Which way to fight wage control?

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La question of slammed by IMG comrades as employer whe a method of having weak or no programme- our kicking br them and assess- but they were to be the areas of got what we Joseph Tosti Joseph Tosti, a member of the strike committee at the Linton Lodge hotel, Oxford, now out for over four months, said Jack Jones bad stabbed every initiative they had taken in the back.

The IGWU 5/670 branch had passed a resolution calling for national blacking of Trust House Forte "an obvious step because we can only do a limited amount on the picket."

The vote went through District Committees of the TGWU to the national trade group and from there to the national executive. "Jack lones spoke against national blacking on the grounds that it would be illegal."

Ron Thompson, AUBW shop steward, Sheffield, argued for support for the grouping calling itself Engineering Voice, because it provided "a link into the Broad Left"

"It's clear that in spite of the complete bankruptcy of the Broad Left, the mass of militants within the engineering union still support the broad left leadership"

"Many of the members though they have been disgusted in the last year will still be attracted to the "It would be absolutely politically futile for the editorial board to counterpose themselves as un alternative leadership to the He said that an abstract programme was not wanted. Engineering Voice only proclaimed three policies; complete opposition to wage controls under capitalism; end phase two; and support for equal pay Eddie Oldnall Eddie Oldnali, AUEV Sheffield, • support for the conference had been defeated on the Divisional Court by one vote and had been oppose: in the Trades Council by both the Communist Party and the Workers Revolutionary Party.

The CP had initially opposed stiegle by 3.000 Balfour Not just demands but implementing ...- 4L- -T.-... ing ine cnanging balances OI class forces.

That was how Alan Thornett presented the fight against wage controls at the Recall Conference on Wage Control and Union Democracy at Birmingham on Sunday.

And the reality of his message in the main conference report was drummed home by the clear division that took place at the conference.

On the one hand-in the main report adopted by the conferencean assessment of the changing class forces, the key role of the bureauстасу and the need for a programme and method to fight them.

On the other, and in the main from IMG supporters, an agreement on the programme but a constant call to move to where the action is -however diversionary the action.

That the IMG comrades were unhappy with the results of the conference was clear. That they had anything to offer but an endless round of visits to other conferences to support "initiatives" that they knew in advance to be hopeless was less so.

"Never mind the quality, feel the width" was their watchword. Speaker after speaker from their ranks proclaimed on Engineering Voice, the Socialist Teachers Alliance, the LCDTU. All were support after workers themselves walked out.

"They've been going around saying Scanion's a brave man to stand up to these workers"

• Stewart McClennan of the Scottish Socialist League said: "1 agree absolutely with Comrade Thornett about how the Communist Party have manoeuvred and betrayed members."

He quoted the abandonment of the jailed Shrewsbury workers as evidence that no faith must be put in any layers of the bureaucracy.

But he said the organising committee had not paid enough attention as to how to gain results and get to workers, such as the 8,500 who marched through Glasgow.

Dick Bradley, from Longbridge, said that ultimately it was Fraser who had sold out the strike, not Scanlon for all his efforts. He told the conference this proved that:

"A lot of reformist ideas do exist in the working class not just in the bureaucracy."

Stalinist convener Derek Robinson in October was arguing that no actions should take place-to Slammed by IMG comrades as having weak or no programmebut they were to be the areas of "main intervention" "'main intervention"

Thornett, behalf of the Organising Committee, stressed the major political change that the toolroom workers had created.

He stressed that in that strike as in so many others the question of leadership had proved crucial.

"If we are going to take the question of leadership-and we are not posing ourselves as the alternative leadership-we are saying that we can by the intervention of programme become an increasingly important force"

The point, as Thornett pointed out, was not to pretend that forces were bigger than they were, but to realise that through fighting for a principled intervention on a programme that did not make compromises we could have a major effect on workers who came into Those struggles could arise firstly on secondary issues as in the case of the fringe benefit document at Leyland.

