[Music]
I
welcome to Sputnik orbiting the world
with me George Gallow and back with me
gatri John murnan is part of the 45
sorry I missed a decimal point they are
the 4.5 the percentage of Labor members
who voted for the blairite candidate Liz
Kendall in the labor leadership election
before that he ran the Scottish labor
general election campaign in which all
but one of the MPS were lost and before
that that he was the spin doctor for
Prime Minister Tony Blair whirling like
a dervish in Downing Street and
Westminster now you must think I hate
him but I don't he has an acute
political mind losing Scotland was not
his fault and Liz Kendall at least had
the courage of her convictions McAn has
courage too otherwise he wouldn't be now
on board the Sputnik John thanks for
joining us I've got to ask as bluntly as
I can tell us what you really think of
Jeremy Corbin
um what was interesting about this week
uh at conference is that Jeremy pitched
himself as an idealist a new type of
politics a new way of engaging with the
country and he says that's how they're
going to do stuff and obviously I'm a
realist I think we have to engage with
the electorate we have to be more to the
center than he does and yet on every
single decision that he took he moves
straight to the center so on on Monday
John McDonald goes we've got to live
within our means and yet Kendall was
abused for being a Tory in June and July
for saying the same thing and so every
time there's an accommodation with my
side of the party I think it kind of
undermines the sincerity and the
authenticity of what Jeremy's pitching
if he believes what he believes he
should go for it full throttle and
there's something interesting about the
fact he's not gone for it Full Throttle
but shouldn't you rejoice Rejoice that
uh The Sinner hath repented I kind of
think there's a difficulty about it
which is that authenticity is
authenticity so
Jeremy praised Liz very warm words in
his conference speech and I think that
was actually because he recognized that
Liz was the only other person in the
election for a leader who had an
analysis I I recognize that also myself
Jeremy has one and Liz has another one
and the thing is you can either be one
or the other I think Jeremy when he
tries to be like Liz um doesn't seem
real to me but more it doesn't seem
authentic to the voter and if you're
going to pitch the voter you've got to
kind of go for it and go actually I
don't believe in austerity politics Fair
Point um I think we should borrow more
money but you watch the way that he and
John McDonald dance around the issue
either borrowing is wrong or borrowing
is right and you can't sort of dance
around it either printing money is right
or it's wrong and I think that's the
difficulty of me watching it is as a
just as a professional think well you
should stick with what you believe and
you shouldn't try and pretend to be a
sort of halfway to Liz Kendall or you'll
end up like Ed Miller Band Oh Heaven for
f uh the but it's neither right nor
wrong is it it's not not an abstract uh
question uh
sometimes it's the right thing to do to
borrow uh it depends what you're doing
with the money that you borrow if you're
borrowing in order to gamble on the on
in a casino that's Madness if you're
borrowing in order to build your family
a house or uh uh buy books for your
children to become better educated uh
that's good borrowing no no listen I
mean I think um borrowing is a historic
low so it's so cheap um governments
centrally and locally should probably be
filling the boots for debt as long as
they borrow for the right things and the
danger is that you borrow just to please
people what you should do is you borrow
for things which got a very good return
on them but didn't is John McDonald
playing the dongchao Ping role uh the
most successful Chinese Chancellor in
history that I don't care whether the
cat is black or white as long as it
catches mice wasn't this a a very
pragmatic quite auster John McDonald we
saw at the labor conference this week if
John Mcdonald had the same same
commitment to capitalism the Chinese
Communist Party had I would welcome him
with open
arms okay let's move uh let's segue into
the onto the war front because the
conference ended yeah uh not divided
around the austerity agenda and economic
policy but over over nuclear weapons
yeah you are at the front in Scotland
you know the significance of trident is
an issue uh in Scotland and you know how
important it is as an Article of Faith
to Corbin uh it didn't take long for the
media to drill down and get to his inner
core uh and he could answer the question
in no other way than that he would not
press the nuclear button um that's
created the mother of all instability
Shadow cabinet members denouncing him uh
and uh more talk of a coup well I don't
think there'd be a coup um there's a few
thoughts I've got on that one of them is
um the debate is a kind of uh artificial
debate in that there will be a vote next
year uh on renewal of trident the Tories
have got a majority they can renew
Trident uh labor will have a free vote
in it so therefore n out of 10 members
of the PLP will vote for it Jeremy will
vote against it um against party policy
as it is at the moment conference policy
as it is at the moment um and you know
the way he runs the cabinet and saying
you people are free to say what they
want it's almost like actually we
shouldn't be asking him what he'd do he
because he' give the right to press the
button to Michael Dugger or Tom Watson
or somebody in the cabinet who who's in
favor of the deterrent well I take that
point but but but it wouldn't in the end
because the only person who can press
the button is the prime minister and if
labor wins Jeremy will be the Prime
Minister but if labor wins and Jeremy is
the prime minister he's a member of a
nuclear Alliance NATO which has
consistently through its history refused
to rule out first
so it's in a it's in a very forward
