Labor Socialism outdated
NSW Labor leader Luke Foley has urged the party to abolish its historic commitment to socialism and its attachment to state ownership and embrace competitive markets alongside individual freedom and opportunity, and will move this formally at the party’s national conference.
Mr Foley, from Labor’s Left faction, will unite with the NSW Right to replace the objective and throw down the gauntlet to Bill Shorten to put his weight behind a rewrite of the party’s philosophy for the 21st century.
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“Labor does not exist to promote state ownership, but to ensure that the state advances the interests of all people. In its current form, the socialist objective is both confused and confusing.”
The party’s “socialist objective” was adopted in 1921, when the party lurched leftward after the First World War. It describes Labor as a “democratic socialist” party that pursues “the democratic socialisation of industry, production, distribution and exchange”. While modified and qualified, it has remained largely unchanged.