The Tories are not limiting their anti-working class measures to attacks on the trade unions. They know that in the area of direct industrial struggle the working class can hit back. The 14% wage rise won by the council workers shows clearly that the power of the working class is quite sufficient to defeat the Tories and all their industrial and local government helpers. The only way the power of the working class can be defeated is if it is misdirected into fruitless activities such as lobbying parliament, writing letters to M.P.s, etc.
Knowing that a direct attack on the living standards of the working class means an extremely tough fight, the Tories are looking around for easier ways. One is to cut the living standards of the working class by attacking the Social Services. Old age pensioners, the sick, and schoolchildren, the Tories calculate, cannot hit back in the way that trade unionists can. This is the meaning of their attack on the Social Services in Barber's "Mini-Budget".
The aim of any Tory Social Services and tax changes is to make the rich better off. It is not often however that the Tories are open about it. This time however they have made little effort to disguise their aim. Even the Daily Mirror was forced to point out that the sums work out roughly as follows:
If we assume a man earning f25 a week with a wife and two children in reasonably good health, then he will have to pay out the following extra money (this is an average):
School meals £13. 6. 8 Child's Milk £5. 0. 0 Prescriptions £1.13. 0 Teeth £2. 4. 0.
Fares £4. 0. 0.
In addition if he lived in a council house, he could expect to pay out at least £1.0.0. a week extra in rent. For example the G.L.C. has announced that it is its aim to increase rents by 30/- a week over the next couple of years.
If we add all this up then the extra cost a year for all these items is £78. 3. 8d.
And how about the wonderful 6d off income tax which the papers made such a fuss about? For a man carning £25 a week, the saving from this is a miserable 3s 9d. a week, that is approx. £13.0.0. a year.
A man on the average wage for the country would be £65.0.0. a year worse off as a result of the Tory Social Security changes. In other words, the Tories have just cut wage packets by an average of £1 a week. And they claim to be the party that stands for more money for the individual! What a joke! A short-term answer to do is to remove from office the government which passes these types of measures. This means getting the Tories out of office by any meals we call If you want another way of looking at the •Tory cuts, you need only see that the income tax saving would not even pay tor the extra charge on school meals, and it would not cover a quarter of the increase in council rents.
All these calculations leave out of account the expected 10% increase in food prices caused by the abolition of the present form of food subsidies.
As for the "special" help for the very poor which the Tories have made such a fuss about, this is so small as to be almost non-existent. For example, a family with the extremely low income of £12.10.0 a week would have to have 4 children before it got even £3 a week. Also by ensuring that it is means-tested, the Tories are hoping that many really poor families will not apply.
Who Gains In contrast to the loss by the average worker, the rich will gain mightily. For example a man earning £10,000 a year gets a tax reduction of 200 a year, and a man on £20,000 gets ar extra f450 a year (over £8.10.0 a week)
Companies are also aided by a 5½% cut in corporation tax Extra money is to be spent on defending the. British companies' profits overseas. According to the Tories, money is not available for school milk, but it is readily available for keeping troops east of Suez.
The change in the system of food payments is to bring Britain into line with European countries, so as to prepare for entering the Common Market. This will mean huge profits for big firms but will be yet another attack on the living standards of the working class. For example, the bill for food would go up by £170 million a year-equivalent to an increase in the cost of living of 4-5%.(1) The value added tax we would be forced to adopt would increase prices by another 2½-5%.12 What Does It All Mean If we look at all the Tory proposals, we see that they merely continue in the footsteps of previous Labour and Tory governments. For example in the field of taxation the last Labour government increased taxation on those earning ₺3,000 a year and over by only 3% while it increased taxation on those earning only £19 a week by nearly 17%.(3) Similarly neither Labour nor, of course, Tory governments have done anything about the fact that 1% of the popula tion own 81% of the industrial capital of this country. The Tory Social Service cuts therefore merely follow in the footsteps of previous governments. The reason for this is simple: as long as the system of private ownership of factories, docks, transport, etc. exists in this country, then the owners of these means of production will ensure that all attempts to solve economic problems will be made at the expense of the working class. The only long-term way to defeat attacks on the trade unions and on the Social Services is to end that system of ownership (1) The Common Market, published by Labour Research Dept.
Ibid (3) Economic Trends, HMSO, 1969.
Interview with Mike Cooley, who is National Vice-President of DATA, and is at the moment himself engaged in a struggle against redundancy in the Rotax factory where he works and where the workers are, for example, physically preventing the removal of machinery from their factory. He gave us this interview in his personal capacity.
