Is Benn a right wing agent?

Scan page 4

Do you know that Tony Benn is working to help the "pro-NATO, pro-EEC, and pro-armed forces" faction in the No? Then you haven't been reading your Newsline, daily organ of Gerry Healy, Ayatollah of the Workers Revolutionary Party!

In a virulently hostile campaign begun in the middle of April, Newsline has been denouncing Benn.

Apparently he is splitting the left, "going against the trade unions" , deiying the majority of Tribune MPs who oppose his candidature, and above all he is providing the Tory press with ammunition!

Newsline thinks Benn knows he can't win. "So. what then is he playing at?" they ask indignantly. In the agent and spy-obsessed world of the WRP this question means: what is the ulterior motive, who is he serving, whose agent is he?

Newsline editorial writer (15/4/81) goes on rhetorically:

"Is this [standing against Healey] the action of a man deeply concerned about the future policies of the Labour Party and anti-Tory struggles, or someone who is wilfully trying to break up the mass movement and create unnecessary diversions?"

So what game is Benn playing then? The Newsline . writer obviously thinks he knows. The clue, which he shares with the reader, is in the answer to this question: what will be the result the election if Benn loses?

Using a computer, the WRP have worked this out in advance: if Benn loses, Healey would be Deputy Leader. And he will be strengthened by having beaten Benn. Thus:

"By his action, Benn is consolidating Healey".

Branded

Benn, who fights the right wing, is thus branded by Newsline-alongside advocates of resistance to the Tories and to the Labour councils who administer the cuts-as one of "Thatcher's people"

There is a coherent political logic to this, of course. Ihe politics of the WRP are now comprehensively right wing.

Yet Newsline's denunciation of Benn was very sudden. Until the day before the editorial entitled "The Strange Case of Mr Benn" (15/4/81) it had supported Benn's candidacy!

For example an editorial on April 4 said this:

"This [Foot's argument] is intended to try to put Benn in the position of a splitter who is disrupting party unity by challenging Healey. In reality it is an argument against ever having an election for leading posts, since there will never be an ideal occasion to hold it...

Foot appeals to Benn on the basis of party unity, but this is simply a cover for capitulating to the blackmail of the right wing who keep threatening to join the social democrats unless they get their way This is well put. An editorial Benn's right to stand" , (6/4/81) continues in these same strong terms. It concludes by explicitly supporting Benn's "right to challenge Healey"

Then came the Great Change. Benn suddenly changed from being a champion against The IMF's man in the Shadow Cabinet" into someone helping the right wing and the "proarmed forces faction"

Sepculation as to why there was a change of line would be idle. Maybe it was a response to Benn signing the Socialist Organiser condemnation of the WRP's libel case against the paper.