does seek change, the change from capitalism to Socialism. Capitalism must be abolished, for only by its abolition and its replacement by Socialism can the things that the working class need and desire become realities. Socialism versus Capitalism is the vital issue here and throughout the world.

Between Socialism and Capitalism there can be no compromise, no half-way house. Those who are not for Socialism are against it. The Socialist Party strikes a blow for a Socialist world. We are at the beginning of the fight. We shall 50 on till final victory.