Time for a chat about left electoral pacts?
“There is nothing more divisive on the left than a call for unity”. These wise words came, I am told, from the ever witty Scottish Socialist Party leader Colin Fox after the launch of Ken Loach’s new outfit, Left Unity.
He is, of course, right. The prospect that, in the short term, all of the parties to the left of Labour will forget our differences and merge is unlikely. But you don’t need to be holding hands in order to avoid treading on each other’s toes.
Whether you call them affinity groups or vanguards or tenancies or groupings; or traditions or factions or currents or sects; or parties – or just ‘people who read a newspaper’ – splitting into clusters of activists who strongly agree with each other is a sensible idea in many contexts.
But when the plan is to win a seat in a first past the post election – as it is some of the time – then it’s pretty useful not to squabble with fellow travellers over small patches of soil. With less than two years until the next general election, there’s some time to plan. So let’s survey the landscape.
Britain’s left electoralists
There are, of course, lots of left wing parties in the UK. But most of them don’t focus on elections. The list of those who do is a little shorter.
Left Unity is one of at least two new parties to be forged from the widefelt anger rising from the wounds of the stomping boot of austerity. It’s rumoured to have an impressive 90 local branches.
The other, the National Health Action Party have a single issue feel. But it is the one issue which has consistently won elections. Local hospital closures have successfully delivered three constituency victories to independent UK parliamentarians in recent years – I can’t think of any parallel.
They haven’t romped to any sort of victory so far. But if they were to stand in one of the seats with a major hospital closure on the cards, I don’t see why they couldn’t win – after all, if their co-leader could secure a seat in Westminster in 2001 & 2005, why not now?
Then there are the more established electoral parties. The largest in England is, of course, the Green Party (of which I am a member). Other than the Greens, there are two parties to the left of Labour who have reasonable levels electoral success in England: Respect and the Liberal Party.
Respect have five councillors in Bradford and George Galloway in Parliament (though whether we count him as left wing is a matter for another day).
The Liberal Party, who refused to merge with the pro-nuclear Social Democrats in 1989, have 21 councillors (up from 16 in two years), and a raft of solid left of centre policies.,
If we are to include a third English example, it is surely the Trade Unionist and Socialist Coalition and the various groups who collaborate through it (many of whom are better known for their activities outside elections). They haven’t won much (a Town Council seat in March), but their ability to stand in an impressive number of seats shows a network and resource which we shouldn’t ignore, and the Socialist Party, who organise through them, had until 2012 a councillor in Coventry (the former Labour MP).
Outside England, there are more parties who sit to the left of Labour, and regularly contest elections – most notably, perhaps, Plaid Cymru, Mebyon Kernow, The Scottish Socialist Party, the SNP, and, Sinn Fein(2). The latter two will be familiar to most readers, and are unlikely candidates for electoral pacts for very different reasons.
Plaid Cymru, on the other hand, define themselves in their constitution as ‘decentralist socialists’ and have a pretty strong track record on most issues. Their newish leader, Leanne Wood, is the kind of politician we certainly need more of. They have 3 MPs, 10 Welsh Assembly Members, 166 councillors and an MEP.

Mebyon Kernow, the party of Cornwall, hold four county council seats and a good cluster of city, town, and parish councillors. They describe themselves as ‘Cornish, Green, Left of Centre, Decentralist’. They also make sure we remember not to count Cornwall as part of England.
The Scottish Socialists had 6 MSPs not so long ago, but have had a pretty sad story since then. Interestingly, their leader, Colin Fox (he of the witty turn of phrase) chose not to stand in a recent by-election in his home ward, and instead backed the Green candidate, Alys Mumford.
Scotland is also home to the broader Radical Independence movement whose activists have brought impressive ideas, energy, organisation and a remarkable degree of collaboration to the left in Scotland in the run up to the referendum next year. The result is that Scotland gets the ‘one to watch’ prize when it comes to co-operation among radicals.
Putting aside the SNP and Sinn Fein, the rest of the parties above are all, at least, worth having a chat with. Each of these parties has a somewhat different set of politics. Some are radical socialist. Some are firmly centre left. Some are democratic centralists, others are decentralists. With one or two, it isn’t clear where they sit on most issues. But each comes from a position to the left of Labour.
Co-operation?
This leaves us Greens (and everyone else listed above) with an interesting question. To what extent should we consider co-operation? There is some history to this.
The first Green Party backed MP wasn’t Caroline Lucas. It was Cynog Dafis(2). Though a member of Plaid Cymru, he was supported by the Welsh Greens in 1992. His researcher, as part of the pact, was Victor Anderson – later a Green London Assembly Member (and now occasion Bright Green contributor).

