Workers Press no. 783

workers press

WILL JONES DO A

BY ALEX MITCHELL

THIS IS A decisive week in government. Through the de the working class the goverr down. On a whole number of issues-th unemployment, prices, the Commo torture in Ulster-this government working class. Standing between the will and the ability of the working class to force the Tories out, is Victor Feather and the other TUC leaders. Feather has fled from a night with the Tories by refusing to call for a recall of the September congress-despite the fact this is what a clear majority of trade unionists urgently want. At the miners' gala in Edin- burgh on Saturday thousands of and their families workers unanimously passed a resolution 'calling up

•TUC

General Council to immediately recon- vene congress in order to unite movement to smash the whole the legislation by refusing to re- cognize, co-operate or acquiesce with any of the machinery set up by the Industrial Relations Act.' Instead, Feather has contra- vened congress policy by recom- mending co-operation with the National Industrial Relations Court and payment of its fines.

Since the fighting spirit of the working class demonstrated in the miners' strike, Feather has been engaged in frenetic col- laboration with Heath and the Tory leaders. But the greatest appeaser of all is 'cloth-cap hero Jack Jones, Transport and General Workers' Union general secretary'. He has already achieved the dubious dis- tinction of being the first trade union leader to pay Tory fines.

Will he now become the first trade union leader to keep the government in office by creating smokescreen of confusion a among his docks members about a 'formula' for peace? Will Jones do his Munich and wave a piece of paper signed Maurice Macmillan calling with for 'peace in our time' on the docks? national shop stewards The committee answered Jones and the Tories on Saturday when they decided not only to continue container firms, their black on but to intensify it! This rank-and-file resistance also expressed itself magnificently in the rail ballot last week.

When the railmen voted for

INCORPORATING THE NEWSLETTE

DAILY ORGAN OF THE CENTR/

week in the life of the Tory the determined resistance of government can be brought ssues-the Industrial Relations Act, Common Market and murder and ernment stands condemned by the the continuation of industrial action, they were voting for the whole of the working class against the government and its indus- trial court. It was the voice of the work- ing class—and it brought message which has shaken the Tories. Having begun two weeks ago *in- with the policy of declaring dustrial war' railmen, on the having declared in a number of statements that ministerial 'greedy" railmen would be re- at all costs' for the sisted economic good of the nation, the Tories are now wavering. They're split. In the next two days the Cabinet will have to resolve the question-will they fight the railmen or pay up? The rifts in the ruling class on this question are very real. Only the other day, the normally sober pro-Tory political correspondent *Evening News' of the London commenting on persistent state- ments that the offer of £20 a week is a 'génerous one, sug- gested that Macmillan should try to live on it for a while.

For the Tories the situation is fraught with dangers. They are through minefield moving a guided, to a large extent, by the Feathers and Joneses. But there are other irrevocable forces at work. By Wednesday or Thursday the Court of Appeal judgement the pass on appeals by the T&GWU against fines and injunctions imposed on it by the NIRC. If the Master of the Rolls, Lord Denning, finds against the union, this will only intensify the rank and file's opposition to the Act and a determination to defeat the government behind it.

Today three members of the Amalgamated Union of Engineer- ing Workers — a district secre- tary, a district chairman and a steward-are sum- senior shop to face moned to the NIRC of 'unfair industrial charges practice. Will they attend? Or will they abide by their union's policy of non-co-operation?

Turn to p.l2, col. 1 INCORPORATING THE NEWSLETTER • MONDAY JUNE 5, 1972 • No.783 • 4p DAILY ORGAN OF THE CENTRAL COMMITTEE OF THE SOCIALIST LABOUR LEAGUE to nuclear CP appeals to Heath in Vietnam protest By JOHN SPENCER

THREE

THOUSAND

demon- gathered Trafalgar in

SUALUIS

Square, London, vesterda against the continued presence in Vietnam. American included contingents Ines from the Communist Party, Young Communist In- Socialism, ternational the nam bondarity campaisn carrying portraits Maoists Stalin. At a meeting before marching on to me American embassy m Grosvenor Square, Gerry Cohen, from the CP national executive, condemned the *abject ana some refusal' of the Heath gov.

less ernment speak against

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NOW OPEN

28 Charlotte St London W1 72 • No.783 • 4p

IE SOCIALIST LABOUR LEAGUE

the American presence in Viet- nam. *The honour of the British labour and trade union move- , he said. Cohen ment is at stake, went on to call for a massive movement of protest to force the Tory government to speak out.

included Pat Other speakers Jordan, leader of the Inter- Group, national Marxist who criticism of the made по CP beyond pointing out that Nixon had been feted in Moscow and Peking while bombarding North Vietnam. Neither James Reid, the UCS stewards leader, nor CP secre- tary John Gollan, both billed as speakers, actually appeared.

A MEETING called by the Transport and General Workers' Union 1/667 branch in London deplored the union yesterday executive's decision to pay the £55,000 fines levied by the National Industrial Relations Court. 40-strong meeting of The T&GWU members, which was supported by officials of several other branches in the London region, called for a return to the of no co-operation laid policy down by the union's last confer- It said the conference ence. should be recalled. remained But the organizers silent on the vital issues of leadership which are now con- many thousands cerning T&GWU members-even patting the executive on the back for its failure discipline shop to stewards as asked to do by the

NIRC.

AS THE 1,500 engineering piece- workers at Reyrolle's switchgear plant in Hebburn, Co Durham, begin their 24-hour strike for the engineers pay • claim, man- agement have retaliated by sus- pending without pay 1,000 in- direct workers. Works councillor convenor, V. Fitzpatrick, claimed there was work for them to do despite the engineers' strikes. Meanwhile in the moulding division of Reyrolle's, at Whinny Lane, Hebburn, 80 workers con- tinue their sit-in. All the heating and telephones were immediately cut off on Friday as the workers refused to vacate the premises after a lock-out threat by management.

Local engineering workers are critical of their union very leaders. One Reyrolle shop steward commented: "The local confederation has watered down the claim to virtually anything you can get. 'It's getting so weak you can hardly taste it. have just signed The unions a deal at Vickers accepting £2 and two days' holiday.' See other engineers' news, p. 12.

workers press

WILL JONES DO A

BY ALEX MITCHELL

THIS IS A decisive week in government. Through the de the working class the goverr down. On a whole number of issues-th unemployment, prices, the Commo torture in Ulster-this government working class. Standing. between the will and the ability of the working class to force the Tories out, is Victor Feather and the other TUC leaders. fled from a fight Feather has with the Tories by refusing to call for a recall of the September congress- despite the fact this is what a clear majority of trade unionists urgently want. in Edin- At the miners' gala burgh on Saturday thousands of families workers their and unanimously passed / a resolution General 'calling the TUC up Council to immediately recon- vene congress in order to unite movement to smash the whole the legislation by refusing to re- cognize, co-operate or acquiesce with any of the machinery set up by the Industrial Relations Act? Instead, Feather has contra- vened congress policy by recom- mending co-operation with . the National Industrial Relations Court and payment of its fines.

Since the fighting spirit of the working class demonstrated in the miners' _strike, Feather has been engaged in frenetic col- Heath and the laboration with Tory leaders. But the greatest appeaser of all is 'cloth-cap hero Jack Jones, Transport and General Workers' Union general secretary'. He has already achieved the dubious dis- tinction of being the first trade union leader to pay Tory fines.

Will he now become the first srave ment in dece by creatihe trade union of confusion a smokescreen among his docks members about formula' for peace? a Will Jones do his Munich and wave a piece of paper signed with Maurice Macmillan calling for 'peace in our time' on the docks? national shop The stewards' committee answered Jones and the Tories on Saturday when they continue decided not only to container firms, their black on but to intensify it! This rank-and-file resistance also expressed itself magnificently in the rail ballot last week.

When the railmen voted for Ti

INCORPORATING THE NEWSLETTE

DAILY ORGAN OF THE CENTR

week in the life of the Tory the determined resistance of government can be brought ssues—the Industrial Relations Act, Common Market and murder and vernment stands condemned by the continuation of industrial the they were voting for the action, whole of the working class against indus- government and its the trial court. It was the voice of the work- ing class-and it brought a message which has shaken the Tories. Having begun two weeks ago with the policy of declaring 'in- dustrial war' the railmen, on having declared in a number of ministerial that the statements 'greedy' railmen would be 're- costs' for sisted at all the economic good of the nation, the Tories are now wavering. They're split. the In the next two days Cabinet will have to resolve the they fight question-will the railmen or pay up? The rifts in the ruling class on this question are very real. Unly the other day, the normally sober pro-Tory political correspondent of the London 'Evening News' commenting on persistent state- of £20 a ments that the offer week is a 'generous' one, sug- gested that Macmillan should try to live on it for a while.

For the Tories the situation is fraught with dangers. They are through minefield moving a guided, to a large extent, by the Feathers and Joneses. But there are other irrevocable forces at work. By Wednesday or Thursday the Court of Appeal judgement will pass on appeals by the T&GWU against fines and injunctions imposed on it by the NIRC. If the Master of the Rolls, Lord Denning, finds against the union, this will only intensify the rank and file's opposition to the Act and a determination to defeat the government behind it. Today three members of the Amalgamated Union of Engineer- ing Workers —a district secre- tary, a district chairman and a senior shop steward-are sum- moned to the

NIRC

to face of 'unfair industrial charges practice'. Will they attend? Or Will they abide by their union's policy of non-co-operation?

Tura to p.lz, col. I INCORPORATING THE NEWSLETTER • MONDAY JUNE 5, 1972 • No.783 • 4p

DAILY ORGAN OF THE CENTRAL COMMITTEE OF THE

1D0 CP appeals to Heath in Vietnam protest By JOHN SPENCER

THREE

THOUSAND

demon- gathered in Trafalgar strators yesterday against the continued protest against American presence in Vietnam. contingents her included Communist -rOm Ene Young Communist ternational Socialism, the Solidarity Campaign and carrying portraits

MUSIC

Stalin. At a meeting before marching Square, Gent of to the Grosvenor Square, Cohen, from the CP national executive, and condemned the abject spine- refusal of the Heath Tess ernment to speak out against

NOW OPEN

28 Charlotte St London W1 72 • No.783 • 4p

IE SOCIALIST LABOUR LEAGUE

the American presence in Viet- nam. "The honour of the British labour and trade union move- went ion to cal, for id. Cassive ment is at stake' of protest to force movement the Tory government to speak out.

included Pat Other speakers Jordan, leader of the Inter- national 1 Marxist Group, who made no criticism of the CP beyond pointing out that Nixon had been feted in Moscow and Peking while bombarding North Vietnam. Neither James Reid, the UCS stewards' leader, nor CP secre- tary John Gollan, both billed as speakers, actually appeared.

