Final Reports From The Convention Of The Left

Final reports from the Convention of The Left in Manchester indicate the event was a great success and the atmosphere at the final "Question Time for The Left" certainly sounded good from the report on the Red Pepper Convention blog -

Their verdict on the convention was unanimous, though: it was ‘historic’ (Wainwright), ‘a tremendous success’ (McDonnell), and even ‘maybe, just maybe, the start of 21st century socialism in Europe’ (Wall).

The discussion darted from why left organisations are so ‘pale and male’, to the anti-war movement, to free public transport to tackle climate change – but it somehow stayed on track, making real links between the problems we face without resorting to the old ‘the problem is capitalism’ schtick. Suddenly the underlying question wasn’t ‘what are the problems?’ or ‘can we work together?’ – it was ‘how will we win?’

The final Convention Bulletin from Wednesday is here.

The optimistic assessment of John Nicholson, prominent organiser of the Convention is here. The idea of a united campaign against fuel poverty coming out of the Convention is a good one.

By all accounts a good basis for further progressive cooperation has been established and hopefully the proposed Local Left Forums will start springing up and becoming spaces for positive cooperation on mutually agreed projects and goals.