• What about the position of Wilson within the Party? Given what you've said in the Tribune letter don't you think that it's necessary to remove him as leader of the Party?
While he is Prime Minister there are no elections for leader. I believe we must sharpen up the situation by finding a new method of deciding the Labour Government. The members of the Government and the leader should be elected by the Party as a whole - by the Party conference. The Tribune group has published a pamphlet on this.
This is the only way to remove the vast. system of patronage which exists in Parliament. The right wing will all have to be removed. But it has to be done by the processes of the movement. The elections for the National Executive now have a very high degree of importance - for example the stand of Eric Heffer. Also very important is the contest for Treasurership against Callaghan.
• What do you think about the statement in today's Evening Standard (12 June) that you won't vote against Wilson because it will bring down the Government?
I think it's nonsense. A Labour Government doesn't fall because it loses one vote - it has to lose a vote of confidence. We can vote against on something like defence and the Government won't fall - Wilson's not suicidal.
In any case, I don't accept that the fall of the Government would automatically lead to the return of the Tories. A general write to us and say that they've decided to set up a Tribune group. But the Tribune group doesn't have a staff or anything.
• How do you think organisations outside the Labour Party can best take part in the struggle which is developing?
I believe that all the socialist organisations, including the Communist Party, should stop contesting against the Labour Party elector-i. ally and should apply for affiliation to the Labour Party. I have always been against ban bans and prescriptions. Selection for every post in the labour movement, including local councillors and MPs, would then be on the basis not of who is in the Labour Party or the Communist Party or who is a Trotskyist, but who is best for the job.
Red Weekly readers and young Marxists, including members of the IMG, should forget the romance of other countries - Russia in 1917 and so on - and understand that you can't bypass the Labour Party. The Labour Party represents the history of the British working class and you can't overtake history overnight. The Labour Party was a federation initially and it still has its local autonomy and federal base. This is the reason for its stability. You have to refashion the tools the working class, has fashioned. I believe all socialists, particularly young socialists, should join the Labour Party and get into the mainstream. I think the various Trotskyist groupings should assess the situation carefully and without romance, and should then help to take hold of the Labour Party locally and nationally for socialist purpose.