Jones Backs 35hr Week

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Answer: Hire a British trade union leader to sort them The firm-Vancouver Wharfs-is a subsidiary of the William Hudson Group, an oil giant. Gormley Will add an undisclosed salary to his £7,500 a year from the NUM and another £1,000 a year from the National Research "He has good qualifications in that we run into an awful lot of labour troubles here and he would know more about that than most people. We would find his Gormley, who angrily refused to comment, before leaving for a holiday in Spain, will no doubt win a glowing reference from NUM members who will confirm his expertise in holding back wage demands and his useMoving the composite resolmuch-vaunted Sex Discriminlot of women in industry.

Pointing out that the composite Thornett emphasised that:

"The main responsibility rests with the trade union movement to force the employer to concede equal rights."

The clearest proof of this, showed Thornett, was the lessons of two recent struggles-Electrolux and Trico.

At Electrolux, individual women won equal pay at a Tribunal, only to be moved off their jobs by the employer.

But at Trico the employer won his case at the Tribunal, only to be defeated by industrial action which achieved equal pay. This showed the way forward.

PLACE OF WORK

Crucial is what union leaders do in the place of work stressed Thornett. And most ignored is the issue of equal opportunity.

"The vast amount of jobs in the engineering and automotive industry are not available to women. It is in the power of convenors and stewards to make major inroads into this."

Despite the efforts of a number of delegates who spoke on the real effects of so-called "workers' participation" and the class collaboration embodied in the proposals of the Bullock Report, a composite motion in favour of the Report was carried.

One speaker, Colin Carty, convenor at Export Packing Services, Banbury, pointed out that stewards Only if this was done could the "women's work" be broken down Delegates. from the floor fire on the less contentious question of equal pay.

Most speakers attacked any idea gates only 35 were women.

YARDLEY

One delegate from the Yardley cosmetics factory bitterly attacked the role of TGWU officials and convenors during their long-running equal pay battle.

She was greeted by Moss Evans' patronising assurance that:

"If the ladies don't think we're doing the job adequately, push us a little bit [!] and we'll see if we can do a bit better next time."

It was left to Alan Thornett, in replying to the debate to ram home the responsibility of convenors and stewards at the conference to lead the fight to bring women into the workforce.

Only this could create conditions for adequate numbers of women to be delegated to conference, and breakdown the present reactionary "women's section" whose work focussed on such "women's jobs" as the 'Pin, Hook and Eye and Snap Fastener • Wages Urwin The unemployment debate indicated how necessary is a fully developed alternative to the reactionary policies of the right wing.

By focussing attention simply on the emotive issue of youth unemployment speaker after speaker succeeded in creating the impression that only school-leavers are on the dole, and concealing the fact that factory after factory has carried through rationalisation and redundancies with the full co-operation of TGWU leaders.

It was not only right wing speakers that created the loophole -indeed a crucial role was played by Broad Left and Militant supporters who followed exactly How do you stop strike?

out.

Joe Gormley-president for life of the of Mineworkers--has been appointed to multi-million pound Canadian company on industrial relations.

So now we see why Gormley was NUM adopting a pay claim that could his members living standards !

Development Corporation.

Vancouver Wharfs chairman David Olhams said:

experience most useful."

fulness to the bosses. Canadian workers going on National Union the board of a to advise them so opposed to the regain and defend same lines.

And Deputy General Secretary Harry Urwin was only too pleased to take advantage, and to move in quoting reams of statistics on the government's various diversionary projects and "job creation" schemes which offer some youth a few weeks or months work. Lacking any alternative, the toothless composite backed by the leadership was carried.

The debate was one-sided because the motion on the agenda spelling out a clear policy to defend jobs and Beaste new ones, submitted by the 5/293 Branch, was manipulated off the order paper and separated from the main discussion on unemployment.

OPEN BOOKS

The 5/293 resolution called for the opening of the books ot employers who declare redundancies; for union backing to factory occupations; for a policy of demanding work sharing on full pay where the employer seeks to cut production, and for nationalisation of employers who refuse these demands.

Having been cut off from the main unemployment debate, this motion had to be moved by Alan Thornett just as the bulk of the left wing delegates were called out discuss the composite resolution wages.

Though Thornett's contribution, stressing the fact that this was the only motion to outline programme to defend jobs won considerable applause from the conference, the motion failed to get a seconder.

BANKRUPT

The bankruptcy of the call for 35 hour week as a supposed "cure for unemployment was indicated by the fact that a composite resolution demanding it was passed with the full backing of Jones and the executive.

As far as the right wing are conierred rate verbal items for d 35 hour week even while consenting to savage speed up on production tracks which jeopardises thousands of jobs.

This was confirmed by the fact that a separate resolution, calling for the Executive to "give official support to all branches, shop stewards committees and groups of members in the fight for a 35 hour week without loss of pay, and for official overtime bans" was opposed by the Executive and substantially defeated