Scanlon Pol Ces Pay Laws Ryder, Threat Used

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in a cold-blooded attack on the working class. Last week, strike leaders at British Leyland plants in the Midlands, who have been in action against the pay laws of the Labour government, were hauled before the full AUEW Executive Council. There they were pressured, by the blackmailing provisions of the Ryder Report, into making recommendations which resulted in a return to work.

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Scanlon acted enthusiastically to enforce the pay laws which are central to the attacks of the Labour government on the living standards of the working class; so enthusiastically that the capitalist press fell over itself to sing his praises.

The Daily Telegraph, possibly the clearest voice of the employers, pointed out that Scanlon and his Executive: "have taken unprecedented steps to exert their authority and order four groups of strikers back to work" "For a union which initially opposed the £6 limit and all forms of wage restraint, they have acted most energetically in enforcing it"

DIFFERENT

This is very different language from that used against Scanlon on the occasions when he has defended the working class. It is the direct opposite of the attacks by the media which followed his use of his President's casting vote to call the whole AUEW out on strike and defeat the National Industrial Relations Court in 1974.

Yet it was in that very period, mid-1974, that today's betrayals began. Even while opposing the NIRC, Scanion allowed the AUEW/TASS motion of oppos movement in struggle against Imperialism. ition to the reactionary social contract to be withdrawn at the special conference of the TUC. He led the AUEW in abstaining on the vote, and the social contract was endorsed.

Scanlon's "opposition" to Wilson's pay policy was a fraud from the start.

"OPPOSITION"

The whole time the AUEW was in "opposition" to the social contract not a finger was lifted to support any section of workers who opposed the pay laws. But no sooner had the right-wing swung the AUEW in support of wage controls than Scanlon acted vigorously to enforce it.

This is why the employers now gloat as Scanlon does their job openly for them.

The strikes of the British Leyland skilled men were of great political significance. They represented the growing opposition in the working class to the attacks of the Labour government. It is for this reason that the forces ranged against them were so great.

To bring the local leaders of a group of workers on strike, whilst all the pressures of the media are on them, in front of a full meeting of the Executive Council is entirely unprecedented.

-Pressure can be brought to bear under these conditions which only a leadership with the clearest pol-itical perspective could resist.

And to force a return to work, Scanlon used all the techniques and rationalisations developed for that purpose.

He argued that workers must sacrifice in order to make the employer "viable"; that opposithopeles overcause poly was, because ther get not support from the union; and finally, he used the threat prepared by the architects of the Ryder plan - if you refuse to return to work, then the next cash injection of £100 million, due in August, would be withheld and Leyland would go into liquidation.

Thus, in order to police the pay laws, Scanion utilises the full weight of the provisions of the Ryder Report.

STAGES

These provisions divide the government's cash payments to Leyland into stages with each stage conditional on substantial increases in productivity and a reduction in disputes.

In this way the threat of unemployment can be used against workers who defend their wages and conditions.

Scanion must be fought. Motions opposing his actions must be raised throughout the AUEW.

A new leadership must be built in the fight to defeat the bureaucracy he leads and ensure that the AUEW ends its support for the pay laws and opposes Stage Two.

Full active support must be given to workers who fight for free collective bargaining, and the pay policy talks with Callaghan, Foot and Healey must end. produced a 'new' formula.

His proposal is for a sum of money to be agreed between the TUC and the Labour government which could be distributed differently in each plant or For example, if 5% was the agreed total figure, workers in each factory could decide if it would be paid as a flat rate increase or on a percentage basis, providing the total increase in the payroll was not more than 5%.

But Jones has no authority from the T&GWU policy conference - the highest body in the union - to pursue such a policy.

HIGH-HANDED

It is however consistent with the high-handed way he is operating in a union which is fast becoming one of the most bureaucratic and undemocratic in the trade union movement.

This raises the question as to where Jones' policies come from.

Does he think them up himself? 11 Are they handed to him after a discussion between Foot and Healey? Do they derive from within the labour movement at all?

With the advent of ever more blatant collaboration with the employers through "participation' major policy decisions being discussed by national and local bureaucrats with big multinational corporations such as Leyland before being presented to the trade union movement.

This certainly seems to be the case with Jones' latest scheme. In a major statement on long term wages policy (dated February 23rd 1976 but only just released) Geoffrey Whalen, Personnel an end to individual plant bargaining - an objective cherished by Leyland for five years whilst they awaited the right conditions to force it in.

He wants to replace it with corporation-wide negotiations conducted by the national officers of the unions.

Corporate bargaining is designed to restrict the independent action of the working class and strengthen the hand of the bureaucracy and the employers.

PART OF RYDER

Whalen, who argues that corporate bargaining is part of the Ryder plan and therefore already accepted by the unions, explains Contd on hank naws unt a

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•SOCIALIST PRESS, Wednesday 21st April, 1976 CERMMTIOWAL MELIS

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TIM Wor

Prential to the Tones plan, policy Whalen's document proposes