Transform Newsletter 9th April 2025

 9th April 2025

Welcome to issue 22 of the Transform Newsletter. This week’s Newsletter comes with an important update to members and supporters on the work being done to create a new Party of the left.

Update on developments regarding creation of a new Left Party

Transform was created on the basis of an appeal for a new left party. By our founding conference, it had become apparent that we had not achieved enough sign-ups, members or media recognisable personalities to be, by ourselves, the core of a mass membership party. The reasons for this are beyond the scope of this piece. But, what we had created was a significant new party with committed activists and some elected councillors which had at its core the vision and the aim to create a new mass left party. We crystallised our strategy to achieve this as:

• Create broad alliances on the Left with people and organisations that agree with our principles – on a national and local basis.
• Build Transform in a way that prefigures and complements the creation of a wider party.
• Develop activists by providing discussion, education and training to increase knowledge and skills of our members and supporters to grow grassroots campaigning.

Collective

The Collective emerged as the most promising project to unite the Left. This is a forum with the explicit aim of creating a new left party, set up by people who had been close to Corbyn when he was Labour leader.  Over time (some would say too much time) the Collective had worked on a constitution, built a broad network including Transform and was preparing a public launch.

In the discussions within The Collective, a key point of contention was whether a national party could be announced without the prior building of local organisation, or if we should build local community groups/parties on an assembly model first, only moving to a national organisation later.

New Project Group

At the end of February, a group who favoured the community base building approach (as yet unnamed, but for ease of reference we will call the New Project Group) called a day-long, in-person meeting to which core people from the Collective were invited. Alan Gibbons from Transform was invited but was unable to travel to London at short notice. That meeting worked through a preliminary proposal for a party based on the development and bringing together of local community independent parties/groups. It was clear that this was now the proposal that would get most support.

Details of the new proposal are still being worked through, but what we know is that it will set out to combine the community organising base of the various independent local groups with a national organisation/party.

This is now the best prospect for a serious and viable left party. Transform is participating in this through continued work with the Collective network, and through our Community Action Group project (see below).

There has been a measure of concern about the time all this is taking, and the secrecy of it. We share some of that and have raised the urgency of something being launched. However, there will only be one shot at this, and it is understandable that those lending their political reputation to it want it to be properly prepared. They’ll need to be on the front foot when facing the inevitable media onslaught.

Community Action Groups

Some local parties and groups, either based on Councillors leaving Labour, or newly created, already exist. The Liverpool Community Independents are one; and are members of and integral to Transform. The recent launch of Southport Community Independents (by Sean Halsall) was supported by Corbyn, Feinstein and Assemble and attracted over 200 people. Jamie Driscoll has created Majority in the North East, and there are others.

The New Project Group strongly supports all these local and regional initiatives.

Together with Assemble, Majority, For the Many, Ron Todd Foundation, OCISA and others, Transform has launched a project to encourage the creation of new local community action groups (or People’s Assemblies) and to link up those that already exist. Both Jamie Driscoll (Majority) and Sean Halsall (Southport Community Independents) have been directly involved in this project. New groups are being created, and work is being done to have an in-person conference of Community Action Groups in the summer.

Alongside this our members in the Liverpool Community Independents have been working with other independent parties across Merseyside to launch a Merseyside-wide rally of independent parties in June. Details of this can be found here.

To be clear, while creation of local groups is of practical benefit in itself and their creation is not predicated on a new national party, we do not see this process alone as sufficient. The aim is that this will provide a community base, already in place when a national party process is launched. The national party project remains indispensable.

We don’t want people to be passively waiting for announcements about the creation of a new party. Transform calls on members and supporters to get involved now by signing up to the project here, and by reaching out to other activists and groups in the areas where you live.

Urgency

We are acutely aware of the urgency of creating a new left party, and are pressing for speedy progress. Today there is a hunger for a real alternative, but there is also a danger that people will grasp at false solutions, and that the moment will be lost. Politics like nature abhors a vacuum. Reform is the major beneficiary of the absence of a progressive socialist alternative on the national political scene.

While there are major challenges ahead, we are guardedly optimistic that real progress is now being made toward establishment of a mass membership party with a strong national profile. We can’t say more than this now, because it’s crucial that news of this breaks at the right time and in the right way; but be ready to respond.

What does this mean for Transform as an organisation ?

Please retain your Transform membership (or consider joining us if you’re not currently a member).

As and when details of the new party are received and can be shared, we will launch consultations with our members as to how Transform should relate to the new organisation.