MEETING called by Union 1/667 branch in London yesterday deplored the union executive's decision to pay the £55,000 fines levied by the National Industrial Relations Court. The 40-strong meeting of

T&GWU

members, which was supported by officials of several other branches in the London region, called for a return to the policy co-operation laid no down by the union's last confer- It said the conference ence. should be recalled. remained But the organizers on the vital issues of silent leadership which are now con- thousands cerning many T&GWU members-even patting the executive on the back for its failure to discipline shop stewards as asked to do by the

NIRC.

AS THE 1,500 engineering piece- workers at Reyrolle's switchgear begin their 24houF strike tor • their 24-hour strike for the engineers' pay claim, man- agement have retaliated by sus- pending without pay 1,000 in- direct workers. Works convenor, councillor V. Fitzpatrick, claimed there was work for them to do despite the enginéers' strikes. Meanwhile in the moulding division of Reyrolle's, at Whinny Lane, Hebburn, 80 workers con- tinue their sit-in. All the heating and telephones immediately cut off were on • Friday as the workers refused to , vacate the premises after a lock-out threat by management.

Local engineering workers are critical of their union very One Reyrolle shop. leaders. steward commented: "The local confederation has watered down the claim to virtually anything you can get. It's getting so weak you can hardly taste it. have just signed 'The unions at Vickers accepting f2 a deal and two days' holiday.' See other engineers' news, 12. p.

PAGE 2 Workers Press, Monday June 5, 1972 MORE than 200 African bus Africa is paralleled by a big arrested the students, in movement among. drivers were both black and white. weekend Johannesburg at the Premier Balthazar Vorster has on charges of taking part in threatened to shut down univer- an ilłegal strike. the sities protests against The strike had caused a com- apartheid system do not cease.

of plete stoppage was speaking after a clash Evaton, Martindale and Soweto, on Friday™ students and between other African townships outside police on the steps of Cape Town the city, stranding 120,000 com- Cathedral 20 in which some

ISSIBILOR

were. injured. He said students The Public Utility Transport the government was contem- Company has said it is impossible plating firm the action against to meet the drivers' demand for students 'unless the agitation of 60 rand minimum wage ends'. (£30) a week. At present the drivers earn about 30 rand.

M. C. Brig Lamprecht, the city's senior CID officer, said the The growing con at South black bludgeoned the workers police kicked and

AROUND THE WORLD

VIETNAMESE liberation forces have begun a of at- new series tacks on districts in the coastal central and northern regions of South Vietnam. The area has a long tradition of anti-imperialist struggle against both the French and the Ameri- of cans. The immediate target of Phu the attacks 1s the town My, east of Kontum which has been under heavy siege for the weeks. past twu Liberation forces blew up the

BY JOHN SPENCER

puppet troops' ammunition dump near Phu My yesterday and there BRITAIN and Japan will ho reports of fighting from number of the region, areas in September on bilateral, econo which has been quiet for some time. The offensive is part of a drive an official announced in Toky to consolidate gains already made on the ground in the coastal re- The announcement follows shar with the aim of cutting gions, tween Tory Trade Minister John South Vietnam across its central counterpart Kakuei Tanaka.

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Name Address students and bystanders and 'would not hesitate to take the same action again'. Vorster said he had discussed ways of dealing with disturb- ances when he met members of als cabinet, including Minister: f National Education, Police Coloured Relations, Indian Affairs and Bantu Education. Students in many parts of the boycotting have been country lectures since the expulsion last month of Abraham Tiro, a stu- dent leader the African at University of the North at Tur- floop who criticized the govern- ment's racialist education policy during a graduation ceremony.

will hold talks in London in , economic and trade questions, n Tokyo at the weekend. ows sharp exchanges last week be- Davies and his Japanese ter John Davies has been demanding in all his talks with Japanese officials that immediate action be taken to stem the increase of Japanese goods on the Euro- pean market and the growing trade balance in Japan's favour. Japan's professions of willing- ness to deal with these questions.

have cut no ice with the British, Tokyo's who correctly promises as a smokescreen for preparing the invasion of Euro- pean markets. Japan is under continued pressure from Washington to slash its exports to the United States. The White House an- nounced yesterday that presiden- tial adviser Henry Kissinger will be visiting Tokyo in week's time for talks with government representatives on this question.

Kissinger is likely to repeat earlier American threats to take drastic action to protect home markets against Japanese goods Tokyo government unless the shows real willingness to stop its exports. THE signing on Saturday of the treaties between West Germany and the Soviet Union and Poland has opened the way for closer collaboration between the capitalist powers and the Stalin- ist bureaucracy in Europe.

One of the major impediments to, this collaboration was re- moved in Berlin after the treaties had been signed, when the British, French, US and Soviet representatives brought into operation protocol guarantee. ing the status of West Berlin.

Unlimited access to this capi- talist outpost within the German Democratic Republic is guaran- by teed the Berlin protocols. West Berliners will in future be travel surrounding able to to Berlin. East Germany and East The Soviet concessions are in order to pave the way for their cherished dream of a European security conference.

FAITHFUL

its reformist to creed and anti-communist heri- tage the International Socialism group has justified the counter- of the revolutionary betrayal Republican and reformist groups in Ireland. In a back-page leader in this 'Socialist week's Worker' apologist, to amazing goes lengths to play down the significance of the Republican capitulation — and predictably, blame the success of Whitelaw on the Catholic workers and housewives öf Ulster. Harman assures his readers that the Official IRA truce 'follows a week in which middle-class establishment has Catholic launched increasingly bitter attacks on the Republican movement. The impression is created in six paragraphs of turgid prose that powerless to the IRA was resist the offensive of the Catholic Church and the Social Democratic and Labour Party and that the truce was only recognition of an a irrevocable objective 'fact'.

Having mitigated the bankruptcy of the Republican leaders in this way Harman, taking his cue from "The Times', 'explains' the demand for 'peace' by the war-weariness of the people.

He writes: 'But the support that the demand for 'peace' enjoys • among a substantial section of the Catholic population is not only to be explained by tub-thumping of the crude priests and politicians...It expresses a genuine feeling that the killing and the fighting has gone on long enough and that its continuance is not going to lead to any real change for the better... Another 'factor pushing people to pray for peace at almost any price is the growing threat of a bitter religious sectarian blood bath...' [Northern Ire- land: Peace at What Price?'

'Socialist Worker, June 3, 1972.] Some cynics might be inclined to explain Harman's attitude of semi-religious reverence and awe at the power of priestly 'tub-thumping' by the well- known fact that the IS group not only tolerates confessed Catholics on its leading bodies, but even approves of religious ceremonies attended by social- ists. This, however, would be a crude oversimplification of 'state capitalist' method • and outlook. Their compromise with religion is an expression of their con- sistent refusal to fight bour- geois consciousness and their equally consistent worship of rank-and-file spontaneity in the working class. This method leads them to systematically rationalize all that is back- ward and idealist in the work- ing class and incorporate it in their policy. In the past this method led them to approve of the despatch of British troops to Ulster and to confine the struggle in Ulster to the bourgeois-demo- Civil cratic programme of Rights. This policy led inevit- ably to the collapse of their organization in Ulster - the People's Democracy. When the IRA took up arms, the IS, just as impressionistically and unprincipledly, dropped its support for British troops and became the most vociferous apologist for bourgeois nation- alism in Ulster. After the Derry massacre, lead- McCann hemselves with the bankrup policies of the Provisionals.

But imperialism does not rule_by alone. Realizing that guns army repression was driving ghetto dwellers to support the IRA more actively, Whitehall decided to split and under- mine the resistance with direct Direct rule with the temporary abolition of Stormont limited release of internees constituted a far greater danger to the IRA and its supporters the British army and Royal Ulster Constabulary.

It is no accident that on this question the IS group deliber- ately played down this danger with its argument that direct rule 'did not change a thing' Only Workers Press warned of the possibility of direct rule and-after it was proclaimed— pointed out the sinister im- plications of this policy.

Contrary to IS claims, it is not 'war weariness' the threat or of 'sectarian strife' that explains the retreat of the IRA. It is, as we pointed out many times, the failure of every political bican revisionision lind group Republican, revisionist Stalinist— to put forward a revolutionary alternative to direct rule, that accounts for "peace' the growth of the movement. As the Insight inquiry in the Times' revealed yes- 'Sunday terday: ...behind the scenes, Whitelaw and his civil servants have not only had a consider- able hand in orchestrating the much reported "peace moves" by priests and assorted citizenry... "The moves have involved White- and his civil servants, law some of the leaders of the Provisional IRA, the

SDLP

opposition party at Stormont, the Rev Ian Paisley and several prominent Unionists— with the assistance of... poli- ticians in the Labour Party at Westminster. In summary what is happening is this: The Provisionals are talking through to Whitelaw, intermediaries ... Meanwhile the Provisionals have also been talking to Paisley and, to Faulkner's ex-Minister of Development, Reg Bradford...

The SDLP "initiative" ten days ago, calling for Catholics to return to public life, had in fact been discussed with White- law's civil servants before- hand' ('The Sunday Times', June 4, 1972.) Thus the Official IRA 'truce' is important only a small but part of a vast conspiracy of all the bourgeois and petty- bourgeois groups in the Catho- lic camp to achieve an un- principled deal which will leave imperialist interests intact at the expense of Catholic and Protestant workers. 'Socialist Worker' and the 'state capitalists' — no matter what •criticism they now make of Republicans—are willing par- ticipants, not hostages, to this historic betrayal.

• BY DAVID MAUDE

Voting takes place this month in the long- awaited contest for the presidency of the Elec- and Plumbing Trades Union. Since the winner will hold the reins of Britain's fourth largest union, the election has an importance which extends far outside the confines of the EPTU itself. Witness to the seriousness with which the right-wing clique, currently dominating the union, regards the result is borne by the extraordinary reluctance to hold it at all; the post has remained vacant since the death of right-winger Sir Les Cannon 18 months ago.

There are six candidates in the field. Despite the reticence of of them about their most polițics, the election is clearly dominated by political issues.

Perhaps chief among these is ion the surface the Industrial Relations Act. But a careful reading of the various candidates' election addresses reveals an even more fundamental issue: what to do about the Tory government?

