2. The crisis ofleadership

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Final section of the document on British Persper • Annual Conference of the Workers Socialist l s of space a number of the final sections of the r he WSL in the next year have been omitted designed to test out the position is on the jobs While Bill Sirs, Hector Smith in inhibiting stru ski par hai by the sut del rigl wh the or prc This is the second and f was adopted at the Fourtt April 4-6 1980. For reason relating to the tasks of tl published version.

iled men)-tied to a 92-page skage of strings.

This "offer" , which could ve been thrown out at once mass meetings throughout : corporation has been the ›ject of three months of ays and prevarication by ht wing union negotiators, o cannot decide whether 'y are more afraid of a strike of the hostility they would ›voke by accepting the deal. Their decision to call a ballot the offer under management:tated terms is an elaborate rans of passing the buck for eir betrayal back to the irkers on the shop floor, and isolating the striking steelirkers.

And of course in the steel lustry the derisory 2% pay er tabled by BSC is little more than of the right wing steel leaders.

accepted BSC's calls to restore the rank and file. down the Tory government. 2. Jobs provocation trade union bur have so far been and Co. have consistently profitability, they have not been able to carry their policies of abject class collaboration into The reason The Tory/BSC combined general possible assault on jobs and living stan- trade union st dards has provoked a surge of concessions on t militancy which now. threatens an employer insi to escape the control of the axe jobs in ordi bureaucracy, and which we are when a governm fighting to develop towards the in the public s call for a general strike to bring frontation takes form.

To challenge "right'" to sack :

Indeed it is the spillover in tively to challe steel from the wages issue to to own the me jobs which is the most embarras- tion; to call for sing and frightening for the the full labour f stives that -eague on document from this eaucracy, for it front that they 1 most successful iggles.

is clear: it is in through simple ruggle to force wages. But when ists that he must er to survive, or rent slashes jobs sector, the cona much sharper › an employer's workers is effecinge his "right" eans of producthe retention of 'orce by a crisiswhich the work available is divided between the whole workforce.

Such a struggle is outside the scope of reformist union leaders, but, as a necessary demand which provides a means of bridging the gap from today's consciousness of the working class to the consciousness required for socialist revolution, it forms part of the programme of transitional demands fought for by Marxists. .

We call for a conscious policy of work-sharing on full pay, backed up by the occupation of threatened plants or public service facilities, and the opening of their books to elected trade union committees in order openly to challenge the "rights" of the employers, and turn this struggle towards suppliers, bankers and distributors.

For the union bureaucracy the case is very different. They have sacrificed thousands of their members' jobs rather than wage any such struggle against the capitalist class or the government.

Civil service union leaders have sat back and isolated even the spontaneous struggles that have opposed cuts in manpower and services. In the shipyards, Confed leaders have actively cooperated with sackings and closures, arguing that they offer the only way of defending any jobs.

In BL the Confed went even further and campaigned alongside Michael Edwardes, the Tory leaders and the press for a "yes" vote to 25,000 sackings and speed-up on the shop floor.

In the steel industry ISTC The occupations that have taken place-such as the EGA, Hounslow and St Benedicts'shave begun from the rank and file and in no way from union leaders.

Elsewhere, too, limited adiana isa defence localsea actions in atience us jobs have taken place-significantly at the Robb Caledon shipyard, which for several weeks took unilateral sanctions in opposition to the British Shipbuilders' closure plans; only to be isolated by Stalinist leaders in the other shipyards under threat; at the Corby steel works (where the refusal of union leaders to fight handed the. jobs fight over to the bizarre community politics of the ROSAC campaign, while thousands of workers throughout. the town showed their solidarity); and at the Meccano plant on Merseyside, occupied to prevent its sudden closure.

3. Viability In arguing for struggles to defend jobs, the main stumbling block remains overcoming the "viability" argument, through which reformists insist that in order to save jobs at a plant it is necessary for that plant to be made profitable.