—What would you say was the most dangerous part of the Tory trade union proposals? I think it is a bad idea to try and identify the most dangerous part. This could lead to a fragmented opposition to the Bill, an attempt merely to get rid of the worst bits. I would prefer to say that the Bill is totally anti-working class and must be opposed as a package. —Can you tell us about DATA's official position on the Bill and on the December 8th strike? DATA, which is now the technical and supervisory section of the 1¼m. strong Amalgamated Union of Engineering Workers (AUEW), has for the last 7 or 8 years been fundamentally opposed to any form of anti-trade union legislation, whether under a Tory or a Labour government. Unlike the other unions, we opposed the wagefreeze legislation under Wilson to the extent that in some companies-for example Beckman Instruments in Scotland-we took the risk of incurring legal action, by pursuing claims in excess of the "norm". The union refused to be intimidated then-it instructed members to take strike action, even when this was illegal, or open to fines-and it certainly will not be intimidated by the Tories. Specifically the full executive committee of DATA has said unanimously that it believes that the way to oppose the legislation is through industrial action, and we have encouraged all members to take as much industrial action as possible against the Bill; in particular we welcome any industrial action taken on December 8th. The executive members have been travelling round the country addressing mass meetings encouraging members to participate in the December 8th strike. These meetings have been mostly in working time. I myself will be addressing mass meetings on the N.E. coast, for example at C. A. Parsons at Newcastle, when thousands of workers will stop work. Most meetings last about 1½ hours, so that means there will be two stoppages: we call them out now to tell them to come out again on December 8th. All trade unions should be doing the same if they were serious in their opposition to the Tory Bill. -What about after December 8th?
DATA has said officially that this should be just the beginning of a campaign of industrial action which makes clear to the employers and the government representing them that DATA is determined that its own members will be able to take industrial action to obtain a more equitable share of the wealth they create. In particular, one of the most important developments, which has been largely ignored by the press, is the decision of the AUEW to call the first meeting of its new national committee specifically to consider steps to oppose the legislation. This is the rank and file policy-making body of the most powerful section of workers in the country who have opposed the Bill. We hope to obtain from this a call to engineering workers throughout the country to undertake industrial action against the Bill. After December 8th, I personally hope there will be continued industrial action culminating, for example, in a series of one-day EDITORIAL BOARD: Tarig Ali, Robin Blackburn, Chenhamo Chimutengwende, Peter Gowan, Teresa Hayter, Dave Kendall. Marie-Therese Ligougne, Branka Magas, Neil Middleton, John Weal.
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BRISTOL: Dave Prior, 7 Ravenswood Road, Redland, Bristol 6. general strikes. -Is there an explanation why DATA has taken this militant line?
I think the drive and energy in DATA stems from the fact that it is controlled by lay members at all levels. Even the National President must work in industry, under the union rules. All the members of the executive committee, the Divisional Council Secretaries, and the Branch Secretaries work in industry. This means that every political and industrial judgement they make is tem pered by the fact that they themselves face the employers at the point of production, which is where the class confrontation is sharpest. We believe that all other unions should be the same. We also believe in DATA that the only way to defend and improve the members working conditions is by industrial action; and in fact we spend over 50% of our total income from subscriptions on strikes (other unions just seem to put it in banks). —If the Bill was passed, what would be your attitude on registration?
The trade unions will have to consider whether they should register; my own feeling is that they should not. If the Bill was passed, I think. it would be essential for the trade unions to explain the nature of the law in bourgeois societies; the law has always worked against the interests of the working class in Britain. There is nothing moral or sacrosanct about it. As far as l am concerned, where there are bad laws the progressive forces have a responsibility to break them. The German people were condemned for not breaking the law in the '30s; the British working class could be similarly condemned by history if they obey these laws. The British ruling class is the most sophisticated in the world, but when it is faced with a direct confrontation with the working class, as in 1926, then it does not hesi: tate to use the most brutal methods. I believe in the coming period we will see this clearlv. There is an intention on the part of the ruling class to introduce measures of the Corporate state. The statements of Robens and Sir Paul Chambers on a "Government of Business Men", together with Robens' latest rantings about communists and such like, and some of Powell's anti-union pronouncements, are a clear indication of this. These rantings are like those of some of the spokesmen in Nazi Germany in the 1930s. -Do you feel the same way about how you should react to the threat of fines? Yes, we should not pay them. Trade union leaders should be prepared to go to prison if necessary to demonstrate how inequitable the legislation is. If I personally was involved, I would not pay the fine. —What is your attitude on the Labour Party's opposition to the Bill?
My personal opinion is that there is precious little to choose between the Tory Party and the Labour Party. They're like Tweedledum and Tweedledee. The Labour Party never was and never will be a party of revolutionary change. It has been in office six times; each time they are in opposition they say they support socialism, but in office they have introduced some of the most repressive legislation against the working class. They introduced the means test in the '30s. They very legislation which the Conservatives are attempting to introduce has been built on foundations laid by Wilson. It's complete hypocrisy that he should be speaking COVENTRY: John Presland, 27 Paynes Lane, Coventry, Warwicks.
