How The unexpected happened

Scan page 10

Resistered as a newspaper at the Post Office. Signed articles do not necessarily represent the views of the Workers Socialist League By Friday Walesa was forced to go along with the movement and make the call for a national strike on Saturday.

Strikes of industrial workers have also been taking place during the week over the demand for a "Rural Solidarity" of péasants and farmworkers.

Cont'd p. 2, col. 6 Walesa This was how Tom Jackson of the Union of Communications Workers described the trouncing of the right wing at the Special Conference of the Labour Party last weekend.

The defeat for the right wing was of course a reflection of the growing demands for democracy arising from the Party's rank and file.

But in a more immediate sense it arose from two most unlikely quarters-the High Court and the casting of union block votes. The right wing were hoise for once from their own petard.

*The High Court stepped in to issue an injunction preventing the AUEW leadership from acting at the last minute to remove left winger Jock MacPherson Quinn from the 35strong delegation.

This meant that instead of the anticipated 17-17 right/ left division-in which Terry Duffy would. have used his casting vote, Boyd and Duffy were faced with an 18-17 majority for the left.

This in turn ruled out any tactical flexiblity for the AUEW delegation in the use of its 928,000 votes to block democratisation of the Labour As soon as the AUEW's proposal to give 75% of electoral college votes to the PLP had bitten the dust, Duffy was forced to abstain-and watch the left cruise to victory.

*Meanwhile the delegation from the right wingled shopworkers' union USDAW found itself in the embarrassing and unaccustomed position of spearheading the left wing offensive at the conferencé. The USDAW leadership's hopes of withdrawing their motion-calling for 40% of votes to the unions, 30% to the PLP and 30% to constituency parties-were dashed as unions and CLPs got up to withdraw their own resolutions in favour of USDAW.

With USDAW locked into the left and the AUEW locked out by its own failed manoeures the 40/30/30 formula steered its way narrowly to victoryto the horror of Jackson and others. made by the Tory government to the 'H' Block prisoners, the release of the critically ill republican prisoner Pauline McLaughlin and the still undisclosed content of the top level talks between the Thatcher and Haughey governments have whipped the Loyalists into a frenzy of hostility based on insecurity.

The result has been growing in-fighting among the Loyalist leaders, and an escalation of Loyalist violence against leaders of the anti-imperialist struggle.

But with the partial success and resulting ebb of the 'H' Block campaign, the republican movement is now left without any focus for its agitation.

It lacks. a programme of democratic and transitional demands designed to mobilise mass action on such problems as factory closures, redundancies, social service cuts, and falling living standards-which are the symptoms of imperialist rule in Ireland.

The result is that increasingly the political initiative is falling into the hands of reactionand a reversion to guerrillaism by the IRA (as opposed to the necessary armed defence of the Catholic minority against the Loyalist murder gangs) can only make this situation worse.

If the struggle is to go forward from the partial victory of the H' Block fight, then the development of a programme for working class action against imperialism is essential. The republican leaders plainly have no grasp of this.

This is why a revolutionary Marxist party is vitally needed to advance the struggles of the Irish people.

----- pull-quotes -----

«A situation which, quite frankly, we didn't expect."