In a period of world-wide recession, whole areas of capitalist industry cease to be profitable and all sections face a drastie cut in profits.

We must press workers to start not from the problems confronting bankrupt employer but from their own

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ereliNtea s independent class interests.

The demand for the 'opening of the books of a particular firm, along with its suppliers and creditors is thus not necessarily designed to prove that the company can pay up, or keep on its workforce. We do not peddle the SWP line that "they can afford it!"

Indeed in the next period we can expect increasing numbers of bosses to produce figures to show that they are bankrupt in capitalist terms and that "therefore" the workforce must sacrifice •jobs and living standards.

The open the books demand is the key to exposing the anarchic way in which the capitalist system works as a wholethe way in which the "losses" in one sector are the profits in another: and the haphazard way in which production takes place solely for private profit and in no way to satisfy social needs.

The opening of the books of supplier companies shows the exploitation of workers in every field of industry. In fighting to uncover such information the demand must be raised for occupation of the factory and office buildings concerned: thus in every way the 'open the books' demand links in to the fight for workers control over particular plants and the workings. of industry as a whole-with full access to all the necessary facts and figures.

This links in to our strategic demand for nationalisation without compensation under workers' management, as part of a planned socialist economy.

In the fight for such a perspective we stress the need for sections in struggle to link up with other sections of workers in councils of action, to generalise and extend strikes and occupations, fight for the removal of the Tories, and press forward the fight against the reformist Labour leaders and for a workers government.

In the public sector, too, the "viability" argument makes itself felt, as Labour "lefts" such as Ted Knight and others argue in favour of rate increases as an alternative to spending cuts.

Such rate increases will not only hit workers, but will also provide the basis for a monumental right wing backlash from infuriated middle class householders, forced to shoulder a massive increased burden of taxation.

At the same time the raising of rates seeks to avoid a confrontation with the Tory government: a confrontation that must take place if the cuts are really to be halted.

4. Cuts Our demand is for Labour councils to refuse to make cuts, to refuse to raise rates, to overspend as necessary and demand the necessary finance from the government, and to fight to mobilise full-scale supporting action from the working class to counter •any government reprisals: The only cuts that should be considered are cuts in interest payments on bank and other loans, and cuts in spending on "law and order"

In the health service we also call on AHAs-unrepresentative management bodies though they are-to follow the stand taken by Lambeth AHA in refusing to implement wholesale spending cuts.

But we place no faith in such bodies to withstand the Tory government and press the fight in health unions for action to defend services, manning levels and working conditions against attack, through strike action, occupations and supporting action as necessary. We fight to force the union leaders to call national strikes in support of sections in struggle against the cuts.

Similarly in education and the social services we must consistently pose concrete demands for the defence of jobs and services. The development of locally-based anti-cuts committees, drawing in trade school students around demands for the occupation of nurseries, community centres and other facilities threatened with closure -linked with supporting strike action, and for immediate walkouts in response to announcements of redundancies or cuts in statting, create the basis tor a political fight against the reformist leadership in the trade unions.

Our experience in the Soutt. Oxford Nursery Campaign has already provided invaluable in developing interventions into new areas which come into struggle. We must continue to deepen our experience of such practical struggles in order to sharpen, the edge of our programme of demands and develop politically those new layers who are drawn around us.

And to build broad support for cuts struggles within the labour movement in each area we fight for workers' inquiries to expose the impact of health and other public sector cuts, to show the scale of unmet needs in each area, to reveal the huge profits made from the NHS and local authorities by suppliers (most notably the drug companies) contractors and bankers, and to draw up workers' plans for an expanded welfare state under workers' management.

The scale of the protest marches on November 7 and November 28 1979 (despite the virtual absence of NALGO and NUPE members in comparison to the 1976 march), showed the potential that exists for widespread action against the cuts.

Rut the refusal of the public sector unions to advance this fight is shown equally clearly by the TUC's pathetic responsecalling a national demonstration on March 9 and a half-hearted "day of action" for May!

