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The Lothian MSP can make Labour relevant to the working class, writes VINCE MILLS

NEIL FINDLAY, list MSP for Lothian, began his address to the Campaign for Socialism conference on Saturday October 25 with a story that got a tense gathering laughing.

As reported in the Morning Star, the meeting was standing room-only and took place the day after Johann Lamont resigned.

There was an atmosphere of hostility toward the Westminster careerists who had manoeuvred against an expectation that the left might just field a candidate in the leadership contest.

Talking about the attitudes he had encountered during the referendum campaign, Findlay recounted how while on holiday after the vote a disappointed No-voting Scots couple lets call them Alick and Nicki surveyed the breakfast menu in a Turkish seaside bar.

See, said Alick. This is always happening to us. He pointed angrily at two options available. One was a full English two lira (56p) cheaper than the full Scottish, perhaps because of the inclusion of square sliced sausage.

Attempts at assuaging the raging Scot by the owner were counterproductive.

Findlays use of that anecdote shows why he will win the contest for the leadership of the Scottish Labour Party. He understands the psyche of working-class Scots. Everybody laughed at his story Yes and No voters alike.

Of course that is not enough. What Findlay also shows is a grasp of the seriousness of the situation facing Labour and the left in Scotland. He is a member of the Campaign for Socialism, formed exactly 20 years ago, because he understands that the unstated ambition of the Blairites was to transform the Labour Party from a party of the working class into something much closer to the US Democratic Party. Something with no affiliated unions, no left wing worth talking about and completely committed to capitalism as an ideology.

Twenty years ago the campaign warned that if Labour pursued this route and abandoned the working class then ultimately the working class would abandon it.

See the rest here:
Morning Star :: Spice it up Mr Findlay