Swedish Workers Defeat Bosses' Offensive

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workers everywhere: united a revolutionary leadership that class action can stem and defeat is prepared to mobilise such The task in the next period such struggles with the objective is to construct in every country of establishing workers' Mass struggles are also erupting in Denmark with demonstrations against the closure of The 6.8-7.3% wage increases won by Swedish workers in the settlement of their massive wage struggles may not seem huge. But they represent a severe blow at the strategy of the employers, and may yet result in the fall of the right wing government.

The Swedish TUC had put forward an 11% pay claim in the centralised wage negotiations. The employers responded by arguing they could not afford to pay any increase at all.

When the unions began selective strike action by some 25,000. workers, the Swedish employers' federation, the SAF, locked out over 700,000 private sector workers.

"Mediators" in the dispute came forward with a 2.3% pay offer. The employers agreed to this figure, but the unions. combatting an inflation rate of 7.5% responded by calling out a further 100,000 workers.

The right wing government of Thorbjorn Falldin attempted to pressurise union leaders into accepting the 2.3% offer by promising a price freeze until the end of the year.

But this too was rejected as inadequate and with the whole economy, including fuel supplies, grinding to a halt, the employers were over a barrel.

A new mediators' report was called for-which recommended wage increases of 6.8% in the private sector and 7.3% for local authority workers, together with food subsidies and: tax concessions for the low paid. This offer-more than treble the initial mediators' proposalwas accepted both by the unions and by the government. The employers, having at first rejected it as "harmful to industry and the economy" caved in, accepted the deal and called off the lockout. Their tough stance bloody defeat.

Already the recriminations have begun in the bosses' camp: sections of employers are questioning why the aggressive stance--a clear breach from the methods of class collaboration and compromise that have prevailed in Sweden since the 1930s-was adopted in the first instance.

Others are now looking with trepidation to the future now that class divisions have been sharpened to historic levels, and Swedish workers have recognised the potential strength they have in their hands.

Such is the feuding. that seems likely to erupt in the capitalist camp that there are doubts as to whether the Falldin government could survive a Parliamentary vote of confidence.

The lesson is clear not only for Swedish workers but for the employers' offensive. parks and against police violence Volvo production line action, and to carry through