These dates are themselves carefully chosen in an attempt to separate completely the fight on the cuts from the steelworkers' struggle on pay and jobs.

Against this must be set the call by Yorkshire Trades Councils for a one-day General Strike on February 18, and the mounting militancy on jobs in South Wales, which has already forced a major one day stoppage and is still pressing for more action.

5. Basic Rights Nor is the TUC's record any better on the question of defending democratic rights. TUC leaders continue to chat amicably with Tory leaders as Prior's anti-union laws go forward.

And while thus conniving at the Tory attack on the closed shop, the last year has seen union officials prove yet again that they refuse to use the power of the unions to defeat the tin-pot anti-union employers.

The 1978 betrayals of unionisation battles at Desoutters, Grunwick and Trust House Forte hotels were followed by the 1979 sell-outs at Garners and Sandersons.

And in other instances where democratic rights have come under attack the response of the union leaders has been in some instances to make perfunctory protest gestures (Corrie Bill, racist laws) or, in some cases lin particular on the question of Ireland) actually to reinforce the attack. The censorship of news of the war in Ireland, and the repression of anti-imperialists under the PTA is comple. mented by the muzzling of discussion on Ireland by the bureaucracy within the ranks of the labour movement itself, and the role of the Labourites in introducing the PTA during the 1974 Wilson government.

The next period will see further Tory moves against long-established democratic rights. The extensive state surveillance of political opponents, as exposed in recent reports on phone-tapping and bugging, will be stepped up, alongside a domestic ''Cold l Nar" " witch-hunt against communists and socialists of every sort.

New laws to restrict demonstrations are already being planned: and the Tories' failure to carry their reactionary "Protection of Information." Bill will not deter them from takiny other legal and more insidious steps to intimidate journalists and trade unionists who might seek to expose state preparations for class war.

The muzzling of the Director of Public Prosecutions-forbidden to speak to the Parliamentary inquiry into deaths in police custody-and the cover-up in the Blair Peach case run alongside the strengthening of the police and its special detachments.

The fight to defend and extend. democratic rights, and against all forms of racist and sexual discrimination remains very much at the forefront of the tasks to be undertaken by revolutionaries in the months ahead. 6. Victimisations Even in workplaces where unionisation is well-established, the need to press through attacks on working conditions, coupled with the evident weakness and collaboration of trade union officials, have persuaded employers to press ahead with victimisations of leading trade unionists.

As the tidal wave of cuts and closures in the London hospitals began to gather pace, a succession of NUPE militants in West London hospitals were victimised; NUPE officials intervened, not to mobilise solid action in their defence, but to persuade them to take their cases through tortuous and time wasting appeals procedures and ACAS.

The outcome was a succession of defeats inflicteo on hospital workers more by their leaders than by management.

And at the Charing Cross Hospital, where a determined strike took place in response to the victimisation of two skilled maintenance workers, a national press witch-hunt, combined with conscious strikebreaking moves by doctors in the hospital were only a part of the opposition faced by strikers: the other side of the attack came from the AUEW Executive, which instructed them back to work!

This treachery from the union leadership is surpassed, however, by the attempts of the TGWU bureaucracy to carry through its own victimisation of a succession of militants-not only the Cowley 9, but also Colin Carty, deputy convenor at Export Packing Services, Banbury; and two lorry drivers from the giant 5/35 Branch (who had led an occupation of the union's Regional Office in a bid to force trade group secretary Alan Law into calling all-out strike action.

It was the successful Cowley 9 Defence Campaign which proved the key to rolling back these attacks and defending the basic rights of militants within the TGWU. The Campaign won support from over 200 leading militants throughout the Union, convened a highly successful conference in Cowley, and created impossible conditions for the bureaucracy to carry through their planned expulsions and banning from office The dropping of the charges against all but one of the Cowley 9 created conditions for an initiative from the Cowley Assembly Plant leadership in defence of Colin Carty. The outcome was a personal intervention from Moss Evans, who overruled the Region 5 Committee to vindicate Carty and restore his credentials. Shortly afterwards the charges against the lorry drivers were also quietly dropped.

