Socialist Press no. 84

As Liberals renew coalition

WORKERS MUST

BREAK IT NOW!

What made 2,200 anti- socialist members of Britain's second capitalist party-the Liberals-vote 3-1 last Saturday to Callaghan apport. the ernment? "German Hans- politician, head rich Geascher, of Party, ho Free Dethocratic out of his way the elements of the arrange between Callaghan and pact Liberal leader bree November 1976, four months before the deal was publicly signed? The both answer questions representatives of the capitalist class the Callaghan-Healey cabinet with its lackeys in the TUC as holding means of besi back the working class and imposing wage culs, sachugs and speed-up. Military scabbing They are absolutely con- fident that the Callaghan will continue to government not socialist but capitalist policies. This contidence W do when they increased enthusiastically walcucu Callaghan's cabinet of strike- breakers mobilising a massive military scabbing operation in order to uphold the 10% pay limit in the conflict with firemen. And the details of Healey's Budget carefully dis- plans, Liberal cussed with top leaders, have convinced them that, in the words of Liberal MP Richard Wainwright: "The first fruits of the agreement wil be a Libera money back budget, putting the of „pockets people.. Illusion Another likely budget measure taken straight from the Liberals' programme "profit form of sharing" scheme designed to illusion that and workers management common interest in share a profitability.

SOCIALIST

PRESS

Weekly paper of the Workers Socialist League * No. 84 * January 25,1978 It is the Liberals' convic- tion that such class collabor- fostered more ation can be easily under the disguise of a Labour than

COVCTECIEL

through the return of a Tory government cemented the Lib-Lab coalition deal from the ber *the pact was signed on the basis agreement need third round rigid wage controls. Healey Recognising that massive working class hostility to 2-reflected the Leyland toolroom strike-was point of breaking the on the the

TUC

bureau- grip of crats, Liberal and Callaghan leaders saw that could only carry through such a policy by drawing on support outside of the labour movement Steel undertook to provide that support and in exchange Callaghan willingly agreed to drop even the vaguest pretense of socialist policies.

Mouthpiece Since then this reactionary coalition spearheaded on wages, jobs and attacks social services, with the Callaghan-Healey leadership functioning as no more than mouthpiece Liberal policies. of actions all these Callaghan has been slavishly supported Parliament by the 'left' MPs of the Tribune group, and by C bureau- crats who have now become front-line defenders of Healey's arbitrary 10% pay * * 15p The 3-1 vote at Saturday's Voteral Assembre cation clear the 10% ahead must press strike vote appreciation with action to win them in full. Callaghan's efforts. And sections yet to form- ulate pay claims must take up Consulted the fight to regain and defend their living standards through But while Liberals have catching repeated ty protect against inflatión on the coalition deal, no such right of discussion has been Socialist policies given to une working class Unemployed workers Callaghan did the deal thrown on the scrapheap by with the Liberals without policies of this the govern- the Parlia- consulting ment must fight for Labour Party, and admission to the trade unions with complete contempt for for action to iorce the whole organised labour and dil movement. The Liberal leaders are now clearly privy to the most budget decisions Dro coral the are consulted every aspect govern they ment policy; and exercise an effective power of veto over policies adopted by the Labour Party Conference.

Wage control Workers Socialist The League has pointed this out the continuous v coalition deal was formed. We have campaigned continuous- ly for the breaking of the Lib- Lab deal and for workers to break its LaKe central policy of wage

CONTO

The open talk of a Phase 4 of coupled controls with the political revelations of the last few days show the urgency of this fight. Last year's Troops Out Movement march on and unionists irade Bloody Sunday Labour Party members must put down motions demand- ing Labour MPs break from the Lib-Lab deal and cam- paign actively against it.

particular those left' In MPs that claim to oppose the Callaghan and boncies Healey must be called upon Two marches will be held caudien this coming Sunday to com- throughout the Labour and the sixth anniv- memorate trade union movement for ersary of British imperialism's the breaking of the coalition of 14 brutal slaughter and the removal its

OTI

unarmed Irish civilians in supporters from the Labour Derry on January 30 1972.

leadership, or to stand aside for those who will. One will consist of the motley Tanker drivers of talkers describe crew themselves as the Those sections of workers JeTT like tanker drivers and The other Ine wi. consist are v of forces mobilised by Sinn Fein, power workers with outstand- Inside

CHINA

1927 Centre pages Kollontai review .. • p.8 Darlington strike. • p.10 Press Gang... ...p.5 Steel jobs threat •Back page Callaghan end to this coalition. Only this can open fight for possibility of socialist policies of nation- alisation ot maior industri and the programme of public works necessary create _ new jaba To takiag workers niel takers wilmn tae labou by their movement who inaction serve to protect this reactionary coalition. And they will see the need for a revolutionary leadership to fight for the independent Heffer -he and other interests of the working class.

lejis must nignt or stand aside

MOVEMENT

Troops out now! - Prevention of Terrorism Act.

which is the main force currently We reject the tendency of left British crudeline imperialism in Ireland. regard this fight as groups Workers Socialist League "single

SSHA 1

political thoroughgoing struggle for the has fundamental the political principled leadership disagreements will positions on British and irish working class ireland put by the organisers of both marches.

It is on this basis and to make this position that a case for We insist that the correct central demands for the assemble 2.00 withdrawal of British immediate troops from treland corner. and TOl self-determination for the Irish depart for Whitehall at 2.30 pm.

Socialist Press readers are also repeal of as the as well repressive legislation such as the

Page 2 There is no indepen- dent evidence to back up racist Premier Smith's that his offer of claim amnesty to what he calls "terrorists" of the the liberation armies has had some success. It is clear why Smith now feels the need to make this He is on the point of sign- ing a political agreement with collaborationist black "leaders" Bishop Muzorewa, Rev. Sithole and Chief Chirau. agreement would be to establish a nominally black lea government wmen would all the protect crucial material interest. whites and of Rhodesian and international capital. Censorship There one The snag "leaders" black Smith speaking to do not have the support of the militant sections of the black workers and peasants of Zimbabwe.

Smith's fear, shared by Muzorewa and Sithole, is that obviously pro-white settle- ment a new of for the surge support

ZAPU

freedom fighters OI

ZANU

and who are not the present settle- ment. In of the blanket spite censorship which the regime has imposed, it has become clearthat the war has sharply increased its the talks began. civilians and White members of the racist forces security been have killed reported in increasing numbers. now future Tne position of the army which is the only outstanding item in the internal settlement talks.

Portugal's political crisis has been "resolved" by a sharp new turn to the right. Premier Socialist Party Mario Soares has formed coalition government with the right wing bourgeois the Democratic and party Social Centre This party which is linked Democratic To me aran Parties Western Europe is well known for containing fascist elements. Soares The Democratic and Social Centre the one major Portugal political Dally which was excluded from of the every provisional governments tallnuadi

• INTERNATIONAL •

Behind Smith's amnesty fraud A warning to Zimbabwe freedom fighters Muzorewa and Sithole Any formal recognition of want some tormula to "inte- the terrorists might allow a grate" white opposition to Smith to the guerrilla armies into the racists' present stand- develop. ing army, (dissolving the most Smith's campaign get hated units such as the Selous the guerrillas to accept an Scouts). amnesty (and probably a wad as extra incentive.) Dissolution therefore, follows directly, to this way they would from his need wisell hope to divide the freedom defuse the strength of the fighters ZAPU and trom the so that any annies ZANU leaders. with paper agreement Smith, on the other hand, Muzorewa and Sithole can be wants the formal dissolution "accepted" nationally and of the guerrilla armies. internationally. Portugal's new right wing coalition throw of the Caetano regime in April 1974. then kept out of was was coveranc ocdust the for organising sections of the extreme right.

Yet Mario Soares, leader ol a workers parly, has made an coalition with open though he coyly refers to the coalition government "with socialist base and Christian Democratic person- alities". Collaboration But no words can disguise what it really is-a regime of naked class collaboration through which Portuguese Cunhal and international capital hope right wing Soares leadership.

THOUS

burdens on the working class.

Soares managed to railroad programme the deal through the National une LOe leaves no doubt government Committee, though certainly about this. It involves a 20% deepening cost of limit on wage increases when gulf between the right wing inflation is currently around leaders and the working class 30%), reductions in subsidies rank and file of the party.

and increases in taxes along Soares to attempting with other austerity himself this by additional measures. making within the Socialist From bilateral pact between the Party there have been signs of Socialist Party and the Com- resistance munist Party. right wino turn by the already of the CP SOCIALIST PRESS, Wednesday 25 January, 1978 Troops out of There would be no chance of settlement being if clear, principled imposed leadership were given to the of the Cyprus! struggle black masses against racism and imperial- 1Sm But the reaction of Joshua and Robert Mugabe, Nkomo the ZAPU and ZANU leaders, The new right wing to the latest internal develop- ments has been to run back coalition government of into the arms of the imperial- Prime Minister Ecevit hope of getting 1sts in the won the necessary vote their own rival neo-colonial of confidence the In solution-some version of the Parliament Turkish British American plan. on Tuesday 17 January. The Less favourable voting was 229 to 218 The plan worked out last Ecevit has taken rapid year by Owen and the Carter decisions the field of administration is less favour- foreign polev in able to Smith, Muzorewa and the Cyprus question. Sithole than the internal After a series of talks with solution. Denktash leader of the The British-American plan Turkish Cys dia comp and also involves the disarmament a plan was drawn the guerrillas, together presented to Greek Cypriot with the establishment of a President K vprianou "temporary" military at a meeting of all the parties under Field dictatorship Secretary at which Marshall Lord Carver. General Kurt Waldheim was But, unlike internal tne also present. settlement, Owen plan the will give a privileged position Revision to Nkomo and Mugabe in the interins is not bt. Ecevit also had a meeting 1s not because the with US Secretary of State British and American imper- Cyrus Vance to discuss the ialists revision of the $1.36 million black liberation. Defence Cooperation Agree signed in March 1976 ment, Sabotage US the held up by Congress after the Cyprus Quite the contrary, it is invasion. aimed to sabotage any real Ecevit's plan for recon- independence struggle by in- the Cyprus talks vening corporating the included Consulta leaders of the guerrilla armie.

for the island proposals into an ignominious i neo- colonial compromise. Split in This pernicious plan must resisted labour the movement state imperialist countries, Britain and by especially the black workers and union of Zimbabwe who ocasalils are threatened with a historic betrayal. The rift between the "trade Tunisian state union" the UGT and the Socialist ruling Destour Party is steadily widening despite the efforts of the union's leadership. Secretary-general Habib Achour is still attempting to straddle both sides, but this will become position soon painfully impossible The bourgeoisie within the DSP is now working to split the salvage its and most reliable class-collabor- of a general ators, part offensive against union rights.

