The Scottish Labour Party (SLP) was a socialist party in Scotland that was active between 1976 and 1981. It formed as a breakaway from the UK Labour Party. It won three council seats in 1977 but lost its MPs at the 1979 election and was dissolved two years later.

History

The party formed on 18 January 1976 as a breakaway from the UK Labour Party, by members disaffected with the then Labour Government's failure to secure a devolved Scottish Assembly, as well as with its social and economic agenda. The formation of the SLP was led by Jim Sillars, then MP for

South Ayrshire South Ayrshire (; , ) is one of thirty-two council areas of Scotland, covering the southern part of Ayrshire. It borders onto Dumfries and Galloway, East Ayrshire and North Ayrshire. South Ayrshire had an estimated population in 2021 of 112,45 ...

, John Robertson, then MP for Paisley, and Alex Neil, the UK Labour Party's senior Scottish researcher. The split came just before the resignation of

Harold Wilson James Harold Wilson, Baron Wilson of Rievaulx (11 March 1916 – 23 May 1995) was a British statesman and Labour Party (UK), Labour Party politician who twice served as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom, from 1964 to 1970 and again from 197 ...

as prime minister and party leader and the election of

James Callaghan Leonard James Callaghan, Baron Callaghan of Cardiff ( ; 27 March 191226 March 2005) was a British statesman and Labour Party (UK), Labour Party politician who served as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from 1976 to 1979 and Leader of the L ...

as his successor. Within a few weeks of its formation, ''The Glasgow Herald'' reported that a System Three

opinion poll An opinion poll, often simply referred to as a survey or a poll, is a human research survey of public opinion from a particular sample. Opinion polls are usually designed to represent the opinions of a population by conducting a series of qu ...

showed the party was taking a quarter of the Labour Party's electoral support in Scotland. The same poll also gave the SLP a higher share of support in Scotland (8%) than the well-established

Liberal Party The Liberal Party is any of many political parties around the world. The meaning of ''liberal'' varies around the world, ranging from liberal conservatism on the right to social liberalism on the left. For example, while the political systems ...

(6%). Neil was reported to be "staggered and delighted by this wonderful result" and warned that SLP could expect to make gains in areas of urban deprivation in the west of Scotland that usually supported Labour. Almost immediately the SLP became the focus for

entryism Entryism (also called entrism, enterism, infiltration, a French Turn, boring from within, or boring-from-within) is a political strategy in which an organization or state encourages its members or supporters to join another, usually larger, organiz ...

from the

International Marxist Group The International Marxist Group (IMG) was a Trotskyist group in Britain between 1968 and 1982. It was the British Section of the Fourth International. It had around 1,000 members and supporters in the late 1970s. In 1980, it had 682 members; by ...

(IMG), and at the party's first congress in October 1976 the IMG was expelled, along with a number of branches whose members were not associated with the IMG. According to Henry Drucker's account, the IMG's role was rather limited; Sillars used this as an excuse for purging anyone he did not see entirely eye-to-eye with or who represented a significant threat to his leadership. The expellees formed a rival Scottish Labour Party (Democratic Wing), and this in turn later renamed itself the Scottish Socialist League (SSL). Gradually, those members of the SSL who had not been associated with the IMG drifted out, and the SSL was reabsorbed into the

Trotskyist Trotskyism (, ) is the political ideology and branch of Marxism developed by Russian revolutionary and intellectual Leon Trotsky along with some other members of the Left Opposition and the Fourth International. Trotsky described himself as an ...

Fourth International The Fourth International (FI) was a political international established in France in 1938 by Leon Trotsky and his supporters, having been expelled from the Soviet Union and the Communist International (also known as Comintern or the Third Inte ...

. The SLP had little electoral success, winning only three council seats at the 1977 local elections. The party polled only 583 votes in the Garscadden by-election in 1978. At the 1979 general election, the SLP fought three seats, including Sillars's attempt at being re-elected (Robertson chose to step down). Sillars came close to retaining his seat in South Ayrshire, but this was clearly a personal vote built up over the years he had already served as an MP, as the other two candidates – standing in Paisley and Edinburgh Central respectively – polled very poorly indeed. This failure prompted the SLP to disband in 1981; and members either fell out of active politics, re-joined the Labour Party, or chose to join the

Scottish National Party The Scottish National Party (SNP; ) is a Scottish nationalist and social democratic party. The party holds 61 of the 129 seats in the Scottish Parliament, and holds 9 out of the 57 Scottish seats in the House of Commons of the United Kingdom, ...

(SNP), which both Sillars and Neil did, with both rising to high office in the SNP. The SLP adventure is generally looked upon as an ambitious failure, but Sillars has himself put this down to a lack of planning before the decision to launch the party. Unlike the SLP, the

Social Democratic Party The name Social Democratic Party or Social Democrats has been used by many political parties in various countries around the world. Such parties are most commonly aligned to social democracy as their political ideology. Active parties Form ...

(SDP) meticulously planned their breakaway from the Labour Party, and were much more successful. Sillars has claimed that the SLP did at least provide a forerunner to the SNP's later dialogue with the left.