But eisewhere victimisations are proceeding. The sacking in Southampton of shipyard militant Ginger' Pearse, who had successfully campaigned for rejection of a new productivity deal, was carried through by management with the assistance of EETPU officials, brought into the area to hold back action in his defence.

And in BL, of course, the sacking of Combine Committee Chairman Derek Robinson was coupled with moves by the AUEW Executive to sabotage the necessary all-out strike in his defence.

Amid the ironic spectacle of the TGWU bureaucracy having failed to victimise the Cowley 9 offering to call official action in Robinson's support, the AUEW leader eventually intervened to call off the struggle and set up an "inquiry" which has effectively damned Robinson even while formally declaring in his tavour.

There is no doubt that the atmosphere of witch-hunt and victimisation will continue in the unions in the next period of Tory government, as management in every sector look to ways of stemming the growing upsurge of anti-Tory militancy and breaking the spirit of the working class.

Nor is there any doubt that in such cases the key role in such attacks will continue to be played by the trade union bureaucracy, who themselves fear nothing more than the development of the independent strength of the working class and any kind of consistent revolutionary opposition.

In short, there is not a single arena of working class struggle where the sabotage and confusion wrought by the labour bureaucracy does not play a role in assisting the Tory offensive. The fight for the most basic rights calls in today's class struggle for the construction of a new, revolutionary leadership in the labour movement.

We must understand that the working class is facing massive problems without the development of such a leadership. Old methods of struggle have become hopelessly inadequate to today's conditions.

The effect of the betrayals of the leadership which we have catalogued, also have an accumulative effect. In short, it is a period where, despite the readiness of workers to struggle, there can be major setbacks and defeats for the working class.

We do not say that this outcome is inevitable. We do say that a revolutionary movement must be steeled against such events and must learn to be patient in the light of them.

Historically, major outbreaks of class struggle have often been preceeded by periods where the working class appeared on the retreat.

Failure to understand that such a period is one possibility, where the attacks of the employers and the government appear to be successful, will demoralise our comrades in the. way it can also demoralise layers of militant workers.

A clear grasp of this danger will ensure that the movement remains strong, undismayed and ready to lead to the offensive when the inevitable explosions reemerge.

Crisis in the Labour Party 1. The Crisis of the Right Wing.

The rejection by both the working class and the capitalists of Callaghan's reformist strategy for the crisis precipitated the May 1979 election, and paved the way for the return of the Tories.

Callaghan had staked all on a government-subsidised revival of capitalism at the expense of working living standards wage controls, rationalisation i of Ino Usty and public spending cuts were thus coupled to huge cash handouts to private industry, in the vain hope that this would provide an "expanding economy" within which, eventually, a few reforms could be conceded to the working class.

This approach relied heavily on the ability of the trade union bureaucracy to police their members, while employers. were to be enticed by government grants into so-called "planning agreements" and. new forms of class collaboration, such "worker participation"

But after three years of TUC-enforced wage cuts and the biggest fall in working class purchasing power for a century, anger exploded at the announcement of a 5% limit for Phase 4.

As shop-floor militancy threatened to escape the control of the bureaucracy, Callaghan found himself isolated by the TUC and defeated at the Labour conference. As he clung desperately on to his pay limits in the face of impossible odds, the uselessness of Callaghan's government to the capitalist class was clear: the Tories began an all-out offensive to prepare the ground for an election.

The 1979 election campaign saw Callaghan and the right wing still nailing their colours to the mast of wage controls, in a Manifesto that offered nothing to any potential Labour voters.

