Socialist Press no. 194

Rovers, Jags resist betrayal Affiliated to the Trotskyist International of Hopes all-out struggle to defend hard-won union rights and agreements in BL cars revived last week despite the frenzied efforts of the AUEW to prevent a strike and a total abdication

TGWU

of leadership by officials. mocco as we

TGWU

General Secretary evans is ponderne wnetner ne should call out union's the 47,000 members who form the semi-skilled ma only

OLDES

worktorce on olica StiKe-oi he should hold back and wait for the growing wave or uollicial snoD 1001

ICSIS-

tance to subside. Mandate The issue has been forced to Evans attention oy une

SLEIKES

that nave erupted in bes mid- lands car plants. But he is not basing his decision on this clear to light sawardes-nor on the unmistakeable mandate for the him by acuun recent ballot reiection of BL's 5%-with-strings package. Instead he has been sound- ing out the views of individual

TWU

convenors-who nave time and again held back from serious deal on bue assuc congorage convenol Communist Party member Jack tently opposed action against Edwardes' insult- ing otter -pointing victimisation of Derek Robinson evidence that it would be toolhardy to strike now. In the Cowley Body Plant, the wing leadership suttered a reout last weekeno as a resolution calling on Evans throughout Bl cast ivas passen call all-out strike by the 5/60 overwne ingly Branch. Mass meetings But this did not stop these leaders from same intervening day Une neXU sectional strike action mann.

that 55% of the plant support a strike before it can be calcu. such leaders have no intention of calling mass meet- allow the members to

HIS LO

express their views. They know full well that even where mass meetings have previously voted strike achion. une sone resistance that has emerged in the last week from workers in Rover and Sherpa van Jaguar, plants nave created completely new conditions for fight. Given a clear official call fo action there would be a solid BL cars. response Enroughout

AUEW

And in Rovers, semi- skilled workers are already following lead oi then Une TGWU brothers and sisters.

Closures The situation offers a better than ever chance to challenge not only Edwardes' 92 pages of but also the miserable o pay oner and une package of closures and redundancies that still threaten thousands of BL jobs et once again, as so many times before in the long saga of the struggle to defend jobs and

SOCIALIST

PRESS

* Weekly paper of the Workers Socialist League * No. 194 * 16 April 1980 * 20p Liaison Committee Evans

BRING ALL

LEYLAND

OUT!

living standards BL, the sabotage TGWU officials again crucial factor is the reluctance refused to give any lead, leaving of union leaders to fight-ever action t stewards in each plant. now. when une very existence or trade unionism in BL plants is at denied stake irst GWU convenors and any perspective of united struggle, voted agalist officials brushed aside the ballot TGWU official Grenville Hawley vote even Edwardes confident that no strike Which was so admitted amounted to a vote would take place that went off on holiday-as did BL boss

SULIKC

hung fire for Edwardes. package-and weeks, leaving the steel workers *The fly in Hawley's oint- to fight on alone.

BACHE

was me studoom ceter mination of workers in Jaguar, negotiators rejected the package and recom the in mayin defying рас mended action, Edwardes April officials sat back anu watcnea ¡nen stand was rolowed D Duffv (Solihull. Executive conduct their fraud- Acocks Green, Tysley) in the ulent "straw poll" and exploit Sherpa plant (Common craft divisions and the threatened Castle Brom.

as a VICEAL 101 members Enem wich Dant-wichas now cut take no action. off supplies of bodies for the *In the wake of the AUEW Mini at Longbridge. *Laid-off workers from the are now picketing the Longbridge plant-pointing out inal buwarues new surmes nave -among other things-scrapped their 80% lay-off pay. Yet still Evans is holding back on an all-out strike coll Stewards from the Leyland Action Committee, however, are Une O DOOTTUnITY mount a company-wide fight

INSIDE

WSL

Conference Pages 3 and 4 Terry Eagleton on Althusser Centre pages Carter threat to use force In both Iran and in the USA reactionary leaders are searching for a way out of the confrontation that has developed over the American embassy hostages.

For President Carter, the miserable failure of US diploma- tic and economic against Iran has now been com- pounaca oy a similar lanure oI nis attempts to whip up a co from response fellow imperialist leaders-all of fear whom

TOT

Their own oll supplies and for the long-term stability of the Gulf region.

Edwardes ГО] A vatollan A nomen the seizure of the supportuls hostages seemed at first to be an against the whole pay-closures- ideal anu com paralively and-strings package. means diverting harmless They are demanding: mass attention from every "M ass meetings unemployment and plant not yet out to vote again

CTISIS

action in the light o on strike imperialist mobilisation.

ollicial already underwav in the Midlands Shah's regime *Pickets to man the gates of plants working to leaflet • Still As moves to consolidate an win an oDeal Jol support and Islamic dictatorship in iran and halt vital component supplies suppress the national struggles *A link-up of strike commit- Kurds, Arabs, tees unroughout Lo ollel and others drew out unpleasan firm alternative to the IGwu memories or ine shans repres bureaucracy sion, the demand for the Shah's *An unambiguous strike call extradition seemed useful from Evans to all 47.000 TGWU To cover members in BL cars. Kut nt wane this course this case the is mail be of by of action, Khomeini has in fact week's meeting of the helped both himself Genera umon s r mance anu and his protege President Bani Purposes Committee Sadt into a corner No to the 5%! Press the ful Bani-Sadr from the £24/35 hour week claim! the holding of opposed *No to the strings! Defend hostages. anu

SOUPTIL

nara-won trade union rignts.

reconstruct Ine centra 1sea sate Defend all jobs! Occupy shreat!

closoures! in iran, and to mike machinery ened plants! OVCTLUTeS particularly in the wake of the carworker. And for every invasion of Afghanistan. once again unaerines But his eitorts to bring ar necessity of constructing a prin- end to the hostages confronta- cipled revolutionary leadership tion have run up against the in the BL it workers anti-imperialist independent interests are to be une Iranian masses. and neitne defended. Cont'd p.2, col. 1 Bani-Sadr Hawley (left)

W. European capitalists search for political answers Page 2 Thatcher's partial victory over the steelworkers not had the effect of firing the bourgeois rulers of the rest of Western Europe with the self-confidence it so sorely needs. Recent weeks. have scen several quarters. many when sate the way which the mainten- ance of bourgeois ruld remains It Thatcher still basking she has made in in the seth and it, virtunay no other can today feel even ine unrea comfort which she does. France, relations between ine iwo man Doulscor parties in the government coali- tion-the Gaullist

RPR

Giscard's Republican Party are growing increasingly bitter.

President Giscard can on RPR • parliamen- longer #Cly Tarl government policy such as the Budget. There is increasing discussion 01 Ine 1iCW government coalition stable governments of Western and Mitterand's Socialist Party and Portugal that the problems of bourgeois rule are today most Cold war 39th Italy's In West Germany. the deter crisis since iorating economic situation and resolved from Carter's arising threatening ColU Walurre of Italy's presidency of the tEC the future oner ben. . council of ministers. right social democratic anoTher goacid sent under rant rapid The far right winger Joseph Cossiga cesco Strauss is preparing to take over with after forthcome elect wis and the Socialist Party even begin siderate presence from nationi semi-permanent wage demands up packed Christian strike action. 1 ПС All these governments, how- ever are relatively speaking, the Carter's threat Cont'd from page 1 Kho einit the Bani-Sadr 1E0 1 flout been orepareu «mov brand une graol aellul American milions on the streets Dy

SIMPLY

enforcing the release of Carter's CIA spies beleagured gang nostaces This is why, so far. none of present Carter's diplomatic or economic imperialist leaders will measures have had any effect on contest

UTILIS

firm control of the crisis. Meanwhile the the supplies strength of the anti-imperialist

DIMES

LIC

movement is a vital reason why imperialist Carter's opposed tenou im beralst leaders are so terrified that the US may resort to military means cava Duckdue. Iranian ports or orner, more steps-in relen be bid the secure the hostages his oppressed deserted by allies, under pressure rom wal ITal secured withou real hope without military defeat han without riskine a wrole- sale anti-imperialist eruption Middle one real cartel nas olls ray of hope left as the days tick by towards his "deadline" Slacken grip If the anti-communist hang- were to Carry out ened military attack on ran and Bani- their grip would on the turned to repel the Iraqis.

other hand On the Carter must also icar that sooner than climb down under such con- present time than the

SOCHISI

Party. It is in Italy, Belgium, Spain i course the or aoes nave enough parliamentary seats to coalition majority. But government it was tne deer sole l which led to the fall of the world war Cossiga's previous ministry.

whirlwind it seems, because Benevolent withdrew from setting The SP position of benevolent neutral- time ity because the Republicans started ent i votha that government Willy grand resolve Italy's

DOI

compromise' government including both unristan Demo- crats and Communists. Democrats now they have could hardly find a less reliable least government Ine changea new needed to ditions the Iranian leaders might topple int Islamic regime and institute a and peasants govern- Orner for the execution of the and give

WUIKCIS

ment liran. Whatever the outcome of the in Iranian students confrontation, launched T nE Britain have not rest campaign to defend the life reestablish bucy of Dr Hussein Bor, an active InC Vital Gulf-and this fighter for national rights in threat of lingering Iranian Baluchestan. war walen must oc Bor, victin of SAVAK by the workers' move- under the Shah, i persecution hospital lehran after attempt on his life, most likely Proletariat Khomeini's agents

SAVAK-

the the same time interests of the working masses

•AVAMA

We loin the iranian student in condemning this attack and itself the numerous in opposition Ine _develoD- the ment of a proletarian leadership repressiv measures Khomeini regime. mobilise the

KURDISH STUDENTS

AGAINST THE DEPOR-

TATION OF KURDISH

STUDENTS FROM,

IRAQ

Demonstration Assemble 1 p.m. 19 April March to picket of Iraqi Embassy Khomeini Chirac (left) with Giscard crat) section of the coalition the first willing support centre-lett coalition for years on the basis or a plan tol o "centre-left" maich woon make Belgium nic constitutional while the bul 1960s formula early • a form of federation. trumpeted as a long-term solution to Italy's governmental from this plan problems, this time the trumpet- Social ing very heavy Nobody, even the plan

SOLES

new dead. expect A new crisis nas will government to last more than a difficult to resolve few weeks, or at most months, before it is broken apart by the nev which have same pressule destroyed its predecessors is unlikely to outlast the municipal elections of June 8.

these Autonomy Hidu pressures is tne demand or le working class for a resolution of also its pressing material i problems and unemploymen mas. inflation above all. Its traditional leaderships in the dismal After Socialist Party the terrified of mobilising their rank Catalan and tie, hold out tne nope tha elections, the • forward through here is a way the participation of the workers' base ut ment" last parties in government. No political tions of the national question.

more certain than that Socialist participation in the new govern produce no benefit ment will political for the working class. tarv-is boycotting the Fearful bly. a position considerable This is why, fearful as they sections are of losing support to the CP masses in Euskadi "opposition" Socialists probably sooner rather than later-will pull out significant stances where Euskadi For a brief interlude, then, Italy has a government. But as under rancoll one leak is plugged, another has police occupation developed-Belgium. The acute difficulties of the the the Belgian bourgeoisie take torm OI growing collect between the French-speaking (Walloon) and Dutch-speaking the right wing, stilled. (Flemish) communities. communal uncerivini

