New Attack on Bl Stewards Movement

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British Leyland management have launched what is effectively a new strategy to break up and neutralise the shop stewards movement in their plants.

These proposals involve the establishment of a National Co A meeting took place last Saturday of the BL Combine Shop Stewards Committee.

During the period of «Workers Participation" in BL it used to meet in working hours, and drew convenors from almost all plants throughout BL Cars and the heavy vehicle divisions.

It met on a Saturday this. time because Michael Edwardes has threatened to sack any steward or convenor who attends a combine committee The four-week strike by nine NUJ members at Robert Maxwell's Pergamon Press headquarters in Oxford continues solid.

Last week saw the first issue of a strike bulletin, distributed on the gates to the large number of staff still working.

The bulletin, which carefully answered a management-sponsored open letter to the local press, won an immediate response.

Staff came out at lunchtime to discuss with pickets and new recruitment was reported by both APEX and NGA chapels inside Pergamon.

The strikers have also circulated an appeal for support to Labour Parties nationally, in an effort to bring additional pressure to bear on Maxwell, the millionaire Labourite who pays wages and conditions that come almost bottom of the league in the field of journals production.

•Strikers will also be campaigning for broader NUJ support at the union's conference in Norwich.

Donations and messages of support should be sent to the strike committee, c/o 5, Union Street, Oxford.

Reconstrust the Fourth Internotional l No. 1 Nov. 1979 . DISCUSSION BULLETIN 60p The Transitional Programme in Today's Class Struggle The founding programmatic document of the Trotskyist International Liaison Committee.

Available, price 80p

including postage, from WSL, BM Box 5277, London WCIN 3XX Joint Negotiating Committee comprising of 23 members-one national officer from each of the eleven unions in BL and 12 others appointed by the executives of the various unions, most which will be full time officials. ' The document meeting inside working hours.

Combine Committee chairman Jack Adams has been disciplined-being given a final warning from BL-for attending one of the two meetings the onceactive committee has held over the past two years.

After some discussion, the meeting took the important decision to reactivate the committee and to meet on Saturdays once every two months.

This will provide a forum for BL stewards which has not existed since "participation" was pushed through by the Communist Party in 1976.

Destruction

Reports from the individual plants more than confirmed the near destruction of the previously stropg shop floor movement through the effective policy of "participation" followed up by a management offensive.

57,000 jobs have gone in BL since Edwardes took over, mostly through voluntary The determined pay strike by 1900 dockworkers continues to paralyse all ship movement in Southampton.

And the act of the Docks Board management in transforming the dispute into a total lock-out has not intimidated the workforce one iota.

Indeed the call by dock stewards for wider labour movement support is fast gathering momentum.

Last week saw action, from five militant South Wales portsBarry, i Newport, Cardiff, Swansea and Port Talbot-as these workers backed their colleagues with a series of 24hour strikes.

All ships diverted to nearby Portsmouth have also been declared blacked' by stevedore and transport union stewards while NUR members "are refusing to offload at the container terminals.

Hull and Liverpool stewards are also pledged to action in the event of TGWU leaders giving the strike official status while flying pickets were canvassing for support at Ipswich and other eastern ports.

However union bureaucrats at national level are already seeking ways to sabotage thé dispute and retard workers' attempts to mobilise for an all-out confrontation with the employer. i new discipline procedure which gives BL the right of summary dismissal for what they choose to define as "gross industrial misconduct"

But politically the most damaging aspect of the document is that it becomes a part of BL workers' contract of redundancy and closures.

In Beans Industries, for. example-a part of the BL combine producing componentsthe workforce has been decimated by compulsory redundancies carried out on a selective basis.

Management selected most of the militants, nearly all of the shop stewards plus the convenor for the sack. They have all gone without resistance.

Compulsory redundancies have taken place at Drews Lane amongst. indirect workers without resistance and now management are preparing for compulsory redundancy amongst directs.

At SU, Carburettors, the convenot was sacked for attending a trade union meeting and then reinstated without recognition as a trade union representative.