Topping the pile is the right-wing general EPTU's: secretary, Frank Chapple, who immediately takes the political bull by the horns with this paragraph: years since Jock In the ten the legal •Byrne and I took action which rid this union of control by the Communist Party. we have gone from strength to strength.' Chapple clearly expects his audience to • attribute the growth in membership, the increase in the number of full- officials and the time strengthening of finances, the sagacity and organizing skill of him and his anti- communist friends rather the growth of the than electrical industry and the rising combativity of the working class. But he is curiously modest about actual results—in terms of wages and conditions-in industries and those com- where the union is panies responsible for negotiations. These are described as merely 'above average'. The EPTU secretary blames the increasing difficulty of representing the membership on "successive governments'.

of the Himself a member Labour Party executive, he says that these 'have been trying to solve the country's economic problems by arbitrarily limiting wage in- creases, encouraging unemploy- ment and finally resorting to ill-conceived Industrial an Relations Act' Chapple's strictures against the Act do not, however, pre- vent him from going on to advise that the EPTU remains registered under it. He encompasses this by first principle' citing 'the of opposition to the Act, then 'the overriding discovering principle' of "defence of our members'. Jim Dormer: call struggle to against Tory Government Even his first 'principle' leads to some bizarre con- clusions. "The movement's policy', the aspiring secretary-president "should be states, to get trade union representatives on National Industrial the Relations Court and Industrial Tribunals which are going to sit in judgement. The second is more straight- forward. It just means: stay on the Tory list. Contracting electrician Jim Dormer is a member of the Socialist Labour League, he has no hesitation in telling the union's 413,071 members. His bid for their support is an uncompromizing call to Tory struggle against the government. He is 'a keen reader of the Workers Press and an active trade unionist', he writes.

shall continue , to fight for a revolutionary leadership in the .....? .... Frank Chapple: advises registration unde union and a socialist Britain'.

Where Chapple wants registration and union judges in the NIRC, Dormer stands for 'a campaign of the trade unions and labour movement to force the Tories to resign and the construction of a revolutionary alternative to reformism and Stalinism'.

The Tories, he goes on, must be replaced with a Labour government pledged to socialist policies which include nationalization under workers' control and without compens- ation of all land, banks and industry. Such a government would also end British membership of the Common Market, with- draw the troops from Northern immediately Ireland an d defend all democratic rights.

"This', Dormer insists, 'is the only answer to the problems of unemployment, homeless- ness and destitution'. He concludes by expressing opposition to all forms. of productivity-bargaining and 'any attempt to replace union democracy by a professional bureaucracy'. Fred Gore, a shop steward at London's Heathrow airport, until recently could have been expected to get the full back- ing of the Communist Party in his attempt at the presidency.

has been But there speculation of late that the CP may swing at least some of its weight behind the former Labour councillor, executive Hammond, member Eric or national officer Mark Young.

Gore's address concerns. itself solely with trade union issues. He is 'completely opposed to the government's Industrial Relations Act', but makes no mention of getting the Tories out of office. Even Chapple calls for the return of a Labour government to repeal the Act.

'It is appalling', Gore goes 'that our 'union has still on, not carried out the 1971 policy conference decision to de- register. 'Ours is the only major industrial union that has yet to comply with TUC policy.

Until we do so, we are in effect aiding and abetting the Workers Press ation under the Act on grounds of 'defence of in'. Tory attacks on trade unions.'

The airport steward also calls for better liaison between . officers and union full-time merbers, more local pay agreements and more negotiat- ing authority for shop stewards. 'No redundancies in any in the. guise can be tolerated present circumstances' " he says. Executive member Hammond tries to stand in the middle of the road, advising union mem- bers not to read his address if they believe officers should be chosen 'on pro- or anti- communism or whether they abhor or revere the leader- ship' He says he voted against this year's electricity-supply 'Supply settlement. pay workers were sold short for their productivity effort, he explains. But he does not opposition to the express history of productivity dealing which has destroyed thousands of power jobs. He says he will oppose any with either the merger engineers' or General and Mark Young: led reform movement tha kora Pross, Monday June 5, 1972 PAGE 3 fence of our members' Workers' Municipal unions 'until I am convinced that our members' interests best are served by merging'. Roy Sanderson's candidature also claims to be 'non-partisan' 'I stand without the support any sectarian group', the of former who left-winger, became an EPTU paid official, writes. He claims to offer 'an alternative choice'. like Chapple, he is But, opposed to the policy of de- registration under the Indust- Relations Act, although to work wanting the union within the . TUC to change these decisions .. • not act defiance unilaterally in of them'. Sanderson also supports unions appearing , before the courts. Young, another national officer, was secretary of the so- called reform movement which the 1961 High 'to decision placing Chapple and company in power. But now, he says, the 'democratic which gone. Fresh blood is needed in lucky donor should you've guessed it, Mark Young.

rement that put Chapple in power

THE CRISIS OF LEADERSHIP

PAGE 4 Workers Prose, Monday June 5, 1 Dear Editor, Ian Yeats attack on 100 years doubt written with the intentions, was, I believe, in effect an unintentional attack on the railway workers, and is at least open to question.

Ian Yeats states that a characterize the maxim to NUR leadership would be 'when the enemy advances we retreat, this maxim to apply over the past 100 years. He goes on to say: 'Not that the 12 general secretaries of the NUR and their success- ive executive committees have themselves seen their decisions as retreats or employers as the enemy.' Have then the membership?

The executive committee of the NUR is changed by one.

therefore third each year wholly by each third year, each retiring member not being eligible to stand again for a further three years.

Although a member of the executive committee serves for a period of three years, the branches of the union in the district he serves have the power to call a ballot to re- place him after one year.

Ian Yeats is in effect suggest- ing that railway workers have consistently allowed them- selves to be sold out and by executive 30-odd different consisting of 24 committees men at a time, the positions of whom the members have the power to change every year, not including the powers members have through their annual general meeting.

This is nonsense and the suggestion only emerges from the articles because they are historical truths taken vut of context. Is this not so? The members of the NUR have laid down certain rules, the spirit of which are that the struggle of all workers in the industry are the same regard-

REPLY BY IAN YEATS

Time and time again in the 100 year history of the ASRS - NUR alter- leadership native has been sought by the rank and file. Only two weeks ago South- ern Region drivers threatened to set up a breakaway union in protest against ASLEF execu- tive's decision to call off the work-to-rule. They would not have got far. Setting up new unions as substitute for the fight for principled revolutionary leader- ship is a blind alley doomed to bring workers back to the reformist quagmire they sought to escape. Historically there are plenty of railwaymen more examples in some cases mooting and establishing breakaway unions and unofficial strikes are legion.

In common with workers in any and every other union they have repeatedly shown their disapproval of the compromises effected by successive leader- ships. There can, therefore, be no question of blaming the rank and file of the NUR for the retreats of their leaders.

That they accepted these retreats owes itself to the fact that workers can only fight organizations they inside the have historically built up.

But the question to be ne 1 лето 5, 1972 less of the job he performs.

The members have also ruled that the NUR exists 'to work for the suppression of the capitalist system by a socialis- tic order of society'. It is rather irksome to hear that sectionalist unions in the railway industry are using lan Yeats articles as an attack on trade unionism industrial as unions barely got a these couple of paragraphs in . the entire series. Why is this?

Ian Yeats writes: 'Only mem- bers of the Labour Party are allowed to stand for the execu- tive-thus excluding commu- nists. Where does he get this information? The membership have ruled that the President must attend the Labour Party conference as a delegate and must therefore be a member of the Labour Party. But there is nothing to say a member of the national executive com- mittee must be a Labour Party member or that he may not be a Communist Party member or any other party member for that matter. We must, as trade unionists, fight to replace any of our leaders who are beat or com- promise and too blind to see the struggle of the workers as a political struggle. We must do this if we are to kick the Tories out and replace them with a true socialist govern- ment. The trade unions are fighting for survival. The capitalists have declared war on the work- ing class. To win this war we must examine as workers our own history so as not to make the same mistakes we 'have made in the past. Ian Yeats may feel this is what his articles did. But his amalysis was incomplete and: left too many questions. This is where the dangers lie.

G. Revell N. London answered is not why workers eventually obey their leaders but why those leaders con- sistently betray and compro- mise. We were at pains to stress at the beginning of our seven- part history of the ASRS-NUR (time and space alone kept us from turning to the ASLEF and the TSSA) that the his- tory of the railway unions was less than the no more or catalogue of reformism. The reformist does not see employers or their government as enemies to be destroyed.

He sees them as men in whom ultimately authority is vested by virtue of their ownership Lenin: 'trade union conscious- is bourgeois conscious- ness ness.? of the means of production and exchange and as men with whom he must and can bargain.

The trade union is a defen- sive organization which exists to squeeze crumbs from the employers by a process of nego- tiation in which compromise is and even honour- a necessary able part. As Lenin says, trade union is bourgeois consciousness the consciousness. In 1919 and 1926 the ruling Tory government was quite clear that if the unions pressed ahead with their claims it meant going beyond the con- cept of 'our society' to the concept of whose society and the consequent battle for state power. The : reformists knew it too and shifted heaven and earth to avoid such a fight. Trotsky wrote: "The decom- position of British capitalism inevitably leads to the impo- tence of the trade unions.' It was this process he referred to.

He went on: 'In order to take • th the proletariat must power necessarily have at their head a revolutionary party.' G. Revell expresses surprise that '30-odd ECs' accountable to general meetings should have consistently sold out the membership. History shows us that that is just what they did.

And they were allowed to not because the rank and file wanted it that way, but be Richard Bell. because of the absence of an alternative revolutionary lead- ership. The working class cannot break spontaneously from reformism and trade union consciousness. Mr Revell is right to say that 'as trade unionists we must fight to replace any of our leaders who are bent on compromise and too blind to see the struggle of the workers as a political struggle'.

But it is not a question of trade union leaders being blind.

It is a question of their being reformist. The fight today is not to exchange a good reformist for a bad reformist but to raise of trade the consciousness unionists to a revolutionary socialist level by fighting for Marxist policies and leader- ship in the unions. And the way to do this is by building the independent revolutionary leadership around the All Trades Unions Alliance, ake the Socialist Labour League and the Young Socialists.

• unions certainly The trade are, as Revell says, fighting for survival and the capitalists certainly have declared war.

Without the revolutionary party it is a war in which the Tories advance with fixed bayonets while the reformists plead. The reformists can and will but be driven to the very points of those bayonets by a working class more confident, aggres- sive and determined to fight than at almost any other time in its history. The miners frog-marched their leaders to the front line and last week's rail ballot has put hot coals under the feet of the rail union leaders. A general strike to force the Tories to resign and return a Labour government pledged to socialist policies is imminent.

But only the revolutionary • is capable of disarming party the Tories and the class they and for all. represent once Only the revolutionary party can break trade unionists from reformist bourgeois conscious- ness. Only the revolutionary party can lead the working class to power. Nowhere is the reformist character of the ASRS-NUR more clear than in its choice of presidents and general sec- retaries-often only one step removed from outright Tories.

While it is true that mem- bers of the NUR executive may belong to any party, the pre- and general sident secretary must be able to attend Labour Party conferences and must therefore be members of the Party. Since the reformist Labour bureaucrats have proscribed communist organizations, com- munists are excluded from these offices.

