Newspaper bosses forced to back down

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Provincial journalists have scored a notable victory towards a struggle over wages when they forced the Newspaper Society employers to back down on attempts to rule out local pay bargaining.

Before signing a ten per cent national pay agreement the employers demanded that the NUJ guarantee local claims would be ruled out.

But after two weeks of a 'work to rule' during which NUJ members reduced most large provincial news rooms to a state of near anarchy, the employers agreed to a clause under which both sides agreed that the Government ten per cent limit would be 'taken into consideration' before local claims were submitted.

This meaningless phrase not brought the dispute to an end. The employers refuse to backdate the agreement to January 1- the date from which members of the scab organisation the Institute of Journalists, received their ten per cent increase. The work to rule continues.

Journalists on the Western Telegraph at Haverfordwest, in Wales, are on strike after one member was sacked for operating the sanctions, and journalists at Worcester and Hereford are occupying editorial offices after they were deemed to have 'dismissed themselves'.

Journalists at both the Kentish Times and the Oxford Mail succeeded in beating off management attempts to victimise members.

The central question, once the issue of backdating is resolved, is that the principle of local deals be translated into UNITED MINE WORKERS "YOUR PROBLEM IS YOU'VE NO FINESSE... YOUR TACTICS ARE ALL WRONG, OLD BOY action. The NUJ work to rule has already succeeded in splitting the employers so that local deals on backdating have been offered.

Wage demands to restore living standards to 1974 and to defend them against inflation must be submitted. Workers committees, drawing in the unemployed and housewives, must compute the necessary rises to combat the rise in prices.

Group chapels, where they exist, must draw together all journalists who face the same employer. The fight for the right to negotiate over wages must be translated into the fight for wages themselves.

Action now for a sliding scale of wages. No to all wage •WASHINGTON D.C.

LET'S GET THE GUY RESPONSIBLE-LOOK HERE'S HIS CAR!

LONDON The Garners Steak House strike has consolidated after two weeks on the picket lines, and there is no sign of demoralisation among the strikers.

It is the employers who show signs of pulling back.

•ARNEPI S UNDR 5223 132% COME ON OUT O'FISHALL IN LONDON, ENGLAND!

WE PLAYED OUR "LEFT"... HE CUT A 90% CLAIM TO A 10% ¡ETTLEMENT!

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WORKERS (QUICK-PUT ME THRU TO'

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SOCIALIST PRESS for

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YOUR MAN AT THE TOP'S ST

FAIR WORKERS MAND FOR RECOGNTTOM /INFAIR EMPLOYER STEAK HOUsES LING