Why Callaghan puts , and we will the Militant group

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The Workers Socialist League is a Trotskyist organisation fighting to construct a principled revolutionary leadership in the working class in Britain and internationally, and for the reconstruction of the Trotskyist Fourth International on the basis of the Transitional Programme.

The WSL fights at every step against the existing leaders of the trade unions and the Labour Party - now firmly harnessed to the bourgeois politicians of the Liberal Party in an Against their policies of class collaboration we put forward instead a programme which points to the independent class interests of the working class, its need to organise independently to overthrow capitalism, destroy its repressive state machinery and establish a Only in this way can workers resolve today's problems of tumbling living standards, mass unemployment, slashed social services, racial, Send to WSL, 31, Dartmouth Park Hill, London NW5 1HR Socialists Conference, sums up the objective role of the left' talking, thoroughly opportunist politics of the Militant group.

In practice they end up cheerleaders for Callaghan and the Lib-Lab coalition.

"Give us the means and we will broaden Labour's support; bring in youth in their thousands" , Bevan went Rhetoric Yes, the "socialist rhetoric, he anti-capitalist facade, the appearance of concern with workers struggles in contrast with the brazen contempt shown by the other Labour Party leaders are all attractive selling points through which the Militant group draws certain layers of young workers towards the Labour Party-and denies them any perspective for a real fight.

In putting the Militant group on show Callaghan knows he has nothing to fear.

He knows that Militant's 'left wing' programme is no more than window-dressing to conceal a long standing iccomodation to the Labour This is why the extreme right wingers in Downing Street and Transport House were quite content for the self-styled "Trotskyists" of the Militant group to completely dominate the conference of nearly 2,000 Labour Party youth in Llandudno last weekend.

Will to fight

The turn-out is a reflection of the increasing willingness of workers and youth to fight back against the determination of the employers and the Lib-Lab government to make them pay for the crisis of capitalism.

Resolutions were passed against a number of reactionary government policies, and calling for socialist policies of Speaker after speaker reiterated the ways in which workers are bearing he brunt of the crisis and the need for socialism.

Yet, for these PHOTO: Mark Rusher (IFL) seemingly revolutionary rerbiage, he LPYS perspective of first winning the mass of workers to a socialist programme, and thus forcing the Labour leadership to implement it, attempts the impossible task of converting the Labour Party into a party of social revolution.

And in the meantime Militant turns a blind eye to the anti-socialist Lib-Lab coalition, and insists that a Labour government-still susceptible to pressure from the labour movementremains in office.

Thus one delegate spelled out the abject confusion peddled by the Militant group:

"Either the Labour government breaks out of the confines of capitalism or it is forced to do the bidding of the bosses-even if that means driving down the living standards of the working class.

The Labour government must carry out socialist policies-it has tried everything else!"

Anti-Socialist

The absurdity of the notion of the reformist Labour Party "breaking out of the confines of capitalism" is matched by the inability to recognise that the terms of Callaghan's coalition deal with the Liberals excludes the enactment of any socialist policies.

A precondition for a socialist programme must therefore be the breaking of the Lib-Lab coalition.

But on this and every political question the Militant group diverts from the key issue of working class leadership.

Their idealist attitude is exemplified in the approved slogan "The workers united will never be defeated"-a slogan which ignores the whole historical experience of the working class movement and in particular the betrayal of the British General Strike of 1926.

Flowever united the rank and file workers may be they remain vulnerable to the Vor did attemp in an the lef talk Group La post re as Calla zh wh apr 10 for the Lib-Lah coalition.

Tribune and PHOTO: Chris Davies, Report.

FBU leader Parry - the firemen united were defeated betrayals of their mass leaders. British firemen, US coalminers, West German metalworkers and countless other sections in recent struggles have shown this in bitter experience.