ISRAELI UNION LEADERS

'SAVED' BY GOLDA MEIR

Israel's TUC, the Histad.

rut, was recently saved from a leadership crisis by the personal interven- tion of Mrs Golda Meir, the Israeli premier. issue was over the intended resignation of Itzhak Ben Aharon, the Histadrut sec- retary. Eventually after suasion from Meir, he decided to stay-but the fact that the premier should have made such a dramatic personal inter- vention is a reminder of the close relationship that has always existed between Israel's trade union bureaucrats and the state. At the time, Ben same Aharon's resignation was a reflection of the impact upon this relationship of the class struggle. Israeli union leader The resigned in protest because of government intervention in a dispute involving 4,500 work- ers in privately-owned canning factories. He took the view that the Israeli government was intervening too often in indus- trial disputes, thus undermin- ing the position of the Hista- drut negotiators for the work- ers. The government move aver- ted a strike and foisted a com- promise on the workers already agreed by the Histadrut's cen- tral committee and the Manu- facturers' Association. Under the deal, day-labourers in the canning factories will be given monthly salaried status after 13 years' work, bringing them into line with conditions of service in the Histadrut's own canneries. Ben Aharon argued that these terms are not as good as the workers could have gained by free trade union action. His announcement that he would resign brought a wave of demonstrations and strikes throughout Israel. This in- cluded the shut-down of Lydda Airport and the stoppage of all factories in the town of Safed. The Ben Aharon resignation incident therefore constituted a significant breach in the poli- tics of class-collaboration which have so far dominated the His- tadrut. With its co-operative socie- ties, industrial enterprises and institutions such as its Health Service, the Histadrut played a major and essential part in creating the basis for the state of Israel. Although it was a labour organization, it was a Zionist organization too, and one of its main aims was to replace Arab labour with Jew- ish labour, as the basis for a Jewish national state. Since the formation of the state of Israel, the Histadrut has continued to collaborate in the implementation of Zionist policies, at home and both abroad. Its bureaucracy has provided many of the political leaders of the state, in fact.

Both Meir and Ben Aharon are from the same stable and the Histadrut secretary is a former Transport Minister. The contradiction that has resulted however, is that the price of having , trade union collaboration at the base of the state has been, for the Zionists, having to accept also a well-organized trade union movement and a working class which expects living decent standards and rights. Private capitalists setting up ese in Israel complain of the atti- tudes of the workers and the power of the Histadrut. Both they and the right-wing poli- ticians who speak for them resent the strength of the His- tadrut and the position of its economic and social institution.

So far as the Zionist capita- lists are concerned, the Hista- drut might have served a neces- sary function in building their state, but now they would pre- fer to be able to dispense with it 'normalize' and Israeli society. Unfortunately this is easier said than done. For the trade union bureau- cracy, the Histadrut is the source of their careers and in- fluence. It is an establishment within an establishment. They have to defend their own social position and political power.

As loyal the servants the Histadrut Zionist state, leaders do their best to hold back struggles of the the Israeli working class. The Hista- drut has been jocularly defined in the past as an organization for the prevention of strikes'!

But at the same time the lead- ers must maintain some appea- rance of being workers' lead- ers. Their class-collaboration policies can be challenged from below, as when the seamen went on strike in 1954 in the Zim lines, which were partly Histadrut-owned, and raised the issue of wages and inde- pendent trade unionism. In the 1960s, there was the challenge of rank-and-file move- workers in the ments, when industrial centres set up action committees to launch strikes against and demonstrations government wage-freeze poli- cies and unemployment. To some extent, the Zionist Wrykers Press rulers have been able to use talk of national security and patriotism to counteract class consciousness and hold back working-class militancy. But they have not been as success- ful as they would wish. Par- ticularly recently, working- class anger has been growing because of the feeling that it is the working class alone that is being made to bear the bur- den of war expenditure. Workers, especially young couples who cannot get accom- modation, are angry at the building of luxury flats for the privileged. They are angry about the profiteering and cor- ruption revealed in recent gov- ernment scandals. Itzhak Ben Aharon, as leader of the Histadrut, has had to protest to the Israeli govern- ment over its economic poli- cies and to denounce corrup- tion. He has condemned the treatment of the poor, and the luxury being enjoyed by the wealthy. This reflects the pres- sure he is under from rank- and-file workers. In threatening to resign over government intervention in industrial disputes, Ben Aharon is clearly recognizing that to maintain his position, as a trade union bureaucrat, he must be allowed the sem- blance, at least, of indepen- dence from the state. The appeal from Golda Meir, on the other hand, reflects the dilemma of the government. The 'Jewish Chronicle' corres- pondent on May 19 says: 'There are many in the gov- ernment who would like to the back of i Mr Ben see Aharon ... but the country cannot afford the widespread ferment which would follow among the workers.' kors Press, Monday June 5, 1972 PAGE 5 The Maoists are working to cement even more closely their ties with the reactionary and pro-imperialist regimes of the Middle East. An important delegation of Peking Stalinists has just returned from a visit to the Sudan. They held talks with President Jaafar Numeiry's dictatorial government on closer trade ties and more aid to the Sudan. Led by Pai Hsiang-kuo, described as a government representative, the delegation was given five-star treatment by the Sudanese. Numeiry: Friendly butcher Last July the Numeiry government executed 13 leading Communists, includ- ing the Sudan CP's general Khaled Abdel secretary Mahgoub. The Chinese are not alone in their courtship of the Sudanese butchers. A 'friendship delegation' from Numeiry's government is reported to have ended its stay in Pyongyang, capital of North Korea. It was headed by Numeiry's Cabinet secretary, • Ahmad Bakiker Isa. At the airport to see the delegation off were An Sung- hak, Minister of Commerce and chairman of the Sudan- Korea Friendship Society and the Vice-Minister of Foreign Affairs, Kim Yong-taek. North Korea's 'great helms- man', Kim Il-sung, recently celebrated his 60th birthday with extravagant self-eulogies in the Stalin manner. Among other things, he claimed to be history's fore- most strategist. His relations with the Sudan demonstrate the re- actionary reality behind these ludicrous claims. Kim Il-sung: Helmsman

PAGE 6 Workers Press, Monday June 5, 1972 At 7.20 a.m. on April 15 pullover followed the brown me and shot after me in Bally- last the Conway brothers, I Road. When was murphy Gerard, left Tohn and about at No. 15 I was grazed my right hip. home in Ballymurphy bullet on by a He did follow not me any I ran into Joe Mark's further. for their fruit stand. I said: "I am shot in house. the backside." Joe brought me the bus They • issed to the Royal Victoria Hospital.'

said: 'Let's walk down Gerry Meanwhile to to the Falls Road-we'll get a we return bus quicker down there' Conway Gerry who took momentary lapse in one of the of St the Near gates gunmen's attention to run Thomas's School a car pulled 'A couple of shots rang away. up in front of them. the calf out. I felt a sting in From sworn statements sup- left kept on of my leg. for Association by the plied While I was running running. have pieced Legal Justice I heard a bullet whizzing past then happened. what together off head. I took my coat doors of my 'Three John says: as I was finding it difficult to - two front and one the run. There were a couple more opened suddenly. back-were shots. They Three men jumped out. of Whiterock Noel O'Reilly İ said to Gerry all had pistols. Road was sleeping in when he back "Run". I started to run outside his towards Ballymurphy Road.'

heard two shots bedroom window. He says: One of the Gerry states: jumped out of bed and went to He to me. ran the window. I saw a man with face and pointed a gun in my whom I now know was a hat, •Hold it." I thought it said: Gerry Conway, running up the usually hold-up, as was a centre of the road from Bally- for about £100 my carry murphy. About 20 or 30 yards "I have only I said: business. behind there was a man fol- watch." John ran £2 and my lowing him. down the road followed back was dressed in a blue 'He The gunman two men. anorak-type jacket with a red beside me turned his head to each sleeve and stripe down this look after them. I took Conway Gerry had pistol. Whiterock chance and ran up "Please don't shouting: Falls. Road towards the shoot." don't shoot, please Terence Marley, a foreman fired a shot at The gunman Belfast cleansing with the wife to keep him. him. i told ran do onstairs department, was standing with waiting for the bin his gang and out to my front gate.

at the corner of White- lorry the fire gunman saw Ballymurphy Road. rock and shot. Gerry kept run- another 'A bluish-green car, He says: stopped The gunman ning. 1100, but I am probably an outside my not absolutely sure, came down He pointed the of the Road... It had Ballymurphy "Get in. at least three occupants.

" He spoke with Just after it passed us th definite English accent. He econd time, John and Gerr "I'm a soldier." shouted again: came out of Bally- Conway You'll I shouted: "No chance. murphy Road and walked up not murder anyone up here.

Whiterock Road towards There's too many witnesses.

Road. When they Falls came 'By this time car we heard shots. near the Conway came running John Whiterock Road and White- Ballymurphy back and into Gardens. The gunman rock He was followed by Road. turned and fired another shot two men. at him which I think hit him.

'One had a blue T-shirt or A car came up the Whiterock polo neck type of sweater and Road from the Falls direction.

dark, had blue the other It stopped. Gerry ran over with a red stripe down jacket this car, threw his hands in I saw that at least the sleeve. "Take me the air and shouted: one of them had a pistol. My He's He's soldier away. away. to murder me. men and myself ran for cover into the gardens of the houses Malachy Milligan who lives right of Ballymurphy Road. The gunmen went back at 69 Whiterock Road was also by the shooting. Whiterock Road. woken uP. Almost and to the window immediately our went observed the following: I saw from the Falls lorry arrived a man-whom I now know to Road direction The driver, Conway-with his Michael Mulligan, shouted: be Gerry in his hands running "Get on and let us get to hell jacket backwards. He was being fol- out of here, I was I was nearly shot blue lowed by man in a there. "You were not the only one.", jacket with red bomber stripe on the sleeve. This man Conway continues his John had Gerry covered with story of his flight from the the pistol and was telling him to into gunmen: stop. Gerry said: "Don't shoot.

The one with murphy Road. march off British troops Derry's demonstrators on 'Bloody Sunday' last January.

Inset the Conway family Don't 'He then turned his back on his assailant and tried to hobble away from him. He already seemed to have been wounded. The gunman fired two shots at him. Gerry began again: "Help me, to shout someone help me. I'm being shot." A car with three people came up Whiterock Road from he Falls and stopped oppo site No. 65. Gerry leaned or the bonnet facing the wind- screen and pleaded for some- one to help him. got The two passengers out of the car. The gunman moved towards the rear of the car keeping Gerry covered 'At this stage a blue-green down Whiterock car came Road from Ballymurphy and pulled up opposite No. 71. Its registration number was men jumped 5275 WZ. Two out. One had fair curly hair and wore a beige sweater and the other a blue sweater.

'They also carried pistols.

The one with the blue sweater Whiterock towards moved Drive. The one with the beigt sweater moved towards Gerry the the on Conway, man He then beckoned to bonnet. the first gunman at the back of the car to come forward which he did. My wife shouted "For • God's sake, please out: don't do it." The gunman with the beige sweater looked up at her and said nothing. 'Then he took out a walkie talkie, knelt behind my car and put out a message: "There has incident, shooting been Road. There Whiterock are civilian four of us here in Special Branch." He clothes. spoke with an English accent.'