have not yet decided how to Within the

UGT

itself react to this. Ivalutaly lie. particularly the youth bear no principled 111-Wil! sections, the calls to break against the new coalition.

trom the Bonapartist regime and built Opportunity workers' party are becoming more insistent. The Stalinists have them- selves long been proposing a Gandhi "national government" which they would participate with the Socialists and Chris- frozen tian Democrats. Stalinist leaders

DUL

opportunity now see do There has been a swift seize some of the Socialists' reaction from bourgeois following by appearing to oppose the new coalition politicians to the split have They already made engineered in the some mat the same i Party Congress by the time sailin Gandhi. Alvaro Cunhal and the other CP stand The coalition Janata cauel. Icou they have done since 1974 tc has withdrawn government from circulation all currency off neat Detray of the notes of the highest values.

independent struggle working class. (This move is aimed at freez- the the tinance: Treacherous believed Congress, ld which selever vasl The CP, therefore, can be undeclared reserves in such expected up notes). covel of treacherous support Already sections of the coalition both inside and Janata and the Chavan-Reddy outside the parliament with discussing Congress the demagogic formation of a new political occasional

VUL'

Ecevit including the Presidency between the two Tolaling small communities with government equal an Ministers number of from well as call Some ConCeSsons occupied territory. Legalise However, the entire plan is aimed to legalise the partition ol tne island by tne Impertal ist powers and aims to restore the credits from the United States in order to solve the precious i co litich acute the pIevious Turkey failed to do in The plan offers nothing to the Turkish and Greek toilers of Cyprus. The fight must be continued for the immediate ot winnotawal

LOODS

the island and for an indepen- dent Cyprus. The role of right wing Ecevit's government became increasingly clear when though it blamed fascists for political violence, it also took series of measures against left wing organisations. Fascist attacks This has not decreased, but on contrary, has increased fascist attacks on clear that quite 1S workers cannot rely on the government right wing IO stop these fascist attacks.

The government programme denies the demo.

rights political Call denial parties-a which Ecevit's election manifesto pledged to reverse. Only workers armed militia can fight against and defeat fascism Meanwhile secret talks have restarted between the metal workers union and the embovers conicuerallon This strike is going to b the target

SCEVIL

in its plan government to of head struggles workers in defence of jobs, living standards and demo cratic rights. Support He has the absolute support of the trade bureaucracy in his attacks on working class thai will _the help the fascists expand their base among disillusione workers and the petty bour- geoisie. The coming period will be decisive. Only the political Ecevit's govern- break trom and the ment mobilisation of the working class can guarantee the rights of workers and stop the threat of a fascist take over in the near future The political parties of the working class and the trade must break from Ecevit's government and fight to form an alternative govern- ment based on the needs ol the workers and peasants of Turkey.

GREECE

Greek unions have rejected the 15% rise wages offered by the Greek equivalent of the unions' original claim was for a 25% rise on the present level of £4.50 per day for unskilled workers.

BRUTAL DICTATORS FAIL

SOCIALIST PRESS, Wednesday 25 January, 1978

INTERNATIONAL-

northern The three of Andean states and Ecuador, Peru all ruled by Bolivia are dictatorships military despite differ- which, shade of in the ences their rhetoric, have prac- ticed similarly repressive class anti-working policies. All three have nonetheless failed to crush the will of the working class to fight. And all three have been attempting to divert growing the resistance to publicl regimes projecting "return to democratic rule" What they are planning is completely almost an cosmetic exercise which of few the displays very of bourgeois demo- forms not a scrap of its cracy and content. Last week the Ecuadorean military dictatorship staged a 'referendum' to select a new constitution. There were two to choose from-the old 1943 constitu- new one which tion would have a single parlia- would assembly and mentary illiterate give votes peasants. Unspecified As the regime had planned second of these 1l was which got a majority. The present plan, however, is not to introduce it until an number unspecified presidential months atter supposed elections which are to take place in mid-July of the But since several presidential candi- potential dates were neld under arrest for the duration of the refer- endum there is no assurance that the time-table for civilian rule will be followed. Massacre regime which two was responsible monlis ago of sugar

TOT

assale in one of the most workers the murderous history of the class struggle in Ecuador cannot be expected its power unless to give up and the rule of capitalists landowners remains assured.

Democratic forms will be the regime granted 1t feels certain they will not be used. Mass action attitude is Just the same being shown in Bolivia where General Banzer has dictator also scheduled presidentia. elections for this summer.

Banzer at present faces a of wave тоте agitation than the mass generals in Ecuador. A wave of public hunger taken place strikes has by last week, about which, 1,500 students and workers were participating. Attempts to break these demonstrations by force were met immediately with strikes in the factories and tin mines.

the top number civilians Banzer's regime resigned in terror when faced with mobilisations. In the middle of last week was forced Banzer apparent climb down. He announced an amnesty charged with for prisoners political or union offences, and for pollical exiles and the reinstatement of sacked WOrKeTS striking. meaning of this The likely nowever was alliesty , comment pointed to by made by Banzer that *the

TO CRUSH WORKERS

Street fighting in Bolivia in 1971 of Bolivia the enemies unpunished. sample of what he m Last gave a what he meant by "aminesty" invited wnen ne political exiles back to Bolivia and then arrested those who took him at his word. Latest information is that many of the nunger strikers 'have remembered this and are continuing their action. 'Democratic neighbouring Peru where the military junta also proposing a future return 'democratic' rule, the working

COLLUC

that it such show regaras plans as a sham. diverted They have not workers' hostility away from programme the

VICIOUS

austerity measures which the regime last week once again the stepped by raising prices of a number of basic foods. The Stalinist-led General of Labour Confederation (CGTP) has been forced to Dineshat's coldiers recov call a two-day general strike against the regime's economic policy. the On the occasion such general previous last year the regime unleashed measures savage repressive continued which have against other individual struggles. At the end of December land four participants were murdered and us puls injured by the the community of Huacataz.

police And on January shot dead two demonstrators in Chimbote during a general of workers strike in support the steel factory have been on strike for nearly two months. Latin Asew here America dictatorships are also under fire. of The bloody rulers Brazil Argentina, Chile and have among those who are to face growth of had recent popular struggle months. Last week one of the most the body of a victim Page 3

ITALIAN CP

SEIZE ON U.S

VETC

L'Unita, the daily newspaper of the Italian Communist Party, com- plained last week that it "certain sectors of New bid was Democ- the Christian racy" had invited who to prop the United States' public to veto CP attempt up Torie in the participation government. the Stalinist But leaders themselves who have immediately taken advantage of Carter's latest imperialist outburst. The American has given the CP just what it was looking for-an oppor- a smoke- tunity put up screen of nationalist rhetoric can beat behind which it retreat from its demands for seats in the Cabinet. The CP leaders, though for a time they hoped to establish "historic com- promise" coalition Moved ment with Italy's Tories now that this would itsell provoke a new instability for capitalist rule in Italy.

Manoeuvres That is exactly what the Berlingi avoid out ic of all the stalinists grotesque The thing wh one The whole behind continent's dictatorships had in advanc included their recent deal with tens Andreotti's mandate fr which led Andreotti to resign thousands of rioting demon- party is the presence as Premier, is their fear that strators. ministers in the governn without some formal change These riots took place in He will be trying, ho in their role in the govern- Managua capital the CP 'leader's would be unable Central American republic of ment thev boration in imposing to control the growing Nicaragua, dictatorially ruled working of the working discontent the Samoza for decades by of programme class. family. ineasures designed to h In recent demonstrations itgelf in th spontaneous t Fires started. of sloeans on wages ahid jobs The demonstrators set fire anxious the plainly rejected which number of appear to hesitate in th Stalinist shameful class of securing a formula v owned by the Samoza family collaboration. largest owners of land, the can sell to Is memor supporters as an advanc industry and commerce in the Fascists country). The problem for It shows itself too in the these was Among unprincipled traitors independent building of Samoza growin working class is that th working class defence against company called Plasmaferesis, the growth of fascist violence of the working which processes factory This involves a rejection of showing itself less and sells blood plasma. the CP's reactionary policy of willing to buy class col This is originally obtained "extremists of right attacking tion at any price. at minimum prices from the and left" through strengthen- Crumbling unemployed poor and state workers of Managua-a telling ing It looks unlikely, th apparatus. symbol of the vam nirism of that any government 1 from Samoza and his fellow Latin Despite CP leadership last week the satisfactory to cal American dictatorships. that there was a majority in exists within of parlian parliament without the framework Popular Front Christian Democrats (they democracy. meant CP, Socialist Party and The present gove In all countries, Stalinists the smaller capitalist parties), crisis looks certain to and reformists are attempting Non they clearly no other and drawn out hold

WORKCIS

outcomes- popular frontist "opposition perspective than some new possible "progressive" form of coalition formula undeclared with alances with the Christian Democrats.

parliar or bourgeois parties. Once more it is Andreotti elections are capable o bourgeois Yet willie who has been charged by the the most fleeting respi groups may al limes oppor the crisis of bourgeois tunistically oppose dictatorial capitalists producing WiT? some governmental formula.

Italy measures. tner interess as a class are ultimately pro-capitalist the Stalinists back dictatorship and hostile to the interests of the working class Chile, pular instance, national repressi Front the way government paved dictatorship of the Pinochet. Ethiopian reactionary that since It is reported Soviet bu Alliance the 26 Sul" last November Ethiopia against Eritrear nati of this the has received gigantic supplies Somalian right to But in spite Stalinists and reformists now "air determination. Soviet arms via an worried Pinochet bridge" in which 225 trans.

that De wall say about the rise of Soviet removed 112% the planes of port strength in the a Horn of A between the workers partics whole Soviet air fleet) have Though he has diph and the Christian Democrats taken part. retused to supply armi supported the openly which now claims will Eritrean liberation forces have establishment of the military Soviet-backed Ethiopia claimed that they have been regul.

