I have decided to do my own New Year’s Message.

2014 will be the last full year of this obnoxious government and it looks as if it is going to continue attacking the most vulnerable. WE can tell this from the Morning Star’s final two front pages of 2013. A & E departments being told to vet patients according to their citizenship status on Monday 30th December and a man dying after waiting two hours for an ambulance in the final issue of the year.

There are so many things to fight against and the pace of destruction of social cohesion gives those of progressive opinions little chance of being effective. If we had a larger Communist party that would help. There are too few of our members who are young, women or from non-British backgrounds. Despite that I believe the Communist Party of Britain is by far the best political organisation in Britain. Its policies are just the ones that would see Britain out of the slump and on the road to socialism. It works in a generously non sectarian way. It helps to sustain the only daily paper which concentrates on the significant rather than the sensational. Its role in the trade union, peace, and solidarity movements is second to none. However if it were a lot bigger it could be a lot more effective. So clearly building the party both locally and nationally is a priority and I look forward to the coming year’s recruitment drive.

Combating anti-communism is the duty of all progressives, not just communists. We must combat name-calling. The words ‘Stalinist’, ‘tankie’ and ‘commie’ should not be accepted as OK. Language is important. We accept that it is from the experience of the women’s movement, the anti-racist movement and the gay movement. Anti-communist language should be challenged in the same way and as vigorously as we would combat sexist, racist and homophobic language. Let’s get started on this! It is important because anti-communism is the basic ingredient of fascism. It is a violation of human rights and should be seen by communist and non-communist alike as such. What a job for 2014!

Forty years ago our party played a magnificent role in ridding the country of a Tory government. Man, didn’t our pickets fly! 1974 saw the best ever labour Government. The one between February and October of that year. Stupidly, our trade union leadership – not all of it by any means, abdicated its responsibility to the membership by signing up to the Social Contract. On being re-elected the Labour Government reneged on its promises and bowed down to the IMF. However we should celebrate the solidarity which many of us experienced forty years ago.

2014 is also the 180th anniversary of the Tolpuddle Martyrs and we will be honouring the solidarity of those early trade unionists whose actions worked to free and bring home the Tolpuddle Six.

Of course, a lot will be said about the 100th anniversary of the Great War. We will be remembering those who refused to fight for pacifist reasons. We will also recall people like Bob Stewart and Willie Gallcher who refused to partake in the war because it was Imperialist. Many of those jailed for that reason formed the core of what was to become the Communist Party.

Communists support the affiliation of trade unions to the Labour Party. The trade union movement is the parent of the Labour Party. Unfortunately the Labour Party has always behaved like a spoilt brat. It has demanded presents and keeps scrounging money from its parent without doing its chores when it got into office. It should have abolished prescription charges and got rid of all anti-trade union legislation. It should not have got into scraps on the side of the other bullies. It should have got rid of all its dangerous toys like Trident missiles. We need to make the Labour Party a part of the Labour Movement and that will require a change in its constitution and a purge of the right starting with Blair.

I hate the National Anthem. It makes me squirm with embarrassment. Our queen is not gracious. She has never once in her inglorious reign declared an amnesty for prisoners. Scotland has her anthem as does Wales. We English have to use the Great Britain one. It’s not right. The ANC had its own anthem before it got rid of Apartheid. Why don’t we have something that can be sung with gusto on picket lines and in peace camps?

I also think the Union Flag is inappropriate. It comprises the flags or crosses of St. George, St. Andrew and St. Patrick. The Welsh are not represented on the flag. I am an atheist. I do not want to be represented by a Christian saint with or without his cross. Let’s have a flag ready for our People’s Republic of Britain! I would like the CPB to initiate a competition for both an anthem and a flag. how about it?

Let us remember that we are internationalists! We have a responsibility to victims of Imperialism everywhere. I call on our party members to make sure that we do what we can whether it be in CND or for the cause of Palestine, or the Miami 5 or for peace in the Middle East. A system which allows the majority of the world’s population to have lives shortened by poverty is a system which needs to be killed. I do not believe in capital punishment for people but it is correct for capitalism.

Have a wonderful new year.