Our Party is unlike any other in Britain, a new type of political body wedded to a different destiny, one of workers taking control and refashioning the world.
Founded in 1968, fresh and confident from the then revolutionary revival in the world, the CPBML was the special, dedicated creation of a group of industrial engineers led by our founding chairman, Reg Birch. From birth, our Party has had one unshakeable purpose – to change the thinking of the British working class – to secure the understanding that our survival with dignity is impossible under a declining capitalism, that only revolution and working class rule will assure work, peace, security – civilisation – for all.
We do not seek to instruct or command the working class. Workers are thinking beings who must be convinced themselves of the need for any course of action. Our party is of the working class, not a set of special people above it, external, doling out an alien theory. We attempt from the conditions of material existence to refine the strategic thinking of a working class and return it to its proper owners in pristine form. In our founder’s metaphor, the working class is the seed, the communist party the fertiliser, enabling the class to flourish more expansively.
We are an unpaid, voluntary community of doers and thinkers with everyone expected to take responsibility and play a full part in developing the party. We attend regular meetings, we study together, we pay our financial commitments, we reflect on and analyse current affairs in Britain and the world, we develop a strategy and tactics that not only make sense of the predicaments we face in the world but also chart a way out of the mess. We produce our own publications, website and public meetings from the ideas we generate after collective exchange. Without rich or foreign backers, our financial resources are either self-generated or come from workers’ donations.
We have democracy within our party with members always expected to think and contribute. Our highest authority is our three-yearly representative Party Congress, which sets out a direction for progress and elects a leadership to administer and safeguard our precious jewel. Discussion establishes the political line, but once established it is adhered to and embellished. We have no factions.
All party members are workers first and foremost, sharing the weal and woe of our class. We have no full-time professional revolutionaries and never will have. We operate on the willing, equal commitment of members.
Proud of our achievements over 44 years, we readily admit the greatest challenges lie ahead. We aim to grow and prosper in these difficult times.