butchersapron
Bring back hanging
He wasn't asked to step down in anything -the CC explicitly said this would be and effective guilty plea.
SWP expulsions and squabbles
- Thread starter Nigel Irritable
- Start date
One_Stop_Shop
Well-Known Member
Why didn't they get him suspended from UAF then in that case?
butchersapron
Bring back hanging
In what case? Have another read of what i said. He was not asked to step down by the CC from anything as this would constitute a guilty.
belboid
Exasperated, not angry.
all that time you were in Workers Power and PR. As you well know. The rest of your post is irrelevant as you refuse to say what you would do when the woman refused to go to the police. In effect, you have said you would do absolutely nothing.
The39thStep
Urban critical thinker
As an aside are there any comments about the process Red Action used in their investigation into the behaviour of Dave Hann?
belboid
Exasperated, not angry.
Overall, little. But several members do have important roles in specific locations and sectors, quite possibly enough to get enough nominations for Hicks to be on the ballot paper.
Were they? I've not been a member for a very long time and I've not heard of only 2 of them.
ETA: or did you mean the existence of the DC itself?
butchersapron
Bring back hanging
Are you sure that you're shouting at the right person here?
I hear the IBT are available.
In addition to what VP and sihhi have said - I do not believe it is realistic to expect an outisde body to carry out an investigation - other than the police.
However if the complainant does not want to involve the police then the organisation should have a menu of options including seeking independent legal advice on how to conduct an internal investigation without opening themselves to challenge or jepordising any future possible police investigation - they should also start working with a specialist rape crisis organisation that can provide advice and support to complianants around this issue - and possible advice to the SWP in how to conduct such investigations and disciplinary procedures.
Also the DC should exist in two halfs - an investigating half and an adjudicating half that do not otherwise meet during the investigation. and of course having them co-opt people for their independence for the specific case is fine - people would have less to moan about afterwards.
It might also make sense to elect the DC for a period of two years to allow for specific training in handling specific types of sensitive case as well to reduce the chances of stupid questions.
Personally I would also bar current or former CC members from sitting on the DC.
However the main issue is more cultural than structural - the interests of the complainent and the accused and justice more broadly should be the only thing under consideration - not 'the party'.
However if the complainant does not want to involve the police then the organisation should have a menu of options including seeking independent legal advice on how to conduct an internal investigation without opening themselves to challenge or jepordising any future possible police investigation - they should also start working with a specialist rape crisis organisation that can provide advice and support to complianants around this issue - and possible advice to the SWP in how to conduct such investigations and disciplinary procedures.
Also the DC should exist in two halfs - an investigating half and an adjudicating half that do not otherwise meet during the investigation. and of course having them co-opt people for their independence for the specific case is fine - people would have less to moan about afterwards.
It might also make sense to elect the DC for a period of two years to allow for specific training in handling specific types of sensitive case as well to reduce the chances of stupid questions.
Personally I would also bar current or former CC members from sitting on the DC.
However the main issue is more cultural than structural - the interests of the complainent and the accused and justice more broadly should be the only thing under consideration - not 'the party'.
SpineyNorman
Inappropriate content removed
On the Unite thing - apparently the SWP Unite fraction actually voted to support McLuskey. But the CC disagreed and determined that since it was a close vote and not all the members were there it should be decided by conference, who voted to support Hicks.
I didn't hear this direct from the SWP but the person who told me is sympathetic and I have no reason to doubt what they told me.
I didn't hear this direct from the SWP but the person who told me is sympathetic and I have no reason to doubt what they told me.
And paid staff of the party should have the right to form their own staff association as well - with a clear and simple industrial relations mechanism, including disciplinary, grievance, and mediation proceedures and specific ones to deal with bullying and harrasment etc.
Or even two associations, one for the CC and one for centre staff and organisers.
Then there could be a sperately elected staffing committee of unpaid activists that meets with the staff associations four times a year in a JCNC type format. And the associations could have a facilities agreement as well.
Smaller organisations than the SWP's claimed size manage this.
Me and Cesere could draw one up for them?
Or even two associations, one for the CC and one for centre staff and organisers.