Carter acta lotsup antinent. ariv bombarded from the Red set The 'Latin have given a Americal by Soviet ships-a claim which the dictators will not be defeated reactionary allies USSR has denied th Saudi Arabia collaboration in by class Notwithstanding overwhelm- fraudulent support of ing evidence The conten Some if cossay, of 'democratisa- Ethiopian

DERG

(the ruling OcCoses military junta) says that "the only tion'. Ethiopia's rejection of They will only be defeated from Carter for negoti Ethiopia diplomats and through the application by a American government s and total are doctors of the conscious leadership only countries to discuss the Trotskyist strategy of perma- imperialist General Mengistu's nent revolution and the fight complained that the Soviet arms reportedly unleashed a "excessive" but the parties revolutionari build street executi based firmly on the organised USA still gives ala to stopid oppositionists mostly the Carter stands alongside

STARK SIGNS OF TRADE

School students' union Page 4 "So long as all goes well for the capitalists] Marx Tote in Capital competi- effects practical rotherhood of the capitalist . so that each shares the common loot in pro- ortion to the magnitude of 3 share of investment. but as soon as it Is no anger a question of sharing rofits, but of sharing losses, veryone tries to reduce his in share to a minimum and an as much as possible upon shoulders of some other ampetitor. However, the class must evitably lose . .. competi- pon then itself ato fight of hostile rothers". was his hostile to that Japanese otters Temier Fukuda was speaking ast week when he gave the ravest warning against trade yar yet uttered by a capitalist cader. The world economic situa- fon, he said, reminded him As capitalism goes into crisis we" wer deeper e once again the rise of scism. The complete refusal of * Lib-Lab coalition govern- and the trade union treaucracy …The orkers living standards and has left night to a Job ctions of workers easy ingets for National Front School students have also en their standard of living ill, not lust because their arents have had their wages bv also

LO BOIS

cause the quality of their lucation has deteriorated.

Force Realising this the National ront has decided to make hools their next targets.

250,000 leaflets entitled How to Spot Red eacher" being some schools have ready received this piece of scist propaganda. The of the N is to vide black and white school udents and to have a force hich will prevent the inde- ndent organising of school adents. reply of the bureau- of the National Union acy Teachers and the National sociation of Headteachers is been predictable. Condemnation There has been a condem- ation of the NF leafleting hools and the NAHT has its members that they throw NF leafleters off shool premises and confis- their literature if it is culating in schools. But this directive applies *other extremist political ganisations" and presumab- to the National Union of hool Students. However, clear alterna- to this sort of "oppos- has been shown In • Wycombe. Beaten up High Wycombe has a high agrant population. It has of the 1930s when after a war of protectionism between the capitalist countries "everyone marched • down the road the second world war". world Chaos the economy, he said, would lead to social and political chaos.

Fukuda as the guardian of Japanese capitalism has the strongest reason express this concern. Disruption During the last few years of disruption of world trade, Japan is the major industria- lised capitalist country eave succeeueu BOst exports and keeping up its keeping down its imports.

Japan's trade massive balance surplus has had its counterpart in big deficits in Europe and above all in the last vear in the United states Both the EEC and the US force have trying Japan (as well as many other countries) to reduce its own levels of high protection to let in imports from Europe and the USA, and to fights fascist menace John Sturrock, Report

PHOTO

Youth in counter-march against National Front youth recently seen fascist threat with the offices of the Council for Commun- ity Relations attacked; black people and the beaten public threat that the schools would be leatleted by the NF.

Aylesbury Area NUSS and High Wycombe Students Union decided that they would carry out a campaign build

NUSS

branches High Wycombe schools and that a detence squad would be established to stop fascists leafleting schools. Leaflets Anti-fascist leaflets were distributed outside schools in High Wycombe and received a good reception from majority of people who took them. The clear hostility of school students to the NF was shown when a meeting called by NUSS was attended by about 30 few of

WAR

"voluntarily" unemployment beside which curb its own exports to the European and even today's Gole Amencan markels. Last month Japanese officials were pushed into this general agreement to US effect with Trade tne negotiator Strauss. "welcomed" this Fukuda deal but he well knows that is protectionism against Japanese capital but by nicer name. Fukuda knows that he "agreed" has to accent this to avoid the protection imposition of an even mOTE savage protec- entorted tionism. Uncontrollable And that kind of compe- titive tariff war could easily become uncontrollable, leading as it did in the 1930s to a sudden and catastrophic collapse WoRe lraut and Fukuda growth mass the of

NO NAZIS

OUR

IN

SCHOOLS

SMASH THE

VO

ALISM

whom had any doubts about The fight against the the need to deny fascists the National Front cannot right to spread their separated from the struggle for action to defend workers' poisonous propaganda living standards. Defence squad Workers Detence Sauads must be built between school NUSS branches are now students and trade unionists being set up in some High wherever fascism raises its Wycombe schools and head. defence squad will be established SOUl possible The fascist threat to

STILL AVAILABLE

school students is not some- thing which can be fought by "How we Fight Youth individuals however much may hate the NF. Unemployment" they Nor can it be countered by Price 10p plus 7p p&p such lne *Reading Schools Against the Nazis' who limit themselves Available from

WSL,

purely to propaganda and the Park 31, Dartmouth occasional picket or demon- Hill, London NW5 slialiuli 1HR Living standards Fascists can only be defeated by organised working class SOCIALIST PRESS, Wednesday 25 January, 1978 "foreign" queues would look short. against cuntry In pointing to this as a workers, the chauvinist trade possibility Fukuda plain- union and labour leaders tively from the themselves show be echolng special interests of Japanese implacable of the capital, a whole number of international working class doom-laden warinings about a But this is the policy of the full-scale trade war. fake 'lefts' Iribune These have come from the Group and left- numerous head of the General Agree- talking leaders like ment Tariffs and Trade Clive Jenkins of ASTMS on

(GATT).

Victims And in the USA it is the policy of most of the leaders But is is not the warnings of the main trade union such international federation, the AFL-CIO functionaries which can stop truly internationalist a war whose victims as in the policy for the working class the WIll in the face of the capitalist working class. crisis must include principled It is not only the capita- opposition all nationalis lists who are demanding these policies which pit one worker measures: the reformist against another, and which betrayers of the working class try to tie the working class to clamouring with at least ale the interests 'their own then 18 CI national capitalists. capitalist masters for inter-capitaiist nationalist and chauvinist economic war, as in militar policies. war, the only principled These policies are totally poncy lot une working class I unprincipled. By to capitalist trying fight its own protect the jobs of the class-class against class inter- of workers capitalist nationally. Olic

CP HAS NO

ANSWER

TO FRONT

If the Young National But the class traitors of Front is stamped out in the Morning Star cast their net wide enough to embrace schools it will be no Enoch Powell, Churchill and thanks to the Communist the most vicious right wingers Party and the "Morning in the Tory Party. Star'. "Did people fight our bloody war against this fascist The paper on January 21 doctrine just to see it poison devoted its front page story the minds of our children to the NF drive to recruit in once again only 30 years after schools which abandoned any that terrible conflict? attempt at a class solution to 'The issue is not whether the young Nazis. politics should be discussed Bourgeois law Of schools. course should. But racism is, not The headline-Your politics. The Race Relations Children in Danger-Keep the Act rightly puts it outside the hate peddlers out of the class- realm of political debate."

rooms-could have Racism is as it debout life.

"Politics about come from the Daily Mirror. Most of the text could have been Wail for help written by Patience Strong.

Its opening reduces the The Communist Party see of crimes Front to only 'our children' 'our our schools, 'our breaches of bourgeois law.

as our word a mut "The government must be compelled to act now against the racial world"). persistent of the Their policies? Thank your Race Relations Act by the National teachers tell Front". councillors ... bombard your MP with demands for prose- Powell cution • Such youth who are still The Communist Party says around the CP and want to that campaigr strike a blow the against being waged against "any fascists must break from the left Enoch organisation that will do Leacle Powell". nothing but wail for help NO

NOT GUILTYN

of

FREIT

DrAMA. Moul Docho InT.

CHRIS

CHR

ROYS,

ROYS

Ý NOT GUL

NOT

Bradford University students and Grunwick strikers picketing the house of Judge Stucley. The judge had turned down an appeal by Christopher Roys, a Bradford student, against a £50 fine for threatening behaviour at Grunwick, only to sentence him to 21 days in Pentonville Prison

HEFFER 'SICK' OF COALITION

Labour's anti-fascist fraud MKARDO HEADS OFF SOCIALIST PRESS, Wednesday 25 January, 1978

LABOUR

put on a Labour produced Weekly 'Race Special'. Bearing the stark headline Nazis this Unite Against handout might seem to the observer to indicate a full-scale political mobilisa- the National tion against Front and similar racist scum.

Could this mean a reversal of Coalition policies in the wage cuts, social service cuts, mass unemployment ana anti- immigrant legislation that provided fertile ground have for fascist agitation! Bankrupt A quick look at the front article by veteran page "left' lan Mikardo Labour this is not the shows case. The same old remain intact-with policies Mikardo's blessing: "Do misled. You not be be fed up to the teeth may waiting too long ter bed or homepplementary supplementary benefit bus service. But do not imagine for a Since 1913 the Second International has been its time-waiting biding patiently for an oppor- tunity to sieze control on behalf of the working class. From time to time faint Trotskyists have hearts and expressed the ridiculous notion that the Second Inter- national is more interested in managing capitalism than in world revolution. For tactical reasons, organ- the British such as sales Labour Party and West Ger- many's Social Democrats have encouraged unemploy- and drastic wage controls But these are short term operated for policies to be barely couple of dozen decades before off the cloak isations throw respectability the red terror beneath. The Daily Express-the Britain -has Voice ot not been fooled. It has uncovered the fact that the

ATITION

between coalition in e Liberals and was West German inspired by Chancellor, Helmut Schmidt, who also is in coalition with a

PARTY

UNITE

Race Special

AGAINST

NAZIS!

single that the National supporting Front will you any get these things one minute more quickly than you otherwise would"

PRESS GANG

Jim Bond? bourgeois party-the Free Democrats. Saturday's Express -bitter at this plot to prevent the Tories taking their rightful' place-nedamned Der Pact!-The amaz- page German ing connection unal kept Callaghan DOWer. Protests The paper went to say: "This is bound to lead to Tory protests about German interference in British politics and give the pact a 'Made in Germany' Tory leaders tag. that Herr Genscher's suspect purpose [Genscher is the Free Democrat who contacted Mr Steell| Keer „LO Callaghan in power because Chancellor Schmidt prefers a Labour government" The pact was sent across from Germany in the same sealed train used to German spy Lenin Unleash on Russia. Already Labour Minister Healey has leaked Denıs budget secrets to the Liberals.

Uncountedi Nas asu these allowed Leasureu British budget secrets to tall into German hands. « TO The 'fight' wasn't on hell with the No. any of these key issues, but Government. I'm sick of on the timetable for legisla- it!" proclaimed 'left' tion of direct elections to the windbag Eric Heffer in European Parliament! Parliament last Thursday.

