Graham Campbell is a Glasgow Councillor, Chair of the SNP BAME Network & Co-Convener of SNP Socialists.
This article has been rewritten several times such have been the dramatic twists and turns in the short lifetime of the temporarily named Your Party (YP). As an SNP councillor, a decades long Independence activist and Co-Convener of SNP Socialists, you’d expect me to have an interest in all of this. Add into this the little known fact that I was on the branch executive of Islington North Labour for a few years in the 1990s and have remained friends with Jeremy Corbyn since then. Then there’s the better known (and often criticised) fact that between coming to live in Scotland in 2002 and until I joined the SNP in 2016, I was associated with several socialist organisations in Scotland. So it’s clear I have some insight into at least some of the characters involved in YP both in Scotland and in England.
So who are these characters and what is their political vision? Now that the mainstream media gloating over the leadership divisions within Your Party and threats of legal action are subsiding, their supporters are witnessing an uneasy calm descend on their new party. The very public spat between Jeremy Corbyn and the Independent Alliance of Pro-Gaza MPs elected in July 2024 on one side and the MP Zarah Sultana who resigned from Labour to become ‘Co-leader’ (with JC) on the other, left their membership caught in the middle. You can’t help but wonder what higher profile members like ex-Tyneside Mayor Jamie Driscoll, former South African MP and anti-apartheid campaigner Andrew Feinstein and ex-Labour MP Beth Winter were thinking throughout all this. This isn’t merely about two rival factions (with rival online membership portals) but about several different competing political visions.
1) Ex-Corbynistas looking for a Labour Party mark 2 led by MPs and trade union bureaucrats as a loose left alliance.
2) A looser ‘Peace & Justice’ Gaza independents’ alliance led by the MPs (reflecting the business and landlord backgrounds of some).
3) A fully grassroots-run democratic socialist (or even anti-capitalist) party not controlled by MPs.
Founding meetings in Scotland
Days before this ‘civil war’ at the top, local founding meetings were organised across the UK. In Scotland with a reported 60,000 sign-ups, 200 attended the founding meeting of the Glasgow branch on September 4th 2025. Five further branches were established in Aberdeen, Edinburgh & Lothians, Dundee, Lanarkshire and Forth Valley. These 6 Scottish branches co-signed a September 20th appeal for “calmer heads to prevail”, stressing Your Party was too important in the context of rising fascism and that it “doesn’t belong to MPs. It belongs to all of us” ie its members.
A veteran left comrade told me the Glasgow branch was organised by “an ad-hoc group which seemed to mainly consist of some ex Labour Corbynistas, ‘movement’ people, some pro-indy leftists but definitely not any organised groups on the left”. With an age profile predominantly under 30 and about 40% women it was a creditable start (although worryingly few came from minoritised and racially marginalised communities).
Others attending said discussions were fruitful but follow-up actions were left unclear although since then, efforts are apparently ongoing to establish local organisers. The Glasgow facilitators, to their credit, seemingly didn’t impose their own views, allowing more open discussion. Glasgow workshops debated anti racism, environmental and electoral strategy with one comrade describing it as having “a refreshing lack of far-left groups repeating party lines” thus permitting more open discussion with some differences of opinion, as you would expect but overall “very participatory, very democratic”.
Attempts to impose policy defeated
Perhaps less democratically, an alliance of well-known left groups (SWP, Socialist Party Scotland and ex-SSP members) and prominent left-wing individuals under the banner of the new UK left wing organisation ‘Collective” apparently made a bid for recognition as the Scottish leadership. They wanted to impose ‘the right of Scotland to self-determination’ (which is also Corbyn’s position). This would have mirrored the STUC position of more devolved tax-raising and spending powers and was intended to gain credibility within the labour movement and keep Independence supporters on side. The fly in the ointment was the attempted imposition on what was supposed to be a grassroots up organisation. It didn’t work because Collective was then superseded by an influx of activists into YP branches so at the time of writing, YP does not yet have a position on Independence or on the right to autonomy. It seems to be to be a bit of an own goal given the unlikeliness of a Scottish left wing party (particularly those from the 16-35 age group with consistent 70% + support for Independence) deciding not to support the right to self determination at the very least. At UK level their members seem to be embracing that right for different reasons. I am hearing that a new democratic socialist platform from 30+ YP branches is already calling for a fully democratic party to be launched – regardless of the MPs.