The work that Transform has done over the past 18 months has placed us as well as we can be to play our part in the most important development on the Left in Britain in living memory. We have an influential voice through our involvement in Collective and through our own network of independent candidates that we created during the GE campaign. We’re having conversations now with key people in the New Project Group. And we’re committed to carrying on the work that we’ve begun in the community action groups.

Under Transform’s Constitution, the party can only be dissolved by way of a vote taken at a Special Conference of party members.

Can Trump be stopped ?

There’s a massive power grab taking place in the USA right now. Trump and his handpicked team are trying to railroad the country into accepting that there should be no constraints on the executive power of the President. They act with disregard for the Constitution and with open contempt for judges who question their diktats. They’re trying to rip up the demarcation of powers between state government and federal government that have existed for 250 years. They suppress dissent and opposition by any means at their disposal: firing workers, criminalising street protest, threatening litigation (against media companies), imposing federal sanctions (against law firms), withdrawing, or threatening to withdraw federal funding (from schools, universities, and even states).

All this is intended to create fear, confusion and demoralisation. And there’s no denying that to some extent, it’s succeeded in this. There’s a lot more resistance though than most people realise. Below we take a look at some of the forms this resistance is taking, and how effective it’s been.

Stopping the deportations

Trump pledged that “on day one, I will launch the largest deportation program in American history.” It’s not quite worked out that way. Since Inauguration Day the numbers of people deported have been lower than the number of removals in the same period in 2024, under the Biden administration. So what’s the story here ?

ICE were indeed carrying out raids and arresting thousands of immigrants. Just two weeks though into the new Presidency they were having to release a few of those arrested, as the immigration detention centres were at over 100% capacity ! It turns out that privately run detention centres can clog up the system even more than state run facilities. Companies like CoreCivic and GEO Group receive government funding based on the numbers that they detain, so it suits them fine to keep people locked up for months on end, and deny them access to lawyers for as long as possible.

The authorities were also blindsided by the volume of court proceedings, and by the tactics of anti-deportation organisers. Last month Trump took the desperate step of invoking the Alien Enemies Act of 1798 to speed up deportations, but Judge James Boasberg took a dim view of this.

The Reagan years saw the birth of the Sanctuary movement, which became the cornerstone of anti-deportation activism. It was clear though that under Trump 2.0 the sanctity of religious grounds would no longer be respected. New tactics were needed.

A frequently used low-level tactic is non-cooperation. Sanctuary cities have statutes restricting cooperation with immigration authorities. At a Congressional hearing last month four of these cities – Boston, Chicago, Denver and New York – argued that they shouldn’t be denied federal funding as their laws were in full compliance with federal law. Their principled stance gives encouragement to employers to shut their doors when ICE agents come knocking. In Chicago and Denver, public school districts issued guidance to schools advising them to set high barriers to entry for ICE agents.

Grassroots organisations are providing direct support to the immigrant populations through a mass Know Your Rights campaign. For instance, people have the right to refuse entry to ICE agents who lack a warrant signed by a judge. Up and down the country, families and employers are being advised on what to do in the event of a raid. Some volunteers are training as legal observers so that they can bear witness to any ICE agents abusing their powers.

Of course the battles being fought in the courtroom are critical. But they’re not happening in a vacuum. The more that the deportations are held up, the more that communities are informed of their rights and put in contact with charities and advocacy groups, the greater the chances of court wins.

Defending DEI

The onslaught against DEI erases decades of hard-won policies safeguarding people of all protected characteristics against discrimination, bullying and harassment. It legitimises racist narratives, it legitimises toxic cultures (eg ‘jobs for the boys’). And of course it’s tied in to the specific objective of erasing trans people from public life and breaking up their support networks.

The legal standing of Trump’s Executive Orders is highly dubious. Judges have been criticising them and suspending them, even as the administration has been going full steam ahead in trying to enforce them.  

Federal agencies though had little choice but to comply. It wasn’t just the policies that went: existing programs and grants that had already been awarded were getting cut. As for corporations, some needed no second invitation, they’d ditched their entire DEI commitments in a shot.

The fundamental reason why we have DEI is that prejudice and discrimination exist. And nowhere is it more vital than in universities. The stakes could not be higher: Trump wants to dictate to universities what policies they can have, what they can teach, and what they can research. Georgetown University politely but firmly refused, saying that “the First Amendment guarantees that the government cannot direct what Georgetown and its faculty teach and how to teach it.” Unfortunately, faced with threats of loss of federal funding and grants, more and more universities are capitulating rather than fighting. And it’s not just university bosses who are afraid to take a stand. An open letter “to the American People” signed by 1,900 members of the National Academies remarked that “a climate of fear has descended on the research community”.