Heffer went so far as to suggest that if the Govern- Was he denouncing the ahead with its plans for a Phase 4 of wage attempts to force this legisla- controls? Posing a sociallst mass unemploy- tion through under the guillo- to ține, he would "reconsider" ment? Or calling for with the his support for some of its immediate break other legislation Liberal Party? Heffer-by saying Was Failure what workers have long been thinking-giving a lead to the he spluttered, AS the Callaghan/ Callaghan burst out laughing.

fight to oust years

REAL FIGHT

and new homes are the tools Mikardo knows that while Lib-Lab Coalition deal use", while offering the clue Callaghan's remains intact there is no as lo now of any of these pro- Coalition cabinet of axemen chance could provide either. blems being resolved. And he knows that, along Defender with the rest of the 'left talkers in the Tribune Group UPW leader Tom Jackson of MPs, he has no intention -a diehard defender of social break that of fighting service cuts and wage control Coalition deal. dons anti-fascist -also an face-only • to call on the Ruled out courts to take action against the National Front. Yet Jackson's own union So the only real answer to only a few months ago fell fascist propaganda- the foul court injunction end _oi a policies socialist to which placed a legal question unemployment and improve mark over postmen's right to social services and housing- while is ruled out of court, There can be no confusion reformist politicians debate on the fact that the courts as with the fascists on how long a part of the state machine workers should wait for a job.

are the tool of the capitalist position same class which in its in the inside page 'Tenected determination to weaken and article by Parti

LA DOW

Chairman Lestor who divide the working Joan providing increasingly limply announces "New jobs for everything they buy Already the Germans have many things require a fistful of roubles their own meticulously engin- which are better eered Zocial Kontract ready kept in a bank than under a to outstrip the British model, bed. which is long in the tooth and "In a capitalist economy in need of revamping national savings are of crucial After Das importance. How the Soviet be warned Kapital, Der Pact. uses all this money is not so clear". Quite how banks are made the west Michael Binyon, to work was the new correspondent for the Times dramatically underlined on page 2 of the same paper.

in the Soviet Union, returning A report of the trial of six Moscow atter a ten year men at the Central Criminal gap, made an early visit to his Court, was said to be one of bank. the biggest conspiracy trials He had deposited 100 before the roubles, worth £40, in 1968 courts. wnien ne discoverca was now Allegations of forged bank £75, mainly due to worth from drafts stepped straight devaluation of sterling. the James bond Ubiquitous The "It prosecution said: Times readers were treated was a fraud, the Crown say, which really knew no limit on the front page to a light If it had not been checked, the Soviet calcuck al and it it had savings bank. can be little doubt it would details ome lave .. All entries were have undermined the banking changed system of virtually the whole previously made by hand, in civilised world" purple It sounds as if the "entire Soviet officialdom uses. But civilised world" would do an abacus stood on better to borrow that abacus counter just in case. from the deformed workers "Millions of Russians have For state than mock their one so ville acco ullls banking system. thing, they have to pay cash rage s spouting the Callaghaniste would begin support for every other nave of the policy reactionary Coalition. And he would hav Labour leadership; to mobilise the ranks of th complete failure to put for- Labour and trade unio ward the principled demand movement to oust the clas for British withdrawal from pro-Marketeer collaborating the Common Market and the from the Party leadership dismantling of the EEC by . The chances of Heffer ( the wuropean workers move 'left' taking any ment; and after nearly a year such a fight remol are the Dackle that the whole affair is see Lib-Lab Coalition, Heffer was as a joke going through the motions of Meanwhile a Tory MP di polishing his 'left' image on a the ant expose piece 1101c socialist nature of the Coal irrelevance tion with one question tha Heffer was going to fight the

EEC

he the Iribunites have since la March. Tory Tim Renton simpl asked what socialist measur the Government had in min dire introduce elections business was out ‹ the way. 'left' One-time Micha Foot floundered and replie "I don't think that questic helpsor one. does th reactionary Lib-Lab deal.

broken. Ar It must be those that stand in the way such a fight must be remove along with its open defender activities the example of last

A HU

year's events at •Tameside-

LIMP -

and where meetings all on racialism demonstrations outlawed, were or anti- fascists called bi

LAPRAG

fascists-shows that bans and the endanger proseculions workers' movement This highlights the dangers of the supplementary feature Having unanimous which on passed a motion of ce the policy of last restates sure of Judge McKinno Party Con- year's Constituency delegates 1 bully-boy "Marches by Par the last Labour through mixed areas groups Actic Race Relations must be

BANNED

the Group were shocked said that Delegates hear a blunt refusal fro Home Secretary have • must the power to make a politica, its Chairperson, _ decision to rule out provoca- Lyons MP, to represe tive marches and stop this motion in the Hou right wing parties forcing con of Commons. frontation on the streets. (Our emphasis) "It was misguid to protect fr attemp Tribun asserted speech Lyons, no doubt anxious his position with protect profession fro the legal issues cantankerous principe However, there is tinuity LPRRAG (Laprag of is rightly known) early! Group's leadi the year, light, Merlyn Rees, stauncl Tory ImI terenced gration Laws. 'No Platform' "The Patrial Clause is t into nov complex o go he had blustered to an an th demanding delegalt immediate repeal Jackson meeting held The last It would not take much Hall, Red Conway imagination to foresee judges Saturday Square on that anti-fascist ruling a "no p January rejected marches and meetings are also fascists" form positi for, "provocative" and banning advanced among others it them motion from a YS branch In practice every such ban Contributions trom implicitly or explicitly for floo attacks the democratic rights towards the mobilisati of the workers' movement.

of the Labour movement n The answer to the fascists with a similar fate. is of course the mobilsation decided The Group of the real mass strength of its function as pursue the working class movement within ginger group to drive them from the streets "to avoid Labour Party and break up their meetings.

duplication of roles of ot This must be backed up anti-racist groups". wherever by the necessary That this meeting co workers tormation only attract half of its ear defence drive squads attendance is sorry proof fascist thugs trom immigrant the transparent inadequacy and labour

OTOLCCI

reformism to be able to gr movemen meeting. allu activities. the most minimal protect from the effects of capita whole exercise 1S a cynical and fraudulent crisis, racism fascism are but symptoms.

head off the political necessary and The 'inaction' Group! physical struggle crush dug itself a hole and rema and to break the only to be buried. Otherw lascism Lib-Lab Coalition whose its function can only by handing policies are barrier to unemployed and im pover- fight for a prit necessary ished sections workers pled leadership National plate to the the Labour Movement. Front

CHINA 1927:

Popular Frontism Page 6 Fruits of Stalin's By Godfrey Parker to justify their collaboration ago, on Fifty years Cadet 1927, with the 13, December Party. pommunist workers Canton made their Independence last tand in defence of the If it had not been for the Canton Commune, itself principled struggle of Lenin the last bloody catas- and Trotsky for the complete trophe in the tragic story independence of the working of the 1925-1927 revolu- a theory class, and against there is no doubt of stages, tion in China. Kussian revolution

CHAL

year earlier an Only would have suffered the same estimated 30 million peasants fate as the Chinese organised were peasant The lessons of the Russian ssociations, land seizure was back- revolution other ridespread, half of China had ward countries put Tallen to a supposedly revolu- forward clearly at the Second China's tionary army, Congress of the Communist Shanghai was on International in 1922 argest city workers' the verge 'There are to be found in the dependent countries two

HERELLION

which General strike distinct movements further and every day grow and It was only further from each apart half years since the One is the bourgeois older. of Shanghai and Canton had nationalist movement with a the revolution by political egun of programme the счета. strike murdet of twelve students by British soldiers. There are two reasons why it is very important to under- this stand the failure and the policies evolution, that led to it. Firstly the defeat of the revolution in China led to the consolidation of Stalinism in To justify the Soviet Union. of the theory rejection

OUT

of 'socialism in one country It is necesary to saw rists to show that is necessary defeat in China was not the inevitable. Real alternative We show that the must path of world revolution was not a pious dream, but a real alternative to ame necessal y fascism, the second world war and the consequent death of 100 milion people. Secondly the theory of the "bloc four classes' which backward CounTies the ot was the cornerstone disastrous policy Comintern kicking. million workers and murdered peasants Indonesia are among its more and a simuar recent victims, well await the fate could Students at Canton University hold nationalist rally workers of Southern Africa if their present leadership is not overthrown. the independence under that This theory says and order, the petit- workers, peasants, other is the mass action and the bourgeois elements, and ignorant the

DOOT

national bourgeolsle nave a and workers for peasants common interest in defeating their liberation from all types imperialism. of exploitation. The former Theory of stages control the latter and often It originates from a theory succeed to a certain extent Communist Inter- that the working of stages: national must struggle against class should support the such control and help develop struggle for a national govern- the class consciousness of the ment based on privale property ownership; and that working masses. For the overthrow of the only later will the working foreign capitalists which class independently lead the the first step towards revolu- oppressed classes agallisi colonies the co- own bourgeoisie. tion in the operation of bourgeois Of course this theory the nationalist revolutionary to students of nothing new It is elements is useful. the Russian Revolution. foremost and the theory put the precisely necessary task the forma- Mancheviks tion of communist parties which will organise the and peasants and lead them to revolution and to the establishment of soviet republics. the masses in the Thus countries may backward communism not reach develop- through but led the class by conscious proletariat of the advanced capitalist countries.

Communist Chinese Party had to decide its atti tude to the weak but growing nationalist party the Kuomin- Laila. Students This pat in and students of support the students Chinese intelligensia, and already although 120 both some support from the working ciass and the national bourgeoisie.

This had been shown by on July 28, 1926 the strike wave which accom- demonstra- panied imperialist against tions carve-up of China in 1919.

Military academy Communists after The Comintern advice decided to Kuomintang the cullel 1922. 1 ney worked lo halls form the Kuomintang into an effective mass organisation.

they Soviet help with military established trained which academy all corps for the future Kuomintang army. bul very back to soon they Decall away from conflicts with the right-wing leadership and pro- the Kuomintang, gramme of for fear of provoking an open split. was a fundamental This because the depended for Kuomintang on power movement which went far peasants beyond its bourgeois programme Illusions had Communists If the clearly drawn the class lines between themselves and the right-wing programme of the Kuomintang there doubt which the mass Inove ment would have chosen. enormous WaD illusions were sown the first about masses Kuomintang government thrust into power which they in Canton in 1924. But the programme of the entirely Kuomintang was It stood for the bourgeois. of China which unication was split up between count- less warlords with their own privale allies for bourgeois

SLOOU

where an democracy "enlightened' gove lieut the would rule in interests of the people's that would ensure peasants had a fair deal trom landlords. In other words it accepted land the whole sy stell which was ownership completely unequal. allu land- dominated by absentee lords. Land seizure And it accepted the right capitalists of to employ terms it whatever the could entorce on and dis- impoverished SOCIALIST PRESS, Wednesday 25 January, 1978 Stalin free speech and press and the possessed peasants who right to vote flocked to the Chinese cities.

This state of affairs was of contrast the peasant In Canton course unacceptable not only around movemen! but powers, quickly moved beyond to Te orela also to the native bourgeoisie.

demands for rent reductions Kuomintang was to the seizure of lands and The brought to power by the mass refusal to pay rents, interest, leaders movement but its and taxes. The spread of commercial immediately began to nego tiate a "return to normality" South into Central China over the pre- with the British authorities.

