[A mass meeting of strikers from Desoutters Brothers…]

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A mass meeting of strikers from Desoutters Brothers in West London-on strike for 20 weeks demanding trade union recognition-voted on Monday to accept a management document as the basis for a return to work.

At the same time the meeting decided to remain on strike in support of the convenor, Fred Hopper (who was sacked during the dispute) and to meet again after AUEW officials have met Desoutters management on the issue.

The document which the mass meeting has accepted in no way concedes trade union recognition.

It simply provides a procedure ›y which "individuals" can raise grievances and if they wish, can be accompanted by an "employee of their choice"

NO RECOGNITION There is to be no recognition of shop stewards and no collective representation. It will remain impossible for example to negotiate on wages. to institute a District levy to finance the strike.

. The Committee had built up the hopes of the strikers by sending an F&GP member Don Cook to look at the books of the strike. He proclaimed that a levy was needed and undertook to press this.

When the F&GP met on Tudesay of last week however, it did not discuss the levy. Instead they recommended a return to work on the basis of the document which has now been accepted.

On the question of the levy the District President George Anthony an extreme right wing CP member, said there was no need for one since voted down a levy by 9 votes to 4.

Stalinist Don Cook who had inspected the books carried out his promise. He argued for the levy, and then voted against it.

This was a further blow to the financially hard pressed strikers.

At the mass meeting the key role was played by Bill McLoughlin AUEW Divisional Organiser. He said that tessions in the document amd that it could be used to the workers' advantage.

"CONCESSIONS"

He was not however prepared to move acceptance himself but instead railroaded the strike committee into recommending acceptance on a majority decision.

The sacking of the convenor shows how many "concessions" the company are making.

A return to work without his full reinstatement would mean further victimisation and harassment.

It is essential that the strike remains completely solid for the full reinstatement of the convenor and the campaign for national blacking must continue.

The blacking is still firm in Oxford and Sheffield and this must be extended. New and more regular sources of finance must be established.

It may be that the struggle to defend Fred Hopper will create the conditions for a new look at a document which can only be described as a sell out.

All this however is window-dressing: the CP are motivated by considerations of bureaucratic self-interest, not concern for independent working class activity; their much feted stand on the nationalisation issue is characterised not by intransigence, but by the crassest opportunism.

Already the CP have dropped their demands that the PeugotCitroen car works and the Compagnie Francaise des Petroles be nationalised.

Moreover, it should be pointed out that the proposed nationalisations will be bureaucratically executed from above, and will include a takeover of plants which French capital currently find it unprofitable to run privately.

The correct demand is that the CP and SP break with the bourgeoisie by breaking from the Union of the Left, by rejecting the common programme and by refusing any participațion in any such popular front blocs. Instead there must be a fight for a SP/ CP government on a socialist 118A7 - 1 TT T

SOCIALIST P

RALLY COMEMORATE 60th ANNIVERSA OF THE RUSSIAN -CELEBRATE THE LAUNCHING OF THE WEEKLY SOCIALIST PRESS day 6 November at 7pm WCA, 16, Russell St.

London WC1 min. Tottenham Court Rd. Tube Station TAMESIDE, From Front Page mass mobilisations ag: tinst fascism and for denying them a platform."

It is all very well for the IMG to "reject the ban with contempt".

The fact of the matter remains that we as socialists cannot march or meet legally within Tameside between September 21 and the end of October.

Workers democratic rights have been removed.

The ban has simply handed the NF an issue on which to campaign while workers have learned no new lessons on how to fight Almost forty years ago Leon Trotsky had this to say about state bans on fascist organisations.

"Being an irre concilable opponent not only of fascism but also of the present day Comintern I am at the same time decidedly against the suppression of either of them.

The outlawing of fascist groups would inevitably have a fictitious character: as reactionary organisations they can easily change their colour and adapt themsełves to any kind of organisational form since the influential sections of the ruling class and of the governmental apparatus sympathise considerably with them and these sympathies inevitably increase during times of political crisis.

... Under the conditions of the bourgeois regime, all suppression of political rights and freedom, no matter whom they are directed against in the beginning, in the end inevitably bear down upon.. the working class, particularly its advanced elements. That is the law of history.

The workers must learn how to distinguish between their friends and their enemies according to their own judgement and not according to the hints of the The ruling class today clearly has no intention of silencing the fascists.

On the other hand the state will continue to bear down heavily on the anti-fascists.

This is why we insist that the way to crush the fascists must be the independent mobilisation of the working class.

Whenever there are threats from the fascists against the organisation of the labour movement or the black community which is bearing the brunt of fascist attacks at present-there must he a campaign for the formation of workers defence squads.

Those letts' who call for a •ban' on the front must be forced to support such a fight.

At the same time we recognise that the fascists are only able to grow because they pose as people with an answer to the economic crisis.

We will be able to cut the ground from beneath the feet of the fascists only by advancing a programme which can defend and regain living standards.

The "lefts" must support the struggles of workers against the coalition government's policies of wage control, unemployment and cuts which add fuel to fascist campaigns.

They must launch a campaign for the breaking of the coalition