Labor's Purge

A victory for moderation

The hecklers in the back of the gilded dance hall of Blackpool's Winter Garden Complex were, for the most part, uncharacteristically silent. The debate, Labor Party Leader Michael Foot, 69, coolly told his party's annual conference, was vital to Labor's chances of ousting the Conservative government of Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher. Thatcher is expected to call a general election by next fall, and Foot's warning did not go unheeded. After hours of impassioned speeches by partisans of left, right and center, the 1,229 delegates voted by an unexpectedly large ratio of more than 3 to 1 to curb the rapidly rising power of Labor's militant far-left fringe.

The instrument of the purge, and the focus of last week's debate, was a Foot-proposed "register" of approved party organizations. Establishing such a list would permit the expulsion from Labor of members of any group not meeting certain standards of moderation. The move was aimed specifically at ridding the party of the Militant Tendency, a 6,000-member Trotskyist group that has successfully infiltrated the party organization and wielded considerable power at local levels. By advocating such policies as abolition of the monarchy, nationalization of Britain's 200 largest companies and expulsion of U.S. forces and nuclear arms from the country, the militants have alienated many of Labor's more traditional blue-collar supporters and spurred deep ideological splits within the party. Labor's standing in the polls has slumped to a 15-year low and a number of popular party figures have defected to the centrist Social Democratic Party formed last year.

The establishment of the register and a subsequent move last week to give moderates a majority on Labor's policy-setting National Executive Committee represent a clear victory for the party's majority of middle-of-the-road socialists. But the militants have vowed to fight back. Meanwhile, Thatcher is still riding the wave of public approval caused by her two-fisted conduct of the Falklands war, though such memories are beginning to fade. And despite 14% unemployment, the highest since the 1930s, Labor has been too preoccupied with factional squabbling to gain in the polls. Late surveys show Labor 13 percentage points behind the Conservatives and only three points ahead of the S.D.P.-Liberal alliance. Though Foot may finally have begun to quell opposition inside his party, there may not be enough time left before a general election to subdue the opposition outside.

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