Women bear brunt oi iobs crisis

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Is 'People's Fronts Send to: WSL, BM Box 5277, Lons Socialist on bureaucracy.

The TUC meetings in h 1932 and 1933 were tected from hunger chers by rows of police. Between 1932 and 1936 TUC bureaucrats tried to blish 'unemployed comtees' through the trades ncils.

When they worked at all, ie committees provided rts facilities for the mployed and did nothing improve their conditions. Meanwhile the big (ches organised by the NM grew stronger and ager.

The Hunger March of fary February 1934 was ned by the TUC but i widespread support. • series of demonstrajes all over the world e declared to be the main Dy.

They were said to be tal fascist'-worse than Nazis because they were ists in disguise.

Communist Parties prea policies of forming • trade unions" , splitting from the old trade ens, and splitting the king class at a time ot "Changed" it was this policy that ted the victory of Hitler -ermany -something the tions early in 1935 again won no support from the trade union bureaucracy.

The Times spoke of the spirit of 1926' and the government was compelled to introduced a 'standstill order' on cuts in benefit.

The largest mobilisation of all was the 1936 National Hunger March which was addressed by Labour leader Clem Attlee when it arrived in London.

The 'Jarrow Crusade' of the same year was consciousmilitant, seeking supvor from vicars, Conservatives and others and pleading with the National' One problem it had despite this was undisguised hostility from the TUC. of democracy Du: ice » a anybody who declarad bezselves anti-aris:

In Britain this led both to the praising of Churchill agains! Chamberlain and also to the inclusion of the Church:

•We el ha: the whole working das movement should comrine to call mass conferenes of all social, Christian and political organisations in these depressed areas, 1o rally all forces. young and old. to consider the blign: a the youth and whet d27 = 100 2 5V2 them. " ¡ Rake the Banne: Hish quoted Blick The NUWM had many achievements to its credit in improving the lot of the unemployed.

Its CP leadership weakened its impact in the 'ultra left' phase after 1927 and then when it ceased after 1934 to campaign for working class mobilisations.

Harassment The unemployed marchers were subject to frequent and violent police harassment.

Hannington himself found a number of agents provocateurs at meetings and demonstrations and the National Council for Civil Liberties was specifically set• up in 1934 because of the he Socialis: Party, the Communis: Party, and the bourgoOD Radical Party.

I: put or*ard cag vitalist solutions and althoug h the working class made CLULL omic gains the mass ment was driven back.

Repression

In Spain the Popular Front government from February to July 1936 which included the CP and the "Republican" bourgeois parties carried out the repression of workers and falled strikers.

of such people.

What Hannington did not know at the time, but has been clearly shown since then, was that the Special Branch had an agent in the top leadership of the movement who attended all the planning meetings and demonstrations and reported back in detail.

The new marchers are to be welcomed, and the Peoples March is the first officially sponsored even of its kind.

However, the question must still be raised: who will fight for the policies to mobilise the unemployedalong with those in work to defeat the system that has forced them onto that long road to London? the land. The army in these areas was immobilised and their arms issued to the workers. The policy of the leadership in these areas was that their policies-particularly land to the peasantsshould be opened all over Spain. This could appeal to Franco's mainly peasant soldier base.

What did the Popular Front do in the time of civil war? Just as in peacetime it ordered the peasants to give back their land so as not to antagonise their landowner "supporters"

It moved to end the control of the militia by the If married women didn't work, as Tory ministers and some labour movement figures have suggested, the number of families living in poverty would treble.

•Women don't work for pin money. Hundreds and thousands of women are their family's only breadwinner.

Besides that, women need the money anyway. Rents and rates have gone up, gas and electricity bills up, school dinners (if you're lucky enough to live in an area where they haven't been cut altogether) have gone up.

Lots of local services that used to be tree now cost money. Then what's left for food and clothing?

The Tories want to put the main burden of unemployment onto women. They say that married women ought to stay at home looking after the kids.

BUT *48% of pre-school kids have no garden or outdoor of the working class, ularly the Trotskyists.

In Spain the GPU liquidated the oppositionists. In France and Britain they were beaten up and declared to be "fascists"

The People's Front policy of the CPs was ended in 1939 with the signing of the Stalin Hitler Pact (so much for the lessons of the fight against fascism!)

Then in 1941 it was resurrected because the Moscow Stalinists were now aligned once more with the bourgeoisie of Britain and France against Germany following the German play area. They'd be better in a good nursery-and 96% of mothers want nursery places for their kids.

*Children cooped up in cramped housing with depressed, frustrated mothers are a far cry from the cosy family image we get from the advertisers and the Tory government.

*3½4 million kids are living on or below the poverty line. If that number trebles, how can that be good for the kids?

And most of all, women want to have jobs. We want to get out of the home, learn skills, have careers, take part in workplace trade unionism, and have the independence of our own wage packet.

We want the burdens of housework to be shared equally. We don't want to be just housekeepers dependent on a man's wage.

And that's our right!

The economic laws of capitalism decree that workers are employed only if they yield a profit-and the rest go on the dole.

But we don't accept that system. Society should be Please send in Socialist Leag Name .

Address reorganised so that everyone has the right to a decent, useful job.

We say: fight for jobs for all. Accepting that there's•a shortage of jobs, and then trying to keep the few there are for men, just plays into the hands of the Tories and the bosses.

FIGHT BACK NOW!

Cut the hours not the jobs! Work sharing with no loss of pay.

Campaign against overtime working. Let's have a decent basic wage instead and share out the work.

Occupy Don't let the union officials negotiate closures. Occupy to stop closures like the Lee Jeans workers. If we accept redundancy money that's the job gone for ever.

Get_your organisation, Labour Party or trade union to support the call from the Women's Festival for the TUC to organise a mass demonstration for à Woman's Right to Work.

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