LIVINGSTON ELECTION LEAFLET

PEOPLE OR PROFIT

That's the issue in this election, says
THE SOCIALIST PARTY
On 29th September, you will have your
occasional ration of democracy with the
opportunity to vote for a member of
Parliament. It's all very well having a
vote-but are you normally given any real
choice?
Let's face it, if it wasn't for the politician's
head on the front of the election leaflet,
could you tell which party was which?
It's tempting, in the absence of any real
alternative, to get drawn into the phoney
war that is political debate today.
Whether Labour, Tory, SNP, Lib Dem or
SSP they all spout the same promises.
But it always amounts to the same thing-they
offer no alternative to the present
way of running society.
Do you really think who wins an election
makes any difference to how you live?
And do politicians (whether left-wing,
nationalist or right-wing) actually have
much real power anyway? OK, they get
to open supermarkets and factories, but
it's capitalism and the market system
which closes them down.

REALITY CHECKDo any of the political parties address
any of the real issues:
.Why is there world hunger in a
world of food surpluses?
.Why are there unemployed nurses,
alongside closed-down hospitals and
waiting lists?
.Why are there homeless people in
the streets and empty houses with
"for sale" signs?
.Why do some people get stressed
working long hours while others get
stressed from the boredom of
unemployment?

SO WHAT'S THE ALTERNATIVE ?
This time you will have a real choice. We
in THE SOCIALIST PARTY are standing
at this election to put forward an
alternative to capitalism and the madness
of the market:
A society of common ownership and
democratic control.
We call it socialism.
But real socialism, not the elite-run
dictatorships that collapsed a few years
ago in Russia and East Europe. And not
the various failed schemes for state
control once put forward by the Labour
Party and now put forward by the
reformist Scottish Socialist Party.

For us socialism means something better

than that

We're talking about a world community
without any frontiers. About wealth being
produced to meet people's needs and not
for sale on a market or for profit. About
everyone having access to what they
require to satisfy their needs, without the
rationing system that is money. A society
where people freely contribute their skills
and experience to produce what is
needed, without the compulsion of a
wage or salary.

SO WHAT NOW ?
If you don't like present-day society . . . if
you are fed up with the way you are
forced to live . . . if you think the root
cause of most social problems is the
market system, then your ideas echo
closely with ours.

If you want to vote for our party we're
delighted. But we don't really want votes
based on a misreading of what we are
about. We are not promising to deliver
socialism to you. We are not putting
ourselves forward as leaders. This new
society can only be achieved if we join
together to strive for it. If you want it, then
it is something you have to bring about
yourselves.
If you agree with this, you can
show it by voting for Brian
Gardner, THE SOCIALIST PARTY
candidate for Livingston
parliamentary constituency.