Quote Originally Posted by Croydon Bob View Post
For more than 20 years in Union elections SWP candidates have claimed to be "grass roots" and suchlike, making no mention of their true politics.
Sorry but in my experience that is blatantly untrue. When I was involved in trade union activity, they always made a point of declaring their politics loud and clear, a fact that made other candidates very uneasy. In fact, if any SWP member had behaved the way you describe, their own branch would have thrown them out.

For many years the SWP was the most prominent grouping on the left because it owned a printing press that used to print Private Eye and used the profit to produce loads of papers, placards, posters and other things that begin with a "p" probably.
It was a commercial print shop and I think even printed the Morning Star. But it was never making money which was why it was sold in the early 90s. It is far more likely that the income for the SWP came from their membership and paper sales.

The SWP didn't even have a single member in the NUM during the Miners Strike of 84/85. They've never had the industrial muscle of the rest of the left, appealing primarily to Middle Class lefties such a students.
Again, this is very wide of the mark. I was in Oxford in the mid 80s and was involved in some support activities for the miners. Around one hundred miners stayed in the town for a few days and amongst them were at least twenty SWP miners. I'm sure other towns had similar delegations going around.

Thanks for the interesting take on the far left. I think I'll leave it there.