Then there could be a sperately elected staffing committee of unpaid activists that meets with the staff associations four times a year in a JCNC type format. And the associations could have a facilities agreement as well.
Smaller organisations than the SWP's claimed size manage this.
Me and Cesere could draw one up for them?
butchersapron
Bring back hanging
The main issue is the cultural expression of a structural problem.
I heard this as well and that at least one leading SWP member is threatening to walk over it.
SpineyNorman
Inappropriate content removed
Also, I'm going to find out what the SP would do in this situation. Not just so I can reply to belboid either - I'd quite like to know so I can settle my own coscience cos I'd be very, very uncomfortable with something like this.
I'm crap with stuff like this so I've not got any brilliant ideas - only thing I can come up with is that if one or other party believes the committee would be biased the committee, or someone like that, should find someone whose impartiality both parties trust and ask them to select one. Fuck knows what you do if they can't find anyone though.
Specific things I'm most uncomfortable about are the questions about drink and (previous) sexual conduct and the fact that the accused was in that meeting while the complainant was left outside. I don't think it's really appropriate for something like that to be aired in front of so many people either but if it's appealed I'm not sure what the alternative is.
I'm crap with stuff like this so I've not got any brilliant ideas - only thing I can come up with is that if one or other party believes the committee would be biased the committee, or someone like that, should find someone whose impartiality both parties trust and ask them to select one. Fuck knows what you do if they can't find anyone though.
Specific things I'm most uncomfortable about are the questions about drink and (previous) sexual conduct and the fact that the accused was in that meeting while the complainant was left outside. I don't think it's really appropriate for something like that to be aired in front of so many people either but if it's appealed I'm not sure what the alternative is.
Socialist Appeal could act as a final court of appeal for all the other groups?
Nigel Irritable
Five, Ten, Fifteen Years
Whatever you think about the merits or otherwise of being in the UL, being in it has been the strategy their Unite activists have been pursuing for quite a while. Now they are having the work they have done undone at a stroke. You can see why that would raise a lot of hackles.
Das Uberdog
remembers the alamo
well, the entirety of the SWP constitution and internal processes are unknown by most of the membership. and yes, i meant the DC as the DC - not as individuals (who are all relatively well known).
there certainly hasn't been a conference before where the CC's group hasn't been appointed to the role de facto though, which was my other point. i still think that's the most important factor. there were obviously serious problems with the protocol involved in this disputes case, as pointed out by the opposition in the transcription. besmirching the reputations of W and X with questions relating to them 'liking a drink' is the worst example of that - and the issues around the availability of 'Delta's' testimony are also unacceptable - but as has been noted the DC is not a professional judiciary and this is by far the most politically significant case they have had to deal with. on the whole i think that the practical remedies for these issues are laid out pretty well in the document, by the opposition, where they would have laid out clear boundaries on the areas onto which the DC was allowed to tread in terms of questioning, and also dealing with the issue of access to Delta's testimony.
the reason those proposals aren't - in reality - good enough, is that the organisation is still totally undemocratic. again, one of the most damning indictment of the CC's aims in respect to this case is the way they used it to expel the leading members of their internal opposition. not only this, but they have also removed those amongst their number who simply requested some sanity. it is this, not the specifics of the investigation (of which we will probably never know the full details) which makes the situation untenable; that there is literally no way that we can actually trust the verdict of the party's organs when relating to assessing the conduct of a member of its ruling faction. how could you trust it. with the best protocol and most reliable structures in the world we would still have to question it - this is why i think all the umming and ahhing about their methods misses the point, which is that a systemic rottenness in the SWP is actually the reason why there could never be a satisfactory conclusion to this case.
Nigel Irritable
Five, Ten, Fifteen Years
I think that you are way off base on this.
Leaving the specifics of this case aside, there are political reasons why we might prefer elected people to coopted people. But in practical terms, appointed people with a distance from both parties are in a drastically, enormously, better position to adjudicate on a serious complaint than a group of people who are close to one party whether elected or appointed. That the judge/jury can't reasonably be associates of one party without giving rise to a serious apprehension of bias is a really fundamental principle.
