Letter

23rd March 2003

Dear Sir,

In our campaign for peace and against the illegal and unjustified attack on Iraq the Buxton Against War group does not of course support Tony Blair. It was Tony Blair who personally took the decision to go to war against the wishes of the majority in this country. He and his close supporters both Labour and Tory are held responsible.

Tom Levitt is a close supporter of Tony Blair – in a recent BBC1 programme he was introduced as a government “loyalist”. So when our local Labour Party talks of standing an Anti War candidate in the coming local elections we are amazed. If this is a rebellion in the local party, an overt challenge to Tom Levitt, Tony Blair and the Labour government we welcome it. If it is not it is nonsense however well meant. More cynically perhaps it is a ploy to confuse.

We support the MPs in Parliament who rebelled against the government over their war mongering and we will support any open and honest revolt in the local Labour party if it is clearly against Tony Blair’s war. But we feel it is very important to make clear that we will not support a Labour anti- war candidate for local office unless of course this is part of a clearly defined campaign against the politics of Tony Blair and Tom Levitt.

Yours sincerely
Chair
Treasurer
Secretary
Membership
Buxton Against War