[To: DEPARTMENT OF EMF Diagram 4 since last…]

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To: DEPARTMENT OF EMF Diagram 4 since last year and are now running at over 1000 a day.

The fourth is more indirect. It is the result of Thatcher's savage spending cuts, instituted partly in order to allow the government to ease the financial situation of at least the strongest sections of capital and so help British capital back to profitability.

All these developments are leading suddenly to a drop in jobs available for a growing labour force, In Table 1 this can be seen in more detail.

This shows that for a decade (and indeed before that as well) there has been a dramatic fall in jobs in industry, especially the manufacturing industries which have been the historical begetters of the British working class.

Until, very recently this decline was offset by an increase in the number of jobs in service industries, especially in the state sector.

Now the Tory government is reducing these jobs too.

So, the decline of industrial jobs s continues without any compensating employment elsewhere, and the result is the present upsurge of mass unemployment.

There are other aspects of =e 5u5 sonomic situation no at the Tory government's Enoric strategy which are, raun; = sons effect.

One of these is the high level of interest rates, designed "LOYMENT - 16 to curb the growth of credit.

These also have a crippling financial effect on those sectors of capitalist industry which are only able to survive on loans from the banks.

High interest hastens the death of such firms and redundancies for their workers.

Also the Thatcher government's policy of keeping up the international value of the pound (partly the result of high rates of interest) means that the weaker British capitalists are finding it increasingly hard to compete with other producers in overseas markets or with imports into Britain.

Thatcher's policies thus demonstrate a ruthless willingness to destroy the weaker sections of the class • she represents in order to improve the survival power of the rest of British capital.

And, of course, the by-product of that process of restructuring of British capital is the heartless destruction of the livelihood of hundreds of thousands of workers.

For the Tories mass unemployment is no mere by-product. They also hope that it will be one of their main weapons in taming the working class. • But the growth of mass unemployment in Britain is not an solated matter, even though some of its causes are special national ones.

Continued next week

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On Saturday August 30, there is te be a one-day conference in Leeds "to go Beyond the Fragments". In advance of this, Socialist Press is publishing two reviews of thẹ book which has sold nearly 10,000 copies, and formed a major topic of discussion on the left. The first, shorter review is by Socialist Press supporter Diane Palmer. The second, more extended analysis by Mary Wilson will be published in next week's Socialist Press. Wednesday 20 August 1980

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