The entire Labour campaign was sustained only by frantic puffs of anti-Tory rhetoric, which connected with many workers' fears of a Thatcher

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! SOCIALIST PRESS, Wednesday 7 May 1980 Page 7 The Tories, on the other hand, in a shrewdly mounted campaign, cynically exploited the cuts, the unemployment and the inflation that they were to increase, and wooed the middle class and backward workers with anti-union and racist propaganda, backed up with promises of tax cuts. The result was a Tory parliamentary majority of 43.

Only after the defeat, crawling from the wreckage, came the Labour 'lefts', , who in the period up to the election had refused to lift a finger to fight for the removal of Callaghan or to publicly oppose his manifesto.

Detecting the shift of mood in the Party's rank and file that had emerged at the previous conference and in the winter's pay battles, Benn deserted the sinking Callaghan cabinet and joined the growing chorus of belated 'left' critics.

Callaghan suffered repeated NEC defeats from May to October, when the Party conterence inflicted a further major defeat on the right wing-this time on Party democracy.

But with local Labour Parties increasingly under pressure from a militant working class seeking a means of struggle against Tory cuts, closures and anti-union laws, the problem that faces the right wing is how to reassert their authority.

A successor to Callaghan must be found. And the fear of the capitalist press and the Labour right wing is that it might be a 'left' winger, who they feel will be susceptible to pressure from the rank and file. The dilemma is how to repress the left without splitting the party, since the danger that many right wingers fear is that they will wind up simply cutting off their nose to spite their face.

This is because in combatting elements within the Labour Party that are pressing for socialist policies, for Party democracy and for an end to the line of the reactionary Callaghan-Healey leadership, the right wing only has a choice of unsatisfactory options. minister William Rodgers, Labour's extreme right wing could simply proceed to split the party and attempt to establish along with Liberals and possibly a few 'left' Tories, a new 'centre" party free from any embarrassing links with the working class or socialist rhetoric.

This, too, is a major gamble, which would effectively hand over control of the Labour Party itself to the left wing and could well throw its advocates into a political limbo-denied votes from both working class Labour supporters and from hard line Tories.

This is plainly what concerns right wing spokesman David Owen in opposing this scheme and calling on the right to fight it out inside the Party.

The re-emergence of the tired old report by Labour's former National Agent Reg (now Lord) Underhill is another expression of this dilemma facing the would-be-witch-hunters.

"Militant' is an obvious target for the extreme right wing because of its considerable support, particularly : within Labour's youth movement, and its ostentatious socialist and even Trotskyist rhetoric.

For veteran anti-Communists like Underhill, the fact that Militant's outward political face is combined in practice with a stubborn refusal to carry out or support any serious struggle within the Labour Party for the removal of the Callaghan-Healey leadership is seen not as a reason for soft-peddling on a witchhunt, but as evidence of Militant supporters' perfidious and devious tactics!

The refusal by Militant even to lobby the January NEC meeting where Underhill's report was to be raised once more affirmed their refusal to struggle against the Labour bureaucracy.

It echoes their stance in the 1950s and 1960s when Grant activists against all right wing witch-hunts, and against bans and proscriptions on socialists.

Instead the fire must be directed at the crypto-Tory right wing that stands opposed to the fight to bring down Thatcher, and unashamedly committed to a programme of class compromise and betrayal.

And in demanding that they wage a serious struggle for the removal of the right wing, it is possible to expose to workers the empty demagogy of many Labour 'lefts'.

2. The Lefts' Balancing Act The onset of mass struggles against the Tory government-in particular in the winter months -has brought a change in the outward behaviour of Labour's "lefts' • They have begun to appear on picket lines and, in some cases, to call on strikers to defy court rulings.

Heffer at the recent Young Socialists unemployment rally called upon anti-socialist right wingers to leave the Labour Party. And, in a very significant move, the most left of the 'lefts' Arthur Scargill, appears to have ended his long-term fence-sitting exercise and to have begun the serious if belated preparation of moves through the Labour Party to oust butcher Mason from his NUM-sponsored Barnsley constituency.

