Tuc Blocks Anti-tory Fighi

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number of workers looked for CDLM conference-see leadership in the fight to defend O'Fishall p.11 TUC Delegates-not a rank and file member in sight and living standards waged by employers and by the government.

After four years of open collaboration with the anti-working class policies of right wing Labour governments under Wilson and Callaghan, TUC leaders plainly have not the stomach even for the 'kind of token protests mobilised in 1972 against the Heath government's anti-union laws.

Manoeuvres

A milk and water motion against Thatcher's package of anti union legislation (which is to be put through Parliarpent this winter) called in the vaguest terms for. the TUC to "resist vigorously* 1 But, after pre-Congress manoeuvres had silenced two motions and an amendment calling for an end to talks with the Tories, the door was deliberately left open for continuing meetings with Employment Secretary James Prior.

Indeed the Tories were ofterad the carrot of TUC enforcement of the Concordat. Print union leader Joe Wade declared openly that:

"If the Tories are not prepared to accept the voluntary principle I!l in respoct of industrial relations, then it will be on their shoulders that the blame will lie for a returnito the destructive confrontation policios of 1971 and 1974."

The TUC dancerate confined itself to a 'propaganda' campaign clearly designed to persuade the Tories that union leaders can control members better than the courts.

As the Financial Times pointed out:

"Government observers in the hall interpretad... [the mood of the debatel... as a sign that the rank and file were not in the mood for a fight..."

Of course, with possibly a mere handful of exceptions, the rank and file were entirely absent from the bureaucratic forces assembled in the Congress. But as an assessment of the mood of union officials, and their reluctance to fight the Tories this is undoubtedly an accurate estimate.

Similar opposition to a fight was reflected in the fate of one of the 'radical' amendments that survived the pre-Congress strongarm work by the General Council-the call by FTAT for mass demonstrations against the Tories' economic onslaught on the working class.

Wafer-thin

Even this modest amendment was vigorously opposed by Len, Murray who argued for delegates to "trust your General Council", and for their absolutely toothless • propaganda campaign ('Forward to the Eighties, not back to the Thirties') to be adopted without commitment to any form of action.

In the event the amendment was rejected-though by the wafer-thin majority of 61,000 out of 12 million votes.

A vague NALGO call. for a campaign against the cuts including "for example, a national day of action" was carried, however, since it was seen to commit union leaders to nothing at all.

Lingering

Any lingering hopes that the Congress might match its periodic spouts of left' rhetoric by some steps to break from its deadly alliance with Labour's right wing leaders were rudely shattered on the final day.

An ASLEF motion calling vacuous speeches for the rostrum in their efforts to hold back the working class, outside the conference hall the Tories pressed ahead on the offensive, and workers stepped up their struggles.

BL management and British. Shipbuilders were putting finishing touches to plans for thousands of sackings; local authorities were spelling out new rounds of spending cuts; two prundo of mandina ainda, deria million engineering workers engaged in an escalation of their pay battle, and a growing jobs and social services.

A gauge of this rising tide of confrontation and militancy was the large number of union banners on the 1,500-strong lobby of the TUC supported by the Liaison Committee for the Defence of Trade Unions and about 500 Right to Work marchers.

Union leaders have set their faces resolutely against any serious straggle against the Tories. But workers continue to embark on these struggles and to seek out leaders capable of defending their jobs and living standards.

Conference

It is in this situation that a revolutionary leadership and a programme for action is crucial to the working class.

In fighting to construct such a leadership the Workers Socialist League urges workers and labour movement bodies to support and attend the November 3 Conference of the Campaign for Democracy in the Labour Movement, to be held in Digbeth Hall, Birmingham.

The conference is called to discuss a fight in the labour movement for an end to talks with the Tories, preparation to force them out and the removal of those Labour and trade union leaders who won't fight.

As such it offers a unique opportunity to discuss a programme and perspective for the mass struggles that are immediately on the agenda for the working class-and which cannot be bureaucratically wished or manoeuvred away be TUC leaders.

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SOCIALIȘT PRESS, Wednesday September 12, 1979