Stop the War Coalition protest at labour's big converstaion

We have a standing policy of protesting at all public meetings where pro-war MPs speak in the town. We don’t disrupt them as that would backfire on us – but we make sure that everyone attending knows that the MPs support illegal invasions and torture. As one of the pro-war MPs has declared she is stepping down after the next election Swindon South Labour party have to select a new candidate, and we are trying to get the point across that they need to select an anti-war candidate, both because that is right, and also because otherwise they will surely lose the seat. To that end we have also arranged a public meeting with left wing labour MP , Alan Simpson, on 12th July.

So the leaflet pointed out that despite two sitting Labour MPs in Swindon the Euro election results were:
Tory 31.4%
Labour 23.4%
UKIP 19.4%
Lib Dem 12.8%
others 13%

What a weird meeting. First of all Charles Clarke didn’t turn up and was replaced by no-mark minister David Milliband. One of the Labour party organisers rushed out as soon as we started putting the banner up outside the entrance to check us out, and then promised the minister would come and talk to us. But he didn’t despite the fact that at that time he was alone for 20 minutes with no punters. No big loss to us – but it shows that the “big conversation” is a sham. It wasn’t as if we didn’t know he was on his own because he was the other side of a plate glass window and we could see him!

There were only about 30 chairs laid out – in groups of 6 around 5 tables, and gradually people started turning up. The theme of the meeting was education, and they mostly seemed to be Labour party members who are also teachers. We did get some support form people saying they agreed with us and taking leaflets, but also there seems to be a new breed of labour party member in their 30s, who were very hostile. Sad to see that the prospect of meeting a cabinet minister meant some of them wore their cheap interview suits.

One foolish chap around 30 years old bustled out and demanded to know what our policy on education was. (I mention his age just to contextualise him in the history of the Labour Party – his whole time in ter party must have been under Blair – so there really is no excuse for him) I explained that as the Stop the War Campaign we clearly didn’t have a policy on education, but as a leading member of the local green party was standing next to me holding a banner saying “spend money on schools not bombs” there was an answer. The guy clearly had never heard of single issue campaigns and indignantly shouted “I might start to take you more seriously if you had a policy on education, what would you do about Headlands School, hah!”. He then stomped off indignantly without waiting for my reply, but clearly very satisfied that his razor sharp intellect had settled the question of the war.

So was it worth it? Well these things are always hard to judge. The Labour party are clearly getting fed up with us turning up at all their meetings, and we suspect that pressure over the war is at least a partial factor in Julia Drown stepping down as MP. Also we do need to keep campaigning, these actions do help keep a core of people in touch with each other. The war in Iraq could easily slip below the radar screen of the mainstream news, like the war in Afghanistan has. Sadly in most parts of the country Stop the War Coalitions seem to have been put on ice.