leaning nuclear Alliance and so some of
this is a kind of there there's a few
threads to be pulled at is is J in favor
of leaving NATO I kind of think he isn't
I know he's got his doubts about what he
calls NATO expansion but he's never
questioned NATO itself existing or us
being a Treaty Organization member and
in the end we're part of a nuclear
treaty and to some extent it's
irrelevant whether we have weapons or
not we're a nuclear power whether we
have nuclear weapons or not I personally
believe we should need to have our own
independent deterent but we're part of a
deterrent
Alliance well you mentioned uh you you
didn't expect a cool how do you exp
explain the absence of the blits at the
conference this week I saw Li Kendall
she was there I saw Tristram hunt if you
talk about the blairites in the historic
sense um lots of people who were
blairites and Blair's number 10 aren't
in politics anymore actively I am and I
was there um people like aliser he's not
in active politics he wasn't there in
terms of where the Blair act present in
a sense we don't exist anymore because
there is no Blair to be a KN for um he's
gone and the the Oddity about the LA
party conference is you would still
think that the last labor leader had
been Tony Blair so when Gordon became
leader he was kind of washed away
immedately by Ed Miller Band Ed Millan
defined themselves against Tony not
against Tony and Gordon or against
Gordon and now Jeremy's defining himself
against uh Blair as if Gordon and Ed
millerand had never happened well in in
a way they didn't uh but the the the
times yeah which has evolved into the
perfect
blairite killing machine in Exile yeah I
mean uh they are there physically but
they're also there uh spiritually this
very week uh outlined the mechanism of a
of a coup the MPS effectively triggering
a no confidence vote trying to keep
Jeremy off the subsequent leadership
ballot election uh that would of course
tell the party ofand would I would argue
be in any case
illegal uh
this according to the times is what's
going to be done whilst you uh
reasonable and moderate fellow that I
know you to be you seem to be saying
that uh Jeremy's probably going to go
the distance
so there's lots of kind of fallacies
around at the moment in my view uh one
of them is uh people on my side of the
party uh say oh look if Jeremy is
doesn't do so well in the polls he'll
Stand Down in for the good the Party by
2020 Jeremy and his supporters never
thought they'd ever get control of the
labor party they're not going to give it
up um and to be honest if I was one of
them I wouldn't either what's the point
of getting power just to give her up and
go oh look I'm not that good at it um
that's kind of FY the other the other is
um speculation which is which is as fact
right if there was a coup and a plan I'd
have been at the meeting or at least
I've been told about the meeting um
there's not been a meeting there's a
very clear mechanism I could outline it
now but there's no point in outlining it
now
because who's the candidate you you you
know you've got to run somebody against
him you can't just you can't IM I mean
the people who just got beaten are not
going to run again the only one who came
the only two people who came out this
with dignity Jeremy and Liz so is Liz
going to run again probably not in this
cycle has Liz strengthened her claim to
be a future Condor of course she has the
question is for me not to people talk to
the papers about what the plans are the
question is do they have an alternative
political project because of all the
things that Jeremy's got he's got a
political project now I don't agree with
it but I can't sit here and tell you
that there is a new labor political
project that I could set out in five
points for you there isn't um there is a
crisis of social democracy Jeremy
Corbin's Victory is a symptom of that
all cause of it but that crisis is there
in Australia it's there on the left in
in in New Zealand in Canada in
Continental Europe um and some really
hard thinking has got to be done and as
a you know there was a comrade at one of
the meetings from Egypt uh and she just
said why is it there is no International
perspective on anything labor discusses
and no feminist perspective she just sat
there and just said I've come to all
these things and it's like everything
shrinks to Britain when you talk and if
we can't think internationally if we
can't think everything through from top
to bottom we don't deserve to be in
contention in a leadership campaign and
you can't have a coup without a
candidate you can't have a coup without
a project there are princes either
across the water uh or wherever they are
Chuka being the latter uh and uh and um
David milleran being the former are they
either of them both of them are they
really out of contention do you think uh
absolutely both of them David's not
coming back there
and was F Gerald said there's no second
acts in American life I don't think it's
a second act in British political life
there really isn't coming back once
you've gone to the international level
like uh like David has uh then the next
job is further on down that TR path is
not and chuker I think you can't launch
a leadership campaign and abandon it in
three days and then expect the next time
the thing comes up you're going to be
top with all this to get the the
leadership campaign um it's going to
have to be somebody who showed more
seriousness um chucka does not have the
right to run rather than Liz in my view
uh if you make a case make a logical
case uh and you show courage and you
show personality and integrity that
gives you a bigger claim on the future
than anything else and for anybody to be
in contention for the future leader of
the L party whenever Jeremy Corbin
stands down after three terms as prime
minister it's got to be somebody who has
shown courage personal integrity and got
a sense of personal ideology values
