Rough ride for do-nothing NUPE

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Three members of the NUPE executive council and two regional full time officers were left shocked and speechless last week after two hours of ruthless attack by over 150 NUPE militants determined to fight against hospital closures.

This took place at Caxton Hall on 11 July at a conference called by the NUPE London Divisional Council to discuss strategy over pay and further moves to defend the Elizabeth Garrett Anderson Hospital.

It became clear from the outset that the NUPE leadership planned to take no further steps to defend the EGA and that they intended to turn this conference into yet another "discussion of the situation" without initiating any action against cuts in the Health Service.

Non-commital

EGA, revealed that the DHSS's proposed structure of the working party-set up to discuss alternative sites for the hospital after the postponement of the July 21 closure date-was to be a party of ten consisting of only two trade union representatives.

Instead of calling In September 1976 Jack Jones and Hugh Scanlon appeared jointly on the front page of British Leyland management's house journal Leyland Mirror to call on their members to 'Keep Working', no matter what attacks management may make.

A year ago officials from all unions involved in British Leyland went further still and agreed to s help increase Leyland's profitability at. the expense of their membership.

They decided to implement a three-fold plan of attack:

1) An end to plant bargaining. All pay negotiations to be handled nationally, by selected officials and senior stewards, every November from 1979.

2) Job evaluation and parity. All jobs throughout Leyland to be graded on a single structure, and each grade paid the same nationally.

3) Fringe benefits to be equalised throughout Leyland.

Working with the selected representatives of the National Joint Negotiating Committee the company then organised a company-side ballot to force through these general principles.

Contained in the "fringe benefits" document was a clause declaring all previous agrements null and void.

As a result, since the ballot, Leyland have been attacking all 38302→= conditions or a inore range oi fronts.

In forcing home job evalucomplete boycott of these proposals Taylor remained non-commital, merely stating that the EGA stewards would "probably reject it"

Nor did he have any plans for the future defence of the EGA. He seemed relieved that Ennals had been "edged out of a confrontation" on July 21.

Repair lift

It was left to Arthur Churchley, an EGA steward, to spell out what policies were needed to save the EGA-a complete rejection of the working party, and a demand that the Area Health Authority should repair the lift-and it was his frustration at the NUPE's apparent unwillingness and inability to defend the hospital that led a massive attack on the NUPE executive from the floor of the conference.

A delegate from the Ambulance Service condemned the executive for not giving full backing to the ambulance drivers who were going against the Area . Health Authority's instructions by continuing to take patients into the casualty ward of Bethnal Green Hospital.

Visibly worried

Delegates from St. Bartholomew's hospital-which was one of the hospitals that staged a one-day strike to defend Bethnal Greenation, Leyland again set out to draw in the union bureaucracy, by first of all persuading the NJNC to agree to a method of evaluation and to set a couple of jobs for each plant to evaluate.

Now joint union-management committees in the plants are being set up to evaluate all jobs in all plants, and then slot them into the national "benchmarks"

With convenors and stewards now drawn into working this scheme, any section of workers that resists or puts forward a grading claim will have to fight their own factory leadership and the NJNC as well as the company.

The ballot declared that normal bargaining arrangements would operate for 1978. and from Tower Hamlets branch, both continued the attack on the executive for their refusal to take up a fight in defence of jobs and services in the public sector.

The executive members present were by now visibly worried that the conference was not going according to Bob Pincher, from the executive, attempted to defend himself by claiming that his job was only to report to the executive what went on in London-a job which he thought he did quite well.

He went on to say that any action must be initiated from a local level, and then the leadership would be ready to give "full support"

This bluff was called immediately by a delegate from Hammersmith Hospital who pointed out that the West London Hospital had gone on strike for three days over the closure of Hounslow Hospital, and would have stayed out longer-except that no support whatsoever was given by the NUPE leadership!

It was over the current dispute at the West London Hospital that the strongest attack of all was made on the executive members.

Full time officer Harold Wilde outlined the disputewhere members of the Branch who refused to use the "clocking on" system had their pay docked.

He reported that the tactics adopted so far by NUPE-which include going But already impatient right wing and Stalinist convenors are trying to get around this. in Longbridge, the wage claim has been intermingled with talk of 'parity', in preparation for a 'fait accompli' national level settlement.

In the Cowley Body Plant the right wing leadership has made specific moves towards a corporate claim.

Complex

The procedure for such a claim is astonishingly complexindicating how far such national claims are removed from the shop floor.

A claim drawn up by the Body Plant union branch leadership is to be put before a stewards meeting, to go then as recommendation to the Oxford Automotive Committee, to go from there to the Oxford District Committee. From the District Committee it will be referred to a meeting of TGWU senior stewards in Leyland, as a recommendation for TGWU representatives on the NJNC. If it were then endorsed by the whole NJNC it would then go to the company!

It doesn't take a genius to recognise that such a procedure puts all the power in the hands of the union bureaucracy. This is why corporate bargaining has been continuously fought in Cowley.

In the Cowley Assembly Plant, TGWU stewards have taken a stand against this saboto ACAS and plans to go through the co urts-seemed to have met with little success.

He was immediately attacked by Stan Hunt, Branch Secretary at the West London, who pointed out how the moves by managementwere obviously an attempt to break the militancy of one of the strongest branches in London-plans have been made to transfer patients from two wards to the nearby Western Hospital, which shows that the AHA are set for a major confrontation.

Disgusted

Hunt pointed out that in his nine years as an active trade unionist, he had never been so disgusted with the NUPE leadership, and a resolution was passed condemning the executive, calling for a lobby of the AHA and demanding full financial and organisational The conference ended with the NUPE officials visibly squirming before such a show of militancy.

The conference proved that the determination to fight the cuts exists amongst the rank and file, and all that is lacking is a strong lead from the union leadership.

Obvious need

If they are unwilling or incapabie of giving this lead, then they must be replaced with a leadership that will fight the cuts all the way, mobilising the full strength of the labour movement.

The final message from the conference is that there is an obvious need for an allLondon Joint Shop Stewards Committee to be formed by Health Service Stewards.

This will bring together the strongest elements in the fight against hospital closures and coordinate a fight which the bureaucracy has shown itself to be incapable of taking up. tage of the wages struggle, and voted to submit a plant level wage claim.

Other Leyland plants should follow suit, and there must be a fight to withdraw all cooperation from job evaluation, and to pull union representatives out of all joint union management committees.

Existing agreements must be defended. The independent interests of the working class demand the opening of Leyland's books and policies leading towards workers' control as preparation for workers' management of a planned, nationalised car industry, not union collaboratioh with capitalist managers to maximise the profits of the banks and components firms that feed off British Leyland.

Such policies require the urgent construction of a revolutionary leadership within the Leyland stewards' movement.

Body Plant convenor Roche scabs

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Regional official Mike Taylor, reporting on the