mayday rally

WORKERS, MAY 2002 ISSUE

THE Communist Party (CPBML) held its annual May Day rally on 1 May in the Conway Hall, London. There were speeches, music, food and conversation, all in celebration of International Workers’ Day.

The first speaker talked about her experience and her hopes for the future: “I may be a grandmother,” she said, “and I have witnessed a world of brutality, of war and of warmongers, of destruction of community, of destruction through greed and stupidity of the brilliance of labour — both of hand and of mind. But in my mind’s eye I am a young woman and I see the world as a beautiful place. A place of great abundance, of great potential, of a human spirit never ceasing to rise above this cesspit of capitalism.”

The second speaker, who works for a trade union, went back to the origins of May Day in Chicago 0 years ago to examine the difference between individual acts of terror and workers’ collective action.

His speech covered issues such as the European Union, immigration, asylum. “We do not believe in the concept of race,” he said. “If there is such a thing, there is only the human race.”. Turning to the ideas of communism, he said: “We are seen as old fashioned, a foreign thing of the past. In reality, communist ideas are very new. We do not genuflect to 2,000-year-old writings as the capitalist states do.”

Next year’s London May Day rally will take place on 1 May 2003.