At the same time as pre- vious fifty years had totally the bulk the for the ruined paring Norinem expedition to unify China the peasants Unable to compete with bourgeois leadership prepared highly a decisive blow to crush the efficient and more the Canton capitalised methods mass movement in peasants had been forced to and land move sell mael further and further into debt and landiords lenders By the 1920s over half the were entirely land- peasants less while about 10% of the population owned 80% of the land. There could be no solu- tion to these problems as long as land and capital remained in private hands. This in itself made a stable bourgeois regime China 1n provided impossible. constant driving force for the revolutionary movement. the But among was workers that organisation and political activity grew most rapidly. Demonstrations 15 There were millon China of whom workers million true about These industrial Worker. were concentrated in the sea and riverside cities penetrated by foreign capital, By 1924 a million workers by trade organised welc unions and a series of econo- mic and political strikes shut down both foreign and native owned industries. the The culmination was out of the strikes arising British soldiers of murder by twelve students on a worKer student solidarity march on 1925 Half 30th, million workers throughout China went on strike On June I1th a strikers' demonstration by British attacked Wai sailors killing eight anotne. British Finally

DCODIC

curb communist and French Canton troops 1n influence. demonstration fired on other hand the On the killing 52 people. were completely Communists was a general The blinded by the positions now result being put forward by Stalin strike Hongkong and the foreign Shameen, Comintern The and concession in Canton, , which were fast abandon- Stalinists The months. lasted fifteen of world ing the perspective elected the first strikers revolution Soviet in China. They considered that their interests in China would best Boycott by a struggle be not served working class leadership The Soviet

LOOK

Over a strong nationalist control of the streets in Can- but by to upset the movement ton and operated a complete and Western powers Hongkong boycott therefore began to They Shameen. the redefine the nature pickets Two thousand the justify Kuomintang enforced the strike Chinese Communist Party's boycott, and offenders were workers subservience to it brought before than a bourgeois Kather nationalist party with which The demands of the strike had Communists day, the eight hour Cucu di the temporary no child labour, the right to allance

SOCIALIST PRESS, Wednesday 25 January, 1978 Kuomintang was now the revolutionary nine intellec- workers. tuals, and of class of these Chiang the Kuomintang, officers ir 'the most was. of the Tendic Communists. The execution of communists after the Canton uprising of 1927 The Communists were told and hold back the from land seizure because this would under- of mine the unity Kuomintang. Chiang Kai-shek no naa of unity. On March illusions 20 1926 he arrested all Soviet and com- holding munists In orlalil positions. Disarmed head- He occupied the Canton- of the quailers Hongkong strike committee and disarmed pIckels called a confer- He then Kuomintang to ence of the recouse ns viclory The Communists were told they could Temal Luci Kuomintang they only They could not criticise the Kuomintang programme They had to hand over a list They could or tnen memoers. not serve as the head of any departments. All instructions CP's Central from the Committee had sub- to De a joint committee of two parties for the approval. of the Many members Communist Party were con- this practical con- vinced by firmation of the class nature of the Kuomintang. But Borodin, the Comin- tern representative persuaded them that it would be wrong to leave the Kuomintang. He argued that the conflict could be put off until the Northern expedition had brought new masses into action. . So the Comintern proceeded all LU news of the coup ior over a year. Nevertheless Trotsky and had opposition con- Ine now recommending drawal from the Kuomintang.

was placed under a dictatorship which military eventually ended the strike with no concessions from the British. Meanwhile the Northern from one triumph to another.

The combination of a dis- and the mass ciplined army mobilisation of workers du By Huge support of expedition Shanghai in repressive warlord 1OCaI authorities five twenty city. The general "Hail singall shek". But plans had darity with workers. cerse November most of out plans or Central had been was crushed occupied. sauceter sive area, began to concessions, occupied Western fleet time made Kai-shek's the Ull masses in more Eastern and 21. Inis gave the mass Central build an 5,000 alternative centre to But Comin- this tern policy being done. firearms to been sympa- as that allack. made with tern, Trotsky's sole against knives until had beer 1926- Stalin In 7 800,000 Chinése telegraphed the Communists the keep Within from peasant tion. shek's Tse-tung who Ine the (classes marched in theory had words to class say and _One far Dilly. an up- which one overthrows another. discussion a revolution which the the peasantry strength of the throw been landlords to leave the actions of personally labelled far" signifi- CCP and To put But munists in every from suppress the still denying activities of the counter- of the gentry'. authority the Privately allied Communists was themselves with In of gentry. arms to 1927 March were given tatives in Government, 1cw in Wuhan whole the bold policy wuu. paper put it: regarded. enable (the party Shanghai China's the financial Shanghai, Chiang Page 7 of ultra-left uprisings with ended recruited by the bloody defeats. and bloodiest The societies defeat was at Canton. As has Northern unpre- fell the held. in been described above, Cantor Tael pickets to a military pared was subjected ana headquarters Chiang's of the dictatorship detencine coup there in March 1926 the Labour of by the and working British Union, The workers' organisations and and had been all but destroyed class there. Without the support of the mass of the workers, the Chou-En-lai organised escape Communists now of the the future of 3,000 uprising supporters in the city and socialist proclaimed under the Chiang Kai- made no Retaken inssurection, Shanghai reign ill Within two days, the city their lives. was retaken by the Kuomin- tang with 6,000 killed Summing up the events of trolled Trade 1925 to 1927, it is clear that soli- the possibilities of establish- striking ling a working class leadership forced to Chiang's against struggle imperialism existed Given a bold independent Chinese bloc with leadership and programme, of the tens 01 mullon. peasants and workers brought into action during the revolu- made the would have establishment of a bourgeois with great regime impossible and would China have gone on to confront the task of establishing a socialist instructed state. the CP to social the As was, the Chinese in tension Only countryside over the land still on the Shanghai was was so intense that question the Kuomintang's rule was for always unstable. be" main. strike would only March tained by constant terror and support from imperialism militia and plans with, so mainly and axes, arms workers hours. four the revolu- entered the Students and workers protest against imperialist domination which of th prove their case they To But the defeat working class in 1927 left a the the development pointed to imprint on China and on th and workers' ot the peasant Chiang Kai- Party West Central Chinese Communist movement which lasts to this day. China. CC This In April the area 119 / had 60,000 membersof whor trolled 30,000 were workers. A yea and Communists Lalle. Chinese the themselves struggling …halt the members ha 14 LI hud was... killed, and there wer been only 3,000 workers left in th ment. sing party and not policy functioning industrial cell independent The first signs of a retur could of political activity in working class were in t city. during the "Cultural Revol reaction by tion' and these were quickl the of the mass between of the This retreat from an activ part in Ine overton Kai-shek. imperialism enabled th the Com- of th slannist CCP to pursue : a policy instruc- Chinese yallUus were warlords. strengthening their own stat of When warloads the expense inte at deserted for their national revolution and their own working class. ally these Comintern Crushing blow choice Com- And On the international scale the defeat in China dealt : military crushing blow to the hopes o and movement the Russian spreading the represen- challenged right revolution. It thereby weakerel w was Trotsky and the left opposi sub- oI tion, although their analysi the national had been correct if somewha …a DOUl belated, it strengthened Stalis Wahan. certain th anu maut triumph of fascism was dis Germany sympathetic It inaugurated a period o to accept the two decades of mo. ment had left leader- crushing defeats ever suffere the Communists by the international workin counselled and class Ine ace Such are the penalties fo were wrong alliances and wron period policies Only when the revolution in loyal

Page o

IN REVIEW

KOLLONTAI:

LOVE AND

MARRIAGE

PRU CHAMBERLAYNE reviews 'Love of Worker Bees' by Allexandra Kollontai, republished in a new edition by Virago Books.

attracted them to their lovers Kollontai wrote these in the first place. 1920-23. three stories in Invariably to propa- revolutionary activity allowed Her aim was simple terms a more settled existence tradi- gandise in the tional 'husband' ideas on her would emerge dilemmas facing Vasilisa in love revolutionaries be with Vladimir for months and months eventually leaves and marriage. She hoped to strengthen her exhausting bur for their struggle commune to join him at his their emancipation and forging of a 'new morality'.

post in the provinces. The rallying cry at the end Absorb the Vasilisa Malygina, of longest story is live! Live 'We must and fight, find that. work work, Bolshevik live and love life. now director of a firm, by throwing is Only totally shackles of her become the oVOI Vasulisa and trade that Call mariage revolutionary rediscover her spirit and zest for activity.

end uses Castigated connections tically. Even wars published in 1923 Love of He regarded house and Bees was Worker dubiously hele occupied with sexual matters.

Vasilisa expects 1930s By the positively castigated as 'petty bourgeois decadence'.

OUR

undoubtedly not It was simply that the stories revolve around delightful, passionate relation- tortured love and ships that came to bother the Stalinist bureaucracy. it is the fact that Rather described are the models who come to realise women and that their initiative dependence is being stiffled by the and sapped Jealous of bonds emotional and who instead to the collective for support with childrearing and for warmth and comradeship.

Restoration counter to the This ran of Stalinist objective restoration of the family.

So undoubtedly the vivid depictions of incipient oppor- bureaucratism and were also seen as intolerable by the Stalinists. Much of the appeal of the book lies in its portrayal of the 1920s life in everyday

USSR,

the the im mense possibilities and the immense betrayed. dangers in the battle between were the bourgeois and proletarian Personal orders. social conflicts reflect these wider longer social conflicts. wages. The Committed All the leading women in committed are weu as enormous the party acuivists. and This in shared political work realised been mutual business of his tainment director's 'the associates keeps wife', and also wnen decorative bourgeois and privilege and expectations CynIcIsm

NEP

and so flourish under the bureaucracy who has longed to does being that the discipline bureaucratic strict is in some sense necessary in control the resur- order work in setting up a housing arrogant capitalist of gence Vasilisa has involved Soon poorly organising herself in paid women workers in a mat factory and she even lands up There she is appalled to ex-anarchist, helping her husband's loaders activist husband, to win better conditions.

has she meets In this work absorbed whom she activists party respects, most particularly business. lide embraced NEP policies as an has Lisa, woman, WIld recently left her husband and themselves political life, than as a means to an end, re emerged mo party cannot understand why WIll Vasilisa tolerates her position.

Embedded acquired a large it fitted out For Vasilisa it takes a long luxuriously, employs servants • time to realise the extent of

TUI

depression and own house and organise the enter-

POLICIES

COUNCILS OF

ACTION

By John Docherty. PART 3: After the General Strike necessity had The struggle had been possibility or not been pointed out. miners The to be left alone Political power driven back to work with There were some ways in hours and lower which councils of action took of local elements of ovel members Tase political power. councils of action had shown Thus besides issuing their courage and inventiveness as own newspapers, they potential distribu- times stopped the anti-strike papers of potential had not Cowdenbeath because with her 'neglect' of house- hold tasks. comes to as such comforts and privileges more then less. Only the tions shows a who manages not to become tied down by love and domes- relationships treats seX casually interpreting general more comradeship and collectivity.