Unity is necessary, but so is a principled and politically developed leadership if workers are not to find themselves outmanoeuvred and In the debate on wage control, delegate Alan Morgan, an NUR member, illustrated the complete inability of the Militant group to grasp this issue:

*Well I work for British Rail and I'm low paid. The NUR reckons that to restore our fallen living standards we need a rise o f 66%, so how has the Socia 1 Contract helped me?

We must tell the bosses that if they can't provide us with a job, a house and a decent wage we'll take over industry to provide these basic rights and build a better society"

Morgan gave ne

mention to the betrayal uf the NUR 63% pay claim by its bureaucratic leaders, or the productivity dealing by NUR General Secretary Weighell that is cutting jobs.

Instead he trotted out simply the old abstrac: Militant blather about "telling the bosses and "building a better society"

But the harsh fact is that unless Weighell, along with his TUC cronies, are challenged and removed in struggle there will be no social revolution-and the bosses will go on laughing all the way to the bank It is not only trade union bureaucrats who find themselves let off the hook by Militant: there was not even a call at the conference for the removal of the Callaghan-Healey right wing leadership of the Labour Partv Tribunites conference attempt in any way to expose one nune Group of Labour MPs, who opponents Callaghan while loyally voting supporters tound their left reformism trumped by the more extravagant gestures of the Militant, and were relatively isolated, but this does not reflect the situation in the workers' movement as a whole.

The LPYS shows this by continuing to invite left talkers like Heffer to speak at its meetings in order to "use them to pull a big crowd"

But unless this is combined with efforts to expose the real nature of the "lefts' to the crowds they attract, by demanding that they turn their verbal "socialism" into practical action to break the Lib-Lab deal and oust the right wing leaders, this can only build the common illusion that Benn, Felow Lefts do represent ar Skinner and their alternative to Callaghan.

Numbers

In spite of their inability to measure up to t he tasks posed for revolu tionaries inside the Labour P: irty, the Militant group point proudly to the numerical size of their "correctness, Proof" of the their policies.

If this peculiar hod of Jrgum ent were crously wicepted, then clea no left * ing forces can ch nge ti snt ig Labo leade lise more oppi But. in lity the rea arguIsed of Militant's ef* wing Conference delegates were old that the PYS was the Digbeth, Ilford, and Trico.

To concede that any other political tendencies were in the front rank of these struggles or had achieved any mass support for a programme of action in the working class would of course jeopardise this argument.

For this reason every other left group is branded as "petty bourgeois sectarians":

unspoken coalition arrangement. socialist planned economy.

national and sexual oppression. For more details on the WSL fill in the form below.

Name.

Addres Rio SCHOI ORENT YOu Andy Bevan But the fact that it is possible to combine principled agitation for the demands of the Trotskyist programme with a continuous struggle to expose and remove the bureaucratic leadership of the working class is born out by the record of the Workers Socialist League.

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THIS HOSPITAT IS UNDER CONTRA SCOHSEL ISAYS THE GA REMAINS ON SITE Brains NHS trade union The EGA occupation only the sign outside CONTROL SUUN PHOTO: Angela Phillips (IFL)

hints at real w thousands of pounds on worthless publicity campaigns approaches to MPs. and petitions.

It was not until the local labour movement became involved, first when anti-cuts sub-committ. uf Camden Trades Council per suaded the NUPE stewar ds to hold a joint meeting with them at the hospital, tha : the first important develop nent took place.

WSL members from the sub-committee, and from the parent NUPE branch at University College Hospital argued that ultimately, the only way to defend the hospital would be for the workers to occupy it, and for the occupation to form the basis of a campaign for a workers' enquiry into the state of the hospital, and for the opening of the books of the Area Health Authority to reveal details of expenditure and health service needs in the area.

It is this aspect of the work-ins, the need for independent class action, which is central to the defence of the NHS, and it is this central aspect which is missing from the pamphlet.

It is not possible here to deal with the pamphlet's every paragraph, some of which retell useful experiences.

SL PEN THE MOST GN

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