Carolyn Leckie is a member of the Scottish Parliament, one of six MSPs representing the Scottish Socialist Party. She is a midwife and former leader of the Unisol health care union. Last year, she visited British Columbia at the invitation of the Hospital Employees Union.

1. You visited B.C. last November, and spoke at the B.C. Federation of Labour convention. What were your impressions of B.C. under Gordon Campbell?

First of all, I was shocked, actually, to see the scale and concentration of the Thatcherite onslaught going much further and faster than Thatcher dared to do at the time. I guess that they [the B.C. Liberals] feel confident that they can do that with the massive majority they have. I also got the impression that people in B.C., including trade unionists, were extremely angry, but a bit in shock themselves at the scale and concentration, probably because they weren’t prepared for such a government. In previous years, having had the NDP -- where there were problems -- but certainly comparatively, it was a period of peace.

2. Given your experience in the labour movement with Thatcherism, or neo-liberalism, what is your advice to working people here, in terms of fighting back?

Well, that there is only a short window of opportunity to defeat it at its beginning. And the alternative to not facing it during that short window of opportunity is probably a lengthy period of time until a firm recovery happens. Here, the trade union movement is making that recovery, but it’s 20 years later and it’s still quite slow and patchy. And I think that there is a risk that history will repeat itself. So, I think what you’re experiencing there is very similar, but maybe on a shorter time scale even.

3. After the ravages of the Thatcher-Major years came Tony Blair. Is it fair to say that the Scottish Socialist Party emerged as a response to Blair’s “New Labour”?

Yes, the Labour Party gave up any pretence of being on the Left. It had been completely taken over by right-wing forces and adopted the neo-liberal agenda on Thatcher’s behalf. Thatcher has claimed that Tony Blair is her biggest achievement, and I think I would agree with her on that. I don’t agree with her on much, but I would agree with her on that assessment. This left a big vacuum on the Left.

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