Likewise, in 2005, the Green Party and Mebyon Kernow co-operated in Cornwall, with the latter not standing in St Ives in favour of the Greens(3).
In 2009, Respect backed the Greens in the North West Euro elections, and in 2010, the Greens gave Respect a clean run in Birmingham Sparkbrook (Salma Yaqoob’s seat) and Manchester, Blackley and Broughton.
Of course, in every case above, there will be significant trip hazards on the path to collaboration. If there weren’t we’d all be in the same happy party. But if we are serious about changing British politics, surely it’s time to start exploring conversations about the 2015 elections?
In practical terms, it’s pretty important to Greens that Left Unity or Respect or TUSC don’t run major campaigns in Brighton Pavillion, and we should be willing to offer them something they want in exchange.
Political pacts are messy, complex and difficult. They involve complex relationships between local and national parties from both sides. But they are, at the very least, worth a few conversations.
Plaid Cymru leader Leanne Wood recently said: “A broad network in England, united behind a core set of progressive values could well include the Greens and other environmentalists. It could include the trade union movement, many in the churches and other faith organisations, the new People’s Assembly movement, our sister party Mebyon Kernow in Cornwall, refugees from Labour and the Lib Dems and, yes, refugees from Respect and the SWP, too.”
We don’t need to unite into one party to start having such conversations, and, if they are likely to take time, they need to start now.
(1)You could include the SDLP in here, and some might argue for Alliance. But they sit with Labour and the Lib Dems respectively so any attempt to woo them seems fated.
(2)In fact, there is another example of this. In 2010, the local Green Party backed Cheltenham Lib Dem candidate/MP Martin Horwood (though there was no formal deal). Because he was re-elected moments before Caroline Lucas, he occasionally claims to have been the first Green MP, but that certainly isn’t true.
(3) and my memory from 2004 insists that Greens and MK ran a joint list in that year’s Euro elections, but I can’t find a reference to it online. We did, though, certainly have a candidate from the now defunct Gibraltar Reform Party on the list.
It’s very early days as far as far as Left Unity is concerned – it won’t be formally launched as a party until the ende of November, but from the very early discussions that are taking place at the moment it seems clear that a) there is a strong feeling among many members that it would be ridiculous to stand in the Euro elections next May and some suggestion that the new party should formally support the Green regional lists as leverage to involve the Green Party in discussions about a non-aggression pact n the General Election in 2015.
While there are a number of TUSC supporters active in Left Unity who, with a few others I have come across, are extremely hostile to the Green Party, I think that such a non-aggression pact is more likely to be scuppered by some local Green Parties adopting a fundamentalist ‘we must stand in every possible election’ position by any widespread anti Green sentiment among LU members. Remember, initially the leading members of the Green Party in Birminghm where bitterly opposed to standing aside for Salma and the vote on the issue had to be forced on them by the membership.
LU will certainly support the handful of Left Labour MPs like John McDonnell and, I would have thought, will just as certaily support Caroline Lucas, who is very well thought of right across the Left. As far as LU adopting a position of supporting the left candidate best placed to win in any specific election, regardless of party, my best judgement is that there is strong sentiment in favour of such an unsectarian position among a great meany of the LU supporter I have discussed it with – although of course, it will be bitterly opposed by some, but only a small minority I hope.
I will certainly be putting forward a resolution along these lines to the LU Electoral Commission, which is currently working on a policy paper for the LU’s founding conference, which will be virtually identical to the motion which is put as an amendment by Green Left comrades at the GPEW conference next month. Let’s see what the Green party’s response is.
Adam
Your article closely matches my feelings as well.
My position is that we on the left in the Green Party should be drawing up lists of people (with others on the left) around the country who could be termed ‘best placed left’ in respect of their support at the ballot box and roots in their community.
The ‘List’ should include people in the Labour Left as well – including the like of John McDonnell and Jeremy Corbyn as it is clear while they shares very similar values to the left outside the Labour Party – they believe rightly or wrongly they are best staying inside Labour at the moment – I think I might agree with them on that stance despite the rottenness of the New Labour.
Their are also a number of left Labour Councillors we should add to the List as well.
I think, what we need to do is build up the left movement in the UK and try to find ways to support each other in struggles (as was called for at the People’s Assembly’ and also when needed at the ballot box.
TUSC/SP as Laurence pointed out about, is highly sectarian in wanting to expose the Greens and Labour Left and also have a tendency from my experience to greatly over promote their political support in the community – which is clearly shown by their pitiful results in elections.