LAUS

conflict also lies the failure of capitalism to meet the needs of coupled with Lilt lasses. Europe. efforts of rival sections oi the capitalist class, with enthusiastic participation on the part of the petty bourgeoisie, to spread the illusory notion "autonomy" will resolve some unemployment of the masses' problems. 200% nearly (much When the conflict threatenec ofticial years ago tear total of 1.5 million two TInG a "saviour" was into Calic wilted martens Unknown more profound like Cossiga Martens, Italy, was the only "acceptable" form political crisis but of extreme lack e callse Dollical unknown without support leading (Christian Demo. the SOCIALIST PRESS, Wednesday April 16, 1980 German righist Strauss the military general staff to take Martens has held on for two political action. readiness_which this Spain from distinguishes Chance also where the rest autobe despite the increasing failures of democracy from with the defection parliamentary point of view of the bou • group still Democratic senators, . the geo sie, tne milary alt definitively much than , in Portugal the con- exceptionally tinued tallure or tre bourgeoisic profound damage yet Martens has rule by done to bourgeoi appeared from obscurity to hold crumbling country together revolutionary aevelophiells being 1974 and new twist in the Last week military President Eanes in name the problem of Celed the Council the Revolution, the new far right-wing self-determination government's which dally weakens the govern Icaislativl ment of Adolfo Suarez in Spain.

designed significant returt showing of oaty alised se tors of theon- his party in both the Basque and Olly regional parliamentary establishment of a Unsavoury govern- "autonomou: week nas ПО | The news coincides with the reduced the explosive implica- discovery by the government of far right wing candidate for bourgeois presidential forthcoming nationalist party, Herri Batasuna Lilt terrorist orani in TA (mil elections-wenera Alliuill Soares Carneiro. Despite his unsavoury record assem Mamens, is acceptasse to and Cossiga Carneiro, which still has support among the radicalised capitalists as a ruler because he fact largely unknown-a ment Kes ice wither any Basque "govern- itself the retlects profound loss of authority of power and in circum- Europe's capitalist class remains Millary allu This makes it unlikely that

NOW OUT

Euskadi which has several times the last three years threaten- ed to lead to a military coup by

DON'T LET TURKEY

will

BECOME ANUTHER

Nor will the development of

CHILE!

the economic crisis. The spanist economy 1 now drama bad a state as any in Western Unemployment Inflation is close to 20% and risen since underestimated) It is the combination of the acute national question and the cituation which makes ene Cosi of be peons in in today A Workers Sociali, other country-reflected not. as

WSL

pamphlet on the situation , Зо of a parliamentary crisis Available, in Turkey.

WSL.

of author- p&p, iron Box 5277, London WCIV 6XX on the part of the govern ment and evident readiness of

BEHIND THE COLD WAR

Parity Commission SOCIALIST PRESS, Wednesday April 16, 1980 The Workers Socialist League's international docu- ment Behind Carter's Cold War Offensive, adopted on April. 6 looks at the events preceding the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan and out steadily

DUTIES

une. weakening position of both imperialism and Stalinism in the face of rising anti-imper- ialist and anti-capitalist struggles. The document looks at the background to the launching by Nixon Kissinger tactic of "detente" 1973 renewed attempt this imperialists to act jointly with the stalinists in containing the struggles of the working class world failed - 12 present eat former- Vietnam, Portugal, Angola, Nicaragua. Locating Carter's POsT Aignanistan : policv depicts sWitch this context, the document finally probes the acute problems and working contradictions faced by the US reformist adopting their Marxism and aggressive whole renewed stance the working rlass". struggles under a guise of an anti-Soviet war drive. It goes on But it stresses that. classic Cold War Ther There must be no illusions the late 1940s under pressure of defeats imperialism international will simply ialism not only scare ghost, or peacefully

SIVE UDE

terms gradually disappear from the USSR. scene. Any competitors in Debate on Fl crisis The still unresolved organisations political crisis and fragmen-

LIULSKYISL

tation of the post-war Trot- split and divided skyist movement provided the post-war period. the basis for a lively debate at the WSL conference. A short document. entitled "The WSL, the TILC and the fight to reconstruct the rourth such a development have been International" was adopted by massively the conference- but only after a small minority of comrades had establishment of the Trotskyist International Liaison discus- consecrane sion by counterposing their own broker very different conception of the the way in which the

W SL

Crisis or ne postnational fight for pointeal world

DOSTOTY

movement

1IOISKVIST

must be resolved. clarity. Reconstruction the WSL committed itself une- the The WSL majority reempha- the unity of Trotskyist forces in sised that our for the single, democratic "reconstruction" of the FI is world party on the basis of a used explicitly to reject any thoroughgoing international dis- cussion and programmatic agree proclamation of the its co-thinkers and "the" International, Fourth ahis it the morgansation int existing tendencies new "international" without the establishment of basis of political agreement.

contrast to there poice under pointed banner orthodox Trotskyism of the Parity LO.• mission (comprising the OCRFI, the Bolshevik Faction and the Leninist Trotskyist Tendency), for the "regroup- Calcu ment" of the PC organisations into national they British Bolshevik and the OCRFI section do wouldlist Labour UToli This was decisively view succession rejected by speakers who pointed to tne ubstantial political differences 75p including our movement lilal separate

WSL,

BM from the PC leadership, ano to the necessity to avoid the temp- London WC1V 6XX. tation simply to reshuffle -WSL Conference report

U.S. FRIENDS

& ALLIES

TOGETHER VESS CLUB

'Dear friends, I have a list of boycotts and sanctions for your consideration... er, friends and allies, er ... sanctions and boycotts against the Soviet... Friends, could I have your attention... er..: dwindling imperialism and Japan-many of whom have developed their over power own calcust class is a deadly, trading links with the stalinist illusion refuted bureaucracies, and cannot refuted by the simply press-ganged into historical experience of concerted action win me co unpertalsts. Differences to compare and contrast the 1980 Cold War period and early S0s Differences raised in were the conference particuan relative weakening of US imper- ment's in military Kremlin relation to decision invade leaders but als Afghanistan, on i terms ol insistence Europe that this move was in essence the word without movement resolving the problems that have it throughout Broken isolation 1) ine lill at its meetin on April 8 1980 heard a report from representatives Our chances to bring about visited the Parity Commission in Paris on March 16. From this report it a peared In proved DV Tne what had riginally Commit- promised to be a developmen which has for the first time offering new opportunitie the national isolation of the reconstruct LO up the ana opened •rourt International is coordinated going a process of rapid chang 2) When first approached b the PC our organisations were an additional resolution assured hat the is no is or the PC's organisers for forming struggle international movement. told that were centrals he sole task or the FC was as quickly possibl organise a conference open to all thos them TeraTo ino selves as based on the Trotsky start process of discussion and clarification on the question On this basis we welcomed the call for the conference, and declared our willingness to work for it on the Parity Commission.

This remains our • 3) But 1t now appears- despite public statements to the contrary national groupigs adnering to the PC- that the PC no longer intends to organise such conference Noe trotskyist to join viting Now. 1979 other Trotskyists to join il undertaking such a task. Insteac

JATIONAL

has effectively formed

$SION

itself into a joint secretariat of Une bolshevik Leninist Trotskyist Tendency

(LTT)

the

VICTENTO

Committee for the Reconstruc p&p from Box 5277, tion of the Fourth International (OCRFI), acting as a new national organisation and closed to ville organisations

LET WEEK ITS

FAFK

Ulipnant© 1980 The Washington Sta few weeks. defensive, and on the conclusion that there is therefore no possib.

ility of Soviet military towards Iran members argued for the WL to adopt a calling for the with- or mobilising potential of the working linked to demands for the either 101CC mobilisation Afghan degenerated workers and poor in the repel imperialist-backed attacks.

imperialism. were heavily Illcot Dostons by the conference. cereated crats recognise But there was no disagree usellast ment on the document's declar- allull tilal the working class". what we sendo TILC Resolution on 4) In place of the 'open con ted on the basis of diplomatic world Trotskyists, terence statements PC is ae ed positiond plans to hold a closed confer a thorough discussion of the ence of-PC forces-together with real political and programmatic those elements that declare the issues that have split and divided • to be the main axis around the Trotskyist which the Fourth International 1953-the role of Stalinism; the reconstructed and willne its independence components represent the working class from petty bour- conținuity the struggle the Balls application movement. Yet

LOTSK VI

hear the USFI has been invited fight in the mass movement of In place of the invitation to the working class. other organisations to join ment on the Nicaraguan events- rules offering only une associate (non-voting) exposed the complete Pabloite HeRo Der by unan- imous vote of all 3 PC group- Issue--Is inadequate ings basis to reconstruct the FI. We 5) The PC has meanwhile should remember in this context begun • issue political state- that Healy ments Iran, on Nicaragua "right" suce Afghanistan, and Salvador as well as a general political resolution. Besides profoundly wrong on Alghanistan. con PC stands in marked contrast to using revolutionar and reac its _ early political tionary movements and which indeed the way for major deviations on need for identifying the historic such basic issue as defence of al roots (starting from Pabloism) the USSR, it is to be stressed the crisis of these statements appear to be written in such a produced the 1979 USec split Yet the present trajectory of the the funda- evate PC appears to be not towards political differences mental between the BF and the OCRFI resolving these basic PC but towards a repetition of th leaders stress unprincipled intend pursue discussions only on areas where a substan- tial measure of agreement exists, correctly opposed by the OCI.

diferences. out their commitment to struggle for the broadert roiskeyist mussion i 6) It is here that we must programmatic or sis fundamentally disagree with the reconstruction the PC. democratic enooved contal si The historical experiences of the party of socialist revolution post-war FI show that the Inter The trajectory of the PC, national cannot be reconstruc- the other hand, appears to Page 3

MOVES

Well over 100 members, observers and fraternal delegates attended the three-day Fourth Annual Conference of the Workers Socialist League on April 4-6.

Five main policy documents were adopted offering general guidelines of WL orientation in the building of a Trotskyist party in Britain, an analysis of the background to the imperialist Cold War offensive, an assessment of the latest changes and development in the crisis of the world Trotskyist movement, an assessment of the development of the WSL's political Work amongst women and a perspective for assisting in the building of the Socialist Youth League.

Brief summaries of these documents appear in this issue of Socialist Press: extended extracts will appear in the next exclude is the prospect of the In this light the document Stalinist bureaucracy unleashing includes a brief examination of the revolutionary the political and economic crisis class dogging of East oralists deformed Europe, Cuba, SE Asia and China and points to the neces- stop dererations in these countries in the orbit of of defending the national- Cold War Cold. War, the Stalinist bureau- fighting stale. political overthrow as sure y as the the the most 1121 dangerous enemy of their para- Extracts from this document sitic power and privilege remains will next •Socialist Press towards an avoidance of dis already cussion on basic issues, and What is needed diplomatic conduçted at leadership level, without the involvement of the rank and file of the PC organis movement since ations This lay the basis Iot political of the musion and luture splits 9) We therefore call on the movements; PC return original terms of reference and its stated objectives-the convening of an conference to begin Mere agree Ace or Patred driestor rightfully We call on the PC to open itself those forces that declare their adherence to the Trotskyist programme and are willing to constructively engage the emerged. in the political preparation and against Pablo in building of such a conference We propose that its agenda should embrace the struggle against the methods of Pabloism 7) The present course of the connection with Stalinism social democracy and bourgeois nationalist statements move- the chessed 10) On such a basis wi declare willing to ourselve participate in the Parity Com- mission in the preparation of that Open Conference , problems Meantime we approach the "reúnification" of presently constituted Parity Commission -which was at that point seeking discussions between our TILC restates its two distinct international organ- isations. seek political debate, discussion in which we fee should unrestrained and principled the We are ready to continue such discussion the framework of the PC: and for world our part we intend to submit our political reply to the declar- ations already passed by the PC.

