6 TRAINING
Austerity post-Brexit Britain presents enormous challenges for the Labour Movement with its ultimate responsibility for representing the hopes and interests of some of the poorest and most disenfranchised in our society. The ranks of the membership have grown bringing a great potential resource, but one cannot assume that everyone has or will have the same privileged higher education as many of the Party ' s candidates and representatives of recent decades. As one activist said to me: " I left school young and didn ' t do PPE "( i. e. at Oxford University). Further, Conservative-run State education is hardly likely to equip people for lives of socialist activism, organisation and leadership. So this is a good moment to consider how best to fill the gap so that Labour Members are able to fulfil their best potential within the Party.
The Movement has a rich tradition of teaching and learning, more than a century long. Ruskin College was established in 1899( originally as Ruskin Hall). Workers Education Associations were formed in 1903 and the National Council of Labour Colleges in 1921. All had strong connections with the Trade Unions who themselves continue to provide a great deal of highly effective education and training designed to prepare members for representative and leadership roles.
The context for this history was always a somewhat deficient and elitist state education system and the need to give working-class students access to knowledge and culture as well as to train them for effective activism.
Post-1945 reforms led to enormous and positive change, not least in the democratisation of Higher Education by successive Labour Governments( e. g. the establishment of the Open University in 1969). Arguably, post-war Trade Union education became more focused on training than on liberal education as a result. However there was a parallel rise in grassroots learning and self-help by way of the women’ s movement, local history projects and the History Workshop movement( once more with roots in, and connections with, Ruskin).
As with all aspects of this Inquiry, I am grateful for the variety of the submissions received, in this case ranging from " pitches " to design values-lead training to critiques of the idea that anti-racism training can ever be effective and nervousness that one strand or another in the Party ' s thinking should be given a privileged position in relation to describing and disseminating the boundaries of acceptable attitudes and behaviour.
On reflection, and having gauged the range of feelings within the Party, it is not my view that narrow anti-racism training programmes are what is required. There is a grave danger that such an approach would seem patronising or otherwise insulting rather than truly empowering and enriching for those taking part. Instead, the Party ' s values, mission and history could be firmly embedded in more comprehensive activism and leadership education designed to equip members for the organisational, electoral and representative challenges ahead.
Now is a time to reassess broad-based education and training within the Labour Movement, and rather than attempting to " re-invent the wheel ", to work in partnership with the Trade Unions, Higher Education institutions, Festivals and others. The Internet also presents a considerable opportunity for the promotion of relevant skills and learning within the Party.
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