As Labour Leaders Prepare State Control Ic Votes Savage Age Cuts

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The Trade Union leaders are collaborating with the right wing of the Labour Government to impose massive wage cuts on the working class in the interest of capitalism. Pushed forward by a severe inflationary crisis the Labour Government is about to introduce harsh statutory controls of wages, involving the creation of mass unemployment. Healey has made it clear that he is not offering a choice between wage legislation and cuts in public spending which will destroy jobs. Speaking to Labour MPs on Tuesday he said: "We must accept a 10% cut in the standard of living and public expenditure. The alternative is to crawl to the International Monetary Fund and accept the terms they impose upon us.

Wilson and Healey are determined, but they could not hope to impose their policies without the collaboration of the TU lead ers. The working class are powel ful and prepared to defend their living standards and jobs.

Wilson's problem in imposing state controls is comparable to the problem of Peron in Argentina where a 48-hour general strike has shattered the government's attempts to introduce flat-rate increases and state controls of wages. In Britain the conditions for wage cutting had first to be created by the trade union leaders working closely with Wilson.

JONES PLAN The first move was made by Jack Jones, General Secretary of the T&GWU. Using the argumen of "social justice" and "equal sacrifice", he raised the concept of flat-rate increases. He then developed a position that the only way to beat inflation was for workers to cut down the size of their wage claims to "break the inflationary spiral" - which is the argument of just about every employer in the country.

The T&GWU conference becam a springboard for this policy. No. sooner had the conference voted for it - as a means of "avoiding" statutory wage controls - than Healey announced imminent wage legislation.

Capitalist propaganda then focussed on the NUM conference where so-called 'Marxist, Arthur Scargill, persuaded the Yorkshire delegation to drop the £100 demand, and the decision taken, splashed all over the capitalist press, strengthened the hand of Jones, Murray and Wilson.

In the forefront of the search for a "compromise" at the NUM conference were well known members of the Communist Party, including Dai Francis and Jack Collins. It is also interesting to ask - where was Mick McGahey and his Scottish delegation who first put the £100 claim forward?

The Stalinist position was seen to be a conscious policy, when the next day's Morning Star head lined uncritically "Neither 10% nor £6.00 has any revelance. MINERS VOTE TO SEEK £100 PER WEEK".

When the General Council of the TUC met, it was not to org anise resistance to state control of wages, but, having already accepted the principle of wage cuts, to discuss the implementation of the Jones plan.

The whole position of the TUC leadership is based on the notion that workers' wages are responsible for inflation - otherwise why cut Jones at T&GWU Conference them to solve the problem? The term "national interest" has bea ome universally used and not a single trade union leader has spoken of the independent interests of the working class.

The outcome of all this collabor ation is clear. The door has been opened, the confusion created, and Wilson will go ahead as he originally planned, with pay laws which would reduce the standard of living in a year by something like 30%. An idea of the price rises in store is given by the increased postal charges just announced.

The decision of the TUC to polici wage cuts is unprecedented in the history of the workers' movement. The general strike of 1926 arose out of a 10% wage cut, imposednot by the TUC - but by a Tory government. The trade union movement was built to defend and improve the standard of living of the working class. Its leaders are now attempting to use it as a mean of cutting the standard of living.

The proposal is that wages be cut in order to "preserve the Labour Government". '. In reality it is precisely the right-wing policies being carried out by Wilson which threaten the very existence of the Labour Government.

The Woolwich by-election showed this clearly, when the Tories were returned on the basis of a working class abstention, brought about by the betrayals of the Labour leaders.

In February 1974 the miners had to bring down the Tory Government and bring the Labour Government to power in order to break the pay laws and defend their living standards. Today, with the rest of the working class, they are being told that the only way to keep the Labour Government in power is to accept - state pay laws.

If there was an election tomorrow Wilson would be heavily defeated. The only way to save the Labour Government now is to remove the right wing from office and reverse the policies Wilson has introduced.

'LEFTS'

In the Parliamentary Labour Party the lefts' have failed consistently to take the opportunit presented to fight Wilson's poli ies. Benn and Foot have now swung behind Wilson in a move the right comparable only to Jones himself.

Some of the remaining 'lefts' have made strong statements against Healey's proposals. They are now called upon to act on their statements and to work to mobilise the labour movement fa the removal of Wilson.

Such a campaign must be based on alternative policies and start from the defence of workers' living standards and not from the requirements of capitalism.

The demands must be for the books of the employers to be opened, for a sliding scale of wag to protect workers against inflati a sliding scale of hours to defend continued on back page, col. 5 The 48-hour General Strike called in Argentina by the 3,500,000 strong General Labour Confederation (CGT) ended 10 hours early on Tues day, after forcing President Isabel Peron to concede wage increases of up to 150%.

The strike had been called because Peron had vetoed these increases (even though they had already been agreed by the employers), and attempted to restrict rises to a 50% "flat rate"

In the stormy period leading up to the stoppage which began on Monday a million workers had been involved in unofficial strike action, and meetings and demonstrations had taken place all over Argentina.

The political impact of this mass movement has been to disrupt the political bloc which had previously existed between the bureacratic leaders of the powerful trade unions and the Peronist governmen The CGT nominee in Peron's government had been forced to resign, and there was mounting pressure on the President to sack her unofficial "Prime Minister". Senor Lopez Rega, Minister of Social Welfare. Rega is well known for his connections with the ultra right-wing AAA (Argentine AntiCommunist Alliance) "death squad" which has been carrying out brutal murders of militants an‹ left-wingers. These connections have now even been publicised in a daily paper, La Opinion, and further damaged the standing of the Peron government.

100% INFLATION The economic crisis itself in Arg entina is out of all control with 100% annual rate of inflation and a huge balance of payments crisis. The proposal to cut the negotiated wage increases, which brought the confrontation, was part of a gov"ernment "package" to cure inflation, which also devalued the peso by 50%, increased fuel prices by 170% and allowed other prices to rise by at least 100%. This open attempt to slash workers' living standards was the motive force Peron behind the strike wave.

The CT leadership, until now the main prop of Peronism, attem! ed throughout to restrict the militant struggles of workers. The 48hour general strike call was widely seen as an attempt to forestall growing demands for an all-out indefinite general strike, to remain in control of the mass movement, and prevent a full-scale political split developing between the trade unions and the bourgeois apparatus of the Peronist movement. Peron must now try to pick up the pieces in order to preserve capitalist rule. With her whole cabinet having offered their resignations as the general strike began, her closest confidant the object of universal hostility, and the massive economic crisis confronted by Argentinian capital, her base of support seems increa: ingly shaky.

But for the workers' movement the problems still are not solved. The undoubted power of the trade unions is still channelled through a reactionary bourgeois leadership. There still is no mass independent workers' party. Inflation will now escalate uncontrollably, snatching away even thi 150% rises just achieved.

The demands of Argentinian workers on their unions must be for a break from Peronism; for a sliding scale of wages to maintain their value against inflation; for workers' defence squads to protect militants against the AA. and other reactionary groups, an the building of a revolutionary leadership to mobilise the class in the fight for socialism.

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US subscriptions collected from wor- subscriptions collected from workers to equip for struggles against the employers are being used to weaken workers resistance to the employers attacks, and pave the way to redundancy.

At the centre of the whole