Long Shot at Margate
The one comforting feature of the list of resolutions for the annual conference of the Labour Party—always the most depressing political document of the year—is that it will be radically shortened before the conference meets. Presumably some of the more illiberal of the demands of the constituency parties and trades unions will be eliminated before Septem- ber 28th. It should not be beyond the powers of the more responsible members of the Labour Party to convince the faithful of Birmingham, Small Heath and Portsmouth (South) that their requirement that all persons who have co-operated in any way with de-nationalisation measures should be banned from future employment in the industries concerned when the Labour Party re-nationalises them constitutes what the trades unions call victimisation." It will certainly be easy to reduce the eleven resolutions calling for the nationalisation of the land to one, though it is unlikely that the demand will be eliminated altogether. It may even he endorsed by the con- ference. If it is, it will put the Executive in the same awkward spot as last year, when the Blackpool conference required it to draw up a list of industries for nationalisation .—a requirement that has been met so inadequately that there will certainly be trouble about it at Margate this year. The plain fact is that the Executive cannot resist all the wild demands of the constituency parties all of the time. Even the degree of resist.nce it has put up so far has produced a threat of a split which is even worse this year than it was last. The more narrow-minded Tories may rub their hands at the row that is going to take place at Margate. But they, may not have made sufficient allowance for yet another victory for the Labour Party's left wing. If the resolutions in their present raw state are anything to go on, the possibility of such a victory cannot be ruled out.
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