Fearing instant execution, Gerry Conway was terrified. He goes on: 'I remember jumping on the bonnet of Charlie Morrison's recall shouting at car. "Reverse Charlie: it back, reverse it back." I also remem- "Don't shoot shouting: children." wife and four staggered over to a car at the side of the road. I then saw the fair-haired , one who had followed my brother, John, pull out a walkie-talkie and I distinctly heard him "Bryson got say: • but Toland is hurt." I away realized then that they were civilian soldiers in probably clothes. I shouted: "I'm not Toland. I am Gerry Conway.

That's not Bryson. That's my brother." I pulled out my driving licence. my tax book, my insur- ance and fruit dockets to prove who I was.' Noel O'Reilly continues: 'A couple of minutes later two Saracens arrived. Soldiers of the King's: Own Regiment got out. I heard the first gun man say: "Bryson got away" I also heard the name "Toland" mentioned. I heard a ginger-haired sol- dier who got out of the Saracen saying: "You've shot the wrong bloody man". Meanwhile Gerry Conway was shouting at the top of his voice: "I'm not Toland, I'm not Toland. I've a wife and four kids". • I then saw them bundling Gerry into a Saracen. Mrs Catherine Wallace of 6 Whiterock Crescent was also attracted to the scene of the 'Gerry kept saying shooting: they'd taken him for Tommy Toland. I shouted to the gun- the walkie-talkie: man with "He's not Tommy Toland. I He's know Tommy Toland. areary who sells the fruit in the "He 'The soldier shouted: jumped one of our men". I said: "He couldn't jump any.

body, not even a fly". I told there was an ambulance them coming. The soldier said: "He won't need one"? Noel O'Reilly • states: The ginger-haired soldier was talk- ing to a couple of the gunmen.

The three gunmen got into the car they arrived in, reversed into Whiterock Gardens and Bally- went off towards murphy.'

POSTSCRIPT

On the noon news the shoot- ing incident was reported. The story specifically stated that the army was not involved. On the 3 p.m. news the story that the army wasn't involved was repeated despite the fact that at least one local resident had complained. , that evening the BBC Later. told one angry eye-witness over the telephone: "Thank you for the lead. The army now they were in- accept that volved! But despite this, the incident was not reported on radio or television. When resident the sug- gested this was suppression of news, he was told: 'Now, now, Workers Press, Mondo that's very strong language.'

in hospital After treatment John Conway was discharged.

He was interrogated by the Special Branch who claimed he was a member of the IRA and he was also shown a gun which they accused him of using. No charges were ever formally laid against him.

Gerry Conway had opera- tions to bullet wounds in both legs. He is still walking on crutches. On the same day the Conways were shot another army patrol assassinated Offi- cial IRA leader Joe McCann as he walked through the streets. During the past week the Conway household has been terrorized by army squads during the night; they bang on the door of the house and shout obscentities through the letterbox. Mrs Conway believes this is part of a campaign to Vorkers Press, Monday June 5, 1972 PAGE 7 her against pur- intimidate suing a legal fight against the soldiers responsible. On May 19 junior Defence Minister Geoffrey Johnson Smith said: 'Army patrols do occasionally operate in civilian clothes. The reason for this is quite simply that soldiers operating in uniform and with service vehicles are easily recognizable at a distance and therefore plainclothes are adopted on certain occasions when surprise is essential.

'On these occasions as at all other times the patrol works under normal military disci- pline and in accordance with the Yellow Card (the army regulations book).' The army is still looking for one called Toland two men, and the other called Bryson.

Late last year they escaped from the prison ship 'Maid- stone'.

PAGE 8 Workers Prose, Monday June 5, The Upper Clyde Ship- builders saga has made history in more ways than one. In a • manner unparalleled since World War 1, a key sec- tion of the Clydeside working thrown into the class was forefront of the class struggle in Britain. It was on the Clyde, in 1915, that the first shop stewards' movement was born.

There is a sickening irony in the fact that it should be on the Clyde, in the infinitely more revolutionary circumstan- ces of the 1970s, that counter- revolutionary Stalinism should strike its most direct blow against the very existence of an independent shop stewards' movement. stewards' move- The shop built in struggle ment was against the capitulation of the trade union leadership to the government's anti-union legis- lation of the World War I period. The infamous Treasure Agreement and Munitions of War Act in 1915 outlawed strikes, imposed virtual mili- tary discipline on the work- ers, and opened the door for the enforcement of 'dilution' of labour and the abolition of protective practices in the munitions industries. The government chose the Clyde as the area in which to fight out their enforcement.

Virtually deserted by the trade union leaders who had climbed eagerly on to the gov- ernment's recruiting platforms, the workers were forced to build rank-and-file committees of which the Clyde Workers' Committee was the first and most famous. y June 5, 1972 It was led by William Gal- lacher (Albion), David Kirk- wood and Tom Clark (Beard- more's, Parkhead), John Muir (Barr & Stroud), James Messer and Arthur MacManus (Weir's of Cathcart). The Committee's manifesto declared: 'Since the outbreak of the European • War, many have been brought changes about of vital interest to the workers. Foremost amongst these has been the scrapping of trade union rules, and the undermining consequent the whole trade union move- ment... The support given to Munitions Act by the (trade union) officials was an act of treachery to the work- ing class. Those of us who refuse to be sold have organ- ized the above committee, rep- resent tive, del mined if the Clyde area, tain what liberties we have, and to take the first oppor- tunity of forcing the repeal of all the pernicious legislation that has im- recently been posed upon us... Our purpose misconstrued, must not • be we are out for unity and closer organization of all trades in the industry, one union being the ultimate aim. We will sup- port the officials just so long as they rightly represent the represent them.' Because the CWC was un- able to develop beyond a syn- dicalist perspective and be- cause there was no revolution- party able to take the ary political fight to mobilize the working class against imperial- ism the Clydeside shop stew- ards' movement was defeated.

Over the winter of 1915- 1916 every trick was used to exploit the weaknesses of the workers' leaders, to isolate the engineers from the skilled movement of the working class as a whole over conscription, rents, profiteering etc and so to create the conditions in which the Clyde Workers' Committee could be smashed.

Late in March 1916 a strike over the rights of shop stewards broke out at Beard- more's, Parkhead. The gov- ernment decided to act. Lead- ing members of the CWC were arbitrarily arrested in the mid- dle of the night and deported without trial out of the Clyde- side area. It was a year before they were allowed legally to return. From the beginning the gov- ernment had been clear that the enforcement of 'dilution' in the munitions industries- substituting the unskilled and female labour for craftsmen in jobs previously reserved for skilled workers-required not only the co-operation of the union leaders, but also the defeat of the workshop leader- ship. They consistently placed the basic class questions first-the carrying through of a political strategy to defeat the most militant section of the working class. They frequently had to whip reluctant employers into line, because they tended to look for the easiest way out of an situation. immediate The Clydeside engineering employ- ers were slow to introduce dilution schemes during 1915, because they had been fright- ened by the action of the work- ers in the first major strike of the war—the 'twopence an hour' strike of engineering workers on the Clyde in Feb- ruary 1915. But from the autumn of 1915 on the government drove through its 'dilution' plans ruthlessly. It made use of the munitions tribunals, a special commission, every propaganda device, and its power to sup- left-wing press newspapers including the reformist ILP paper, Forward, which had refused to support strike action during the war-to carry through the task The details of how the gov- ernment did the job can be found in an essay by _James Hinton 1886-1923 (Macmil- lan, 1971). But the writer is so obsessed with the strategy of the government and the civil servants and by the tac- tical mistakes the shop stewards that he leaves the working of his class out His criticism of the account. CWC is devoid of any analy- sis of their theoretical limita- tions-limitations which accounted in large part for their defeat. His theory is that 'the inde-

CWC]

pendence [that the established was not the inde- pendence of the rank and file as such from the officials, but the independence of a militant vanguard among the rank and file from officials who derived their authority from a rela- tively apathetic majority' (p.

165.) This idealist conception is fundamentally different no from the openly reactionary view that the working-class militancy is the product of the activities of a minority of agi- tators. It precisely the was strength and determination of the Clydeside working class which threw forward the Clyde Workers' Committee.. On a whole number of issues, from working conditions and rents to conscription, the workers on the Clyde were in the van- guard of the struggle of the proletariat dur- International ing this period. Despite the divisions which the leadership was unable to overcome, despite the defeats which they suffered, the Clyde- side workers refused to capitu- late the to government- directed offensive. After the war, early in 1919.

it was to be the Clydeside working class which led the fight once again, through a 14- day general strike for a 40- hour week. The crisis on the Clyde then as now was, above all, a crisis of leadership. It was the War Act, 1915, The Munitions outlawed strikes and disciplined workers. The Clyde was chosen to fight for its enforcement.

crisis of the lack of a Leninist party to unite all the struggles of the working class and direct them against the main enemy — the capitalist class and its government. Hinton's inability to grasp the revolutionary strength of the working class leads him to idealize the strategic genius of the servants of the ruling class.

He correctly brings out the class cunning of Lloyd George and his civil servants—includ- ing William Beveridge, later to be painted as the father of the welfare state-and their deter- mination to smash the shop stewards' movement. Divorced from an overall, materialist analysis of history, this point is turned into a quality of the British fixed governing class in such a way as to make it sound eternally invincible. Hinton's essay often to the sounds like a hymn intelligence of Britain's capi- talist rulers. Pessimism over the capacity of the working class to fight back coupled with a one- sided admiration of the appearance of strength the ruling class deliberately culti- vated, is the mood and meth- od of all idealists like Hinton.

Beneath their bombast the ruling class is weak. Today the economic crisis they face is more acute than in 1914 and it is felt at its sharpest in Britain.

This is not to disarm the working class — for this very Tories the must reason depend on extra parliamentary forces in the courts and the army to perpetuate their rule.

But correspondingly the class is British working stronger than it was in 1914, both in resources and experi- ence. At the time of World War I no political tendency existed in Britain that was able to grasp the full meaning of the Octo- ber Revolution in Russia. But today in the Socialist Lab- our League we do have such a movement which can negate the past lessons and bring the working class to power.

GEORGE

JACKSON

AND HIS

POLITICS

BOOK REVIEW

Eye. George "Blood My Published by Jonathan TacKson Cape. £1.95. 217 pages. One of the contradictions of capitalism is that its prisons, bastilles for the defence of private pro- at certain perty, prove moments in its history to the de- schools be for of political velopment consciousness. and Soledad San Quentin the most orisons are two 0l in the world. deliberately en- Racialism couraged by the guards. Fights provoked black are between and where white prisoners, high- guards armed With velocity rifles can pick off militants. In the aftermath of one such fight a warder was found dead with Jackson To ta George Fleeta Drumgo and Cluchette, framed with was his murder. Since Jackson's 'one year to life' sentence, for $70 theft from a petrol station, was technically.- - and in his case literally—a life sen- conviction would have tence, automatic death carried penalty. But the prison authori- the verdict. anucated inere was anotner provocalon reported out, •reak Jackson was shot. before his Some months death a collection of his prison letters was published, 'Soledad Brother'. It was acclaimed as a literary masterpiece, a triumph ot survival under intolerable "The circumstances. "Jimes' revewer wiole It is Jackson's achievement •.. Inal ne nas succeeded m turning to positive account an experience which has destroyed almost all have those wno undergone it... Jackson is an liberated individual by developing talent.' What is expressed here, and it was typical of Fleet Street's reaction to jackson's book, is a pompous philistine astonish- ment that a self-educated black youth could master the English language. Jackson portrayed as a shining example of the Tory philosophy of self- help, a lonely individual suc- cessfully defying the odds.

