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Supporting Jeremy Corbyn, Liverpool, 2.7.16, photo Simon Worthington (Click to enlarge)
Merseyside says: Keep Corbyn, sack the Blairites
Hugh Caffrey
In response to the Blairites' vicious campaign, a mood of mass support for Jeremy Corbyn's embattled leadership is developing on Merseyside. 4,000 people marched through Liverpool on Saturday 2 July under the slogan "Keep Corbyn, Build our movement". This is just 24 hours after over 1,000 rallied under the same slogan in Manchester despite the downpours.
Twelve months since Corbyn came to Merseyside during his leadership election campaign, moods have hardened against the Blairite Red Tories. The idea now of building a mass movement to keep Jeremy Corbyn and drive out the Blairites as part of preparing to fight and win a general election is widely accepted among rank and file Corbyn supporters.
Outside the BBC, Liverpool, 2.7.16, photo by Simon Worthington (Click to enlarge)
Despite our exclusion from Momentum and the Labour Party, Socialist Party members and supporters have been steadfast in arguing for a non-sectarian way forward: for Jeremy Corbyn to lead a mass struggle on a clear anti-austerity basis, cease any attempts to appease the Blairites, drive out the Red Tories and democratise the Labour Party.
These are the conclusions already drawn by thousands upon thousands, who have been following our campaign for these policies and agree with it completely. They have no time for half-measures or retreats or bureaucratic manoeuvres; but want Jeremy Corbyn to go on the bold socialist offensive that we advocate.
Over 100 copies of the Socialist were bought, with hundreds of leaflets taken and a number of 'join the Socialist Party' cards completed.
Liverpool, 2.7.16, photo Simon Worthington (Click to enlarge)
The demonstration follows a meeting held earlier in the week by Liverpool Socialist Party - attended by 40 people, a majority of them at their first Socialist Party meeting - that discussed the post-referendum situation and the way forward for a socialist struggle. The meeting resolved to take the fight to the Blairites, build a campaign of mass mobilisation to 'keep Corbyn', and link it with a thorough-going anti-austerity socialist programme that can win mass support.
Elsewhere on the same night, Liverpool Momentum also met with a significantly increased turnout, which led to Saturday's demonstration.
A mass national conference followed by more and bigger local demonstrations are the next steps to turn this mood of resistance into the necessary mass movement.
This version of this article was first posted on the Socialist Party website on 4 July 2016 and may vary slightly from the version subsequently printed in The Socialist.
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