PREPARE TO BRING DOWN

Page 4 The British Perspectives a large document-into Which amendments were incorporated do with a cera ven ! the impact on the class struggle of the election last May of the Thatcher government analyse coes on T tine international economic and crisis within which the I ories dri'ven ottensive. ano Ene particula reflection of the economic crisis British capitalist economy: •tressinu tar every one ou the Tory government's policies tends to bene fit the banks and finance Lavil al

LTIE

or manuracturing industry, the

PRESS

GANG

'Against this view stand our own traditions of free speech and seeking after the truth. And these simply do not admit of diktats which ban programmes not to the simply net our sae. That is (government's taste. This came from the Daily Telegraph, The DaDe witch unequivocally stated just a few months it would have ago sacked the BBC Panorama team

WICH

a Cu

LAH

Carrickmore, had they been on the Telegraph payroll. However Ireland was not the this sub ect unutt unscusson l detence oi the treedom press, and it was clearly far from the mind of enough away the educi 1U t i also any embarrassing questions.

The subet was in fact the from clique the showing of the ATV film, Death Princess, portraved a tictionalis d docu- execu- mentarv account. the tion of Princess Misha'al and her lover for adultery. The said to have film W de

OUT

T1SK

lucramve contracts between British firms and the Saudis. In matters relating to Ireland the rew programmes wnieh get made with any degree of under- standing of the anti-imperialist - WSL conference report' Callaghan ••cument coes on to doint out the acute dangers this brings for the working class, in the form of and ITiass use or inat unem diovment in a bid to further force down real and the wages strength of the workers move Ment Social services and cuts, and the halt council house virtual tne TaC that the ories-in recoonse there set be spot an aun reverse on soca brooress or une British working class. Such an attack requires the ot the torces of the state, through increased struggie are or course subject to those diktats which the Telegraph denies The

BBC

policy oi upwards programme on the Irish war before it made. By and even cyclicat chiels oress exercist sophisticated a degree of censor ship on Ireland as can be found anly wiltre inue world In rejecting the crude torms favoured by of censorship Saudi the royal government asur preference

TOT

LN1S

sopnistica- tio There was indeed not a little way Tne lender explained that the free ways of the British are inscrutable to the Daily Mail headed Arabs. (The Header CUStOMS mysterious West") Vor did the defence of the AlV programme makers extend much beyond formal defence of their right to make the film.

said that Lord The Guardian which ne denies an apology) was Core. could searcely than regret a nut m Angio Saudi be a very regrettable matter The Times said: of that offence had been taken was appropriate. It is not at all the Tory leaders in conference Keynote of WSL conference police and military spending and this situatIon. The crucia weakness and treachery of the anti-union aws At the same time the Tories and Stalinist existing reformist are working to divide the work.

leadership of the working clas lecisid- nas been expose•— n ine retusa.

union leaders to fight on tion moves to utilise the individual unit as wages, on jobs, on conditions, prime target against employers' blackmailing breaking media and press propa- ed to vigolly. audinist cover ganda. ment soendino cuis. or even In defence of democratic rights document Irish war stresses, the willingness of the working class detend At the same time the Tories interests poses continual have pressed ahead with their chailenge to such betrayals, and attends Ene Ene leadership liberation struggle. within the Labour Party. The document examines the importance in this situation of the role played by the Labour containine Tor ward movement of the working class Parliamentary, reformist channels-creating the b son be decade lems of the working class can resolved through the Labour Party Expose lefts Such leaders cannot be simply ignored: they retain the aleciance ot many thousands ot advanced workers. Instead it is necessary to put down demands the letts that can expose and take Then limitation workers foward: contrast the class collaboration, same thing apologising, contusion down on their betraval SImov anothe Labour under grovelling, making obeisance Callaghan or a Benn, the call for and so on." ment responsive The needs paper to dime any an alogy only The Times was only and demands of the workers' the struggle tol orner subjects workers ince "It may be of some consol- them to know that they ation to head a large company of valued Triends •an( servants of this country who have recently been outraged by some portrayal or other on the box: field marshalls. Admirals ela deploye Northern (who masters, Jews mans holocaust, detore our made verna for films about the war) immi- Puritans, Libertarians, Bralls, bishops, w eisanel. ministers (our very own),,

MPS

(almost without cessation).

Absent from this list was the nonce nere ‹ itte count ina there would be a unanimous squeal of press protest at any exposure corruption. In short, all the reaction the capitalist Irom press time being a detess TV: net: Arab make 3 state rik=s Ice calcu eloquent than the words co it paper. SOCIALIST PRESS, Wednesday April 16, 1980 Build Woman Worker groups The document Perspec tives for Work Amongst Women' summed up the pendent interests." results of a year's work by The document goes on to the WSL which had brought explain contex the successful launching of

TIE

has inrougnout int strike advanced the step the paper Woman Worker demand for General Strike and an all-round strengthen- to bring down the Tory govern- ing of the WSL Women's ment, stressing that 'We reject formal and propa- Commission gandist calls that simply demand Pointing to the way in which a general strike witnout regard the to the fight to develop such a their elimination from women. strike from workers actual the workforce and isolation ...) Our genera home the flows the tron to the orientation in relation capitalism recuremes government will therefore crisis, the document moves or remain that of Prepare to bring to look at the ways in which the WSL has been able to intervent cown me ones. Some of the discussion on mobilise working class ane British Perspectives docu- the in wide range struggles the analist Cuts. smaii num del ot members struggles reject the WSL's call on the nursery and other campaigns in Labour 'lefts to kick out nice one organsed and Callaghan and Healey, and to outside organised challenge the document s assess ment of the complex struggles in BL's Cowiey factories Criticisms But in general the amended done minaried by majority rom tne floor or ine con ference came some criticisms of votes, represented the consensus the linked to calls document, as estaoised in eight weeks of pre-conference discussions in branches and area attached to theoretical work on the whole question of sexual meetings. • oppression and sexuality A framework and timetable Tasks for such work was agreed by the conference. number of other dele It called for "vigorous" steps emphasised the towards discussions and possible neeo tor such theoretical wor fusion with the Workers Power to be conducted not in abstrac tion but hand in hand with the WItT number tactical disagree • struggle in practice to mobills ments (some which women echoed trade union and Labour bureau- level 01 cracy and to win them to revol

.VVOL

wit common ground clearly exists.

annary pontes Other tasks mapped out in the document include: the Womens paper of further furth heand turther steps to the political fight the Workers Socialist League contraise lade union work, trie Tant tor. a summer conterence of the Campaign for Democracy Movement; woman worker renewed initiative toward Socialist Press supporters in the Tories attack housing Labour Party; the fight to set up and jobs... local Woman Worker groups and to expand the paper, along with vurtner. steps to orine tae orow ing number of women comrades into political leader- positions; a turn by Ws branches to assist the building of the Socialist Youth League workers ane students, ane more attention by WSL branches to

KICK

be devoted to solidarity

THEM OUT WITH

Turkey South Atrica ane nie

A GENERAL STRIKE!

The conference also agreed to organise expanded steps

WOMAN WORKER

6 programme of theoretical work incl. on to uner ne work o le avallable, price 18p newly formed Trotskyist Inter- from Box 5277, national Liaison Committee.

London WCTV 6XX

SOCIALIST PRESS, Wednesday April 16, 1980 Teachers' leaders run from fight Harsh reality intruded Executive had opposed a sus- pension of standing orders even into this year's NUT confer-

CO •ISCUSS IT

ence, knocking into second The Executive did get place the routine junketing defeated on their memorandum of delegates and friends.

union Tinance ano suoscrio their rule change on Even, made by tions and the Executive LIse , wouid ences on salaries-which rentecteo tne crowine concern or the membership at the erosion twee cuarlers of jobs, and their control •xecutive to cecice not 1o cal a conference-was thrown out.

of what they teach So too was a move to use the ever teless Ine place in a some- strike tund for administration ings did take unreal atmosphere with i here was cenera boreement in conference opposing the use 1979 wayt Cainol for public funds assisted ,1980 claim) mention the outstanding and with the Clegs Diaces, .Ene need

TOT

united action and fraternal relations report conveniently unpublished Unth ine •elecares are satell dispersed. Desperately trying to hold up some example of action that Enev have conconco in the bast year, the Executive called on Nottingham teacher Eileen Crosbie address conference on the tirst day. sne is suspendea tor retusing to take in the assistances y pupils with assistance ony one nursery nurse. Rolling strikes Since January than moTe 450 teachers from 35 schools rollino strikes in ner suooort The Executive then obvious- ly their bit and refused to allow a suspension from Avon Tor ce bontes report on their action his was one of the relative- TeW occasion. MOnT wito Was resorted Exécutive member. Executive been i NE las areativ weakenec in its anti- eti Salthet retirement of right winger Voteroll white mis orotedt Malcolm Horne succeeded only making a fool of himself.

with other teaching unions; for the rights of members in special the DEnC mUCA mess exenances take that the policies being ano acainst covernmen: forward by those who have long link conditions of attempts to to fight the cuts, wanted have There was heated debate on recognisca the motion on racialism mem sers more ang more "realistic" and necessary in the Executive carried amendment to cut out from the face of the Tory onslaught.

that the sio uld sale Hall Socialist Teachers Alliance, des-

TOI

memoers retusine pite major political weaknesses, to work with those engaged racialist activities and rule nas conc a lot ou patient, careiu and has down work broken suCh actimes incomoatiole With memberchin ot the Nik It also deleted affiliation to example, a delegate the ANL, a call for the disband- from Easi concon na ovee en important amendment to the Ing of the or and opposition conference day orevous vears there been groans and hissing. Blair Peach This year, however, the addendum calce attention to the death of Blair Peach and to the delay in calling public enquiry, accepted cxecutive ane was (We, course, have called consistently for a workers on tato tre murocr. most of ine exec. utive motions were carried, and five anda. I ne salar les memoranoun was suitably vague talking "'increases E. salaries real standard of to get "a new salary structure".

discussion did take pace. nowever. aroune une Tont for decent for teachers defence and wages through a sliding scale on index to be decided by the union itself. Delegates pointed out that memoranoum nurser produced was white-wash job take action Cesures. une delegate trom witney and Burford pointed out that when she involved was in the coupation Oxford two years ago the to rame basic deman basic demand for the TreI avorton demand was yet again attacked the who to declare its opposition Half-day strikes ne pressure that the exec utive feels under came out clearly in address to confer. by General Secretary. Fred

CHICE

JarvIs. . announcee decision to support the May 14 Action with half-day

SETIKOS

approprialt Jarvis action". Parents picketing the nursery class of suspended Nottingham teacher Eileen Crosbie This was, unfortunately, not the NUT is politically unaligned and not against this government associa secause of its political complex- serves wnat action to take IOn How teachers are to fight to Fear of members defend jobs wages under "'this comex varvis teit comeeleo to aool Ion was not mae cear "This is not meant to be generil strike bring down the begin learn, however It is an exercise moves into strugge acainsi [0e Tories and sees more clearly the EnE rignt or working people to withdraw their labour to show need to fight against a leader- opinion ship which is nothing more than ment's policies.' an oostace to that Tiant.