moral and kind of absolutely clear um
and as you know those people are rarer
in politics than they should be well I
hope we're there to see it John you and
I thanks very much for joining us the
spck after the break it's the leftwing
leader of Britain's firefighters Union
Matt rack of the fbu don't miss
it welcome back to Sputnik it is a truth
universally acknowledged that the
conservatives don't like trade unions
very much the old type of Tory we might
call them the D Abbey set preferred
paternalistic relationships with their
workers a kind of nobless oblige the
thatcherites took off the Velvet gloves
to reveal the Iron Fist therein the
1980s and '90s saw big defeats for
organized labor and a series of
anti-union laws new labor under Mr Blair
and Mr Brown had no appetite to reverse
them this is one of the reasons why
unions like the rmt and the fire
brigades Union ended up outside labor
joining us now to discuss the new wave
of thatcherite anti-union laws and maybe
a word or two about Labor's new
situation
is the General Secretary of the fire
brigade Union Matt rack Matt thanks for
coming on the Sputnik it's public sector
unions like you and the rmt as it
happens that are really in the Tor
government sites now they want to
effectively make it impossible for
public sector workers the only remaining
workers by and large who are strongly
unionized can defend their members from
doing so yes I think in the uh in the
the consultation documents the fire
brigade Union specifically mentioned
some of the some of the disputes some of
the picketing and so on they
specifically mentioned and it is clearly
targeted at public sector unions uh
interestingly for us in terms of this
debate about thresholds we achieve very
high thresholds uh when we've had to
ballot for industrial action uh but it's
clear an attempt to uh effectively
illegalize strikes across most of the
public sector and once they've done that
they'll come after the rest of us to me
and the debate I've had with
firefighters and other trade unionists
is you've got to ask why are they doing
it at this time they've just announced
that for the public sector for the next
four years another fouryear pay freeze
they on top of the freeze that we've had
for the past five years uh they we were
expecting the comprehensive spending
review with further cuts of between 25
and 40% in public services so that's
going to mean tens of thousands of jobs
going our pensions are being attacked
it's obvious why they want they want to
stop people resisting and and I think
it's you've got to put the two sides of
that together yeah uh your in industry
and your your union with which I've long
been
Associated uh for 40 years nearly uh
used to have a big Workforce with fire
stations everywhere uh where response
times were razor sharp and even your own
fire station the the first one you ever
served in just been closed down you've
been under remorseless attack
unprecedented in in modern history it's
it's staggering 7,000 it's a small part
of the public service the fire service
but 7,000 jobs almost gone in Under The
Last 5 Years over 40 fire stations
closed across the country dozens of fire
engines axed uh so the service that
people are getting is not what it was 5
years ago and and by the way if there
are a big events like the floods or for
example a terrorist attack then in our
view we're less resilient than we were 5
years years ago so tell us what the new
laws and the TU and labor actually under
its new leader have actually stepped up
to the plate to oppose this bill with
some
Gusto uh what will the what will the
bill actually means spell out the Dil I
think the the the headline thing that
people have picked up on is the
thresholds uh that means that there will
be a certain requirement to achieve a
yes vote if you call for industrial
action and there's two of those there's
a general one that 50%
uh need to uh turn out to vote Yes in
what are called important Public
Services which include my own transport
education you would have to have that
and 40% of the total uh eligible
Workforce would have to vote yes that
means that if you achieved threshold one
just so a 50% turnout you would have to
have an 80% yes vote for the strike or
industrial action to be lawful so I mean
these are figures that no I mean the
analogy we've drawn is with politicians
no politician in the UK anywhere
achieves anything like that that they
expect trade unions to to achieve the uh
other part of the bill doesn't directly
affect you at least not at this moment
maybe it will and maybe you'll say
something uh about that it is also a
further attempt to sever the ability of
trade unions to spend money
democratically agreed by their members
on politics absolutely well I mean we we
have a political fund we've and we're
required to vote every 10 years so I
think the first thing the first point I
would make is nobody forces anyone to
join a trade Union it's a voluntary
organization workers choose to join an
organization volunt organization bigest
in the country 6 and a half million of
us uh and once you join a club then that
club makes its rules so people have
decided to join the Fire brigades Union
for example we have decided through our
structures to have a political fund
we're required by law to ballot everyone
every 10 years what they're now trying
to do is make it more difficult for us
to run that fund our money by the way is
not used currently for as you've hinted
at isn't used for labor party
affiliation fees but much wider
political campaigning so that again
they're making it harder for unions to
defend people industrially and
politically now uh we know why the farb
Jor ended up outside labor even though
it was a part of the very foundation of
the labor party and the Railway Union
the rmt actually proposed the motion
which set the labor party up in the
first place yet both ended up outside
the labor party as indeed I did myself
the landscape has now just very