Nigel Irritable
Five, Ten, Fifteen Years
I'm reasonably sure that he is. This has come up before.
dennisr
the acceptable face
two sheds
Least noticed poster 2007
Yes, and did they ask the bloke whether he ever drinks, and whether he 'puts it about a bit'? Obvious rapist behaviour.
sihhi
Tyranny, like hell, is not easily conquered
Lots more that could be said, but:
Why must there be fewer adjudicators? There could perfectly well be more investigators, investigating different aspects (with a repetition of actions where necessary) and a small-ish number of adjudicators drawn at random from non-prejudiced peers. That's been the case in other legal traditions.
I mentioned nothing - zero - about "another group". I referred to fellow revolutionaries from the same tradition - and that's been turned into 'another party' by later posts. It could be people from the same tradition from different parties or ex-members of those parties or non-party Trotksyists - to form as un-prejudiced a group as possible in the circumstances. As you sort of hint at later, people from other traditions might be prejudiced towards doing "getting one over the SWP". A single party taking over the internal running of another party isn't what I suggested.
Using new non-high-up Irish SWP could have been an option. Their ability to withhold from spreading comment until after the process is finished would hopefully be influenced by the fact that they know neither accused nor accuser. Confidentiality is a tool for objectivity, one that needs to be defended, but it's not a catch-all to allow secrecy and stitch-up by investigating powers. Note according to the transcript it's only non-higher ups speaking from the floor that highlight some of the most egregious abuses in the process of the investigation.
Anything that mars the possibility of objectivity/impartiality of the investigating+judging bodies (such as knowing the accused for decades) should mean they rule themselves out of the task. (But they didn't).
If SWP comrades don't know of "the nature of women's oppression", then they should not be full members, but instead be on probation. The level of political education for SWP people, seems to me, weak. I don't know when this started but can give one recent example a full-timer, telling me been so for over year in 2012, HAD NEVER HEARD OF Red Action. University educated SWSS involved in anti-war actions etc. I got the same sense when discussing SWP internal politics, didn't know Chanie Rosenberg (Cliff's wife) was once a teacher, didn't want to/know how to discuss slates for the SWP AGM. (Don't want to reveal more).
They didn't call on comrades from elsewhere to oversee or listen in on their own investigation, and most significantly there has been no proposal to change structures from them. They relied, it seems to me, on habit (we've had/done investigations before) and on a self-assurance that can emerge simply from longevity in progressive politics. Everyone can be guilty of this. Something along the lines of 'We've been writing about oppression for 30 years, we know how to behave in an-anti-oppressive manner even though we know the accused'.
The point about "support" was that it would not have been given unless Comrade W and her younger female advocates demanded it. Even that "support" doesn't hold any weight against the structural inequality of the process - Comrade Delta prepping himself for weeks by point by point over the charges in Comrade W's statement. Comrade W being asked questions of behaviour (presumably behaviour that Comrade Delta has asserted in his less-stressed hearing constitutes consent) and expected to answer on the spot.
Most posters in fact have not recommended 'visit the police, it's the best thing do'. I have made no judgement of what course of action Comrade X took.
I fully respect the decision whatever motivated it. Only about 1 in 10 rapes are ever reported to the police anyway, or something like it - disputed statistics, therefore this case not being reported is not unexpected or .
It's wholly wrong to claim the SWP screwed up while the police could have done better.
(In this kind of case, any police involvement would come laden with its own internalised or whispered preconceptions about "lefties" and "lefty women" as the investigation proceeded, on top of other issues. I stress that we know nothing about Comrade W other than that she is a SWP member and not at the level of Delta et al. We can't know and shouldn't judge)
There is no fundamental better way because the root of the problem can not be tackled at a clean stroke, but the serious questions about the culture of the SWP remain.
Why must there be fewer adjudicators? There could perfectly well be more investigators, investigating different aspects (with a repetition of actions where necessary) and a small-ish number of adjudicators drawn at random from non-prejudiced peers. That's been the case in other legal traditions.