The best placed left must be a genuine best placed left and not based on an inflated self worth.
The standing down of our selected Green Party candidate by the Green Party for Salma Yaqoob was endorsed by Caroline Lucas and significantly 84% of Green Party in the Hall Green Constituency – because of Salma’s shared values , roots in the local community and also because she was the best placed left. So it has been done before by us in the Green Party and could be done again.
I would also says the people that go on the best placed left list should not be party to the sects line of exposure of other good people on the left by using general bile about all members of one particular party being the same as the worse in their party.
I see that the sects are trying to force the new Left Unity group into the tunnel of exclusivity and sectarianism of the TUSC methodology of hating other lefts and that is a real shame if it takes place.
Left Unity can only be built on the 80% principle and understanding that the Labour Left, Greens. Plaid, NHP etc have a valuable role to play in building the alternative to the neo liberals.
The only left choice at the forthcoming euro elections is the Greens and perhaps Plaid in Wales (would need to know their lead candidate are) as the Green lead candidate is a good socialist green.
Its a shame that the RMT seem to want to have another no2eu campaign – with the SP following on in behind loyally as even sections of TUSC know what a poor idea this is and any way might stop them taking over as the electoral wing of Left unity – its all intrigue and front for them. http://leftunity.org/ & http://www.independentsocialistnetwork.org/?p=2402
I would personally like to hear the views of the current left unity leadership on the issue of ‘Best Placed Left ‘ position as they need to not to allow themselves to be box into sectarian if they wish to grow and make a real difference.
Your list is a good start – be good if we could start to build up a fuller list of names and places etc.
Roy
Philip – interesting read, thanks.
You might like to consider the various grass-roots English regionalists as well. I’ve blogged about them here: http://thecornishrepublican.blogspot.fr/2010/12/wonderful-chaos-that-is-english.html
Hi Dani,
Thanks – yeah, it’s a good point. Maybe a better example would be Norwich South or, I’d even say Oxford East – Greens will know our other long term targets pretty soon…
thanks,
Adam
Thanks for starting this conversation. Two brief points about Brighton occurred to me while reading your post:
1. As a left wing voter in Brighton who is not a member of any party, I will be pretty pissed off if we end up handing Brighton & Hove constituencies to the Tories again in 2015. Nancy Platts, Labour’s candidate for Brighton Kemptown, is one of those rare proper lefties in the Labour Party, I think, and I’m already a bit despairing that she and Davy Jones (who I like and respect enormously) are standing against each other.
2. TUSC didn’t stand against Caroline Lucas in 2010 – I’d be really surprised if they or Left Unity are considering standing against her in 2015. So I don’t think that’s your best example. There’s no need to offer them something in return for not standing – a win for Caroline is already something they want.
It all seems to be settled already around here anyway – maybe things are at a different stage elsewhere.
Rod – I don’t think that’s fair – there are a few proper left wingers hanging around in the Labour party. How to interact with them in a purely electoral way is a bit trickier than other smaller parties – they have much less agency: they can’t choose not to have a Labour candidate/Labour resource somewhere; and they can’t back anyone who isn’t Labour, or they’ll be thrown out of the party; they will be running on a manifesto which commits them to supporting cuts, meaning that if they rebel, then they have lied to their electorate, etc. But I think it is worth at least a conversation.
As a fairly involved Eastern Green I can report we’ve had this discussion. I think it was Jill who raised it and I filmed the whole debate. Will Duckworth (who was our guest speaker from the West Midlands) takes the view that he only joined because no one else in Dudley was prepared to be the Green Party Candidate. In fact until a decade ago there was no local party; he hadn’t started one yet.
In Hertsmere I was fairly vocal at the count approaching the Labour group and explaining that we in the Green Party don’t do electoral pacts. This is largely because we have to be very careful as a smaller party. The meetings with other parties in the run up to an elections have to be carefully controlled.
My approach is that everyone should be involved in politics and it’s sad that not more people are registered, vote, support a party with canvassing and leafleting, and people aren’t actively standing.
We had an interesting opportunity in Chipstead last time round when Labour (Anne) failed to get on the ballot. In hindsight maybe we could have made a last-minute attempt to unite the left but the candidate was smart enough to stay on the target to win strategy which got his local target candidate 50% of the vote.
This is a really good conversation to start. The one thing I think is missing though is a look at leftwing Labour people, do you think that they have a part to play at all? –
————————————————
Ash Left wing labour people????
Who are these left wing Labour People?
They all (like me) left years ago ,there are no genuine left wingers in the Labour party anymore.
Any Leftie with a shred of principle left those right wing Neo Con Red Tories years ago.
