Left Unity, the far-left party set up with the help of film director Ken Loach, is to discuss whether to dissolve and join Labour, or seek to affiliate to Jeremy Corbyn’s party.



Set up in 2013, Left Unity has stood candidates against Labour at the general election and hoped to become a focal point for disillusionment with Labour in 2015. But Corbyn’s election has led to mass resignations as its activists quit to join Labour.

The party now has about 1,500 members, but has lost 400 to Labour since the party’s summer leadership campaign. It lost a further grouping to the Green party before the general election. Most resignation letters state they want to join Labour under Corbyn because his leadership offers a better chance of creating socialism.

Left Unity will hold a conference this weekend to decide its future. Options include applying to affiliate to Labour, dissolving entirely, remaining unchanged or forming a network with people inside and outside the party. The idea of remaining as an independent party but affiliated to Labour is modelled on the Co-operative party.

One motion to the conference suggests “Corbyn’s election has transformed the landscape” adding: “The struggle inside the Labour party itself over its direction and policies is now critical for the future of the left and the interests of the vast majority of people in Britain.”

Another states Corbyn’s election amounts to “a revolution in the workers’ movement in Britain”, adding: “All halfway house projects, opportunist attempts to chase the Greens, adaptations to petty nationalism have been exposed, wrecked or left high and dry. Left Unity commits itself to the project of transforming the Labour party into an instrument for working-class advance and international socialism.

“Towards that end we will join with others and seek the closest unity of the left inside and outside the Labour party.”

Many motions urge Left Unity to join Momentum, the grassroots group set up by some Corbyn supporters in the wake of his victory.

Some Left Unity members recognise that Labour is likely to reject an affiliation, but the debate this weekend highlights the extent to which former left groups outside the Labour party have been attracted by Corbyn and want to become involved.

Corbyn has always shown a willingness to work with parties and campaign groups to the left of Labour, partly explaining his ability to recruit so many to pay £3 to vote for him in the leadership election.

The Fire Brigades Union and the RMT, two unions that used to be affiliated to Labour have been looking at the possibility of re-affiliating.

The news that Left Unity might dissolve and seek to join Labour en masse will unnerve some Labour members who will worry that it is effectively being taken over by the far-left.

David Blunkett, the former home secretary, urged traditional social democrats to join Labour to prevent such a takeover. Lord Blunkett again attacked Momentum, saying it represented a party within a party.

The two far-left groups that have insisted they will remain outside Labour are the Socialist Workers party, a longstanding Trotskyist party, and the Socialist party, an organisation that has a lineage that goes back to the Militant Tendency – an entryist party that held sway in the 80s.