What was ignored was that Jackson not only described his experience so powerfully that Fleet Street reviewers could share it, but fought to under- it and relate it to the stand social and political context which impelled thousands of youth like himself into crime of spontaneous means as a rebelling against an oppressive system. It was a battle for conscious- ness, in which Jackson turned Marxism as the highest to expression of the struggle of the working class to overthrow capitalism. Inevitably he came to Marxism not in any pure form but encumbered by all the confusion and opportunism of the New Left. The middle-class narrow, those circles, of perspective meeting with his own spon- taneous anger, reinforces that tendency towards adventurism whose hallmark is the idea that revolutions are made not through but on behalf of people. Had he lived, Jackson would certainly have developed far beyond this. And even as it is, his book has the very opposite significance to that which his reviewers ascribed to it. 'Blood in My Eye' is a collec- tion of longer letters and essays analysing capitalism in America and setting out a programme for revolution.

was completed almost It Jackson's within a week of death on August 21 last year.

And therefore only days before Nixon's decision to end dollar convertibility and to impose a 10-per-cent surcharge on imports. To point that out is not to fit Jackson into a con- venient chronological pattern, but to call attention to what is missing. Despite his understanding that capitalism of the way works, and of the way it uses racialism, he ignores what is crucial to an understanding of capitalism, the fact that it is in a state of mortal crisis.

In. 'Memories of Lenin', Krupskaya describes how in Petersburg Marxist circles...

a certain tendency began to crystallize. To the representa- tives of this tendency the processes of social develop- ment appeared as something schematic. mechanical and an interpretation Such com- pletely neglected the role of the proletariat. the masses, The revolutionary dialectic of Marxism stowed was away somewhere, and only lifeless "phases development" remained.' Jackson's Marxism is at first sight very different from the spirit of these circles. They were engaging in a reformist campaign for 'Committees of Illiteracy'. Jackson demands immediate urban guerrilla warfare. But his analysis, based on a static impression of society, is essen- tially similar to theirs. It is no coincidence either that his party, the Black Panthers, are presently engaging in a cam- paign to register 10,000 voters with the Democratic Party.

This tendency is most apparent in the essay 'On Withdrawal', which uses the methods of formal logic to solve the problem of revolu- syllogism is tion. The as follows: Since the working in America has been class bought off, robbed of its revo- lutionary potential, and since the only elements untouched by this process are black revo- lutionists, the revolution must begin with them. Organized in the vanguard party of the Black Panthers their task is to build communes within the cities, armed and capable of challenging the full power of the state. The state will be compelled to take violent measures of rep will ensuing war administer a traumatic shock to the working class which will arouse them from their con- ditioned conservatism. They will then join the revolution.

Or if not, at least the countries of the third world will benefit from the destruction of America. Thus the major premise of Jackson's syllogism is that capitalism has triumphed over its contradictions and has emerged, not as Mandel and the Pabloites claim in the form of 'neo-capitalism', but as fascism. Workers Press 'When I am interviewed by a member of the old guard and point to the concrete and steel, tiny electronic listening the device concealéd in the vent, the phalanx of goons peeping in at us, and his barely func- plastic tape recorder tional that cost him a week's labour, and point out that these are all manifestations of fascism, he invariably will attempt to refute me by defining fascism simply as an economic geo- political affair where only one political party is allowed to exist above ground and no opposition political party is allowed.' But what is essential to the development of fascism is the defeat of the working class destruction of its and the in organized strength trade in which unions. The period the incorpora- Germany saw tion of unions into the state under fascist law saw in America the building powerful independent unions with a vigour and speed un- in union paralleled trade history. For all its manifestations of fascism, its racialism, its net- work of secret agencies, etc., capitalism has not defeated the working class in America.

On the contrary its great strength, as evidenced in the recent settlements in the steel and auto industries, lies at the in the heart of the crisis American economy. Jackson ignores this and assumes that class struggle has been halted, allowing capital- ism to transform itself into its "logical and final arrangement'.

The revolution which ought to have happened failed to happen. Counter-revolution has triumphed by default. persuasion. It has succeeded in internalizing within the con- of the sciousness working Workars Prose, Monday Juno 5, 1972 PAGE 9 class its law drome. It has of short nation tented, conservative •. historically fear, to feel the dom'. sciousness hippie influenced by Wilhelm Whereas they Reich's later, which talism COnCouses class. trauma, bring forth In the ruling of of workers. Confidence tionary role or doctrine, tical of the crisis Without ism Marxism. ness ln a working eradicated. Both In struggle penal Marxism struggle, labour youth outside. sumo 5, 1872 PAGE• res only the proper et crocer eco-socio- circumstances to way he sees not as an agency of within the ass, but as a failure the part usness on in the revolu- of the working t a maiter of faith of a • dialec- erstanding the of class forces, and of capitalism lialectical material- whatever its sees himself as an socialist conscious- society where the of the been has Whereas his real is utterly different undamental. his formidable everything rica's most inhuman could throw 1, and in his turn to course

THA

ackson reflects working class anticipates develop- ad not only in the ghettos, but in the and the

PAGE 10 Workers Press, Monday June 5, Dear Editor, The situation in the electrical moment. Already we in the industry have seen the implementation of labour intensification via productivity, Measured-Day Work and ten- hour day stagger methods.

These methods have been implemented with the full co- operation and favour of our union, the EPTU, who at the beginning of this period guaranteed that it would not mean redundancies. Over the first period 30,000 men were laid off with a few hundred quid to tide them over eligible for until they were their old age pension. Many of these men had in excess of two years to wait for this time to come. They happy were told if they could not do their jobs as tradesmen they must go. Despite most of these men suffering from bad health as a direct result of their trades and the weather and bad con- ditions they had worked in, this process was called natural wastage by the management and union. In January 1971 the power workers' dispute was settled • an 11-per-cent rise in with basic pay, but labour had to back by a further be cut 13,000. Where were these jobs to be cut? Skilled tradesmen's mates were first to become obsolete.

Some were offered labouring jobs. Higher standards of work- manship demanded. were Codes of Practice were issued to all skilled men. Any man found not to have worked strictly to the code was either disciplined, demoted severely or dismissed. The codes were impossible to work to if the target for the bonus scheme was to be reached. Work that failed mechanic- ally was blamed on the trades- men despite the use of cheap and inferior materials supplied to the craftsmen. Therefore in 1972 the man-

TWO PAMPHLETS AND

A MAGAZINE

'Fourth International' the journal of international Marxism published by the International Committee of the Fourth Inter- national. 25p. (post 3}p) 'We Demand the Right to Work' is a fully documented and illus- trated account of the five Young Socialist Right-to-Work marches throughout Britain. 15p.

(Post 3}p) "The Soclal Security Swindle' by Bernard Franks. A useful hand- book in the SLL pocket library series on state restrictions on social security. 5p. (Post 24p) All three avallable from: New Clap- Park Publications, 186a, ham High St, London SW4 70G.

TORIES ATTACK

THE UNEMPLOYED

The Social Security Swindle ay June 5, 1972 agement still needs to cut back the labour and at the same intensify productivity time • to reach their even further targets agreed in the 1971 agreement. This will be done by threatening men with records of absenteeism or sickness, the further use of the Codes of Practice, the cutting of the times agreed in the produc- tivity deal, and the whole package will be wrapped up in the Industrial Relations Act.

The way out of this mess can be achieved with the removal of those trade union leaders who have given the management the seal approval on these methods from their positions as our representatives and the election of trade unionists who fully realize the dangers of ignoring the conditions we as trade unionists find ourselves in today. All that has previously been mentioned has been the policy of the employing class faced with an economic crisis of un- paralleled proportions. They desperately need to cut wages, speed workers and sack up them all with the help of trade union officials. Mere militancy is not enough to defeat this onslaught on the working class. What is needed are leaders the movement with within the knowledge and perspective of how to defeat this onslaught and • create conditions for a.

General Election to re-elect a Labour government pledged to socialism. Bedfordshire electrician. Dear Editor, As a strong trade union mem- ber I fully endorse Walter Cunningham's stand and that of his committee. I fully support the resolu- tion by the technical section of the AUEW (TASS) backing the dockers, but I think more branches and committees need to come forward to show the lads at Hull that they are not on their own.

A YOUNG SOCIALISTS PAMPHLET

I hope Walter Cunningham's members realize they are fight- ing for their lives. I myself forecast that only 15 men out of every 100 would be needed on the docks if containerization got under way Cunningham I agree with 100 per cent when he asks why docks modernization has not made goods cheaper and the answer lies in . the last six months of 1971. During that period profits on average from 9 per rose cent to 16 per cent. The port employers and the Tories are engaged in class war and there can be no peaceful co-existence with the govern- ment and the vicious policies it pursues. The unions have got to work together in a common effort to oppose and force this Tory government out of office.

The government is delibera- tely sorting out the dockers and men of all unless the unions stand by and support them, then as sure as rain falls in Manchester others will fol- low. Yours fraternally Frank Tomany Sec. Colnbrook & Poyle branch AUEW

PRICE: FIFTEEN PENCE

T&GWU lawyers appear at the NIRC : Dear Editor, the Workers Having read Press regularly I find it most informative and very refresh- ing in its fight for freedom.

I agree with Mr Garland in Tuesday's edition when he said that the TUC should clarify position regarding the our

NIRC.

For considerable time a active trade unionists must have been passing resolutions through their branches for a recall of the TUC to reaffirm its policy of non-co-operation.

My own union FTAT is one.