This fear of the membership moving too far and too fast for its dynamic (!) leadership shoni through his hasty reminder that Left wing image shattered '

KINNOCK IN THE OPEN

lethal one cheese" Neil "green Carlisle and Thatcher Kinnock put the last nail in wall 16 tor duce, er edocation and the coffin of his left reputa- further even when speaking to the at when options are tion Teachers chosen tor specialisation

NUT

Secondary tney, alm lo make academi Section on Easter Saturday.

success the only criteria for success. to the delegates he Central control zone will be the state that service The f939 million of cuts Tory the next five years will be rule-without over yvals the sugges- tion that the Thatcher govern- means of exerting more central should local ment brought down government control over he Kinnock admitted that local : OTTICe. He councils faced with the then explained why would way forward incoming Labour administratior Tuses but gave no to find the funds to restore the for Labour councils fighting the cuts. cuts The combination Nor, of course. , did he make any

CULS

TecorO O attack on free state education- the previous Labour administra form bringing whose policy spending selection Paulies aill alit work. benefits places scherte cass porces neldeo abour Budget to public schools lose last May's general election 1n the to the Tories Instead Kinnock placed the and so on-was, Kinnock said. : Carlisle walks in-200 walk out. The appearance of Tory Education Minister Mark Carlisle was enough to prompt an immediate walk out by over 200 NUT con- ference delegates last Tuesday. Manv other delegates staved away from the session, unable stomach the sight of the axe- trade union batiorm But a lot of delegates mis sit through takenly decided hIs hour-ions nion ol cuis covernment cortro of the curriculum and attacks on conditions of service Seconds after Carlisle's open ing solitell the hall rose to their feet. backs to Carlisle, in applause as dele- from •Avon unfurled gates "Give banner demanding large Avon back Ils 1 cacners .

Banner Minutes later there was more "All out applause as May 14 was nune rom me darconv Then Carliste slowly began get into his stride to attacks on teachers Conuilluls • on tne compre• ball back into the teachers COlT. s Teachers, he said, must go on the offensive to save the edu- Callul and attacks made on accepted them past and present. some politic calculs alle "but it is your responsibility to be at the forefront of the cam- paign "I am accused' he went or "of a certain lack of zeal" But far from making apolo- this Kinnock declared restore education cuts Instead he simply repeated his belief moon 1s made oi green cheese would expect such promises For Kinnock it is all a ques tion of competing priorities since is ready allow the Thatcher government at least one full term of office- havoc-his nave wreaker first priorities before restoring the cuts are apparently produc- hon ana poverty. Page 5 200 dele- hensive system the and held an aternative will speaker from Avon outlining the and achievements by experienced members there The next day Kennedy, NUT was questioned President, the divisiveness of -his decisior to announce to Carlisle and the general public : that "only • 111" 'delegates had taken part in the walk-out "Black shirts" Kennedy took advantage of this opportunity to further deni witch-hunt the alle demonstrators ov. akenms "a squad of Moseley's black- shirts" A second demonstration left ange Cacaost actions of the National Execu- tive held on Wednesday evening when a group of dele- gates and members of Blackboo Trades Council picketed the "Mayor's evening's entertainment offered by Blackpools 1ory Mayor an accepted the Executive expense • of the housing services of the people of - Carlisle social demo. Inus a lue cratic fashion Kannock bicate mim sell to relorming the system helping ailing capitalism back te its Thatcher to lanu oul a lew more pound benefit salve his to conscience. Cabinet post "balanced view" Kinnock's is now tipped by the trappings office. -the ministerial car he promise Lave l Mi-the of Cabinet position in the next Labour government, associated now even with those lefts who do still talk of mobilis- ing the working class against the Labour councils Lones and oI refusing to implement the cuts easier to talk of "expos ing the and Dillatt SeCIOT amenang tne charity laws an‹ withdrawing finance from schools at who pupils , in the future than it is te lead a struggle now to drive out the Tories and their vicious anti-working class policies.

MAKERS OF MODE

MARXISM 8. Louis Althi Page 6 No single contempor- ary Marxist philosopher has had a deeper influ- the past ence over than Louis decade Althusser, veteran of theoretician the French Communist Party. The positions set forward in Althusser's major works- For Marx (1965), Reading Capital (1965), cana Philosophy (1968) -have infiltrated theory political science anthropology, from history to the Willill criticism of art. *Althusserianısm' fashionable whether Althusser's flirtation WIll language more body of WOrk represents the most radical challenge, from within

CENE

Marxist camp, to revolution- ary theory and practice. It is one which Trotsky- ists can by no means ignore.

It would be impossible in a brief article to summarise Althusser's thought. Instead I propose to single out four central areas of his theory, and in each case to do three things: First, to show what is of value in these positions, correctives inadequate Marxist Tormulauons. second to show how what is of value with theoretical twined positions which must rejected; and third, to point out in each case the connec- Althusser's between

LOH

theoretical and the errors of which he has for so long been a leading The theory of know- ledge. Althusser rightly and vehemently rejects. all empiricist theories of know- ledge. This is more than a pious because empiricism gesture, in one form or another, still deeply contaminates much Marxism. Marxists, Many consciously-or not, continue theory of to hold a crude knowledge whereby 'truth' is established by measuring of. things concepts your against the things them- This, as Althusser рет. ceives, is utterly naive and incoherent. rOI we never have access to things, whether they be coffee-cups or capitalist society, except through concepts. 'naked' There encounter with reality, inde- pendent particular conceptual frameworks. To your the things concepts against themselves itselt Gemanas concepts in which to do it; and Then the truth of these measure concepts? then, Althusser argues, that all realty is construc- particular ted in and by conceptual discourses. AlI knowledge of readity occurs within what he calls "problematic'-an historic- ally particular structure of which certain concepts, in ideas granteu privileged status, and others silently excluded. The "problematic' of the bourgeois pontical econom- ists necessarily excluded the concept of 'labour power'; their work, criticising Marx revealed inis naden actively and transtormed it. have Marx could not written Capital particular developing structure of concepts, such which 'commodity, as the made the capitalist mode ot production intelligible. look didn't simply around him and see what crude was there, as theory of know- empiricist ledge would suggest. that structure Moreover. of concepts just was not and for all: given took Marx-a long time to elaborate it, ana ll unack. historical constant weill development. then, there So far, differentiate little to Althusser's theory of know- ledge from Marx's. But there more 1S „LO Althusser's theory than For him, theory essentially a kind of practice -a form of production. like Theoretical labour, other form of labour any takes certain 'raw materials' (concepts), and by the use "instruments of certain (theoretical production' transforms procedures) them into a particular theor- etical product. of the As account dIl theoretical process, this use- fully dispels idealist illusions from that theory 'comes nowhere', although really not much more than a metaphor. But in another sense it is itself idealist: for it really comes down to saying that the Marxist theoretician need to leave his doesn't study. Theory, for Althusser, is autonomous practice, all propels itself along which its own internal proce- by dures. There is no need to relate theory to practice, becaust theory is a practice anyway.

we never neta lo relale theories to other forms of in order to test practice them out, because the truth theory •is guaranteed of. entirely by procedures internal to that theory. Althusser has later modi- extreme theoretic- fied the ism of this position: He would now define Marxist philosophy as 'the class-struggle at the level of theory'-by which he means SOCIALIST PRESS, Wednesday April 16, 1980 French, Stalinist congress 'Hegelian-Marxist' idealist concepts as 'species the that it is only by first of all thinkers examined in these being'-the 'essence proletarian, Taking of 'humanity' which is aliena materialist at the articles: position ted under capitalism the dialiectical level materiallsin For his work to achieve autonomous science of his- 'expres sion' of the particular his- the scientific status of torical materialism can be had to break torical interests of a class, Capital, developed which thus tends to deprive decisively with such human- But the class struggle ism for an entirely different, Marxist theory of all objec- as here only enters concepts: scientific theoretical precondition for tive validitv and degrade it set of to a form of pragmatism. forces and reanor. base and super- production, Is a Altnussel s structure and so on. to such timely, antidote if it's reductionism Whether or not there is attempts to counter it keel such a clean break between This hardly over into the most rampant Hegel and Marx is still relation between theory and idealism matter of fierce contention which Something similar can be the Class within Marxist scholarship Lenin had in mind when he said of Althusser's resolute My that own view wrote that "Correct revolu- denunciation what 01 Althusser is right to claim tionary theory assumes final terms 'Marxist humanism'.

Marx is a early that the shape only in close connec- He means by this those 'humanist, and that human tion with the practical activ- theory forms •ot Marxist is ideological; at the ism ity of a truly mass and truly which to base same time, Althusser almost upon revolutionary movement. certainly underestimates the nemselves sUll It is the absence of such concept of 'Man , and which continuities between earlier Althusser as the process and and which defines his Stalinism.

whereby this entity drastic forced into some essentially the alienated from become scissors-and-paste property of the party itself (class society) and oeuvres. off sealed later restored to itself (com- The mature Marxist doc. from the practical activity munism). the 'fetishism trine of 'of the working class, to be commodities, , for example dispensed to

HASSON

echoes the earlier 'humanist from above. themes of alienation; the 2. 'Humanism'. Althus- accordingly Althusserians This, to be sure, is the ser's attempt to win com throw overboard a keystone perspective underlying plete autonomy for theory of Marxist theory. Marx's early writings, influ- can be as part of a seen root of Althusser's were "the enced they by struggle for his own partic • as Marxist to opposition ular within • the theories Hegellan ana rueuerbachlal humanism is that it under Althusser French CP humanism; but mines the Scientific natur But it is also an extreme insists on more bi-es reduc complete "epistemological caricature of what. taken in everything back to the add a valuable oppos- itself, break' a netween Marx and a later ities of living human idealist ition to historicist notion: iduals' of Marxist theory. scientific one. The Marx still For Marxism. D encountered early nave can be understoo thinks in terms of such such notions several times in

SOCIALIST PRESS, Wednesday April 16, 1980 RN sser From the 1920s to the present day, major con- tributions to Marxist theory have been made by thinkers indifferent or implacably opposed to the revolutionary heritage of Trotskyism.

George Lukacs to Louis Althusser, From Antonio Gramsci to Jean-Paul Sartre, Karl Korsch to Herbert Marcuse, a powerful body of Western Marxist' theory has been developed, which has yet to receive full critical assessment by Trotskyists themselves. are the Stalinist or revisionist politics of How these writers to be weighed against their theoretical contributions to Marxist theory?