Membership

Although the SLP was initially reported (usually by the party's leaders) to have as many as 2,000 to 3,000 members, Drucker later estimated that numbers had actually peaked at 883 in October 1976, the same month that the party split in two. This figure disguised a strong imbalance in favour of Sillars's Ayrshire fiefdom, with 276 members (nearly one-third of the total) recorded as being represented by that county's delegation to the party's 1976 congress. Thus a highly unusual situation emerged whereby branches in small Ayrshire villages such as

Patna Patna (; , ISO 15919, ISO: ''Paṭanā''), historically known as Pataliputra, Pāṭaliputra, is the List of state and union territory capitals in India, capital and largest city of the state of Bihar in India. According to the United Nations, ...

and

Ochiltree Ochiltree is a conservation village in East Ayrshire, Scotland, near Auchinleck and Cumnock. It is one of the oldest villages in East Ayrshire, with archaeological remains indicating Stone Age and Bronze Age settlers. A cinerary urn was found i ...

reported membership numbers higher than those for the cities of

Aberdeen Aberdeen ( ; ; ) is a port city in North East Scotland, and is the List of towns and cities in Scotland by population, third most populous Cities of Scotland, Scottish city. Historically, Aberdeen was within the historic county of Aberdeensh ...

and

Stirling Stirling (; ; ) is a City status in the United Kingdom, city in Central Belt, central Scotland, northeast of Glasgow and north-west of Edinburgh. The market town#Scotland, market town, surrounded by rich farmland, grew up connecting the roya ...

. The SLP did, however, contain a number of committed activists who would later go on to achieve a name for themselves as mainstream politicians, including John McAllion, who became MP and then MSP for Dundee East; Maria Fyfe, one time MP for Glasgow Maryhill; Sheila Gilmore, later MP for

Edinburgh East Edinburgh East was a burgh constituency of the House of Commons of the United Kingdom, House of Commons of the Parliament of the United Kingdom. It elected one Member of Parliament (MP) by the first past the post system of election. It existed ...

; and Charlie Gordon, future leader of

Glasgow City Council Glasgow City Council (Scottish Gaelic: ''Comhairle Baile Ghlaschu'') is the Local government in Scotland, local government authority for Glasgow, Glasgow City council area, Scotland. In its modern form it was created in 1996. Glasgow was former ...

and MSP for Glasgow Cathcart. These individuals all chose to join (or in some cases re-join) the Labour Party rather than follow Sillars into the SNP. Also involved as members of the SLP were: *

Neal Ascherson Charles Neal Ascherson (born 5 October 1932) is a Scottish journalist and writer. In his youth he fought for the British in the Malayan Emergency. He has been described by Radio Prague as "one of Britain's leading experts on central and easte ...

* Chris Bambery *

Colin Boyd, Baron Boyd of Duncansby Colin Boyd, Baron Boyd of Duncansby, (born 7 June 1953) is a former Scottish judge who was a Senator of the College of Justice from June 2012 to June 2024. He was Lord Advocate for Scotland from 24 February 2000 until his resignation on 4 Octob ...

* George Kerevan * Tom Nairn * Danus Skene Neal Ascherson was the Scottish political correspondent for ''

The Scotsman ''The Scotsman'' is a Scottish compact (newspaper), compact newspaper and daily news website headquartered in Edinburgh. First established as a radical political paper in 1817, it began daily publication in 1855 and remained a broadsheet until ...

'' at this time, and was the most prominent example of a curious phenomenon that distinguished the party from its rivals: namely, the relatively high proportion of journalists on its membership roll. Other leading figures from the Scottish press who joined the SLP were Bob Brown of ''

The Times ''The Times'' is a British Newspaper#Daily, daily Newspaper#National, national newspaper based in London. It began in 1785 under the title ''The Daily Universal Register'', adopting its modern name on 1 January 1788. ''The Times'' and its si ...

'' (who was the party's first chairman), Stewart MacLachlan and Ruth Wishart of the '' Daily Record'', James Fyfe (husband of Maria) of the '' Glasgow Herald'', and James Frame of the ''

Edinburgh Evening News The ''Edinburgh Evening News'' is a daily newspaper and website based in Edinburgh, Scotland. It was founded by John Wilson (1844–1909) and first published in 1873. It is printed daily, except on Sundays. It is owned by National World, whic ...

.'' Chris Baur, Scottish political correspondent for both the

BBC The British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) is a British public service broadcaster headquartered at Broadcasting House in London, England. Originally established in 1922 as the British Broadcasting Company, it evolved into its current sta ...

and the ''

Financial Times The ''Financial Times'' (''FT'') is a British daily newspaper printed in broadsheet and also published digitally that focuses on business and economic Current affairs (news format), current affairs. Based in London, the paper is owned by a Jap ...

'', was a sympathiser who was consulted by the others, but did not join the party.Drucker, ''Breakaway'', pp. 20-1, 57, 66.

Electoral performance

Notes

References

Bibliography