Relationships 'new kind' This is not a developed theme in these stories; it is discussed more Kollontai's other where she possessive relationships as Kollontai consequence individual property relations.

inactivity embedded Collective deeply should mind relations her 10 dec revolu- material basis Vladimir as an active so deep does her forming tionary, and but this can only be achieved run that attachment to him tries to through struggle. constantly she herself that that this convince happiness will return. Kollontai encourage the own fears She takes her advocated stands out sharply him anxieties about and that signs of her own love for him: bourgeois feminists. For it is bound that 'The threads personal him to her were fine but thes not personal ends were fast and tied so artfull but that even Vasya herself had sougal, ends. how noticed before never they The here: too, the Sisters, husband who originally loves his wife for her strength and selves impatient activism becomes A street market during the NEP period TUC leaders leaving after the sell-out picketing mass Newcastie control over gave some regular passenger and goods traffic. 12 May Workers defence corps Fife, established were serious about the Cheltenham and St. Pancras.

Willesden, However at Lincoln such havi Selby and bodies did not see themselves cooperative society. as in opposition to the police, and indeed operated closely action with them. societies, This could not have con- actively pursued. tinued for much longer, how- with police harassment and Ever, also is a nepman, and enjoy his Genera- Three new woman because she more altogether "love' in of sense of love some writings, sees jealous and Stalin (left) in 1926 bourgeois their full women can give strength to the revolutionary struggle lay the of the only because for that of the revolution gains emotional in her Vasilisa can pregnancy at the end of the knowing that a creche story, struggle which established and the can he wanted child collectively cared for.

. women to take up But it is only because she liberation has freed herself that she can devote her full energies sought by petty work, to improving her union conditions of the liberation for the workers-including which creche. for collective commitment This socialist ends is what makes and this book revolutionary Struggle means and by no socialist the bourgeois as It is only by freeing them- petty Stalinists would have it.

that emotionally less direct way of obtain!

rapidly increasing in the last control over the distributi days of the strike and with of goods. the entire Birmingham Emer- In many places the mo gency Committee arrested on vehicles of scab ment severely limited. Had the TUC leaders been la In Edinburgh strike and of them efforts to win it, they could numbers impounded so the strike co alternative organised mittee got near to food distribution through the practical control of the ro traffic' in the city. In a few cases, councils of The confusion caused these with worked Bevin and Thomas with th this was not but Transport Comr National tee meant that the pern The issue oi permils was a

SWALLOWS

AND

BOLSHEVIKS

By DAVID WHITFIELD as justified under the circum- readers Our regular declared that his politics were 'fishing', this was not stances, may well have difficulty and ana ne reluinca lo Russia in 1919. bluffing. in identifying the English His aim was to counter It seems unlikely that such writer who was invited to for propaganda individual could add to bourgeois intervention military by attend the 1917 Petro- understanding of the revealing the truth of what Russian Revolution, but, in a grad Soviet from its first was happening inside Russia.

small way, he did just that.

meeting; who was Ransome left England for The result was detained by the British Weeks in Russia book, Six Russia 1913, to escape in 1919, 'Bolshevik which immediately police as from disastrous became a bestseller. agent' in 1919, and, later and the aftermath of a libel case provoked by his book on that year, arranged the Impressions Oscar Wilde. negotiations peace The book not Folklore the Estonian between of the new revolu- analysis • Bolshevik and govern- tionary state, but a collection first of was the accurate and ments. visits 1928. shrewd several up Arthur The man impressions. was Although he had gone there describes Ransome, who was Ransome to study folklore he became a friend of Karl Radek; domestic and street scenes in close journalist for the Daily News and Moscow his wife Evgenia was and then later for the Manchester retrograd, relates interviews with a wide Trotsky's secretary, and as a Guardian. child he had been taught to range of Russians, including In his reports to these left- skate by the Anarchist leader Lenin and Bukharin. liberal Ransome words, what Kropotkin! In his own the colossal effects stressed Today Arthur Ransome is emerges is produced within Russia 'That extraordinary mainly remembered for his and the imperialist war, Swallows and Amazons series vitality which obstinately per- pointed to the inevitability of of books for children. sists in Moscow even in these revolutionary upsurge. dark of discomfort, days Later, he was argue TO forcibly for recognition of the disillusion, pestilence, tion and unwanted war. Bolshevik government, and The revolutionary recon- form ally struction of Russian society imperialist intervention was being obstructed by war, and political Although he never spoke poverty, reaction as constant enemies.

regularly there, Kansonne was attended the Petrograd Soviet Above all, impressed by the response of he had speaking, but the workers to this situation- not voting rights the co-operation with which Ridicule they united to overcome these problems. There he clearly Knowing that their leaders shared the same food and the both the power recognised expressed in the form of the same housing conditions, could at the very least Soviet, and the crucial impor- unev tance of the Bolsheviks. agree with the chambermaid These insights course who said "that there was not and to eat, but that she brought him ridicule enough Radek the British felt freer!' suspicion For all their bourgeoisie. Ransome planned to write Advantages strengths, these books history of the revolution, very obviously not written by but Others of were the Soviet secret police a revolutionary socialist.

Louise more conscious of the revolu- removed most of his material was which they tionary war communist-when questioned -an event wach, remarkabiy, he seems to have understood engaged. British police, by the

SMITTERY MAURICE MOSCOVITCH

CREAT LOVER*

"THE

Bus immobilised by strikers is towed away Soviet in the period of the the system had broken down by continued work OI. so-called 'dual docks until end of the power the end of the first week in (February-November 1917)".

strike any case. 1 nis point represented the After Newcastle the local sunke was ovel opinion of the Stalin faction authorities strike-breaking the comintern Issuca a stale• the Comintern were compelled to negotiate ment about its development

TUC

capable leaders were Council of Action which included the following with the themselves of fighting for statement: about the unloading of goods of Action without alter- "The Councils on the docks. powel organised by the trade unions from within coming nave actually developed into Infringement the working class movenien District Soviets. The Depart- itself. by the reflected the Although this was raised in ments organised was slogan put forward in Britain already General Council Parliament as an infringement by the Communist Party of authority, resembled anen structure governmental "All Power itself calling for the depart- and functions, no agreement Was to the General Council" made and blacklegs ments of the St Petersburg actually Ransome Pavlovich, President oi ine Committee of State Construc- who talked about the tions, immense military duvalilages possessed the by counter- revolutionary white armies.

Why? 'And vet we win Because from every town we capture we get new strength.

And any town they take is a source of weakness to them, more town to one hold against the wishes and of the population!'. Technology book details the The of the housing workings committees and the factory It also shows the to convince attempts made peasants of the advantages of as again in new technology, the talk with Pavlovich: "The local inhabitants, partly, the • no doubl, mael of political influence our opponents were extremely regard the hostile with building of the power station, because they did not understand it. there myself, and wenti what it explained to them would mean, that their river would become rich that they would be able to get cheap power for all sorts and that they works, would have electric light in all their houses. To call on the TUC leaders act itself was not mistaken. What was necessary was to face before the masses rapidly moving into struggle leaderhsip, the of and the alternative possibilities which had been opened up. workers were in a i ne begin to run position to from the society differentiy way the capitalist class were doing. The problem was to raise the political road along which they could proceed. carried inen Iney shoulder-high through the village, and sent telegrams to Lenin, to Zinoviev, to every- body they could think of, and since then we have had nothing but help from them'.

But what comes over most strongly is the quality which dominates the great film of early Soviet cinema-the ardour of the revolutionary Russian workers. Ransome does not avoid political direct comment altogether. In a briet account he sharply exposes the weak- of the opposition Tesser left Social parties-the Revolutionaries Mensheviks and right Social Revolution- aries-and shows how the last hoped to mobilise the

LWO

against the Bolsheviks. His own support for the Bolsheviks was entirely based in his recognition the party held the support of the vast majority ol ine popula tion because it offered, and was prepared fight policies that could fulfil their demands and aspirations. not just This their was heroism at points of great the challenge,

DUI

shown enthusiasm every moment of their daily life, as in this description: 'there are many classes for designed working Communist Party, under the tutorship of Stalin, compete fast paoy phil the last public- party strike, the ation before the Workers Daily of 3 May, the councils of action were told "should not take they

OYCL

of duties which the dily ordinarily belong to the Trade Unions' Party's Bulletin in the issued the following day, it was said that: Unconcerned "All it needs now is for every man to stand fast and the fight is won" R. Page Arnot, , a leading CP short time member before released from prison was active setting up 1n in Strike Committee Northumberland and Durham. He said at the same time that he was unconcerned: any wider with horizons, but simply with our limited objective' This was a disastrous atti- Only end at the very Tune did the CP begin to fight for the definite lIne strike. Meetings The day after it was called advocated off they gency meetings of councils of action and the day after that a national meeting of council of action representatives to the worker a genera give his scientific knowledge own trade and so prevent him from being merely a machine single carrying out uncomprehended process to crowd these courses. One course, for enousand mentiste or the example attended appalling cold of the lecture rooms Ransome's partial but the accurate product of a shrewd material- ism which • enabled him the forces shaping ver cerve history, even if he could not analyse them. time his At the same humanifor and genuine political the ideals of the one-time revolu- • bourgeoisie, gave him ability to respect the the equality and liberty pained in the fraternity struggles

WULACIS

It was for these qualities told that lenin Kansome laughingly, that he had 'more or less succeeded in under- standing what they were at and that Lenin would be 'pleased to see him again'.

they knew. he Because would present an honest and sympathetic report, Bolsheviks invited Ransome to extend his stay and sit in to themmetings tou were founding become conference of the Third Inter- Conversations Ransome admitted that as the only non-communist who meetings, he attended these dis- sketchy and gave appointing report in the end.

But the core of the book is the conversations witn those figures involved in building a socialist society. Its value a source of hidden not as information, but as a record of the enthusiasm and dedica- which they tion fronted the massive problems in their path. Six Weeks in Russia, m difficult to 1919 very obtain now, but the sales of Ransome's other books inla some publisher to

OCCUC

re-issue it thate nappfut, it's that happens, Unti the trying to find worth of Arthur Autobiography Ransome in a local library.