In this series, Terry Eagleton examines the work of the theorists named above, as an introduction to a full evaluation of their work.

way: it operates by objec- purposes through their its tive laws, accessible to scien- heads. tific analysis, which deter- History itself, for struc- mine the activity of human turalism, is little more than beings. the weaving of a set of varia- 'Althusser's 'anti-human- tions on such a static struc- ism' is thus a necessary ture; and Althusser and his collaborators accordingly of subjectivised Marxism- set out to define modes of whether production as mere permu- Hegellan, of tialist or ethical-which we tations certain given have reviewed in this series.

elements, with all the mis- In opposition the placed ingenuity of a mathe- to of revisionist solving quadratic such matician luminaries of the French CP equations while his univer- Roger Garaudy, who sity around burns came see Marxism him. poetic of some scneme human redemption compat- ible Christianity, with What structuralism 'Allnussel unswervnaly sought to defend its scien- finally account unable to for is how structures get nuc clams He did this, however, at historically transformed.

For for immense Human practices, combat the structuraliot the

TEST

contamination Marxism 'effects' structure by one form of bourgeois itself, and are thus eternally ideology, reached for contained within it. another: structuralism. It is not difficult to see Structuralism certainly the appeal of such a theory shitts emphasis away irom Hrench Stalinists *living human individuals' Nothing could have pleased only at the them

DUEE

them to from their leading intellec- reducing mere functions of some invariant In ine most sopustic- 'structure' which works out ated theoretical language, that the working class were and merely, "functions' capitalist 'effects' of the 'Historicism'. For Althusser, Marxism nis- Hegel take believed phenomena could ace 1ch phenomena were merely For this principle but was the igh this sim piy the mout the class productive left the argues. is 11U Marxism. "regions'- four economic, ogical and one can and nomy of its with the the various usually unit veri last instance. determinant. 'the last lous pnrase, instance comes, rightly, that this is never naked deeply intertwined poutical Borrowing Freud Althusser from all speaks oI phenomena 'overdeter- as mined': they are never the product of a single, abstrac- table but rather cause, the simultaneous action of several causes. Such a position valuably reductionist counteracts tendencies within Marxism- that mechanical linking of the political, economic and which ideological can have disastrous political conse- cuences But it is also highly convenient for Althusser's own politics. True to his Althusser holds Stalinism, to capitalist that the key exploitation lies political region-in the state framework which allows the of production to DEOCCCus be unequally distributed among the classes For him, as for the bour- geois Donica. whom Marx combatted, the actual social organisation of production is merely a tech- nical matter. It is not here that the secret of the relation lies; capital-labour it is merely in the distribu- tion of the product If, then, the state itself be the can taken over, actual social organisation of production can go on much as before. Stalin with fellow bureaucrats Page 7 Althusser fails to grasp exploitation at the point of production Socialism is essentially a Ideology is more than juridical of who disembodied set of ideas: it matter owns the means of produc is a material, practical force tion through the state; it is within class-society. not basically a question of What Althusser is unable social relations at the point to do, however, is to relate of production. adequately to the ideology Little wonder, then, that In his earlier class struggle. Althusser is happy to keep work, ideology figures "political' 'economic' and opposite of the merelv as separate science; later on, ideology is For this is precisely what presented as a monolith into demands his Stalinism which individuals are Indeed the most blatant passively inserted, an auto- exposure of this truth can matic mechanism whereby be found in his comments capitalism reproduces itself on what he naturally refers This is view almost to as the 'cult of personal- from that indistinguishable ity' of bourgeois sociology "Everything that has scant odys 'cult of been said …ot the attention to the contradic- personality' refers exactly ideology, within

TONS

to the domain of the super.

which individuals may be therefore of structure and transformed from passive State organisation and ideol- to revolutionary subjects further ogies, refers largely to this domain alone, which know from Marxist theory possesses a His vision of class-society 'relative autonomy' (which is that of a self-contained explains very simply which carries theory, how the socialist structure within it the mechanisms of infrastructure (of the Soviet • eternal Union) has been able its own, potentially develop without essential reproduction Once damage during this period again, no vision of errors affecting the super- could follow more logically from his Stalinisin structure). For Marx Althusser's stress on the 'theoretical Nothing, indeed could be autonomy practice' has proved more simple. Stalinism, we extremely attractive to are relieved to learn, of younger whole groups merely matter of the a left wing intellectuals. in superstructure; while one or Europe-not surprisingly, two unhappy events were since it assigns a high status there the social. • ОССИЛЯ ist' infrastructure proceeded to their own activity Regis Drebray, melly on ls way, protec former pupil of Althusser's ted from the superstructure put it: "All we had to do to by its relative autonomy'.

thec reticians 4. Ideology. There are •ecome cool was to be lazy bastards'.

two main ways in which Some intellec- Althusser has made clearly tuals are now original Importall beyond redemption: the contribution to the Marxist English 'Marxists' Paul Hirst theory of ideology. and Barry Hindess, former and disciples of widely influential among First, in his insistence date rejected as ideology that not concepts of mode the 'false reducible to , economic deter- production consciousness' For one mination, Mary's thecry of thing, it is for the most part value, materialism, deeply unconscious; for revolutionary party and is another thing, ideology iother more OI less any not just a distorted reflec- Marxist notion you carre to tion of reality, but rather mention. signifies live vut their rend- the way men None • of this follows wome Althus:ser's logically tion to that reality. own work; there are o ther Secondly, Althusser has 'Althusserian' theorists who shown us the "materiality have made valuable contri- of ideology. It is not just a butions and should be cloud of illusions floating engaged in controversy. As above the economic base; for Marxists' like Hindess it is embedded in material and Hirst, only one response practices and institutions possible: is their the ories (family, education, media, should be opposed and political parties, churches destroyed. and so on), , which are quite material economic production itself.

THE GENERAL STRIKE

The first few months of 1980 have brought to the fore the demand for a General Strike to bring down the Tory government. Such a demand naturally gives rise to further discussion on the lessons of the 1926 General Strike, betrayed by the TUC. With this in view, we are repriting in two parts an extended article on the General Strike by John Docherty, first published in a supplement to Socialist Press in April 1976.

Page 8 FO MH 3298 For a long time after 1926, it was often consider- Communist ed that it Party had done what could. After all, despite the arrest of most of its leaders in 1925.

the strike itself, the CP had played an active role in almost every area, been represented on numerous strike committees an councils of actior, and recruited large numbers of workers, espec- ially The Communist Party alone through its press, had warned in ine struggle ana called or ine establishment of councils of. action, defence squads and • other necessary/ forms of prepar- alon All of the se steps represen- ted undoubted However, they closely war be to bring out the strengths of the working class in such a way as to take the neces- saryasteps lo victory The last Party publication before the of the beginning strike echoe d the "views of the 'union leaders by saying that ine proposed of action hould not take over any of the oralially the trade unions and in 1tst1rst statement said, All that needs for hal to stand lim and lac fight is won' Soldiers guard food lorries It was a great achievement of to reorganise it on democratic of centralist lines in 1922-23 and Brian series Pearce articles originaly to mae : ine necessary. lui! the late 50s, to draw attention mass work.by setting up Ine and international Minority Movement in 1924, to the origin break Party failed 611k the early Communist party decisive tom lus own sectal- Britain, to describe how it built ian and syndicalist roots and to and how develop a is de use eat or that it hid it industrial base policy could mobilise the working class inde- pendenty or Is bureductatic 1967-59. Michael Wood se leadership. later. In the period from systematically analysed collapse of the Labou Govern- strengths and weaknesses of the great victory of 'Red Friday' brush communist rary mune the cal perime of the serious, July 1925, the CP made some time it tried seriously inroads. into the mass move to build a revolutionary leader- ment we support tile ship in the working class move- trades councils, the Miners Federation and many other The arguments oI Hial al cas trotsky, ano lolowing a. . 01~ Stalinist grip Pearce Woodhouse, about struggle for revolutionary the leadership in the British working This impetus was lost as the Stalinist faction consolidated its class briefly summarised as follows.

the Communist Inter mously positive step so estanis.

Although a policy of nalional. supporIcu sections of trade allance with 'lefts' through the Anglo- ine. communist Trade Union Commit- , and turned the British Party away positive. mat policies for which it pendent to search in its first had begun mass steps thi Restal movement In 1925 Trotsky outlined in Where Britain Going? need for a decisive break from the trade union 'lefts" as well as the rights, the need for an ideol ogical struggle against Fabianism decisive the building of "a correct and resolute revolutionary Closer as the struggle However which the CP correctly warned was inevitable closer and grew closer. there was. as Woodhoust puts it: "Very little the party did any- evidence that tions preparation on the rank and file by trade union apparatus saw its role as more 'gingering up' official leaderships" of the leading members One of the Party about this time oresente• a ran or acuon a strike committee in the North- East which repudiated a concern Part Two with any wider horizons, and restricted the committee to 'our limited objectives' of the effectively after the end the CP called for meetings 01 but council councis or action or ever pos de inacesent of the terent the current leaders of the movement. Trotsky For many years after 1926 it was very difficult to discove how it came about that such a poor lead bad been to the embattled British working "nEV Trotsky's writings on this period generally available, become was cult d different method in existence called for the indepen- : of the dent mobilisation work- Ine class mn a way tnal chauenge the bureaucratic leadership.

Since these views were first fought for by the Communist international ir the y zus inev nave been sub• ject to attack in a number of different ways. of the

DESI

course Stalinists developed a style of which accused the polemic opponents of their opportunist policies fascism and counter-revolution.

It is of some interest to see in a pamphiet by Ermie

I TOT

Soviet Unions and the General Strike. This in a quaint 1s written Tai knockabout suvic. will on stain to rene as no references to any containing different books and a complete point of view, ignorance 10C between the various opposition tendencies within the Commun ist movement during the 1920s •Bloc It is of interest to note that Stalin describing quoted as the Anglo-Russian Trade Unior Committee bloc which could used to organise the united movement against offensive capitalisI Was certainly nothing of the kind.

also goes _mis- on to his represent o•ponents supporters of breakaway 'dual unionism'. This SOCIALIST FKESS, Wednesday April 16, 1980 ebreakers during the General Strike

MCCALLLIE!

Stalin's own policy for Britain tendentious views ot kiemany two years later. to careful analysis is rather like the study specific Lies gravily or suel pudding However, the defence of the Stalinist positions on these ques- The lies, distortions and pure tions went a stage further with jonorance thi Contaneu the publication or a colection are easy enolon te articles edited refute with the most elementary entitled knowledge what actually General Strike 1926 Nowadays the Material leadership has take more of the careful serious account must be said 'that this book movement undertaken in partic- contals ular by Woodhouse and Pearce, particularly in the new Патета! though generally they information it provides on local prefer to 'activities exclude Tererence this work, perhaps in the hope however. is man birdose l people not find out to associate the mistaken but may sincere and combative Commun- about it. Party 1926 with utterly rotten policies of today "hus Martin Jacques, who i both a university lecturer and a backullye aDOU anne period as if all that was involved was the manoeuvres of various of the bureaucracy, without independent of the WOTKng class. To see things in that way to gratuitously insult those who once tought for something aeren. • left to Klugmann in entitled .Marxism Reformism and the General Strike to justify › again the line of the Cr at the time, and indeed ever since.