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LEICESTER: Alan Lenton, 18 West Street, LeICeSter against the legislation at the TUC really in January. Some parliamentary fakers have been saying in the last few weeks that the working class should oppose the Bill; when they were in themselves, not one of them voted against the initial July 66 freeze and anti-trade union measures (a few abstained). I feel personally that there is a real danger that the campaign will be sidetracked into one of returning a Labour government. -What do you think of Eric Heffer's statement that it takes great courage to vote against a Bill? Well, if he thinks that's great courage, we know what to expect in the next months when people could find themselves being put in jail for their political views. A fair indication of how the trade union leaders and M.P.s see the campaign is their continuous condemnation of the December 8th strike; if they were serious in their opposition to the Bill, they would be travelling all over the country encouraging direct industrial action against the Bill. I also think there's a real danger that the TUC will try and get itself into a bargaining position with the government in which it is prepared to offer a voluntary wage freeze as an alternative to the Bill; this would be equally disastrous; a wage freeze is a wage freeze, whether voluntary or otherwise. -What do you think should be done in local areas to coordinate action against the Bill? There is a definite need for local defence committees. They should be based on the sort of programme I have outlined, not try to attract sympathetic M.P.s and trade union leaders. They must coordinate the rank and file and be pre pared to give vent to the militancy which exists on the shop floor. —What are your general conclusions on the anti-trade union legislation?
It is inevitable that any government, whatever its complexion, that seeks to make capitalism work, will find itself having to attempt to do this sort of thing, for four main reasons, l think: 1. The general crisis of world imperialism makes this necessary. As a result of the national liberation movements, the metropolitan powers can no longer export the most intense exploitation. The Vietnamese people have demonstrated that they can fight the greatest imperialist power to a standstill. So they will increasingly have to bring the worst of the exploitation back onto the shoulders of the metropolitan working class. This means that there is an identity of interest between the struggles of the metropolitan and colonial peoples; they have the same common enemy. 2. There are the effects of technological change. The employers are involved in enormous capital investment in equipment which is obsolete in 3 or 4 years; they must exploit this equipment for 24 hours a day; therefore they will try to eliminate all "non-productive" time and to subordinate the work-force more and more to the machine, in other words to create a docile work-force. The contradiction for the employer is that the more capital is accumulated in one place, and the more production is synchronised, the greater is the strike power of the workers; therefore 12 workers in a foundry can stop almost the entire motor car industry. The working class now realises that it has new industrial strength and tries to use it to end the situa tion in which 7% of the population own 84% of NORTH: John Weal, 182 Pentonville Road London N.1.
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SHEFFIELD: Paul Neville, Ranmoor House, the nation's wealth. The employers a mined they shall not achieve this, an they are introducing the legislation. 3. There is the problem of overprod impossible for any modern industria which is run on capitalist criteria to f right to work. In the United States al • million are unemployed; in Britain th already demands that the 600,000 ur should be increased. There is evidenc tions of the working class are prepare the strike weapon to assert the right an example was the DATA demand f strikes throughout the GEC combine seeks to prevent this. 4. The law of diminishing returns is ning to bite. Rolls-Royce is in dire d British Leyland is also having trouble structural difficulties within the syst make change necessary. Rather than the ruling class will try to make some work faster whilst simultaneously cr pool of unemployed, in a desperate offset one of the inherent features capitalist system. It is very importar workers should understand that it is problem to make these industries via they have a responsibility to heighter dictions in the system in order to ma change necessary.
Workers will be told, once again, that national interest that they should acc legislation. It is becoming more and r important that we should explain the facts: that there are two classes in so parasitic class which extracts £8,000 profit from us every year, and the wo which creates all the real wealth we s us and has this profit extracted from interests of these classes are diametri posed: there is no cooperation possib the exploiters and the exploited. Whe about this legislation being in the nat est, we have to ask which nation are about?-the bankers, share holders ar eers, or the working class? The Bill is the interests of the former. It seeks tr the working class the basic trade unic which have been established after gen struggle and sacrifice.
I think there are three basic dema which the mass of the working class v prepared to fight; these would be the bread and land of today:
1. wage increases without product 2. no anti-trade union legislation.
3. the right to work.
If these demands were properly fougl would get mass support. The ruling c incapable of granting them, and so th demonstrate the need for fundament DATA, by the way, is the only union won't accept productivity deals.
I feel that the limiting feature in B that the working class has always sou resolve its problems in the framework mism. I recognise that the steps I hav are purely industrial, but I would see heightening the contradictions in the a level from which real political actio embarked upon. I believe personally t political lead could only from from a Leninist party which has deep roots v working class, is led by the working c trusted and respected by the working YORK: Phil Hearse, Goodricke Co IRISH RED CiRCLE: Robin Mor, clo tonville Road, London N.1.
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to this type of this would be for all unions to put in an immediate demand for a fl a week pay increase, but in the long term what we have