A large part of that later with book taken up Russia Ransome's visits to and the relevant chapters side- throw interesting develop- light on the early ment of the Soviet Union.

consider 'the question changing the leadership of th labour movement'. Hindsight Only some weeks later did a pamphlet issued by the CP set out the issues more clearly. It was, they said with hindsight: . not enough for the workers to give greate Genera to the

DUWCLI

Council or the local Trades Councils the acting under General Council. It was neces- sarv to ao bevond this to the defeat of the labour bureau Cracy The Communist Party was these unable learn from 'errors and develop in a revol utionary direction. Assimilate It is up to the Trotskyist movement today to assimilate these and experiences bring them into ine struggie alternative leadership for the workers' movement. councils of The call for action has again begun to get a response within the struggle against the Lib-Lab coalition and its wage-cutting policies The problems political, theoretical and practica which necessarily follow can only be solved if we assimil ate in a living way historical experiences described in this article

Page 10

DARLINGTON:

A CRISIS OF

LEADERSHIP

accept the position and gave not was verbal assurance policy would not be broken.

strike. ever But if the local North of England newspapers favoured collaboration, their bosses on the board of Press in London were not so journalists' union over concilatory. The Echo morning papers big centres ot lists in and Glasgow. If the Westminster working class. wages, ward trade demand, In April to lead union fight anti an against the «n editor

NUJ

a strike.

ACAS

the weakness

NUJ

the the militants Executive.

NUJ

the Closed have been

NGA,

The and The demand of the has 01 five over the •y edis has barrier the sponsored owners by When the Labour the return

NGA

Press Government the scrap passed support were the this more ecutiv Westminster campaign the of the Press-the in the Northern and other and Durham Darlington The newspapers. thoug for the capable three print Westminster circulated near s members WIlU of and rungs Th lcducis

NUJ

have burea come If they to work from strike the through

MACIDCS

When Bill action taken any of the most servile that 1 promotion of secure by

NUJ

cept cowardice surrender right to

NUJ.

and the same nel. time it was a registered trade union which might give the and organisation so deferential to member- management Lial ship would no barrier to promotion. against this back- ground that journalists on the Northern Echo, the Evening Dispatch, the Durham Adver- of weeklies and tiser series the Darlington and Stockton Times, declared a post entry closed shop in the summer of 1976. Management signed after that the January 16 united but defeated. Their 32 week strike for a closed shop was broken despite their determination principled chapel of NUJ members at the London office of their employers, Westminster Press. The Westminster committee to examine the strike and the future of National Executive of the NUJ has set up Northern few policy. closed shop the the McIntyre examines the lessons to be learned.

Street, anded angrily to know when they would grow up, empire if that expresses the con- tempt that Keys has for prin- then the fact that the lasted just one week demonstrates how weak vacillating was the opp-

ASEALE

firm osition. the Social Democrat The local leadership at Darlington strike which committee contained individuals close to the SWP and to the Co Fatueist of the Father (FoC), M Chapel a social democ E elected been the before ch assault on the shop declaration. have the Throughout and the Duggan leaders held the of the united any dispute. member- to the concept or a successful action. Darlington chapel Formally Press Group all Chapel group) to Officially papers in the group. was that any contrast- sabotage the of the chapel. For confront the union print The strike 'anta- leaders must the did not

NGA

elements have right wingers own that the lobbies For this off of the

PIC

the and Industries watered chapel cancel he dem- The

NOR

NORTHEN

CHO

Mike Duggan, NUJ President John Devine, Ken Morgan and Darlington picket continue to scab on the Lon- Strikers at Darlington returned to work on

GOT

difficult a finger ing to every war there are casualties a highly the backing was his cynical reply to NUJ support had built up in most in which with have union

NUJ,

member Peter whelmed therefore expressed both the strengths and weakness. The pavel painful but bearable. To hav weakness was that no alterna- confront questions closed would have When the strike began in June the printers continued Critics of the the picket lines. A escalation have said could not called in which NUJ members and that the NUJ could not scare disted the oriented afford to risk escalation with- through the pickets by police.

out guarantee support. Print union 'another That entirely The question. approach fail and everyone knew it.

by escalation, print union determined happening, could only NUJ alone-linked to a fight to get printers out alongside afterwards. Many Joe Wade After stalling off support for a month with hopeless talks with the employers, the The Printing Industries print Committee finally sanctioned Darling- from the ton August and that of beginning ewspapers the in West-

NUJ

there. No such bureaucratic by guaranteed advance. guaranteed that if print did not Morgan, give the Jim would SeCTeL allowing the wiLl members at work. the being both the London chapels with no return to work. One vote A Group Yes to Talks, members said: "To despair disputes". its most supported these demands. One. Wade and down SOCIALIST PRESS, Wednesday 25 January, 1978

TECHO

yOU cant *ch

VIN

ATC

became clear that his had not much more succeeded. But although the strike without lift-

PIC

had pulled out (and it. 'In stop

NATSOPA

members well back to work) both the NGA and SLADE aware that ACAS nothing to the had offered By August it was clear that strikers could not see an easy work to their memberturn t member Stalled off Spreading the strikes was week To survive with a cluster stalled from OIl week. Chapels ready to come out began to get demora- For a period of six lised. weeks they remained on the verge of one of the biggest WP's fat fought strikes to be against a major employer.

of When that strike did not policy that it the inevitably begin steam of the guarantee success began out go support. dispute By allowing the of print go to ACAS the chapels to had avoided the immediate evades the danger of a return to work.

safe 'united'

ACAS

But, once had become involved, print union was guaranteeu l leaders-with co-operation from first Ken Morgan, and then his • successor Ken Escalation Ashton-were able to prevent the strike spreading. was not a tactical

ACAS

The only way to win was of question. It was one and since the principle. leaderships were this Excluded the escalation Three the Come ron talks followed between NGA NUJ, SLADE leaders and the employers, and for the first chapel representatives had time apels were excluded and the

ACAS

The plan was had also trotted out again and put back to the chapel and was of the cted them again rejected. Wade But this time question but declared that the plan had West- been a joint union/manage- ave and that his ment initiative strength would return „LO members its work. Despite Ken Ashton's wa take willing to that he had protests ead word the plan, not helped agreed it, the printers went back the same ove supportin had already established sell-out they rejected once block can in success be Mass turnout fail if that this On the very day was decided the NUJ Execu per, with met tive called for escalation and The result was not in surprising. A mass turnout at was a Group Chapel meeting the demolish rejected escalation two weeks strike by sending it to ACAS before Christmas with strikers back guarantee of NGA scabbing It took eight months fo Seeing the main danger as the leadership to bring work return Darlington members to the and Darlington point where they returned to work and not much less than voted accept arbitration in principle that to break the resolve of other journalists in London and potential support all over the country. Chapel leaflet The need for a leadership No to Com- revolutionary based on promise handed out to NEC understanding of the nature of bureaucracy and the on the compromise to confront it was raised in basic principles is a policy of the sharpest possible way which is not present throughout the strike. in the chapels. The aim of the closed In other groups NEC must be to win these conceded shops were being without a fight. It is not the By one vote the NEC took demand that the NUJ Execu- militant position tive needs to look at during the entire strike and is the building of: leadership prepared to tackle week later this stand the real questions raised by it.

was ended. Under threat from Keys it climbed

SOCIALIST PRESS, Wednesday 25 January, 1978

INDUSTRIAL NEWS

Grunwick diversion: blacking only way A Private Members Bill sing out of the Grun- ck dispute, which seeks Report inject some life into Government's badly leased 'conciliation' John Stupenol vice, was accorded a cond reading last iday 20 January. Introduced by old-time Ted Fletcher (Lab (lington) with the blessing the Employment Depart- nt and the full backing

TUC,

the igned to help ACAS con- investigations with- The sponsor of the motion

ALS

hindrance from stubborn won't be ployers, of count accisions or Socialist helpful delays. Only last week we reported - What has Leyland got to hide? documents in the "Socialist Venge', paper of the Inter- anal Marxist Group, prove to be genuine, they would seem new evidence of bribery ive and corrup- within British Leyland: difficulties iction from the Depart. Public Prosecutions the IMG from oublish- • Lne text LIte nents. Leyland • cout atemor to contest they have aith the documents revealed Daily Mail last year. committees access to the Leyland, and all the issue for Leyland Mation on dealers and component suppliers.

cannot be settled in this Whose word have This we information er such documents are fake show real thing? are genuine or not. used also show the need for the nation- mg foreign contracts, and if bribery is not alisation of the motor industry as ush tund' exists. why does a whole of pyland throw its books open socialist economy. dependent examination? While doubts linger over these NoW Under that Leyland boss 'leaked' documents, Edwardes planning have (not surprisingly) failed sackings, must

DUT

come do wits any all forms of secrecy and theft of trade union and personal files from Cowley ay must elect trade union Thornett early last month.

BRITISH SHIPBUILDERS - O'FISHALL)

SPEAKING! CAN I HELP YOU? )

I'LL NEED SOME HELP IN THIS-QUICK

ME THROUGH TO THE MORNING STALINUT

I MAN AT THE TOP

that it was in his constituency journalists the Northern Echo were driven back work after the longest strike in the history of the NUJ The strike over basic trade union rights defeated by the combined onslaught of employers, trade union bureaucrats, ACAS and last but least, Ted Fletcher himself. Hypocritical In a speech which must rank one of the most uranınam nypocritical and obscure ever to get an airing the Commons namele gallery, Fletcher Press. told his audience how his Bill would be a positive reponse those trade O1 unionists appalled with what Grunwick COnO backed by the NAFF' Barbara Castle, former Labour Secre- employment to say lary also chippea in that she hoped the Bill would deal with the 'other mini Grunwicks cropping up in my constituency'

APEX

HOT

leader Grantham and his followers on Brent Trades Council, its purpose Is cical. .As it gets dragged through the maze parliamentary •TI debating chambers, the are left waiting still SLIIKeIS longer for action to achieve the demands for which they nave been on strike now tor over eighteen months. Little opposition That Grantham has to regain control managed over the strike committee is clear. Strike bulletins are now published under APEX letterheads and the committee's offices are Edwardes littered with АРЕХ pamphlets titled APEX Looks You which all outs for designed to be handed out to the scabs. accounts Picketing now taking avalable ІПТОГ 1S its relationship with place only in the mornings.

Little opposition has been soon shown by the strikers against these documents the path to final betrayal And will being opened up by APEX. The WSL, unlike almost every left a planned group, ded reasserts that this strike is not over. It can and must be won: do that a sharp break Oxford

CID

must first be made from the bureaucracy, and the strikers clues on the must turn back to calls I01 steward Alan direct action from workers the scab who supply Iirm wath its essential services.

... NO SIR, WE COULDN'T GET THEM TO

DROP THEIR PAY DEWDS- STUBBORN

BASTARDS!