Enormous length writes enormous length to arrive at the irrefut- able proposition that reformists revolutionary struggles Thus the Party's 'official' He concludes from this that James Klugmann historian "It has been a tragic teature of agrees that the slogan 'All Powe werking class history' BrITIST to the General Council', perhaps that resentment against common one betrayal been Party's press during 1925-6 'was certainly not against the most real enemy

CORICCU

theory, - refers • the attacks on the -reformist reformist trade union lefts after the end ideas of the General Strike. If this odd statement means anything it must be that revolu- Correct line tionaries should not fact struggle to replace the Such points do little to sup- counte evommonary eer at port the view he continues to should manoeuvre bul maintain that the line of around them the basis of was 'overwhelmingly revolutionary ideas pall correct. To submit the wordy and policy he considers to have been

appropriate for the General The Strike. wien wel knew that . the workers. were not ready to challenge the social system' Everything else that they did flowed from this and has been used to justify every • Stalinist effort to hold back and defeat the working class ever since congru- Inere is a curious ence between these views and those presented in a recent pam- phlet James Richard Hyman, two lecturers at Warwick University associa- with International socialism group (now ine DWr) entitled Trade Unions and Revo- lution: The Industrial Politics of the Early Communist Party. this work is that the CR could thesisonesentee not have done better fact. is, we are told, It was a ConstruCT revolutionary foundly unfavourable situation' Though they agree that the Communist Party in the neriod before the General Strike tied closely to the trade most uneharacteristic statement from just before the struggle pointing to the potential of the councils aven toa pone that far in defending their Stalinists themselves have position! Statistics By the use of statistics about strikes and union membership in that way must nave cone many post-

LOWE

wes in seminar, Hinton and Hyman argue from their Olym- revolutionary situation' the mid-1920s. They sneer at the 'orthodox Trotskvists'. who. unlike them. selves fail to understand that history in devious moves its through the way cross currens oline immense v and many-sided con- varied working of masses'. However. show an utter contempt for the needs and aspirations the working class in falling to ever revolutionaries ConsCer

HOW

could or should have intervened the dynamic relationship between the workers and thei established leaders. In fact it is they who leave the masses the Lesal • bureaucrats and the stalinists.

The one question that our authors refuse consider in all their grand talk of revolutionary situations and the self-action the masses, is just how supposed confront the real problems that faceu ine miners and all sections of the working class. The capitalists and the ruling class decided lo make a stanc after July 1925. Hinton and Hyman appar- ently consider that at this point they should have been 'cadre building, and preserving the purity of their theory. Miners But the efforts of even the smallest group of revolutionary workers cannot be developed in wils way. The miners and the rest of working the class were SOCIALIST PRESS, H'ednesday April 16, 1980 Armoured cars escort food convoy through Poplar 1926 much less true. thrown in Mav in to revolutionary situation' that The failure of anybody at all they could smell or measure to present any other possibility with a slide rule meant mar were was no new road open to the working class iney moved in a mass way in a struggle which could have were overwhelmed developed of to a much higher by the sell-out. level. When the Coventrv Counci novorutonaries nad OI Action sent a delegation to responsibility to present policies the and are tell deto develop the struggle, even if demand they could predic General Strike m me name ou would finally noW the workers of Coventry one of work out. While it is certainly true that the orientanon To wares union 'lefts? in 1925-6 known as a fighter was Trace represented a fatal error, it cowed and beaten The iron had feet of clay' also worthwhile the man. recallin it is clear that more that „anc achievements the Minority Movement before vears after the event tha it finally succumbed to Stalinist General Strike and its problems live degeneration. with us. We can of course see a capil Step forward alist cass • st determined solve its crisis at the expense of working class and a trade It was above all not a kind of union and Labour bureaucracy precursor of the SWP 'Rank and determined to help them with which places the task. itself outside the dynamic of the Many echoes of the strength struggle for leadership deternmaton working class have been heard • It represented a considerable in the battles of the miners, the step forward from wartime dockers, the shop stewards enscene workers and the steelworkers in that it hoped not to bypass the recent years leadership but important putting forward a programme confuse the together interests wrong Doneles all sections of the working class the Communist Party in thos years with the counter-revolu- i a unita, revolutionary way.

tionary activities of those who challenging the established leaders within the same mascutrade mine name today. mass organisations, proclaimed that almer Analysis become a 'majority movement'.

There is no doubt that they had Above all, it is necessary to considerable elect see that the struggle for a revol- forcig tne nands of the union leaders on 'Red Friday'. utionary programme It strengthened the miners, "ass inseparable the trades from a co tinual analysis of the cave contence councils, and did much to process within the working class for working class and the testing of the battles that were ditterent layers of its leadership.

Dound TO It is in this process that even Come It was a lack of sensitivity to small groups of revolutionaries the the struer hdeveloped that play • botta cole Struggle wistrucuon or me mass revolu tionary party which is necessary made denuncton or the lefts' by the Communist Party put end • o capitalist Minority exploitation for good. the Movement and after the General Strike The Battle for Trotskyism Second edition of the opposition documents presented inside the WRP by the present leader- ship of the Workers Socialist League With a new introduction Price £2.50 plus 20p postage and package from Workers Socialist League BM Box 5277, London WCIV 6XX

RIG SAFETY:

HOLD A UNION

INQUIRY

The horrific tragedy of the collapse of the "Alek- sander Keilland" hotel plat- form into the North Sea with the loss of 123 lives has concentrated the atten- tion of trade unionists upon the whole question . of health and safety standards onboard North Sea oil installations. • ne trace the disastroited engened dinto controlled enquiry as fresh doubts as to the safet of the semi-submersible rig are One of the major issues is that the platiorm was not pur butli

• DOSC

accomodate workers but was converted drilling platform from which the 200 ton removed. in the oifields must intensifi Replacement the call for a workers' inquiry.

This report, which was commis- That the management recog- sioned by lony Benn lour year inten- ago, contains a strongly worded mused lis sified the instability of the rig is dissenting note by the two trade the fact that it was unionists in the C due for repiacement by a sister-

LIC

matters of 11a. LIl henrick nosen wole

DOS TON

was snar had no derrick health and safety should remain Mr Sverre Nielson, managing the hands of the Department his tor Stavanger Energy laut : said, "1 here's have that involved demanded these matters come under ital, Once Ine rig startea to ist derrick would have had a surveillance of the Health The and bad effect Executive the Why did the leg of the plat- unions. first place? Their stand has been backed Om crack in the Now that the disaster by benn , wio nas urawn atten. reports are emerging trade

L1ON

TO LOE

ansence ot ot warnings union representation on the rigs years ago about the insuffic- being iently materials used sarely. the construction of such rigs Anti-union steel structures large dimension but This rightly spotlights the extremely material notorious continue to be used, despite the isolat companies. suci warmes orexperts as Phillips and Esso recog- The fifth nition for trade unions on sander which away was. 4 İt diameter but metal made for safety confined to offshore only 30mm thick. The five week suspen The whole question of metal fatigue on son or workers ov me teac such immense struc Bridge Company on the site at the hazardous condi- Hunterston. Ayrshire, where tions of the North Sea has also they are building a platform for been insufficiently researched this very same Trade unionists will not be issue. fobbed off by references to the There men have been expec- unpredictable lIlC ted to work vil lolally cements. stal. the determined resistance helents or over l are rightly suspicious They feet. that standards health and of the workers defence safety blatantly safety • minimum standards llas profits 101 fierce hostility from North Sea oil American management: Hellbent upon extracting Less strict: maximum profits from the oil The fact that regulations are Donanta COnStrUCTIOT less strict in British sector companies such as Chicago compared to the Norwegian Marathon and the where recent disaster took UEl have lice basta • rusher to take advantage of the pros place, tends to strengthen then worst fears opened to them the hur rene Report on safety recent publication tirst • a supine Labour Adminis then rapacious Lamon Page 9 Tory government. Marathon having milked £1 million in 1972 from the las Tory government, in return for an agreemen › set up busine's: on the site of the defunct Johr browns silpyara in Clydebank have now sold out to the Fiench VEI who have demanded large scale redundancies as their terms As a further measure of thei unscrupulous approach the same companies some o shipyards Licl

WOTK

done ir such as Govan Shipbuilders and Cammell-Laird-where rates than • lower those employed on the platform building sites. protest this against 900 boilermakers at anomaly vovan went on strike last weer seeking parity with the men on the sites This attempt to take advan- tage oi a lack of orders in the shipyards and secure work done at lower wage rates is now meet- ing : resistance from the yards The demand, already taken up by some trade unionists, for conterence of representative.

of all workers in the oil produc- tion and related industries, must be campaigned vigour in the light of the recent disaster. Such • conference should consider: *a full scale inquiry by th movement into health about and safety standards both onshore and offshore for struggle unionisation on the rigs campaign for parity wages workers involved in similar construc-

WUIK

*the demand that the next Labour production and related industries under workers control. By lan McCalman

Page 10 The main lines of argu- ment in the recent meeting to save the Perivale Matern- ity Hospital (West London) from closure were put by May Heywood, Ealing Labour Councillor and member of the Area Health Autority. e tec nai tnere are toc maternity beds the Is bing spent on lac Noo m London. making Periale the recipient of objected the cuts! Marion Stern, Health th.e Eling Community Council. pointed out that there wiss someroo kea a occ• pancy of the maternity beds in the AHA and as it is impossible birth accurulciy rare itstaererore impossibie 1o say if there are too many beds or nol. Good case She went on to put forward an extremely good case for the retention of Perivale. Ihe area it serves has a high num Der oT women Chlo- bearing age, and has poor hous- ing and social services told "the She num der ol DaDles Wno the first days of life is highest in Ealing com pared to surround- Eling needs a good di cas

JOIN THE

With by the Wokes thousand taking the Tory streets to oppose policies there is plainly no lack of militancy in the organised working class. Yet the existing trade union bureaucrats and Labour leaders right or 'eft'-have perspective prepared fight vurals derence

OOS

hvine stan daras, cocia services ano demo- cratic rights. These can only be defended through policies trom • ine workina class. internationa cass nas nothing gain and every thing trom the profitability of their UVil emoovine Cass In a period where the contra- dictions of the anarchic capit- force the wholesale alist system Crosurt artu pro•uctive Torce: society only planned cocial ls economy on a world scale offers a way forward such a perspec- • v aklave tive ledoersn necaco which. in locavs strudcres nionts b workers beyond duvante trace UnION orotest politics and illusions that capit- can be abolished through war tollicill.

INDUSTRIAL NEWS

Occupy to save Perivale Hospital maternity service." Sister Lee. from the hospital from the salta une opoosilon entire worktorce toine cosire and the members of COHSE at tho hospital have reply to the AHA consultative cocumcnl in speeches from the floor.

