Tuc New Rule Democracy Under Fire

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THE 24 issues TH E WORLD £1.50 £3.00 ••••• ..16.00 out a subscription to Socialist ... issues, I enclose E 31, Dartmouth Park Hill, Lon WORKERS Each day now seems to produce new attacks upon trade union democracy from the various wings of the TUC bureaucracy. Communist Party members have now threatened to use the TUC's new Trades Councils Rule 14 to exclude opponents on the left from Islington Trades At the Islington AGM, the Stalinists adopted the rule without even a vote stating that it was "mandatory" • Even before it had been discussed, the President attempted to prevent a delegate from attacking the Council's abominable record over the past year - threatening to exclude him from the Trades Council because he was "disrupting" the meeting.

Ironically, the Council had earlier in the year refused to rule that fascists would not be allowed to represent union branches at the Trades Counci.

During the same meeting, the CP dominated executive refused four delegates from NATHE voting rights, because the treasurer had "mislaid" their affiliation fees, and in a crude manoeuvre to prevent election of a new secretary ruled that this post was not elected at AGMs, but only when the sitting secretary retired.

It is ironic that the rules used by the CP to prevent discussion today CP themselves in the thirties. "Black were used by the TUC against the In 1934 the TUC Circulars" were used to exclude Communists of the Minority Movement from the Trades Councils, thus removing from union branches their right to choose their own delegates in their own way.

The TUC, then as now, saw the Trades Councils as part of the chain of command by which the leaderBy fighting to make the Trades Councils "the local coordinating and unifying centres of the working class organisations" and fashioning them into "weapons of struggle the Minority Movement, despite the limitations of Stalinist politics posed a real threat to the bureaucracy.

The outcry at this crude censorship amongst the trade unions threatened the ability of the TUC to get the circulars accepted and Ernest Bevin was forced to fabricate a new reason for their introduction, that "delegates were being sent from unions to these bodies, who continually obstructed, and men who gave up their time to do the business of these bodies could not get beyond the Minutes" . In this way the circulars were forced through.

Now in 1976, with the TUC called upon again to hold back workers' militancy, the modern equivalent of the black circulars have again been issued. The new Rule 14 which Trades Councils have been asked to adopt (one clause is optional, the other mandatory) is intended for use against political opposition which challenges the TUC's class collaborationist policies.

There is however, one major difference between the new Rule 14 and the black circulars. The latter were intended for use against the Communist Party. Today, as the TUC's introduction to the new rule makes clear, the target is the militants and revolutionaries to the left of the Communist Party, while the CP is the agency that is used by the TUC to attack these militants.

The new clause which prevents Trades Councils from cooperating with any organisation whose Pongress is interded to thosent to prevent Trades Councils from cooperating even with the Cuts Committees expenditure cuts.

Nevertheless the refusal of Camden and Westminster Trades Councils to accept either clause of the new rule shows that the resistance amongst the Trades Councils and even some CP members, to the witch hunting, will be as strong as it was in the thirties.

Of course, "democratic" procedures do not inhibit the CP and right-wing when they risk defeat.

In the Oxford Trades Council AGM a rump grouping of 15 rightwingers and Stalinists walked out, led by Stalinist Trades Council President Joe Richards, after failing to carry a majority against continuing the meeting. Even some right-wingers were unable to support this move, and stayed even after Richards had declared the AGM 'closed'.

The walk-out followed repeated refusals by Richards to reveal to delegates what had taken place at a conspiratorial "special Trades Council meeting" held by selected CP and right-wing delegates half-anhour before the AGM.

It later emerged that they had voted unconstitutionally for a rule change restricting Trades Council to monthly instead of fortnightly meetings.

These upheavals in Oxford are no accident - they flow from a prolonged fight against the CP and the right-wing by WSL and other delegates and for a Trades Council demonstration against Wilson's spending cuts.

Confronted with a clear majority against their acceptance of the cuts, the bureaucracy and their political allies could only seek themselves to disrupt and stage provocations to impede any local action.

Despite these manoeuvres, 34 delegates from a wide range of unions stayed to agree overwhelmingly to press ahead with organising the demonstration against the cuts, to take place next