drastically changed or may have at least
has begun drastically to change that
must provoke uh amongst unions like the
fbu a discussion about whether to seek
reaffiliation
again yeah I think it's it's a
remarkable uh summer you know political
earthquake in Britain where rules
invented by the right-wing of the labor
party to stop the left getting any uh uh
presence have actually completely
backfired and a remarkable campaign by
Jeremy Corbin and his supporters have
engaged labor party members trade
unionists and a whole range of new
people who haven't been involved in
politics before me huge meetings of a
thousand people in small towns around
the country it's it's staggering we
disaffiliated as as you say in 2004 it
was a very democratic debate it was in
Anger at the way Tony Blair had treated
us as an Affiliated organization simply
for daring to demand a pay rise uh and
the debate's gone on ever since there is
no doubt that there that debate is now
going on among firefighters and fire
brigades union members I've got no doubt
it'll be going on among rmt members as
well the two unions who ended up as you
say outside of Labor and this wave of
new members that Labor uh attracted as a
result of the Jeremy Corbin phenomenon
were hundreds of thousands of new people
joined uh we hear we understand is
beginning to lead now in the
constituencies to phenomenal scenes
where hundreds of people turn up for a
labor party meeting that maybe just 12
months ago would have been attended by a
dozen yeah I exactly I think uh one of
the the things things that people have
commented on in the past few years is
people's disengagement with politics
people don't like uh politicians who all
look the same sound the same about the
same policies uh and Corbin has blown
that apart and is engaged with a whole
layer of people who uh don't uh want to
see things carrying on as they have done
uh now that's a potentially a mass a
genuine mass movement the like of what
we've never seen uh in in British
certainly in recent British politics
uh and I think the challenge for the
trade unions for the left in in Britain
is to actually organize that and make
sure it it carries on well he even
announced recently that if he were to
become a PM that he would set up this
ministry for employment rights which
then the obviously uh right-wing papers
coined as a Ministry for unions yeah
exactly and I think one of the huge
frustrations under the the new labor
period in government uh and it it refers
back to the current trade I bill is that
13 years there was a chance to uh
improve position the position of workers
in relation to trade Union legislation
and they didn't take that opportunity so
uh Cameron is now starting not just from
where thatch left off but from where BR
Blair and brown and the Coalition left
off uh and they're able to push forward
uh because of that failure to to
challenge the trade Union laws after
1997 so I think we would welcome that
why can't we have a proper debate in
Britain about what workers rights should
be and actually the right to organize
the right to join a union the right to
uh freedom of Association and the right
to take industrial action those rights
should be accepted publicly and in in in
law well Tony Blair presided over the 10
richest years in British history and 10
years of record parliamentary majorities
so if he had wanted to the country could
both have afforded to and Parliament
would have passed the reversal of these
attacks that were made on Trade union
rights and the rights of working people
to defend themselves over the thater
period absolutely and and interestingly
the likes of of John McDonald and Corbin
who were very much marginalized during
that period uh were arguing for that and
others were arguing for that at the time
and on the the new labor leadership
refused Point Blank and and Blair Bo
boasted of the the fact that Britain had
the most restrictive Trade union rights
in Western Europe so for trade unionist
for for workers you know these are about
workers rights uh all you know Cameron
often now talking about the working
people workers Working Families and so
on Working Families come together to
organize themselves in trade Unions
that's what they are it's not about
General secretaries it's about working
people trying to protect themselves in
work uh and that's a huge debate that is
almost ignored in a media the people's
life at work today nowadays um and so I
think I welcome the the discussion and
that that Jeremy Corbin has opened
around some of these issues and and hope
we can see it through last and quickly
uh Matt the all this talk of uh police
and fire service mergers where does the
union stand on that we think it is
absolutely crazy um the fire service
performs a unique
humanitarian uh and independent role in
relation to the the 999 services it's
not part of the police and
internationally generally it's not
treated in the same way a couple of
weeks ago we had a fire crew attacked in
Northern Ireland seriously attacked uh
we've spent uh 40 years in Northern
Ireland navigating through very
difficult circumstances because Fire
crws have to be able to get into
communities in in all across the Divide
uh to do their job without coming under
attack and to do that they have to be
seen to be neutral so this is a real
threat to us uh and we will be fighting
as as hard as we can uh to to allow we
want to be able to engage with
communities who whoever they are
wherever they are and we're not the
police we're not there to do police uh
enforcement roles we're not there to be
at protests we're there to render a
unique humanitarian service so that's
the essential uh the background to why
we'll be opposing those proposals well
said good luck with it Matt rack of the
fire brigade Union thanks for joining us
on the
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on Russia today it's goodbye from me gri
and from me George Galloway it's been
marvelous