In addition to the open letter, academic staff joined Stand Up for Science protests around the country on March 7th. One of the themes of these protests was defending DEI – “Attacks on diversity, equity, inclusion, and accessibility are attacks on science itself.” This Tuesday saw demonstrations in over 30 US cities organised by a coalition of higher education trade unions and other organisations, under the slogan ‘Kill the Cuts’. Further protests are planned on April 17th.

All these actions are important in themselves: the court where this issue will ultimately be decided is the court of public opinion, and it has to be explained again and again why DEI matters in the fight for a fairer society.

By far the most promising initiative though has been the Boycott movement.

The retail chain Target is one of America’s largest corporations, and one which in the past has been a champion of DEI. In 2020, CEO Brian Cornell said that the police murder of George Floyd, which took place just a short distance from Target’s headquarters in Minneapolis, had a personal effect on him. In the wake of the murder, Target pledged to increase its black workforce by 20%, and to support black-owned businesses, as part of a massive inclusion drive. So when in January Target abruptly announced that it was ending its DEI programme, the black community was incensed. Since the announcement, its stock price had fallen by over 30%. Key to this was the well organised consumer boycott which attracted widespread publicity in the national news media.

The share price drop may not have been the aim, but is critical nonetheless. If it had just been a matter of reduced sales for a limited period of time, the company could have taken the hit. But as Tesla are also finding, the adverse publicity and perceived loss of brand credibility will be much harder to recover from.

The action against Target is just one of a number of rolling boycotts of high profile corporations. Walmart and Amazon are also in the firing line.

New and old forms of resistance

Despite the climate of fear, street protests are still alive and kicking. Research by the Crowd Counting Consortium found that the number of protests taking place across the USA has been more than twice as high as it was during the same period in Trump’s first term, eight years earlier. The authors discuss concerns about turnouts and the possible risks to some of taking part in such protests, but it seems that the tide may be turning. On Saturday enormous numbers attended Hands Off protests across the country. Indivisible, one of the organising groups, issued the following statement:

“Today, millions of Americans flooded the streets to demand an end to Trump’s authoritarian power grab. We expected hundreds of thousands. But at virtually every single event, the crowds eclipsed our estimates. And it’s not over — people are still marching in some West Coast cities and heading to events in Alaska and Hawaii.

This is the largest day of protest since Trump retook office. And in many small towns and cities, activists are reporting the biggest protests their communities have ever seen as everyday people send a clear, unmistakable message to Trump and Musk: Hands off our healthcare, hands off our civil rights, hands off our schools, our freedoms, and our democracy.“

Meanwhile the movement against Trump and Musk has been taking on some new unexpected forms. The #TeslaTakedown protests have caught on at remarkable speed: on the global day of action on 29th March, over 200 Tesla stores around the world were targeted.

According to actor Alex Winter, who’s friends with many Tesla owners, the car’s popularity is plummeting: “I think it’s the hypocrisy of it. This idea that these guys, who have built their wealth off of government subsidies and government handouts, are accusing hard-working, low-income people of being parasites. It makes people just staggeringly angry.” The movement’s aim, Winter says, is to force shareholders to ditch Elon Musk; and with share prices sharply down already Musk is sounding rattled.

Yet more unconventional are the Resistance Rangers, who describe themselves as “a community of over 800 off-duty park rangers rallying to save National Park sites.” They stand for protection of public lands and opposition to illegal firings. As well as taking actions themselves they try to mobilise the public. This is one of their recent Bluesky posts: “Just this month, you all have made hundreds of calls, sent thousands of postcards, and organized two nationwide protests at 200 park sites! Damn. Next up? Organizing in your own community. Tag a friend in the comments who will help you protect public lands! #ProtectPublicLands #WorthFightingFor”

The roll call of resistance would not be complete without a mention of individual acts of courage. Perhaps the most memorable of all of these was the Bishop of Washington Mariann Budde addressing Trump to his face during her sermon and pleading with him to show mercy to vulnerable groups. Another remarkable moment came in February when 21 DOGE employees – a third of the workforce – resigned from their jobs. Their joint statement said that they were refusing to use their technical expertise to “dismantle critical public services.”

