Communist Party of Britain - History

History

The Communist Party of Britain (CPB) was formed in 1988 by a disaffected segment of the Communist Party of Great Britain (CPGB), including the editorship of the Morning Star, largely supporters of the "Communist Campaign Group" (CCG). The founders of the CPB attacked the leadership of the CPGB for allegedly abandoning 'class politics' and the leading role of the working class in the revolutionary process in Britain. The youth wing of the CPGB, the Young Communist League, had collapsed, and the Morning Star was losing circulation.

The next year, the leaders of CPGB formally declared that they had abandoned the party's programme British Road to Socialism. Members of the CPB perceived this as the CPGB turning its back on socialism.

Membership of the CPB was boosted after the dissolution of the CPGB in 1991 and its reformation as the "Democratic Left". Many members of the Straight Left faction who had stayed in the CPGB formed a group called "Communist Liaison" which later opted to join the CPB. Others remained in the Democratic Left or joined the Labour Party.

This split within the Communist Party of Great Britain was not the first. The Communist Party of Britain (Marxist-Leninist) was established in 1968 by a leading engineering union official, Reg Birch, who had been a prominent member of the CPGB and at that time a supporter of the Beijing line in the Sino-Soviet dispute. Prior to the collapse of the Soviet Union, ideological differences between party members led to the establishment of the New Communist Party (formed in 1977), who also opposed 'eurocommunism'. The splitting up of the Communist Party of Great Britain resulted in bitter divisions. The CPB's account of its history claims "the ruling class worked to undermine it from within" which "the old Communist Party leadership failed to recognise and withstand ... It succumbed to reformist ideas, drifting away from its class basis, even attacking the leadership of the 1984-85 miners’ strike and expelling many of the Party’s finest militants".

The CPB was largely the creation of the "Communist Campaign Group" and one of its prominent leaders, Mike Hicks, was elected to the post of General Secretary when the CPB was founded in 1988. In January 1998 Hicks was ousted as general secretary in a 17 - 13 vote moved by John Haylett (who was also editor of the Morning Star) at a meeting of the CPB's Executive Committee. Hicks' supporters on the Management Committee of the Morning Star followed by suspending and then sacking Haylett, which led to a prolonged strike at the Morning Star, ending in victory for Haylett and his reinstatement. Some of Hicks' supporters were expelled and others resigned in protest. They formed a discussion group called Marxist Forum and continue to hold prominent positions at the Marx Memorial Library in London.

The CPB has always been actively engaged in the labour and trade union movement in Britain. It is part of the Stop the War Coalition; the movement's chair, Andrew Murray is a Communist Party of Britain member. Prior to the formation of the Respect - The Unity Coalition, headed by George Galloway and supported by the Socialist Workers Party, the CPB engaged in a major debate about whether to join an electoral alliance with Galloway and the SWP. Those in favour, including General Secretary Robert Griffiths, Andrew Murray and Morning Star editor John Haylett, were however defeated at a Special Congress in 2004.