Adam,
That’s slightly more than a ‘non-aggression pact’ of not standing against each other, but positively campaigning for another party is an open alliance, which could become very tricky indeed if only agreed at a local level.
But yes it’d be a shame if all the differing groups you suggest all made the same ward their target.
As I noted to you in a tweet, the SDP still exist. I’ll leave your readers to decide what to make of them:
http://www.socialdemocraticparty.co.uk/home/4559244531.html
Political relationships between parties occupying a similar part of the spectrum vary widely. This can be more to do with the personalities involved that political good sense. As an ex Green party person, there was always a battle against those who favoured the stand everywhere and regards all other parties in the same way regardless of political common ground. I’m sure its the same in other parties.
Hi McAsh,
Yes, I was aware of this as I wrote it, but figured it deserves a whole separate debate I didn’t want to get bogged down in too much.
Thanks,
Adam
This is a really good conversation to start. The one thing I think is missing though is a look at leftwing Labour people, do you think that they have a part to play at all?
McAsh
Hi Adam.
Great article on the whole, electoral pacts certainly would make sense. However, a pact between parties such as the Greens and TUSC would be near enough impossible in the current climate.
A couple of years ago we had an informal electoral pact between the Greens and TUSC in Rugby. Any candidate which signed the “Rugby against the cuts” pledge gained the backing of the group and seats were split up to ensure no anti-cuts candidates are against each other.
It all fell to shit soon after though. The happenings in Brighton Council really pissed of the TUSC members and they decided to start standing against greens. We were given the usual spiel – we were a middle class party, we would go the same way as the German greens, the party is attacking workers in Brighton so can’t be trusted anywhere.
The local party was and still is made up of committed ecosocialists, yet we were being tarred with the same brush as Brighton.
In terms of Respect: I was really hoping that Salma Yaqoob would join the Greens after leaving Respect. In the Euros a while back she gave the West Midlands Green candidate her formal backing.
Dan – thanks, interesting stuff. I’d forgotten that Alliance backed Lady Sylvia Herman, and now you mention it, I have a vague memory of respect/Green conversations before the Euros, but had totally forgotten/never knew much about them.
I think you don’t necessarily need a base, depending on the election. Even just liberating activists to campaign for each other might in some cases mean some progress, though I agree that some might not know what they’d want from a pact, which does make them tricky.
Likewise I agree it’s thorny. As you say, Galloway is a big barrier. However, if Ruqqiah Collector (sp?) replaced him as the candidate (as is possible I guess), I’d happily back her… (To give one example).
Wasn’t there an attempt at a wider pact with Respect in the Euro election which broke down over disputes as to who wanted London?
Any pact would require two things that many of the smaller parties either don’t have or can’t easily identify, namely a base of known supporters and a known conflict with those bases. So while you correctly identify that Greens could do with Pavilion being left open by say the TUSC, where would they want in return? My betting is that they don’t know.
As you mention NI so much one of the most successful pacts is North Down where Alliance don’t run in favour of Lady Sylvia Herman, originally to boot out the rabid Bob McCartney of the UK Unionists. There not only do they have a large support base they can also identify and encourage it. The fact that this is also the place where the Greens have their own support in NI does beg the question what should they do at the next election. To be brutal it’s probably not in the Greens interests to run anyway for fear of the lost deposit.
My guessing is that pacts would have the most practical impact on a council level where a lot of these parties suddenly come into contention and have a realistic chance of winning in some places, but how often is there a big conflict of support base? And as a pertinent example, what wider impression would there be of ths Greens if they let Respect have a free run not through a lack of resources, but as a positive decision after all that has gone on with Galloway?
Hi Danny,
Thanks – longer term, I think Syriza is exactly the model we should aim for – and, in fact, Natalie Bennett had talked about them in this way a few times. I didn’t mention them above because I thought it would be more useful to start by surveying the landscape, but ultimately, that’s the direction I’d like to head in…
Adam – very interesting to read this. I’ve been having similar thoughts myself, from the perspective of someone who’s a member of no party but would be very happy for genuinely left-wing and eco-literate parties to do better in our elections.
I wonder if there’s anything to be learned from the Syriza coalition in Greece, that started as a scattered selection of left-wing and green parties and are now the official opposition? I know you’re suggesting a rather milder level of collaboration here, but presumably there must have been a process through which all these Greek parties started talking to each other and agreed to work together. I don’t know the story, it would be interesting to hear if anyone else out there does…
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coalition_of_the_Radical_Left
http://montypython.50webs.com/scripts/Life_of_Brian/8.htm