To follow the "initiatives" put forward by the Communist Party as if they were struggles leading somewhere was a recipe for disaster.

The day before the Recall Conference CP Executive member Derek Robinson had told the British Leyland combine:

'Times have changed. It's not like it was under the private Stewart McClellan struggle in the next few months.

But when the toolmakers' strike started he didn't turn up to any meetings except to urge specifically a return to work on the employers' terms.

Bob Barnes, a shop steward at Export Packing at Banbury said all their efforts to fight to save their jobs were being sabotaged by union officials and ri aht wing Levland employer when we used to get out our kicking boots and kick until we got what we wanted. The whole thing has changed. We've got to thing has ch. preserve British Leyland and make it viable"

Thornett said he would fight to get full support for the one day strike on April 19-but it could not be represented as anything but a diversion.

But the toolmakers' struggle had brought to the forefront the independence of the working class and the essential weakness of the bureaucracy once separated from their power base-the employers.

"The rest of the working class must conclude that if 3,000 toolmakers can brush aside Scanlon, a main pillar of the Social Contract, and a few hundred dockers can brush aside the other pillar of the Social Contract, Jack Jones; then it is open season for attacks on the Inside the AUEW the response to the toolmakers had been immediate. "There was coming up within a few hours what could have become a general strike. It was then that we would have had to move forward with the policy of councils of action"

Instead the backing down of the leadership and the coalition sought by the Labour government had brought about a situation where the Liberals had more influence on government policy than any body within the labour movement.

"Deals have been concluded without our knowledge which ultimately mean complete redundancy for our workforce"

Stewards at Rover, Solihul, had said they would support. But a deal was done through the participation committee to send the work elsewhere.

"Obviously sooner or later we've got to use the right every worker has got-to withdraw their labour and picket."

Shawn Morrisroe, a GMWU shop steward from a London hotel group described how catering workers in London had come together after the sell-out of a strike in Basildon.

"They left them on strike without any contact with their officials. You can't find these people. They are at meetings in the House of Commons or with employers up and down the country"

Colin Kenny, Secretary of the Conference of London Area Shop Stewards in the NHS said that struggles on cuts had been diverted but as soon as wages had been attacked an explosion had resulted.

Kenny said the struggle to standing of the need for a struggle.

This did not come from the bureaucracy. "It has set an example which other hospitals are bound to He said the forming of joint shop stewards committees was a major factor in being able to organise interventions.

Bob Barnes Trevor Holdsworth, an AUEW deputy convener trom bradiora, said the toolmakers' dispute had caught the imagination of the whole working class.

"Every trade unionist in the country was glued to what they were doing. You came home and the TV's on and there is Scarlon and Lowry on the same box, both condemning this strike. That was really recognised and it must have revolted every trade unionist in the country.

"If they had decided to stay out without question every section would be out. Posed at that point in my view was a general strike"

*The main resolution was adopted in its entirety.

*In addition the conference supported amendments calling for an intervention in the BLMC combine committee conference on April 3, and full support for any workers taking action against Phase Two.

*It condemned the LabourLiberal coalition and called for a recall Labour Party conference to remove Callaghan and Healey and to fight for the implementation of socialist policies.

It adopted a policy of calling for an end to bans and proscriptions in the labour movement, including the Labour Party and an end to Rule 15 in the trades councils.

*The conference condemned Scanlon and the AUEW executive for their role in the toolroom workers strike.

*It agreed to fight to extend the actions around the one day strikes called for April 19 and May 11, and for a campaign in labour movement bodies for a sliding scale of wages, including the production of a bulletin to put forward the policy.

*It agreed to build the lobby for the AUEW national conference on *The conference also supported an extension to the programme against racism, including no immigration controls, removal of racists from labour movement positions and expulsion of known fascists. The conference agreed to support all measures for the defence of

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With fifteen notable exceptions, members of Parliament voted on March 9th to give the Prevention of Terrorism (Tem-