There should be a clear understanding of the roles of both the NIRC and TUC. Tory One speaks for the capitalist, the other on behalf of the trade unionist. fined The T&GWU were €55,000 for contempt of court

A JOURNAL OF INTERNATIONAL MARXISM PUBLISHED BY THE INTERNAT

Volume 7 No. 3 Price 25 pe Editorial: Class War and the Mass Party Draft International Perspective of the Fourth Internation le NIRC after payment of the fine and if the TUC continues to collaborate with the NIRC it will have the contempt of the unions who stand to be smashed irreparably or Heath damaged forever, with and his lackeys rubbing hands and raking in our money via the disgusting 'fair rents' Bill, which Ports- Tory council mouth have already put into operation. While one must deplore the thought of a national strike and its consequential hardship, if that's what will shift this parasitical government, then so be it. We must all support the Charter of Basic Rights and the building of the revolution- ary party with every man's interest at heart. I remain yours J. P. Thornton

BY THE INTERNATIONAL COMMITTEE OF THE FOURTH INTERNATIONAL

Spring 1972 Price 25 pence Perspectives International

We're becoming paupers in our own cities'

-RE ENDESEN

BY PHILIP WADE Our housing correspondent THE HATRED of the Tory 'fair rents' Bill exploded on the streets of Woolwich in South London on Saturday with a demonstration of 600 tenants, trade unionists and Labour Party members. Organized by the Greenwich adding the call for General they neared Tenants' and Residents' Cam- the Strike as end. paign Committee, the demonstra- Said Fred Heffer, secretary of tion stopped shoppers in their tracks with shouts of 'Tories out'.

the Horn Park tenants' associa- tion: 'As far as I'm concerned, The called lemonstration this, together with the Industrial largely in support of Greenwicl Relations Act, the beginning 1S Labour council's decision not to of a slide to the corporate, fas- implement the Bill, united broad cist state. cross-sections of the labour "fair rents" Bill is all "The movement. part of the general attack on the And it is In addition to the nine tenants' working class. more than just a rent increase—it takes associations there delega- were all powers away from local coun- tions of miners from Bettes- cils and puts it in the hands of hanger colliery, Kent, the Wool- Transport Tory stooge. wich district of the Workers' Union, and General 'The whole working class must Greenwich Labour Party and unite fight the Tories. We •to Lewisham Trades Council. could get them out if did we that, said Fred. From the other side of Lon- Islington don came North In contrast to the feeling on Labour Party and five Labour the march, none of the speakers councillors Opposed the at the meeting afterwards really council there majority the answered the tenants' needs. who for implementation. I have always believed it are pos- sible Tory legislation,' to beat Islington councillor Gerald said Greenwich MP Guy Barnett. Flynn told me: 'As far as we're Organization, solidarity and concerned the fight goes Bill outright opposition the said. the the finish on our council. would win the day, 'We were all disappointed that He made no the mention of Islington decided implement House had Transport fact that Tory policies. What we need now given the go-ahead for imple- is socialist ideas throughout the mentation by leaving the position Labour Party? for to decide. open councils Despite the efforts of the Most significantly he referred Communist Party delegation to to the supposed concession made keep the march at a low tempo, to Birmingham council as an in- tenants had no hesitation in tak- dication that the Tories could up the cry of "Tories out, be forced to ing retreat. THE garden city image of post-war council

BY OUR OW

much housing is well tarnished. Not even this pretence has been Partly the initiative of on newly-appointed community possible in areas of pre-war worker resi- housing. dent's action been group formed to pressurize the Labour - the One such area Little into revamping the area. council Heath district in Coventry-con- Tenants know, however, that tains both private and municipal far more is involved than simply houses which, for the most part, modernization. In the past, lack bathrooms and inside toilets, pren the installation of safe electrical contain dilapidated electrical wiring has been classed not as wiring which has already claimed but as a modification, and repair life the and district, one in rents have been raised. of structurally are state decay. They weekly rent Heavy traffic in the area means face the prospect of their rents that the 'safe' made 'fairer' only play areas being by £1 for the children number increase in October. are a of dangerously derelict buildings.

Nor can the class issues be

BBC 1

ITV

10.20, 1.40 Schools. 9.20 Trumpton. 9.38 Schools. 1.10 Re- 2.33 Afternoon. 12.55 Origins of Christianity. 1.30 member. Good Woodentops. 1.45 News, weather.

3.00 3.15 Film: Houseparty "Tall 2.05 Schools. 4.00 Boomph with Story'. 4 40 Enchanted 4.15 Play 4.40 4.55 Lassie. 5.20 Genie. Becker. School. House. 4.45 Jack- Magic 5.50 News. Roundabout. 4.55 Blue Pe He 5.20 Peter. 5.20 anory. Penelope Pitstop.

6.00 TODAY.

House. 5.50 News, weather. 6.20

CROSSROADS.

6.00 LONDON THIS WEEK.

6.40 THE

DAVID

NIXON

6.20

ENTERTAINING

WITH

SHOW

CORONATION STREET.

KERR.

7.30

6.45 A QUESTION OF SPORT.

WORLD IN ACTION.

8.00 8.30

ALCOCK AND GANDER

Quiz programme.

7.10 Z CARS.

(New Series). Business

8.00 PANORAMA.

enterprise in Soho.

MAN

AT

THE TOP.

9.00 NEWS, Weather. 9.00 920 DOOMWATCH. Fire and Vou'll Never Understand Women. Brimstone.

10.15 THE

SPINNERS

with 10.00

NEWS.

MCMILLAN AND WIFE.

Moira Anderson. 10.30 Elementary Case of

10.45 24 HOURS.

An 11.20 ATHLETE. Part 1: Sprints.

Murder.

ONLY

ONE EARTH.

11.50 Weather. 11.55 Marine Pollution.

BBC 2

9,25 HORIZON. The Rat Man. 11.00 Play School. 5.35 Open 7.05 Let's Get Going. reconstruction University. Sigmund Freud's 7.30

NEWSROOM,

Weather treat.

'THE

SNOW

of obsessive 8.00

PLAY:

ment an GOOSE' by Paul Gallico neurotic. 10.15

THIRTY-MINUTE THE

Richard Harris starring

ATRE:

"SWISS

COT.

and Jenny Agutte iNTER- 8.55

HIS

LORDSHIP

TAGE' by John Mortimer. TAINS (New Series) star- '10.45 News, weather.

10.50 LATE NIGHT LINE-UP.

ring Ronnie Barker. Workors Pr

MARYS

Coldharbour NO demonstration in South East Lor Housewives were prominent on Saturday's

OUR OWN CORRESPONDENT IN COVENTRY

small corner shop to buy small very far from the scene. On the of and when flats side the estate, the amounts from, one squalid Social Security offices are centrally-heated with meters are a visual symbol of the fear which that take than you more can stalks a with the highest afford. Before the war when you city unemployment rate in the West hard you would pawn were up, Today you can't be Midlands. Dominating the sky- your table. line the other side is the poor; you can only sell what you on Courtaulds giant plant, con- have and never see it again.'

stantly reminding tenants of the Commenting rebates, rent on husband strength of the organized work- Mrs Townsley, whose has been denied the right to ing class. work over the last 12 months, Mrs Townsley, a council tenant and chairman of the said: achon I'll become beholden to the is aware that the urgent group, need to modernize the City Council; a pauper in my own area is on you side five struggle.

city! What is can't live cheap today. I want more, to How can you when there is no the right to refuse to reserve

REGIONAL TV

All Regions as BBC 1 except: CHANNEL: 10.20, 1.40 Schools.

4.05 Once Time. 4.20 4.25 Yoga. 4.50 Wales: 1.30 Ar Lin Mam. 6.00 Puffin. Rovers. 5.20 London 6.00 Channer N.s Wales Today. 6.20 Mynd Dod. 6.45 Heddiw. 11.52 News. weather, What's on Where. Pursuers. Behind 6.45 London. 10.32 Scotland: 1.00 the Masque. 6.00 Reporting Scot- 11.17 Univer- Theatre of Stars. 11.20 Open Question. Challenge. 11.47 News, land. to sity 11.50 Athlete. 12.15 News, weather. weather. 6.00 Scene Around N Ireland:

WESTWARD.

As Channel ex- Six. 11.52 News, weather. 3.55 Gus Honeybun. 4.20 cept: 6.00 Look North, Mid England: 6.00 Westward News Headlines. lands Today, Look East, Points Westward Diary. 6.20 Sports South Today, West, Spotlight Desk. 10.30 Format. 11.13 News, West. Weather® 11.52 South 11.47 Faith for Life. weather. News, weather. GRANADA: 11.00 Schools, 2.30 TYNE TEES: 11.00, 1.40 Schools 1.10 Songs for Your Delight. 2.30 3.30 3.55 Dr Gannon. Yoga. Cook-Book. 3.00 Film: "The Vil- News. Camera Action. 4.10 in Once lage'. 4.35 Newsroom. 4.40 4.40 Once Upon Peyton Place. 4.55 HR Pufnstuf. 5.15 Upon a Time. Clapperboard. Time. 4.55 6.00 Today at Six. 5.20 London. London. 6.00 Newsday. 6.25 This 6.45 Under These Roofs. 6.40 London. 10.30 6.25 is Your Right. 10.30 Times Four. 11.00 London. Film: "The Mummy'. 11.55 News. 12.10 Eternal Saint. Thought. GRAMPIAN: 11.00 Schools. 3.38 News. 3.45 Women. 4.10 Lucy. 11.00 Schools. 2.33 4.40 Paulus. 4.55 Clapperboard.

SCOTTISH:

3.30 72. Nuts and 5.20 London. 6.00 Grampian Class of Simon Simon Dr Locke. News, weather. 6.05 Dr Bones. 3.45 Early. 4.55 Arthur. Time. 6.45 Locke. 6.35 Cartoon 4.10 Dateline: 10.30 University Chal- 6.00 Dateline: Mon- London. 5.20 London. Van Dyke. 6.45 11.00 Derby Day. 12.00 6.15 Dick lenge. day. 10.30 University Chal- Evening Prayers. London. ( 11.00 Call. 11.05 lenge. Late

YORKSHIRE:

11.00 Schools. Marty Feldman. 3.00 Film: 2.32 Good Afternoon. 4.30 Place Jennifer.

ULSTER:

No for 4.35 10.20 Schools. Once Upon 4.50 4.55 Calendar News. 4.40 Romper Room. News. 4.55 Rovers. 5.20 Lon- 5.20 London. 6.00 Time. Clapperboard. 6.25 Under News. 6.10 Funny Face. don. 6.00 Calendar.

ITV

10.30 6.45 London, 6.35 Cartoon Time. 6.45 These Roofs. London Name of the Game. 11.55 Yester- 10.30 Monday Night. 10.35 Film: days. 12.25 Weather. "Breakaway'. cors Pross, Monday Juno 5, 1872 PAGE 11 Taro: Ass. S04 -

ENT

ILL

• East London. pay the rent some weeks when it's necessary to buy the kids shoes instead. 'There is only one thing we can do now and that's to get the Tories out and Labour back. The : only thing I've got against their lack of cam- Labour is paigning—they just don't bother to mobilize people. "They should be doing this They should protesting, not us. stick to their principles and defy the government on the rents.

They would get lots of support from off the estates.' The light for principles anc the fight to defend working-class rights must be taken up by the tenants in the Council of Action which the Coventry Trades Coun- cil is proposing to establish at a forthcoming public meeting.

SOUTHERN: 2.30 Good After- noon. 3.00 Good Cooks. Sylvester. 3.30 Lucy. 4.00 House- 6.45 London. 10.30 Afloat. 11.00 Marcus Welby. 12.05 to the Artist. ANGLIA: 2.30 London. 3.15 News- Jokers. 3.45 Yoga. 4.10 5.20 London. 6.00 About Anglia.

