Communist Party of Great Britain

The Communist Party of Great Britain (CPGB) was a political party in the United Kingdom, which existed from 1920 to 1991.

1960s and 1970s: Decline of the party

After the calamitous events of 1956 the party increasingly functioned as a pressure group on the Labour Party seeking to use its well organised base in the trade union movement to push Labour leftwards. The "Daily Worker" was renamed the "Morning Star". At the same time the party became increasingly polarised between those who sought to maintain close relations with the Soviet Union and those who sught to convert the party into a force independent of Moscow.

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With the international split between Moscow and Beijing in 1961 similar divisions were found in many Communist Parties. But in the relatively small British CP pro-Beijing sympathies were thin on the ground and only a tiny minority of CPGB members opposed the Moscow line. Perhaps the best known being Michael McCreery who formed the Committee to Defeat Revisionism for Communist Unity. This tiny grouplet leaving the CPGB by 1963. McCreery himself reportedly died in 1965 in New Zealand. Later a more significant group formed around Reg Birch, an engineering union official, established the Communist Party of Britain (Marxist-Leninist) that initially supported the position of the Communist Party of China.

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Divisions in the CPGB concerning the autonomy of the party from Moscow reached a crisis when in 1968 Warsaw pact forces intervened in Czechoslovakia which the CPGB, with memories of 1956 in mind, responded to with criticism. From this time onwards the elements in the CPGB most traditionally minded were known as 'Tankies' by their enemies due to their support of the Warsaw Pact forces while their opponents in the party leaned more and more towards the position of eurocommunism who led the important Communist parties in Italy and later in Spain.

Related Topics:
1968 - Czechoslovakia - Eurocommunism

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The last strong electoral performance of the CPGB was in the February 1974 General Election in Clydebank where candidate Jimmy Reid won almost 6,000 votes, but this was primarily a personal vote for Reid who was a prominent local trade union leader. This vote being motivated by Reid's prominent role in the Upper Clyde Ship Builders work-in a few years earlier which was seen as having saved local jobs. Nationally the party's vote continued its decline as the CPGB pursued the British Road To Lost Deposits as the joke of the time went.

Related Topics:
February 1974 General Election - Clydebank - Jimmy Reid - Trade union

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The growing crisis in the party also affected the credibility of its leadership as formerly senior and influential members left its ranks. In 1976 three of its top engineering cadres resigned. Jimmy Reid, Cyril Morton and John Tocher had all been members of the Political Committee, playing a crucial role in determining the direction of the party. Like another engineer, Bernard Panter, who left a few months before them, they jumped a sinking ship.

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