Councilior argu- • Hevwooo s ments were эттяскес. Chopped She was simply saying that in another West beds of the AHA London - sulil as. lill hospital maternity unit - wnich are under threat, should be chopped fight against the cuts as a whole not arguing over "priorit- les' The two senior nurses also a1 the mceting stated categorically that the hospital would not because of the danger occupied •aedes oi datuale medical cover. But what other action can be welfare of taken to. ensure the the mothers ano bades. Obviously preparations have o be well laid for such an occu should include: ballon. unusu support *enlisting local GPs to keep referring Malicis, that ambulance workers will contmue to bring patients in; sympatetic consul- tants and other doctors to con-

NSL

The Workers Socialist • Leaove : s a l rorskvisı mover out to buid slan an and day build in the working class cdat dity in aritain Internationally, are affiliated the newly-formed Trotskyist. International Liaison committee wach morto tor cre reconstruction ine c r ourIn International and the building parties in every struggle aortary and against oer lais!l barasitic oralinist buredl cracies deformed and the degener ted worklr, retares invite Socialist

TICS

t oe wr and to join us in the struggle for Please send me more details about the Workers Socialist League. Name Address. Send BM Box

WSL,

to 5277, London WC1V 6XX. The occupation of the Wandsworth Day Nursery in its Nightingale Road is sixth week. off services welt Cul • last week despue Ine lace lla NALGO has given support anc NALGO official Stan the local Bush had written a letter to this effect. workers turn or theseus ly bo re told o came this union support and to check wit hush-out returneu hour later with a supervisor to Bush was disconnect services. ret used Tet noner

DUT

budge from his office-which is tinue giving adequate cover.

only ten minutes away from the *taking up the offer of the AHA io Sive Sul support- occuvalvl. doubt made Bust nas no •DuvVll- glowing speeches in the past and including sympathetic SUTIKe doubt will make them in the future on the destruction of the *making sure that supplies continue to be welfare state brought about Dy .of linen, Cic., the cuts. oriereu. But he and his fellow union *continuing the campaign otticials are aiding and abetting for support locally. their Other can be added blit

1 OICS

. D) the services detend list. Enls rete Rowlanus actually being cut. Secretary of Hounslow Trades At a recent council meeting Council, pointed out that even it was agreed that the otticer.

it this year's tuls for Tepo sosion opr bueldings AHA will have : throlon ine buildings deficit of £2.3 million. "squatters" with to fight is occupiea now. The time our relerring back to a counci untorunaev neuu noi orm- meeting. out the record The occupation has Councillor Heywood who was served with of the been deeply implicated in the viciou be on court hearing which will occupied Closure Wilt rnday o April al mia-day a Hounslow Hospital. the High Court. A lobby has been called to This • that the Sheriff the closure of the protest of London will be carrying out AHA on 21 May une evicuon Wandsworth doubt Tories that

NOW AVAILABLE

coverage will go in their tavoul Labour movement bulle. ane deter orners m Ine ares from taking similar action tin on Ireland with back- Yet this may not be the case witch- articles ground on St. sides in D includid ame. Marsalel" Nursery Battersea have been informed including p&p that their nursery is next for the from WSL, BM Box 5277 axe and have asked Nightingale London WCIV 6XX Lane occuolers. To speak ala meting of parents and workers ọn how i occupations are run.

INSIDE

the eviction of Ironically Witch-hunts: Nightingale Lane Nursery Tildy occur on Monday April 28.

This will be the-day after the y vals

WAR-

eviction of the occupied South Oxford Nursery Class under the Labour government. Then, as now, the hard task peen

UHON

officials to lead action that will im possible- make eviction 1.C. supportme sire acon. the such anreat action two years ago at the EGA hospital London Labour government retreat Irom A lobour movement tne cosure-wineh was eventual- ly carried through by the Tories.

buletiR on IKELAND The leadership of the unions

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Six months (25 issues). One year (50 issues) SOCIALIST PRESS, Wednesday April 16, 1980 Court threat to nursery sit-in Labour support that is needed: but at refused to fight the same time pressurę must still the leaders and is not prepared to light under a tory government to vca . -Laut Increasingly. the need for a Labour leaders in the union and leadership • to black any future use of change building both at workh ulas l psou h ual lacılity and to cut ofi oca an ramona eval l wc a!

pulyals not to see further defeats.

their services Wandsworth occupiers have the vital Lulle

TROTSKYIST INTERNATIONAL LIAISON

COMMITTEE

INTERNATIONAL SUMMER SCHOOL

TROTSKYISM

AND THE MASS

MOVEMENT

Eight days of lectures and discussion on basic questions of Marxism and the fight to reconstruct the Fourth International. *TROTSKYISM AND THE TRADE UNIONS: USA in the 1930s. The postwar struggle to build France in the 1930s Trotskyist parties in the working class.

*TROTSKYISM, STALINISM AND SOCIAL DEMOCRACY.

The struggle for the against stalinism in ine issUs Lessons for the period of entry into social democracy in France and the USA.

*TROTSKYISM AND THE FIGHT AGAINST SEXUAL

OPPRESSION.

*TROTSKYISM AND PETTY BOURGEOIS NATIONALIST

MOVEMENTS

*THE FIGHT FOR A TROTSKYIST YOUTH MOVEMENT

*RECONSTRUCT THE FOURTH INTERNATIONAL

Evening meetings on additional topics, films and social events. The school will be attended by delegations from the ordanisations attinateo to the ano memoers от ini

WSL.

A special invitation is being extended to supporters o1 the WSL to take part in the discussion and learn more about the vot ano me tiLG Details are available from any WSL branch or from: WSL BM Box 5277 , London WC1V 6XX accomodation for the eight days.

Cost: t1z including cneao mear wir oe oromdeo ar funch uime ane mere wir D a pooled fare arrangement. Creche facilities

DON'T GO INTO

THE FIGHT BLINDFOLD!

For a

SOCIAL

£2.00 clear lead in the £4.00 stricto afsinsi £8.00 ware control, cuta £14.00 and redundancie. your cheque/P.O. Send to Socialist Press, BM Box 5277, £9.00 £16.00 London WCIV 6XX. £10.00 £18.00

SERTUC jamboree for SOCIALIST PRESS, Wednesday April 16, 1980 Stalinists There timeless a Saturday's quality about South East Regional Council of the TUC's emer- the gency conterence Employment Bill, attended by 240 delegates. There was much lelt from

SERTUC

Secretary Jack Dromey and platform svanel Ken Gill the stenera Secretary of AUEW/TASS and Bill Keyes, General Secretary of

SOGAT,

wilU патке vack the heady days of the struggle gainst the Industrial Relation ill-which they at the time dic alt i nel power lo contail anu derail. Concordat But in al the anti-Tory retoric there was not so much as a mention of the Concordat allu alt Works Class polices carriea out by the last Labour government. Nor was there any reference to une sen-our or ine steel strike ana Bil Keyes involvement in the* Lever Commision of Inquiry. Derek Robinson was hailed mar[VI-our Ine AULW leadership's role in his victimis- ation AUEW's role in sabotaging

SLIIKU

delun aralisı tile anti-union measures awarded in Leyland. Dromey Jack manoeuvred zde coen cvd co cne no Trotskyist could intervene to talk shop. expose cosy Nearly all the speakers were Communist Party members who talked not of the betrayals . of but of the need to banel sul the members on the shop floor. When a Tory came to the and heckled, ustill. Was rome aema derenoe nim saying "there must be room for differences in the movement" Not ready Militant supporter salc that the TUC must call a 24 General Strike May on 14th" but that call tor general strike could inceste class beas mot read y for thar king.

as the working inerne Was tamerl taken by Dromey, Gill and Keyes in their reply One speaker made mild crticism of the lUC's tallure to make a clear call lor a strike on May 14. This led Gill to spring Len Murray's defence 'Len clearet Nulldy Ilas Secretary than General since 1926 l!!. I'm prepared to congratulate Len Murray. with him agreed neves We could have found our- selves the outmanoeuvred veneral Counci i we nao pul a strike resolution". Dromey joined them in the Gill praise of Murray and said that the leadership had done all they CoulO anle Inal maln nrobem wold ne in mondiang the membership for May 14th.

fight taken up must be Umons 1OI

SULKU

Bition against the Employment a Socialist natenged s oi Press supporter after the confer- his role in the ence to justify steel

SILKE

sell bul. nºyts claimed that a. ballot on The Lever Commission's pay proposals would have produced a "9-1" vote to return to work.

Keyes claimed that he had been under pressure from othel Iuc leaders not to present a blocked The annual conference of of the National Union Journalists opens in Port- rush, Northern Ireland, this Friday with fourth the biggest branch in the union denied representation. National Executive NUJ over- Committee turne ecommenuauon oi a ape oced totear had 2,0 up- the 2,000- branch for being suiul

DUUK

more îan n bn ołeg its subs. Liverpool city counci have voted to increase rates in the city by 50%, instead of implementing the Tory cut-backs in services. Labour the largest party on the council but overall without the majority, suvereu

LICH

Dua ger toronaa toe counci ate the Liberals' abstention Wednesday 26 March-with opposition tivll. all) Labou Councilors wan mcuce Militant supporter Derek Hatton. was a realled Luc clae after meeting t ne tallure reach agreement which had occurred the previous week.

Deficit this earlier meeting Hatton had boldly •roDose• a motion against the main Labour for the policy of deficit budgeting; with government recommenda- out "t ls cear that tne kes of Dromey see May 14 as a huge diversion. fight for necessary to ll 15 strike * æch0n on væv 4 not aç !

one-off but as prepara tion for the General Strike thai petacc bring down ine Tory government. minority report from the Lever explain inquiry-but Talen support for the majority's proposal of a l.1% muserabie rise Nor would he argue a case for SOGAT's refusal to support Me NUA's mousta acuor pursuit of the three-union joint RYA Wim In Keyes' view "The never get what they are asking lot. NUJ conference: left motions number of left resolutions on

BOOK

least the agenda-not among ate wraw casn urooos from Ireland. The NEC decision is a highly convertert one ane nas rsaser the reactionary disenfranchising rule, which was Hivucca luree years aco. branch, for Kristol example, has lost its place at oil culle as LIo ugil virtually all statt journalists in its branch are paid up. Union bureaucrats back Liverpool rates retreat the tons to increase in inflation; and the cancelling of interest payments on ioans wit a campaea to mobilse tat working class in support of the council. Wrath Only _rune councilo s nad back this proposal the guts to which predictably provoked the wall ol ene ma omly or carter created time servers and uproar for several minutes.

This ort ad couldztous support deserveo ne workers and served to expose the thoroughly spineless and cowdlt! la orly reminder oi the Labour group The backlash from the righ in the Labour Party vanlic swiftly wilck proposca полог IOm une rignt wing Party executive the Labour expel the nine from the Party Threats were made by fiell wing

USLIICI

secretar v wall withdraw official Howaros status from one canadate Page 11

ALL OUT

MAY 14!