6.45 London. 10.30 Aquarius.

11.30 Theatre of Stars. ATV MIDLANDS: 3.10 Good Afternoon. 3.35 Horoscope. 3.45 5.20 London. 6.00 ATV today.

6.45 London. 10.30 Challenge.

11.00 Randall. HTV: 10.20 Schools. 3.10 Sara Hoppity. 3.25 Enchanted Practice. 4.35 London. 6.01 Report West. 6.22 Report Wales. 6.45 London. 10.30 Film: "The Skull'. 12.00 Weather.

HTV Wales as above except: 2.33 Sain, Cerdd a Chan. 4.35 Cantamil. 6.01 Y Dydd. HTV West as above except: 6.22 This is the West This Week.

HTV Cymru/Wales as above ex- cept: 4.35 Cantamil. 6.01 Y Dydd.

Councils of Action winning wider PAGE 12 Workers Press, Monday Juno 5, ENGINEERS at Aberdeen have voted overwhelmingly to strike from today to get the full £6 in the national pay claim. The decision was taken at a mass meeting of 700 engineers on Saturday. Only about 26 men voted against the decision.

The men belong to 35 local firms including the big Consoli- dated Pneumatic Tools Company.

In reply to the claim local em- ployers offered only £2.25 for skilled men and less for unskilled workers. At Saturday's meeting women from the Comb Works said they hoped their equal wage claim would not be forgotten during the struggle. Dangers for the fight are already During the • apparent. meeting neither the government; the National Industrial Relations Court nor the disastrous results engineering of the Manchester campaign were mentioned. The workers at one small firm have accepted £2 m a increase, though this decision may be re- versed.

IN MANCHESTER

another sit- in has ended, reducing the num- ber of occupied factories to four.

The settlement is at the GEC works, Higher Openshaw, where 600 workers took part. Manches- ter Engineering Employers' As- sociation says the rest of the will be settled within disputes a week. are still about 3,000 There employees laid off. THE lock-out of engineering Clark Chapmans' workers at works in Gateshead, Co Durham, has been lifted the in- after tervention of a local union chief.

George Arnold, district com- mittee chairman • of the Confed- eration of Shipbuilding and Engineering Unions on Tyneside, has arranged to meet the man- agement tomorrow. Meanwhile the are to men work normally when they start back this morning Arnold told Workers Press earlier in the dispute that he prepared to ratify settle- was ments of less than the full pay claim if circumstances required

SPECIAL

FEATURE

Starting Wednesday Cliff Slaughter answers. the question. Why a Labour government? in a five-part series of articles. Don't miss this im- portant series. From p.l The unprecedented decrees of Sir John Donaldson, the court president, have had the ettect of bringing millions of workers int conflict with Tory rule. Workers will not be appeased by the waffle being put about by Jones, Feather and Labour leader Harold Wilson. These reformist leaders come together today to blunt the thrust of the working class.

It is the imperative of the hour, therefore, that the working class recognizes that embodied in the rail and docks fight is the life or death of the Tory govern- ment. The working class must stand four-square behind both these sections of workers in their fight agaist the Tory Act and for decent wages. By building Councils of Action in the labour and trade union movement, this solidarity will be transformed into practice.

The councils must be bastions of struggle against the Tory gov- ernment and will create the political and industrial conditions to get the Tories out. ay June 5, 1972 SUPPORT for the Councils defend the of Action to working against the class attacks of the Tory govern- ment is growing. The building of such councils was the central theme of the May Day manifesto of the Socialist Labour League and Young Socialists. Two branches of the Amal- gamated Union of Engineering Workers in Coventry have sent resolutions welcoming the Coven- try Trades Council decision to set up a Council of Action. Coventry No. 8 branch of the AUEW states: "This branch feels that the No. 1 priority for this council must be to prepare the working • for the General class Strike that this Tory government is trying to provoke through its National Industrial Relations Court. By lan Yeats

SHOP

from

STEWARDS

Britain's major ports voted intensify the to extend and blacking of container opera- tors using non-registered labour at a special meeting in London on Saturday. - The decision by about 30 from stewards, including men Liverpool and Hull, reflected dockers' determination to fight the mounting unemployment caused by ports modernization.

They also pledged to defend hauled before any man National Industrial Relations Court. No concessions were made on blacking and the meeting at London's Duke of York Hotel agreed to call a one-day strike and to lobby the national dele- gate conference on June 14-15.

The joint port employers-trade union committee on dock labour set up last week is faced with the near impossible task of coming up with a formula capable of halting in its tracks the fast run down of dockland jobs. Since the whole point of Devlin and modernization is to slash costs by shedding labour the chances of finding a satis- factory solution are next to nil.

The only hope, of even ameliorating the rundown lies in persuading container terminal operators to employ only regis- tered labour. But this means

WEATHER

NORTH and western districts of Scotland, Northern Ireland, North West England and North Wales will have sunny periods and scattered showers. South Wales and South. West England will be cloudy with some rain at first but will become brighter later. East Scotland and North East England will start bright but it will become cloudy with some rain later. East, central and southern districts of England will be times cloudy with rain at becoming brighter later from the south. It will generally be rather cool.

Outlook for Tuesday and Wed- nesday: Rain at times. Some sunshine. Becoming rather warmer,

NEWS DESK

01-720 2000

CIRCULATION

01-622 7029 Registered as a newspaper at the Post Omce. Published by Workers Press, Clapham Street, 186& High London,

SW4 7UG.

Printed by Plough Press Ltd. (TU), 180% Clapham Street, London. Hish

SWA 7UG.

"We also feel that those union leaders who break the decisions elected conferences by of the Tories and operating with their industrial court must be made accountable to the rank and file of the movement.

"We must demand through this Council of Action the resignation of this Tory government to be replaced by a Labour government pledged to socialist policies.?

Coventry No.

AUEW

branch resolution reads: "This branch welcomes the of Coventry Trades decision Council to set up a Council of Action from all workers' organ- izations to organize the defence of workers againsi the Tory onslaught.' The branch elected a delegate to attend the founding meeting Dock stewards from Merseyside enter Saturday's meeting.

adding up to a third more to their wages bill. Saturday's meeting of shop stewards gave the go-ahead to a further of postponement national strike-still to be ratified by mass meetings of the men.

While the NIRC is near certain to intervene this week. It has its ulti- already deferred once matum to the T&GWU to call off the blacking and when the verdict of the Appeal Court becomes known in the next few days, action seems inevitable.

About 6,000 Merseyside dockers yesterday unanimously decided to lobby the national delegate docks conference on June 14 and 15. dockers' spokesman said A that they considered postpone- national ment the dockers strike 'a retreat'.

JUNE APPEAL

FUND OPENS

LAST MONTH'S Fund ended with a record amount of- £2,023.06! This was a really magnificent total and your best effort so far. We cannot thank you all enough. The only problem that such a great total poses is—can we beat it this month? Let's try.

We will need the extra amount, not just to cover our increased expenditure, but to prepare to expand the sales of Workers Press during the immediate period ahead. Our sights are set high. Let us go into action immediately.

Collect as much as you can and post all donations to: Workers Press June Appeal Fund, 186a Clapham High St, London, SW4 7UG. and is asking the trades council ecretary for the exact date anc venue of the meeting. As reported previously in Workers Press, the trades coun- cil was originally calling a town meeting uneraployment against and the Industrial Relations Act on the recommendation of its unemployment sub-committee. The last trades council agreed to extend the meeting to represen- tatives of all sections and set up a Council of Action. But so far no date and venue has been This announced. is ominous because the officers of both the trades council are Communist Party members. Delaying tactics on their part will not be able to prevent this meet- ing or stop the decision to set up the Council of Action.

By our own reporter OVERSEAS telegraphists in London will be given details today of a £70 bonus the Post Office is offering to cover the loss of at least 350 jobs.

Publication of the offer is likely to lead to a new row over the productivity-dealing policies of the Union of Post Office Workers' leadership. The bonus scheme — a sweetener for the cutting-up of London's big Electra House

ALLIANCE A

Support the dockers and rail- waymen. Build Councils of Action ACTON: Monday June 5, 8 p.m. Co-op Hall, High Road.

'Fight the Tories' rent Bill'.

COVENTRY: Tuesday June 6, 8 p.m. Wood End Community Association Hall, Hillmorton Road. NORTH KENT: Tuesday June 6, 8 p.m. SOGAT House, 25 Essex Rd, Dartford. 'Engineers' pay claim'. DAGENHAM: Tuesday June 6, 8 p.m. Co-op Hall, Fanshawe Ave, Barking. 'Industrial Rela- tions Act'. SOUTH LONDON: Tuesday June 6, 8 p.m. Clapham Manor Baths, Clapham Manor Street, SW4.

WEST LONDON:

Tuesday June 6, 8 p.m. 'Prince Albert' Wharfedale Road, Kings Cross.

GLASGOW: Tuesday June 6, Meanwhile Daventry No. 87 AUEW branch has called on Daventry Trades Council to dis- cuss the setting up of a Council council of Action. The proposed shop will be composed of committees, tenants' stewards' associations and all political organizations within the working class. Huddersfield No. 2 AUEW branch has passed the following resolution: "This branch supports the call of Liverpool Trades Council for the establishment of Councils of • of Action • to unite all sections the working class in opposition to the attacks on basic rights being waged by the Tory government.

"Trade union organizations, trades councils, shop stewards' committees, tenants' associations and all working-class socialist be invited organizations should to join these councils' cable headquarters into self- contained units-is the first step towards full-scale computeriza- tion of the service by 1973.

At least 1,500 jobs are under threat in the plan as a whole.

Kim McKinlay, UPW assistant secretary responsible for tele- communications, believes that the cutting-up can be separated from the larger plan, but the rank and file is not so sure.

Union branch officials at Electra House, who face a rising tide of opposition to any loss of jobs, are demanding no forced redundancies.

ADES UNIONS

CE MEETINGS

7.30 p.m. Room 1, Partick Burgh Hall. NORTH LONDON: Thursday June 8, 8 p.m. 'Bricklayers Arms', Tottenham High Rd (nr White Hart Lane). CROYDON: Thursday June 8, 8 p.m. Ruskin House, Coombe Road. LUTON: Thursday June 8, 8 p.m. St John Ambulance Brigade Hall, Lea Road.

SOUTH EAST LONDON:

Thursday June 8, 8 p.m. Dept- ford Engineers' Club (opposite New Cross Station). SOUTHALL: Thursday June 8, 8 p.m. Parkway Rooms (Rent Office), Racecourse Estate, Northolt. PRESTON:_Thursday June 8, 7.30 p.m. Railway and Com- mercial Hotel (nr rail stn), Butler St. COALVILLE: Thursday June 8, 8 p.m. Miners' Welfare. 'Organize Councils of Action'.