The resistance movements are not going away. What we’ve seen up to now is only the beginning. Evidence is emerging that the number of foreign visitors to the USA dropped sharply last month, a sign that people are already changing their holiday plans. We’re likely to be seeing much more of this: Trump’s tariff announcement on April 2nd has triggered outrage around the globe, along with a resurgence of interest in boycott campaigns. And as he continues to overreach in all kinds of ways, we expect that opposition movements will broaden, drawing in an ever wider range of people.

New date for Louise Raw talk

Just to confirm for anyone who’s not seen the emails: the guest talk by Dr Louise Raw will now be taking place on Friday 11th April at 7pm.

She’ll be speaking on ‘The man who bought the world – Musk, Fascism and Fighting Back’.

The event is free and open to all. Please join us to discuss the situation in America: what is it that Trump and Musk really stand for, and what are the prospects for fighting back.

Register now for the event via this link.

Local Election focus

Gary Ruff is standing for the Transform Party in Hemel Hempstead in the May elections. He told the Newsletter that “my campaign to be elected in the Herts County Council Hemel Town Centre division has started positively, with some positive feedback regarding the leaflets while canvassing. However, there is still so much to do, leaflets to deliver and doors to knock on !  Volunteers for election day itself would be great also !

Any help is appreciated. Please contact myself on 07414 954194, email transformhertfordshire@gmail.com, or join the campaign WhatsApp group.”

Transform is also endorsing the following candidates in the May elections (all Independent unless otherwise indicated):

LEICESTERSHIRE

Ray Sutton in Castle Donington & Kegworth

Email: raysutton1000@gmail.com

LINCOLNSHIRE

Charmaine Morgan in Grantham South & John Morgan in Colsterworth Rural

Email: johnmorgan101@btinternet.com

NOTTINGHAMSHIRE

6 Broxtowe Alliance candidates in 5 Divisions:

Teresa Ann Cullen in Beeston Central & Rylands, Milan Radulovic in Eastwood, David Kirwan in Nuthall & Kimberley, Maggie McGrath in Stapleford & Broxtowe Central & Shaun Dannheimer and Stephen Jeremiah in Toton, Chilwell & Attenborough

Email: winning@broxtoweindependents.org.uk

OXFORDSHIRE

Cassi Bellingham in Banbury, Grimsbury & Castle, Simon Garrett in Banbury Hardwick, Julie Batterson in Banbury Ruscote & Philip Richards in Banbury Easington

Email: cassibelles@yahoo.co.uk

Jabu Nala-Hartley standing for Oxford Community Socialists in Barton, Sandhills & Risinghurst

Email: info@oxfordcommunitysocialists.org

Israel is a terror state

It was deliberate, cold-blooded murder. On 23rd March, IDF forces opened attack without warning on ambulances displaying emergency lights. Fifteen paramedics and rescue workers were shot at close range, their bodies buried in shallow graves. Even the ambulances were buried. As usual, the IDF lied about what had happened, but the evidence against them was all there, buried in the sand.

This was no isolated incident. A state that repeatedly allows its forces to engage in war crimes and acts of barbarity is a terror state.

Last week, UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Volker Türk told the Security Council that “There must be an independent, prompt and thorough investigation into the killings, and those responsible for any violation of international law must be held to account.” After commenting on other serious human rights violations by Israel, he advised the Council that  under the Geneva Conventions, states are obligated to act when a serious violation of international humanitarian law is committed; and that similar duties apply under the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide.

Of course, the Security Council members have no intention of complying with their obligations, and that’s why we should all keep marching and keep protesting, and doing anything possible to put pressure on the Israeli government. Sporting sanctions would certainly have an impact, and this page offers a number of ways in which we can campaign for this.

Help us to develop our policy offer

Have you been completing our weekly Policy Questionnaires (or at least a few of them) ? Are you interested in finding out how we work the responses into an integrated and fleshed out policy ?

Transform’s Policy Working Group is calling for volunteers to join it. Membership of the Group entails being part of a WhatsApp group and attending weekly meetings on Zoom. Transform members can register their interest by emailing Tracey at membership@transformpolitics.uk.

Next Newsletter

The next newsletter will be out on Wednesday 30th April. Until then, keep organising, keep campaigning, and please remember if you are on the campaign trail to take a couple of photos and let us know about what you’ve been doing. You can contact us at any time at info@transformpolitics.uk: please mark your email for the attention of the Newsletter Team.

In solidarity,

Transform Newsletter Team