HUNDREDS of peace campaigners gathered in central London last Saturday for a vital CND conference.

With the threat of a nuclear catastrophe being sparked by any one of the major conflicts in Ukraine and across the Middle East, it was more than timely that peace activists came together to share information and, perhaps more importantly, develop strategies for winning peace at a time when warfare and the mass killing of civilians is taking on the appearance of being normal.

I should declare an interest as I have the honour of being one of CND’s vice-presidents. But, I dare say, pretty much everyone who bothers to read my scribblings does so because they also have an interest in winning peace and, I hope, socialism.

The conference, dubbed The World We Want: A New Agenda for Peace and Justice, covered a range of themes such as how can we end the risk of nuclear war? How do we break the “nuclear weapons create jobs” myth?

Key themes throughout the conference were the importance of uniting the peace movement with the fight against the continuing climate emergency and also the importance of understanding the role that racism and imperialism play in feeding the greed of the arms industry.

CND general secretary Kate Hudson, who is soon retiring from the post after around two decades, set the tone for the conference in the opening plenary.

Hudson reminded everyone that while there continued to be “grief and rage” over the genocide that was being committed by Israeli forces against the Palestinians in Gaza and the West Bank, the fighting spreading to Lebanon, the possibility of a wider conflict involving Iran, plus Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, there was another story.

That story was of our movement. We could all draw strength from the millions of people across the globe who were standing up for peace.

“We are part of the global majority.”

Our challenge, she said, was to work out “what we can do to make sure that our vision of the future comes to life.”

The challenge set by Hudson dominated my thinking for the rest of the day.

We have seen hundreds of thousands of people taking to the streets for massive demonstrations in support of the Palestinians in Gaza and the West Bank in some of the most diverse protests that I can ever remember.

The Muslim Association of Britain’s Raghad Altikriti was particularly heartened by “the countless young people” taking part in the protests. She said that despite the horrors we were all witnessing on our social media this was “an inspiring generation of young people.”

I agree. This tells me that there needs to be urgent and serious collective thought given to how we can keep this movement for peace in Palestine together once the bombing ends and the guns go quiet — as eventually, they will.

How can we make sure that all of these people who have been stirred to collective action for peace make the connections between what is happening in the Middle East and what is taking place in Ukraine, Sudan and everywhere else there are conflicts raging?

How can we build a movement that fully understands the stranglehold that the arms industry holds over politicians in the Western world that ensures wars continue and profits increase?

I have been involved in too many movements over the years, particularly in trade unions, where this question gets asked, but the imperative of dealing with the next crisis overrides all else.

I am not blaming anyone for this, but in a time where the next war could easily be the very last one as humanity is destroyed by nuclear weapons, we don’t really have a lot of choice over whether to treat this question seriously.

As well as working together to bring an end to the fighting that is killing so many people across the globe, it really would be a criminal to give up on any longer-term aim of beating back the purveyors of death and turning peace into the norm rather than a short coffee break until the next war starts.

Andrew Feinstein, from Shadow World Investigations, reminded the conference about how it was “fill your boots” time for the arms industry, which was making huge profits from the slaughter that was taking place.

Sometimes, these battles can appear too big to win, but Feinstein reminded the conference that we had little choice other than to “exert pressure” and “demand an immediate ceasefire in Gaza as well as an end to all arms exports to Israel.”

MP for Islington North Jeremy Corbyn said his victory in the general election earlier this year should serve as a reminder that even when people think that it’s too difficult and that everything is stacked against you, “It’s possible to win speaking up for the Palestinians, for refugees and against racism.”

Asad Rehman, the executive director of War on Want, told the conference that rather than a time of doom and gloom, we actually find ourselves in “a huge moment of hope and solidarity in the fight for justice.”

I agree with Rehman because if there was one thing that I took away from the conference, it was that feeling of hope.

Not some sort of false hope built on a fantasy. But one based on the knowledge that all the expertise, determination and commitment that graced the Soas University of London building, where the conference took place on Saturday, could be a springboard to involving people in the peace movement that have never been involved in it before.

I sense that it’s been happening slowly but surely, and certainly, some of it away from my gaze.

The way that both CND and the Stop the War Coalition have reached out on a wider basis than perhaps they ever have done before is truly exciting. Especially for me, the way that both organisations understand and include the need to end the exploitation of the global South that is critical to the fuelling of the military-industrial monster as well as so many of the luxuries that we take for granted in the North.

These things don’t just happen overnight. They come about because of the political understanding and commitment of the leadership of those organisations.

I believe how we tackle this link will be critical for our future success in being able to build a movement for radical change in favour of working-class and peasant communities across the globe that has peace and social justice as its core tenants.

I paid tribute to the work of the great Kate Hudson during the conference. I referred to her as one of the great peacemongers — which she undoubtedly is. She may be retiring, but she will always be a peacemonger. Once a peacemonger, always a peacemonger.

At a time in history when the warmongers have led us to the brink of catastrophe, it is time for all of us peacemongers to step up. It is our time now!