Young Communist League (Great Britain)

Establishment

In August 1921 two of Great Britain's leading radical youth organisations, the Young Workers' League and the International Communist Schools Movement, gathered at a special conference held at Birmingham. The assembled delegates to this Unity Conference passed a proposal calling for the two standing groups to merge under a new name, that of the Young Communist League. This proposal was taken to the rank-and-file of each group and the proposed unified constitution and organisational rules ratified in a referendum of branches held in October.

The YCL was the youth wing of the Communist Party of Great Britain (CPGB), which exercised oversight over the group. The YCL modeled itself upon the adult party and, in the estimation of historian Thomas Linehan, "functioned as a younger version of it." In 1954, the YCL supported 'The Red Scout' Paul Garland who had been dismissed from his local Scout Group in Bristol following his dual membership - a controversy with wide media coverage and a debate in the House of Lords. While formally independent, the group was always closely linked to the CPGB and its activities and fortunes broadly followed those of its parent organisation. As with the adult party, the YCL saw itself as part of a unified world movement and took its ultimate direction from the Young Communist International (CYI), with headquarters in Moscow.

The YCL was seen as a recruiting school for activists in the adult party, and the organisation's structure, internal relationships, and tactical activities closely paralleled and followed those of the CPGB. This was in turn a reflection of the structure and practise of the Russian Communist Party (later known as the Communist Party of the Soviet Union). Similarly the Young Communist International which formally stood at the head of the YCL's decision-making process was closely modeled upon the adult Communist International, which was shaped by Russian Communist Party practise.

The fledgling YCL published its own official monthly periodical, known as The Young Communist.

The 1960s and 1970s

A recruitment drive started in 1966 around the slogan "The Trend - Communism" associated the group with wider cultural trends in society. Pete Townshend of The Who was a prominent but short-lived member and the "The Trend" campaign emphasised the power of music in social change. Throughout this period YCL membership grew to over 6,000 members and a generation of young members - led by Barney Davis (national secretary), George Bridges (London secretary) and others challenged the political approach of the parent party. The YCL took a lead in condemning what it defined as the Soviet invasion of Czechoslovakia (the Party called it at the time an intervention) but the position was only adopted by a 60:40 vote. Some members who favoured a pro-Soviet line, including John Chamberlain (Jack Conrad), left the YCL to join the New Communist Party of Britain in 1977. Chamberlain was to become head of the NCP's youth section but was shortly later to attempt to rejoin the CPGB.

The 1970s and 1980s

1968 proved the start of a long decline in membership, characterised by competition between different tendencies. The leadership tended to be eurocommunist, but opposition was stronger than in the CPGB. In 1979, its congress adopted a new programme, Our Future, which did not commit the group to Marxism and removed the policy of democratic centralism. The new programme exacerbated divisions in the group, and in 1983, with membership down to 510, democratic centralism was re-imposed. By 1987, the league had only fifty members.

Youth section of the Communist Party of Britain (1991 to present)

After the split in the CPGB leading to the creation of the Communist Party of Britain in 1988 (and the dissolution of the CPGB in 1991), the YCL was re-established in 1991, based on the CPB Youth Section. The YCL is organisationally autonomous and decides its own activities and priorities, but is constitutionally committed to support for the CPB's programme, Britain's Road to Socialism. The YCL is a member of the World Federation of Democratic Youth(WFDY).

Communist Students is the student section of the Young Communist League. It was launched in 2005 in coordination with several overseas Communist parties and Young Communist organisations, with members studying in this country. This reflects the close relationship between the CPB and its fraternal parties that is developed in the Co-ordinating Committee of Communist Parties in Britain.

Secretaries

1923: William Rust 1929?: Wally Tapsell 1935: John Gollan 1941: Ted Willis 1946?: Bill Brooks 1950: John Moss 1958: Jimmy Reid 1964: Barney Davis 1970: Tom Bell 1979: Nina Temple 1983: Doug Chalmers 1985: Mark Ashton

Secretaries of re-established Young Communist League include Zoe Hennessy (2014), who stood for the Communist Party of Britain in the 2015 general election in the Glasgow North West parliamentary constituency.