I mentioned nothing - zero - about "another group". I referred to fellow revolutionaries from the same tradition - and that's been turned into 'another party' by later posts. It could be people from the same tradition from different parties or ex-members of those parties or non-party Trotksyists - to form as un-prejudiced a group as possible in the circumstances. As you sort of hint at later, people from other traditions might be prejudiced towards doing "getting one over the SWP". A single party taking over the internal running of another party isn't what I suggested.
Using new non-high-up Irish SWP could have been an option. Their ability to withhold from spreading comment until after the process is finished would hopefully be influenced by the fact that they know neither accused nor accuser. Confidentiality is a tool for objectivity, one that needs to be defended, but it's not a catch-all to allow secrecy and stitch-up by investigating powers. Note according to the transcript it's only non-higher ups speaking from the floor that highlight some of the most egregious abuses in the process of the investigation.
Anything that mars the possibility of objectivity/impartiality of the investigating+judging bodies (such as knowing the accused for decades) should mean they rule themselves out of the task. (But they didn't).
If SWP comrades don't know of "the nature of women's oppression", then they should not be full members, but instead be on probation. The level of political education for SWP people, seems to me, weak. I don't know when this started but can give one recent example a full-timer, telling me been so for over year in 2012, HAD NEVER HEARD OF Red Action. University educated SWSS involved in anti-war actions etc. I got the same sense when discussing SWP internal politics, didn't know Chanie Rosenberg (Cliff's wife) was once a teacher, didn't want to/know how to discuss slates for the SWP AGM. (Don't want to reveal more).
They didn't call on comrades from elsewhere to oversee or listen in on their own investigation, and most significantly there has been no proposal to change structures from them. They relied, it seems to me, on habit (we've had/done investigations before) and on a self-assurance that can emerge simply from longevity in progressive politics. Everyone can be guilty of this. Something along the lines of 'We've been writing about oppression for 30 years, we know how to behave in an-anti-oppressive manner even though we know the accused'.
The point about "support" was that it would not have been given unless Comrade W and her younger female advocates demanded it. Even that "support" doesn't hold any weight against the structural inequality of the process - Comrade Delta prepping himself for weeks by point by point over the charges in Comrade W's statement. Comrade W being asked questions of behaviour (presumably behaviour that Comrade Delta has asserted in his less-stressed hearing constitutes consent) and expected to answer on the spot.
Most posters in fact have not recommended 'visit the police, it's the best thing do'. I have made no judgement of what course of action Comrade X took.
No one is suggesting this. No one is stating that "the police" offer any kind of solution particularly when we consider that 6.5% of reported rapes result in conviction, whilst 34% of trials result in conviction.
I fully respect the decision whatever motivated it. Only about 1 in 10 rapes are ever reported to the police anyway, or something like it - disputed statistics, therefore this case not being reported is not unexpected or .
It's wholly wrong to claim the SWP screwed up while the police could have done better.
(In this kind of case, any police involvement would come laden with its own internalised or whispered preconceptions about "lefties" and "lefty women" as the investigation proceeded, on top of other issues. I stress that we know nothing about Comrade W other than that she is a SWP member and not at the level of Delta et al. We can't know and shouldn't judge)
There is no fundamental better way because the root of the problem can not be tackled at a clean stroke, but the serious questions about the culture of the SWP remain.
Athos
Well-Known Member
Does anyone happen to now the standard of proof that was required for the charges to be substantiated? Would his guilt have to be proven beyond reasonable doubt, or just on the balance of probabilities? The former being the standard in criminal trials; the latter being more common in staff conduct procedures.
One_Stop_Shop
Well-Known Member
Belboid has got me confused with someone else.
And is ignoring everything. He is advocating a process in which the inevitable result of a guilty verdict would be that the media and police would get involved yet having a go for me saying thats the only option. Also saying that the SWP aren't the right people to investigate a murder or rape case doesn't mean do nothing.
butchersapron
Bring back hanging
I would suspect that there was no standard of proof outlined and understood by all beforehand.
Das Uberdog
remembers the alamo
what options does it leave?
Athos
Well-Known Member
I think you're right. It jumped out at me that nobody referred to that issue anywhere in the transcript.
But surely it's a big issue. There a massive difference between saying that "we cannot be absolutely certain that he did it", and saying "she's probably lying." Which is what the difference would ultimately boil down to.
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