In heavy vehicles it js even worse. Most plants -are on one day a week and the trading position " is worsening all the time.

spreads Even as Docks Board officials brazenly announced plans to axe 250 dockers jobs, regional secretary John Ashman (IGWU) was accepting overtures from ACAS for meaningful talks' on Monday next.

The strike is now in its most crucial phase. The workforce must reject any compromise hatched between union leaders and BTDB employers.

Defend industry

: Further, they must demand that TGWU and NUR leaders defend this nationalised industry against any rationalisation programme outlined in the government's Transport Bill.

The transfer of BTDB assets into the new British Ports Company offers workers no respite from attacks on their jobs or working agreements.

The hiving off of two unprofitable dry docks has merely been the prelude to further rundown and selling out to private profiteers.

The only way to guarantee even existing conditions is to force this struggle into every section of BTD under the following programme:

*No sackings or redundancies-work sharing on full pay!

*No closures-open BTDB books to elected union committees!

*Renationalise BTD under workers control!

*Prepare a general kick out the Tories! : employment-a move which effectively means that it is legally binding.

Since it contains a new disputes procedure, this is also tantamount to a no strike clause since if a worker went on unofficial strike or otherwise broke the disputes procedure The projected market foI heavy lorries this year 51,000 units-a year's work for only one plant.

Compulsory redundancy has taken place at the biggest plant in Leyland, Lancashire, but at the Albion works management backed off after a mass meeting voted to resist compulsory redundancy.

Finally the meeting discussed the victimisations in Longbridge in January.

Jim Denham, one of the victimised stewards, spoke about the victimisations and proposed that the Combine convene a conference of BL stewards discuss the increasing victimisations in BL and the response to them.

Jack Adams, from the chair -who had been very reluctant to allow Denham to speakrefused to allow any motions or proposals on the issue, ruling that they will have to be put on the agenda of the next meeting.

On Friday 27 March, parents and supporters of Beal Street Play Centre occupied the building. The parents and supporters timed their entry to the play centre to coincide with the finish of the children's farewell party at 3.55 p.m.

The play centre staff were given a notice that it was a legal occupation and notices were posted on the doors and windows.

The matron immediately rang up County Hall. Staff continued with their usual duties until the last children had been collected and then left.

During this time the local policeman popped by, read the notice, and said, "That's fine, good luck. that worker would be in breach of his or her contract of employment.

Whilst the document is presented as a 'Discussion Document" submitted by management it was in fact the subject of a secret meeting between BL and the national officers of the major unions early in March.

Almost certainly there had been discussions earlier than that.

Ken Cure, right wing Executive Councilman of the AUEW responsible for BL met AUEW convenors last Thursday to discuss the document.

He refused to take a vote on it, saying he simply "wanted to get the flavour of the meeting" which is another way of saying that he will decide what the meeting thought.

He admitted that there had been some amendments as a result of trade union involvement but denied trade union involvement in its drafting. • He said that BL had requested that the document be published as a joint document, but they had refused. But the management approach suggests that there had been enough trade union involvement and agreement to make it a viable proposition.

WhenAutomotive national officer Grenville Hawley met the TGWU convenors, however, there was a vote, and the document was unanimously rejected after pressure from the At about 5.15 the Director of Social Services, Brian Rice, arrived.

He was not allowed into the building and had to speak to the parents on the door step. • He was worried about "damage to the equipment" and said that someone should bé in the building at all times in case of vandalism!

He was reassured on both points. He then said that he would have to inform the press that the mentally handicapped group would now be unable to use the building.

He was informed that this would not be the case since all the groups that previously used the building would be more than welcome to continue to do so.

Th 3XX. convenors.

The meeting reaffirmed its existing policy of a JNC comprised of elected delegates from the plants on the hasis of one delegate per 1,000 workers. This is a policy which arose after mass meetings condemned the existing undemocratic JNC structure following the sell-out of last year's wage review.

A meeting of the BL Shop Stewards Combine Committee held last Saturday joined the, TGWU convenors in totally rejecting the document. ;

Ihis does not mean that Edwardes will back off. If there is tacit behind-the-scenes agreement with the national officers he will exploit it to the full.

BL workers could soon be faced with the imposition of the document by BL or a recommendation for its acceptance by national officials-or both.

THE

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