Such developments should come as no surprise to WSL members who have followed our consistent analysis of the Labour 'lefts' as forces that emerge at times when the working class moves forward and that seek to contain that forward movement within 'Parliamentary, reformist channels.

It is conspicuous that, even after the lessons of the defeat of Heath, Labour 'lefts' such as Allaun and Heffer still now call ior the Tories to be "brought down' not by industrial action, but by mass protests. And Benn chose the middle of the steel strike to get up and deliver an eight-point speech spelling out an entirely reformist perspective.

Yet the changed mood in 'radical' sounding versions of Callaghan's own class collaborationist policies.

Where Callaghan proposes wage controls linked to cash handouts to industry through the NEB, the Tribunite 'left' propose no wage controls, but even more cash handouts to industry., through the NEB.

Where Callaghan opposes nationalisation, of basic industries, the 'lefts' also oppose complete nationalisation; but advocate 'state shareholdings' in major induștries.

And where Callaghan calls for sacrifice of workers' living standards 'in the national interest' ¡ the 'lefts' idea of the 'national interest'. leads them to propose a nationalist policy of import controls, in an attempt to export unemployment overseas.

It is necessary to expose the political bankruptcy of these '"lefts' to the growing number of working class militants who in the next period will look to Benn, Heffer or Skinner as an alternative to Callaghan.

Such exposure requires both propaganda for a consistent programme of transitional demands, and the placing of demands on the 'lefts' which can reveal the limits of their political opposition to Callaghan, and show workers the necessity for a new, revolutionary leadership.

At a time when thousands of new members are joining the Labour Pärty looking for a lead in the struggle against the Tories, we can expect that the conditions for such political intervention will remain good in the months ahead.

Not until the outcome of Callaghan's inner-party inquiry -and possibly not even thenwill the right wing make any definitive move against socialists within the party. They must orepare the ground carefully for any splits or witch-hunts if they are not to risk losing crucial union block votes and affiliations in the process.

The fact that Communist Party members played the leading role in setting up and running the right wing witchhunt against Fryer and Thornett in Cowley, while at the same time heading off any serious political fight in defence of Derek Robinson, spells out unmistakeably the way the rightward evolution of the CP has continued under its "Eurocommunist" leadership since our last conference.

We noted in our 1979 Perspectives the way in which at Garners the Stalinists had been engaged in 'every one of the bureaucratic manoeuvres designed to hold back mobilisation of the forces of the trade unions and to collaborate with the police'. And our document drew attention to the crucial role played by Derek Robinson in averting a possible move for occupation of the threatened BL plant at Speke.

Since then, the Garners strike has been finally sold out, and the CP's long line of betrayals on jobs has extended with the capitulation of the CP-led stewards at BL's Park Royal plant to Edwardes' closure plan, and the abject failure of the Stalinists in the shipbuilding industry to support and spread the struggle against closure by the workforce at the Robb Caledon yard.

The rightward movement of the CP has also been noticeable in ASTMS, where the sizeable Stalinist votes were cast in favour of Clive Jenkins' increasingly right wing policies, and in the CPSA, where the 'Broad Left'-led Executive offers as little lead against the cuts as any other union bureaucracy.

But the reactionary role of the Stalinists could scarcely be more clearly demonstrated than in the AUEW in the wake of the victimisation of leading Stalinist Derek Robinson. With 350 branches readily joining in a rank and file condemnation of the treachery of Duffy and the Executive Council, the key question is clearly to press home the political offensive.

Yet the CP only in the vaguest terms took up the correct campaign by the SWP for a ballot under rule to remove the entire Executive. And instead of pin-pointing the betrayal carried out by Duffy and the EC, Robinson toured the country giving the impression that official action in his support was a foregone conclusion, even while the EC post poned its decision and dropped heavy hints that it intended to do nothing.

Meanwhile, the CP-led 'Broad Left' in the AUEW has.

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unionists, tenants' associations, parents action groups and

NUPE says: NUPE £60

ENA STRIKE