NuJ delegates duck Tameside fight

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Around 100 trade unionists and socialists joined a vociferous lobby of the TUC on Wednesday, demanding the reinstatement of the disaffiliated Tameside Trades Council.

Shouting "Troops Out, Tameside In" , they marched on the Congress from the rail station and harangued delegates during the lunch break.

Tameside was struck off the TUC's list of recognised Trades Councils for the "crime" of convening a labour movement conference on Ireland with republican speakers.

But the lobby took place a full 24 hours after the NUJ delegation had ratted on its mandate to demand a reference back of the section of the TUC General Council Report which endorsed the Tameside disaftiliation.

The NUJ Annual Delegate Meeting in April had condemned the TUC move. The union's delegation to the TUC had designated 'left' talking full time official Mike Bower to move the reference back.

But as the crucial clause 88 of the TUC Report was reached in the morning of Tuesday, Bower and his fellow delegates raised not a whisper.

Conference President Terry Parry eagerly moved on-and the disaffiliation of Tameside went by 'on the nod' Questioned later by angry lobbyers NUJ delegates professed ignorance that the section of the Report had been taken-even though it was clearly scheduled for that morning.

Of course the likelihood of this being a simple "mistake" is negligible: nobody gets elected as a delegate to the TUC without being well-versed in following through Annual Reports in union conferences.

The fact is that the delegation clearly had no wish to raise the issue of Tameside and avoided doing so -in defiance of their own mandate.

As a result the TUC has set a substantial precedent in muzzling labour movement debate on Ireland-and hung a threatover every Trades Council for the next period.

The campaign for the reinstatement of Tameside however has won the support of over 46 Trades Councils and dozens of union branches.

It must continue to press for the ending of labour movement censorship on the Irish war and to oppose bureaucratic moves to "reorganise" Tameside Trades Council. REINSTATE TAMESIDE DES EI Capitalism rests on production for private profit. The main productive forces are held by powerful monopoly cliques (banks, multinationals) Capitalist states are pliant tools in the hands of these cliques.

The magnates of monopoly capitalism stand above the official organs of state power (government, courts, armed forces), controlling these organs from their commanding heights in the economy.

The opportunist labour bureaucrats scurry around the footstool of state power, creating support for it within the working class.

The imperialist powers and their agents are armed to the teeth in order to protect the power and profits of monopoly capital.

The growth of class struggle and the sharpening of rivalries between capitalist nations under the impact of economic crisis are the driving forces in the current military build-up.

Without working class revolution that tears state power and domination of the economy from the hands of monopoly capital, wars are inevitable.

Calling for disarmament without linking it to the socialist revolution is not just utopian. In the hands of reformists and Stalinists it is a weapon aimed at blocking the necessary preparation for the working class revolution, at paralysing the revolutionary will of the working class and demoralising it in the face of a supposedly all-powerful bourgeoisie.

In order to disarm the bourgeoisie, the working class

Obstacle

To' achieve the workers' revolution, a revolutionary programme and leadership must first be built in the working class. An immediate obstacle to this is the slogan of disarmament peddled by the reformists and Stalinists.

Revolutionaries must fight for a programme of transitional demands around the question of capitalist militarism to be taken up in the working class.

The first condition for a successtul fight by the advanced workers against the grip of the existing leadership over the working class, is that they be armed with such a programme.

*No to the armaments programme! No cuts in public services! For a massive job-creating programme of useful public works and services under workers' control.

*Nationalise the arms and nuclear industries and their suppliers under workers' control.

*Build workers defence squads against police, army and fascist attack.

*Disband the capitalist armed forces (including US armed forces in Britain). For a workers militia.

*No secret diplomacy *Build independent working člass action in support of mass struggles against world imperialism, and in defence of the degenerated and deformed workers states. British troops out of Ireland.

*Prepare a general strike to bring down the bosses government of Thatcher. For a workers government.