AS THE TUC's May 14 ployment: but nor is there any doubt that TUC leaders Day of Action grows closer desperately hope to confine the list of trade union the action to one-day bodies calling for or recom- token affair which will leave mending strike action has Tories the safely in office rapidly-now includ- grown

GMWU,

The fight 1014 stist strike the

AT, NUG NUT:

11 9 May

NUPE

SOGAT,

therefore be combined with

ASMTS,

FTATU, the Sea- Union the redobled demands on the men's and TUC to break off all talks Scottish TUC. with the Tories and call There is little doubt that General Strike Action to the day will register a huge Dromey at Tory cuts, anti- bring down the Thatcher protest government. union laws and mass unem- NGA: call all out strike. 1,274 firms, a 37½ hour week by April of em ploying with a next year, starting 20% of the membership of in the working the National Graphical ПОЦ! week this month, as a first step Association, have towards a 35 hour week The employers "final" offe agreements signed interim on the current pay and Keyes a j/iz nour week Dy hours claim. July 1982 with the first reduc- being Te Na ciam le for an hout £80 minimum arnings level and implemented unti January next year The also employers rBSC war demanding mande deve neer cy who sui mitted the same opm

SOGAT

NATSOPA,

on jobs as une Nua. nave recommenace acceptance employers oI thei The

NGA

National rejected the Council, however, In the wake of the sell- olle ane ne URO nas TU Vi embarked on a series of selec- out on wages, steel workers strikes which caused are coming face to face with 160 editions the BSC offensive on jobs.

papers o an o aooe e! to 1,000 workers taking indef- Management in Scotland are inite action and occupy- strike immediate Attempts by the branch to demanding Ins Inel plants keep a number of freelances in Increast Inoroauclio! willd The firms signing the interim union membership despite dues 1,900 reduction in the labour from arrears, have now backfired on force return io them muustrlal action Une of the groups to bi Ravenscraig agreeing to ine union cialm on made Attem ots were seine eliminated wages and hours to get the ruling reversed before that of craftsmen's mates.

There interim agreement will the conference began. is also pressure being exerted be replaced b' Savs ne ta i ne agenda nerudes a •Cali emu demarcalon oerween amier whatever final agreement ent types of craftsmen. for the union to affiliate to the reached between the employers for the The increased prodution is

BPIF

and to meet Newspaper officials, for withdrawal from nev take up work that bocetv. anu ine unon Council has hithert( t ttss ana enorce and ment ottne union's code beer done Lanwern Long battle and for wage rises to Port Talbot in South Wales.

match inflation Feelings run high in the But the plants the the Government Issue li blatu

. UVE]

ui colil Newspaper Society ate md ing battle and and attac. TOr ung 0acK0e ol transDor their censorship of the Carrick- firms which broke the picket and Oxford lines during the strike. tactics more events asCuS anel relation to the industrial action.

branch has called for a labou vintant. noI( While the NGA has not yet movement conference organised position that blacking by the NUJ on censorship.

decision should stand. endorsed anv cusseproposelor that, were dis 11V before negotiations finally broke down. it is clea that if the employers are pre- offer money. officials will

SOOT

the lound laDie negotating away their members' jobs.

NGA

members should demand all-out strike action fo £80 and 37½ hours now-anc no strings! this position the coming council elections

SAVE OUR NURSERIES

And leaflets for the elec- Militani „vome supportets have tried to claim that it was

CAMPAIGN

tions opposing the rate-rises the poat les. to Labour vuusel were arot Regional Conference had traily and mysteriously the Deen aereated changed on the way to the week, that th tu thet had May 17 1980 DIevor made their and Nottingham printers. resistance was pointless.

background to these events has been a campaign by the right wing and Communist Tribunites Party members "How to Defend Nurseries public against Closures" artur . uon olduenes to scare This is the mentality of the members monger the with Tribunites in Parlament who horror stories about thousands make token gestures to certain of redundancies if the policy of policies allu unel •DecentN rate rises was cuts, no Region covered includes troop into the opposite lobbies adopted. afterwards. Coventry, Leicestershire, Even so, the Labour Party Such manoeuvres serve only Warwickshire, Oxfordshire, district narrowly executve to register opposition and create Derbyshire Nottingham- voted in favour of this policy of a 'left' appearance opposi- deficit budgeting. shire, Birmingham. tional resistance. It is an utterly alle deceDerve Packed symptom of political cowardice For details contact: Ann A question mark must t there- A policy called chorey ace omard. fore placed McKinley, Norreys over the future alici walus leadership Oxford, res starce Avene. nuwever. was backee out ov tne F-Margaret Lee, 28 Bramble Tory attacks on the Merseyside : right wing and public sector working class by the Liverpoo!

union delegates who had Drive, Portchester Lodge, beer 'nine' and Militant whipped up into an ill-consider- | Nottingham. tenacn

UDDUSUO

ane Geт1ci spending policy and reversed

Lesson of steel strike:

PRESS

NEEDED!

The sheer dimension of the sell-out moves by union officials in the steel industry and in British Leyland sum the harsh political up problems now faced by the British working class in the struggle against Thatcher's bosses' government. live years of luc collabor- ation with wage-cutting Labour arouno toat workers must acri fice living standards and social services in order to restore "viabilitv' of British capital- Ine ism; five years of steadfast independent opposition to struggles by the working Class. union Gave Trade bureaucracy even further to the right than any period since the Wul If anv worker had seriousli Could believed that those union nere be leaders refused to defend example of such behaviour than who the steel strike? government would suddent ocean in sanuary n became cied begin to lead struggles that in South Wales and other Tories, the first nine months areas it was and o lory rue and ne outcome or aunt ase the longest national strike since beyond the wages issue to link 1926 should provide a bitter ine with utty and the answer. industry Opposed minancy working class as a whole.

The TUC leaders who once not as argued against action under the dil opollulllty. 'save the Labour govern- membership on own power and a natener. nel commitment way to 1s in of socialism, but to unsured unal ne surike remamea isolated. They blocked growing the negotiation of petty reforms demands for a General Strike to and concessions willin ine framework of capitalism. detent une In period pay and jobs; they connived at world-wide wholesale, massive Caullalist alla CrISIS in which the drive for profits une strike by docKets. forces employers workers and onto allowed steel pickets offensive the working analist search reforms case this nem cran within the system turns into plants and stocknolders than on stopping production at all out struggle to preserve the big itselt -and motive plants. ment that defends it. Yet oy bL union negotiators orrered a real chance of another section workers strike struggle 1 Ores moved like greased lightning.

Renegade phony inquiry, headed by Labourite Lord Slaued i Bill Keyes Labour was set up. than BSC's 'final offer' leaders heli back politely Meanwhile Executive knifed the strike call Sirs -declaring their confidence Published by Folrose Ltd for the Workers Socialist League, BM Box 5277, London WC1V 6XX. Printed by

SOCIALIST

NEW LEADERS

Edwardes and BL clearer Michael management not to "abuse" the 92-page of As soon as 1t sumes to be imposea on te BE workforce. possible to extend was, appropriately April Fool's Day structic that Bill Sirs took up the fight jobs in to force the Lever Commission's and the the ISTC negotiating committee with Ine and Executive. Yet the TUC leaders saw this . Vul as a Instruction control ol Ind which their privileges rest here were nockets ot recto tance But the they official instruction to return We sat me clums l ne steer strike Yet, olens Ve blacking scab on suppliers scabbing on anu on payment ol back wares have shown. strikers the steel have returned not defeated and others; and they crushed but is incapable of by leadersal Inal steel DIlyalt defen int, theo, despises.

rainer despite years of effort by betrayals and engineering and auto- reducts to volste action, the feeling on the shop soon as a strike call against Edwardes' steel against the umon leaders on au sce. commission millionaire Lever. anu _ leader yesterd rechard Mart- renegade BL

TGWU

while Joseph Registered as a newspaper at the Post Office. Signed articles do not necessarily represent the views of the workers socialst League.

TOTALOCAL

BACK PAGE COMMENT

ancillary is one of Ireland. years been heavy military hospital-but eruotee into Not crushed: steel strikers Victoria followed busting moves has brought a action five They resurgence ol strike action Iron hospitals. appeared to be the ashes compiett of a successful sell-out troops from the premises.

While workers remain deter mined fight, There possibiers and the fory go the possibility defeating ment. but at ine same time it l NUPE's cries of recognis that has which called crisis leadership weakened in and stands as a threat for the future. hard who has Repeated betrayals-though invitation They may nor actualy crusa lac working class-can spread to cross NUPE nicket lines nave cumulative effect. They while and tions that "a demoralisation, open exists within the door to actual defeats and set backs. The Tories have successfully simply strikers sat out the steel strike: but they "deliver the goods' have yet to intlict the kina of historic defeat on the working strikers cannot, gone on must achieve Class in order to establish tne levels of exploitation they seek.

Militant The the steelworKers or other hand have emerged stili militant but effectively leader- facing an unpreceden- ess, and ted attack working conditions. Nothing is resolved. But the most question of all is urgent

WSL

receni the steel

UNIORS

2000 weekend, ship that starts noof fainter- from the starts not search for "reforms within the system, not from conceding the employers' "right" to extract the necessity but trom Drills To cerend ine maevendent mier the working class- ests through to defeat mass the Tories and their Labour and have completed by ackevs. ana estabuse a of July workers government to create a planned, socialist economy The Socialist precisely such a revolutionary leadership. Anvil Printers Ltd., London.

ANNIVERSARY OF SOUTHALL.

PICKET!

DISBAND THE SPG

•POLICE STATION

DEMONSTRATION:

SUN APRIL 27h rs Corner • Marble Arch March via Scotland Yard to Rally in Tefcher Square

REMEMBER BLAIR PEACH

Troops out -demand NUPE strikers The strike by hospital Vur members must knov christmas it will not mak one they stay workers SiX Belfast hospitals including • to the armi the Royal Victoria Hospital presence," he declared in a press of the first major Attacking the strike leaders, he went on: industrial actions against the he striking members have effective martial law repres been pushed into a corner sion operating in the North They have allowed themselves to be led there by hotheads.

'leadership' from with such Hospital workers have for Coulthard it is scarcely • surpris angered by the ing that the strikers are demand- inside presence inal encl ance talks on the army presence in action at wee the hospital. Not easy members at the Royal Nobody can pretend that it nospital warked out solidarity is an easy force the other Belfast withdrawal L100D demanding tom even a single bulaig r the occupied six counties.

witnarawal But the obvious readiness of NUPE members to take Attacked Lus beats anexpression orine rising hostility to British imper- The 1,200 strikers have been ialism in the North of Ireland а таскес National Hiu une relusal oi coulare Executive, along with Alan Fisher and the for a return British

NUPE

leadership, to work while talks were held on strengthen and develop this ine Issue ol the troops, and b local NUPE official John Coult- with British colorar issued a virtua capitalism and its brutal colonia oppression in Ireland traut condemning allega Ireland wel SOCialty republican caucus North and South must however draw strength from the struggle nostal ane came at doe of the NUPE strikers, and ster difference between him and the the struggle to force the withdrawal of British troops not wall only Victoria trom the Kova Coulthard has Hospital, but from the six coun gone into condemn the strike ties as a whole

FUND

A record collection of just over £500 in cash to aid the development of our international work was taken at the Conference with the successful Together completion of the first half of our £3,000 fund the same and the raising, month by month of our regular Socialist Press Fund, this represents an enormous achieve.

ment for a movement of our size.

But now, more than ever, we cannot afford to rest on our laurels. The more successful we are in taking up the fight to reconstruct the Fourth International, the heavier our financial commitments become.

up to raise the So an immediate fight must be taken second half of our £3,000 Special Fund which we mus the TILC Summer School at the end The current total is £1539.85 All donations should be sent to: Socialist Press Special Fund BM Box 5277, London WCIV 6XX