...SURE! CLASS SOLIDARITY" IS THE BEST

In a further round of brazen blacklegging, Stalinist leaders at Govan shipbuilders are to accept again work on three further ships for Poland, former- ly allocated to the Swan Hunter yard on Tyneside. Govan stewards first nailed their yellow colours to the mast in December when they leg is second voted not to black work that to crack the determination of had been diverted from Tyne- the outfitters side as a result of a continu- Dalily cal. ing 1,700 overtime ban by outfitters at the Swan Hunter was awarded yard. Instead they called on the yard, in a bid to reestablish outfitters their their differentials, 3-month struggle. mediately And Stalinist flexible Jimmy Airlie declared arrangements, Govan would accept as many one-man-one-job working ships employers off- as British ered in order to "prove that agement-the board of which the British • shipbuilder second to none" Chalmers, Even this strikebreaking of the Boilermakers union-

ETHN 2460.

Mass meeting at Swan Hunters Weighell bid to sell The right wing leader- ship of the National Union of Railwaymen that has tamely sat back while 10.000 British Rail their shoes jobs have been Weighell's axed over the last two claim that changed working years, made 'left' a practices speech last week. bureaucrals abolished a large number of In a carefully-timed Cur. tain raiser to a planned sell- 'vacancies' LNe filled. out of the union's 63% pay Weighell has no intention claim fixed at last summer's of mobilising action to pre- conference, General Secre- Sidney Weighell deman- serve or tary British Kather he is Rail fill an as- further agreed job cuts as a tonishing 9,000 vacant posts.

bargaining counter nounced Weighell, the NURS push concede pay cringing cooperation on in excess of 10%. money-saving measures will

NUR

•be ended. handling British Rail management whole sections of road haul- will scarcely be shaking

|HA HA! WHO'S GOING TO TELL THEM

THEY'RE SACKED?

5 issues 10 issues 25 issues 150 issues

I BROTHERS... FIRST THE GOOD NEWS-

I would like to

• SOLIDARITY FROM THE LADS

A MESSAGE OF

AT GOVAN - NOW THE BAD NEWS..

Name Address Page 11

BLACK THE SWAN

HUNTER SHIPS

Stalinists scab immediately stepped in and withdrew the order, awarding most of it to the bootlicking.

Govan Stalinists, by the Govan stewards-indi- one ana cating that a Stalinist black- extra ship order to Smith's Docks on leeside to none-failed If this move is allowed to proceed it will mean rapid It was only end- steps by swan Hunter man- ed when a £5.40 pay increase agement to impose 800 re- including many wunuancies. boilermakers. but bolermakers at the Occupation volca im after this to end There must be no accep- working tance of such sackings. Boiler- and insist on makers and outfitters, what- feelings on wages, oversel shipbuilders man- must unite in defence of all jobs at the Swan Hunter yard 'Brother' John and the first attempts at lay- General Secretary offs must be met by occupa- tion of the yard demanding work sharing on full pay for the whole workforce They must fight tenacious- ly for the blacking of all work diverted from Tyneside management's black- mailing tactics on pay. "Nationalised" But above all they must ensure that their unions. present tied hand and foot management through the collaboration of leaders such as Chalmers, break from their efforts to help the old bosses manage the "national- ised" and star corporation, fighting for the interests of thet members rail jobs of age drivers receive rises above threats. They the 10% limit, and are press- ing for similar treatment.

agreed by union But if Weighell's strategy actually have continues unimpeded many

NUR

members will be recei- he ving their cards rather than a limit-busting pay increase.

Railwaymen must insist that vacant jobs are filled reopen these jobs. But this is linked to rejec- aiming to use ting all forms of productivity dealing, and insistence that in an the full pay claim is backed British Rail up by all-out action increases Only when basic pay rates are adequate to ensure decent members in freight living standards will the fight already seen to end rest-day and overtime working reach full strength.

SOCIALIST

PRESS

* . £1.10 .£2.20 . £5.50 . £10.00 issues. I enclose the sum of £.

Send to: Socialist Press, 31, Dartmouth Park Hill London NW5 1HR

MUST NOT BE

PRESS

SOLD!

The decision by British Steel Corporation stick rigidly agement to to their derisory 6% pay offer unless union leaders concede 25,000 redun- is dancies conscious attempt by employers to profit from the defeat of the firemen's pay battle.

And it indicates also the Lib-Lab government's deter- mination that the national- ised industries-including shipbuilding, the and part-nationalised British llevland. should n assivery exploitation of step their labour force in order to increase the rate of profit tor privately owned industries.

No improvement The major steel union-the Steel Trades Iron and Confederation-was bluntly last week that unless closure accepts early cost outdated and will plants then there improvement in the pay 011C1 ISTC leaders had in any case only demanded a etic 11.5% increase. And they seeking are cannica

JUW

tion' from government axe- man Eric Varley before deci- the ding management ultimatum. General Secretary Bill Sirs Fords stand tirm 1,000 The strike by Ford at press men in its Halewood IS now third week. have Management attempted to introduce speed up by bringing in an nouriy system instead of quota shift quota system. This would mean that tue worktorce would dae to meet productivity targets at the end of each hour instead of reaching them at the end of each shift. Speed-up like this would clamp down on inter- tne changeability of jobs and frequency of breaks. The men voted solidly to is still and ine plant closed.

SOCIALIST

*

STEEL JOBS

almost fell over himself point- ing out that he was more than with the 1cduy lu convicte other

BSC

wish to StILLED pay deal-inclu- ding increased productivity at profitable plants and slashed manning levels. 10,000 jobs Jobs most at rISK 1n East Moors reel Plalll: Cardiff and Ebbw Vale. Clo- of these suIc allegedly 10,000 jobs and save BSC £100 million. unnamed plants are also on BSC's 'death list'.

surrounding ine BSC's projection of a loss this year of £520 million has been pile much almed pressure on Bll sirs and the negotiators as to •ELe assert the rights of Parliamen- tary Select Committees. in the Sirs has repeatedly past shown himself willing to sell the jobs and conditions of his members in the name of the 'viability' of BSC. Desperate dangers facing Now Tne particularly steelworkers are acute as they confront a des- perate employer and a com- pletely bankrupt, class collab- orating union leadership Even as BSC's planned cut- backs were reveaica, union bureaucrats were entering of new 3

OXFORD

Wednesday 8 February 8.00 pm East Oxford Community Centre, Princes Street

COVENTRY

Tuesday 7 February 8.00 pm Old Dyers Arms Spon End, Coventry Published by Folrose Ltd for the Workers Socialist League, 31, Dartmouth Park Hill, London NW5 1HR.

participation' de- "worker signed to enlist them as direct advocates of management Not challenged Sirs has yet to challenge a single one ot the monumental

BSC

assertions by manage- ments as to the financial state of the corporation. Not a single Labour MP or asked union leader has Trace question: if BSC the

ODVIOUS

£520 losing year-where is it all going to?

Who profits from BSC losses?

Rather than leaving their leaders to barter huge redun- "conces- sions' on wages, steel workers must elect committees full-scale order to start examination of BSC's books.

ANNIVERSARY

OF SOCIALIST

PRESS

Special meetings

LIVERPOOL

Sunday 12 February 8.00 pm Mitre, Dale Street

LONDON

Friday 10 February 7.30 pm New Theatre, LSE Houghton Street London WC2 Plus FILM Sadat's treachery meets failure The utterly predatory of the Zionist nature state of Israel was clearly indicated in the break- down of the Egypt-Israel PHOTO: John Sturrock. Repor talks during last week. The 'peace initiative' taken by President Sadat just two months ago was designed in the first place to draw atten.

tion away from the social crisis in Egypt itself. Sadat then hoped by the use of his frienship with the US at least stop • LU occupation of his country and to obtain at least some status for a tiny puppet state for the Palestinians.

s been offer this Saure Sadat Steel union boss Sirs has been offering boundaries" to the Zionists possibly international ana guarantees against the efforts to undermine Zionist state Pressure could He hoped that he imperialist to pressure isolate the Palestinians and agreement of the secure the different Arab states in area. These hopes have founder- ed because the Zionist settlers are not seriously interested in recognised by their being neighbours, and

HOL

make the slightest intend to territorial concessions. They are prepared to resist even strong pressure from the in order to retain their racially exclusive state of series statements Israeli Prime made by Begin Minister during last week, on one occasion during for the Egyptian Foreign Minister, revealed the utterly reaction- ary character of Zionism.

Granted by God jobs, and for the nationalisa- The private employers that Israel had tion of the whole industry, The state supplied by and according to Begin,

BSC

must be examined and together with relatea sector: easter the banks, for 3,700 years, and this "had profits publicised. anu God private kers' management been granted creamed off by the Abraham, Isaac and Jacob".

policy Such means remaining within breaking the anti-socialist State power creden- steel industry must also needs the tials like these hardly Lib-Lab coalition, and revealed. for serious justification its huge interest removal or the reacuonar made British leadership within the steel ments predatory activilies over lo unions and the TUC. The Zionists genuinely and international • bankers understand how the from the labour of steelwor If such a fight is not taken cannot Egyptians, or for that matter then the present 25,000 kers must be exposed. up, redundancies will the Jordanians, can threatened On the basis of such infor- Israel's right to hold settle- be be simply the opening shot of mation the fight must ments on their territories.

taken up for work sharing on a long drawn out war on 1oDs of 20 Times throughout the steel industry the full pay to defend all steel Even January was driven to observe that: "Mr Begin shows that he Cowley pulls believes Israel can have her cake and eat it, can have both territories and peace". The question goes much The beyond this however. out of Zionist state can only exist by denying national rights. Begin This why compared the national rights participation Palestinians the claimed bi with the nationalist claims of the as Threadbare 170 TGWU stewards The decision reflects the This tired old equation of change on the plant since the Leyland with anti- at the British anti-Zionism of the defeat right wing in Plant Semitism becomes increasing- Cowley Assembly elections last November. Zionists threadbare, overwhelmingly voted Bob Fryer, the newly elec- always trot it will ted convenor has re establish- last Monday (23 January) justify their every ed democratic procedures and to withdraw from the so- crime. has begun to restore the "worker The Israeli state by its very called particip- rights of the shop stewards essence denies national rights, ation' scheme set up movement. Palestinian Arabs not only to under the Ryder Report. but also to Palestinian Jews

READERS' LETTERS

As the major union on the destruction Only its from readers plant, the TGWU withdrawal Letters together with its allies in the will render the remaining in response to articles will Arab world, open the committees of little value to Socialist road to the liberation of the contained in the management. feudal. landlorism area tron other Press or on ism racialism and class topics are welcome. exploitation. First chance They should, however, "peace negotiations' Any brief will be kept as as based other Today was the first time of the national rights possible. Write to deny had the stewaras lave the Palestinians and the 31, Socialist Press, participa- chance to vote on rights of all the democratic tion since it was bulldozed in Dartmouth Park Hill people of the area. 2n vears ago NW5 1HR London