That’s the trouble with telling members that it’s ‘their’ party. They believe it and act accordingly. I sympathise more with Sultana’s calls for transparency and members being in control (even if she jumped the gun with the membership portal). Sultana correctly identified bureaucratic anti-democratic impulses stemming not from Corbyn himself but from his camp.
Jeremy Corbyn & his advisors
I have known Jeremy Corbyn since the 1980s and when our 56 SNP MPs were elected in 2015 we got ‘reacquainted’. I hold him in high esteem. But the core team he surrounds himself with have past form. Who can forget them bureaucratically closing down Momentum (the mass movement that brought Corbyn to the Labour leadership in 2015) leaving members demobilised and demoralised and Corbyn defenceless against the Labour right’s antisemitism onslaught?
Corbyn still relies on those self-same advisors who seem to have learned no lessons. He also leans on the Gaza independent MPs some of whom are business-owners and landlords with no previous associations with the left. Let’s face it, they would likely never back rent controls like those we’ve just passed at Holyrood. It’s reminiscent of the compromises George Galloway made (and the controls he imposed against genuine socialists’ influence) when setting up the Respect Coalition in 2004. This should warn us all that no leader (however charismatic or personally decent or indeed problematic) should be allowed to run things over and above members’ democratic control.
Is there space in UK politics for Your Party?
I believe YP’s grassroots movement could have a role to play in doing what we are trying to do – confronting the far right, offering real answers to working class people and giving hope to large sections of ex-Labour supporters desperately looking for an alternative. However, that might be the problem for them – across the UK there are already parties doing or trying to do just that and making progress.
Zack Polanski’s overwhelming Green Party Leadership victory in England & Wales shows people on the left in both countries already have a viable left alternative that can win elections.
In Wales a stronger alternative is a Plaid Cymru set to win the Senedd elections in May 2026 as the main vehicle capable of defeating Reform UK.
In Scotland the SNP is still the main route to a different Scotland – a radical independence tackling poverty, inequality and climate change through a socially just transition with an internationalist foreign policy.
And for those left leaning Independence supporters who don’t yet support us, there are the Scottish Greens whose new Co-leaders Gillian Mackay and Ross Greer will likely be saying similar things to a Scottish YP making Your Party in Scotland look electorally superfluous in 2026. The point is, there are already alternatives in England and Wales who are more established, better organised and rising in popularity. And here in Scotland, there is not only a viable vote-winning pro-independence, left-of-Labour alternative in government at Holyrood (ie the SNP) but a viable vote-winning (albeit far fewer votes) pro-independence, left-of-Labour-AND-of-SNP alternative.
Having another party to the left of the SNP might represent healthy external pressure upon our government but it could potentially mean that a record 5th consecutive Holyrood victory in May 2026 is won by an SNP government but with no majority. That would be a challenge for the SNP and for the Indy movement as a whole and ironically, it’s more likely if YP decides to support Independence. But will it?
Your Party’s stance on Independence for Scotland and for Your Party in Scotland
Sultana’s support for the autonomy of Your Party in Scotland has not been echoed by Corbyn. It’s simply not viable for Your Party to call themselves ‘Your’ Party but also tell Scottish members that the rUK members will be in charge. Nor is it viable to remain silent on such a foundational issue as Scottish independence. I would be concerned about splitting the Independence vote further amongst the parties. But I’d definitely welcome working with YP comrades on common ground. It’s important to recognise that this is not solely an electoral question but one of class struggle.
For me, socialism from below means building a movement or party run by members organised both vertically and horizontally with accountable structures holding politicians accountable to collective decision making. It’s the only way to build a socialist society. That, of course is a post Independence consideration but let’s keep in mind that a radical progressive independent Scotland will need radical progressive allies in England organised in a viable left party. We don’t need another mild reformist Labour Party. Scotland needs profound change that tackles poverty, inequality and the climate emergency.
And the British imperialist empire state needs to be broken up.
Independence is our democratic revolutionary route to a more just society but it’s also theirs because Britain and its parliamentary system is not working. In order not to waste this opportunity grassroots Your Party activists must quickly seize the initiative. I genuinely hope they succeed.
Photo Credit: RT.com
