The Wilson Government has met the first real resistance to its unemployment policies. Massive hostility from steel workers has met proposals to reduce the labour bill in the industry by £179 million at the price of 40,000 jobs and wage cuts.
The British Steel Corporation's plan has been overwhelmingly rejected by the vast majority of steelworkers. Action has been widespread, calls of support for national strike action have come from numerous plants. Workers at Port Talbot remain on strike after two weeks. has been taken at the Velindre and Trostre tinplant works to remain on strike. An overtime ban at the River Don works in Sheffield continues. Scotland has come out against the proposals, as have the Midlands plants of Corby and Bilston.
The Iron and Steel Trades Confederation leadership is squirming under the fierce pressure of its membership. A national steel strike is essential to unify and strengthen the plant-byplant action taken so far. All other unions have declared their opposition to the proposals. But it can be guaranteed that the ISTC leadership will try to force the mass movement into the blind alley of negotiations.
Scholey, the BSC chief executive and self-appointed 'hammer of the workers", has declared that management will implement the scheme unlaterally if union agreement cannot be bought. The only way in which steel workers can defend their jobs is by totally rejecting negotiations on the plans and counterposing a workers alternative to the crisis of the steel industry, to be backed up by national strike action.
CAPITALIST CRISIS The Labour Party 'left' leaders are refusing to support the steel workers actions. Foot, in particular, openly justities the loss of jobs and talks of the need for 'productivity'. But the crisis in the steel industry is not the product of unofficial strikes or lazy workers. It is the product of the capitalist economic crisis, sharpened by secret deals made with the steel monopolies in Europe, crippling debt and interest charges that have grown up over the years, and the failure of the capitalists to re-equip the industry. The secrecy surrounding these facts must be torn away by opening the books of the BSC and its counterparts in the private sector.
The steelworkers' action is defending the right to work of the whole British labour movement. Every worker should support and hold meetings to discuss solidarity action. to the task of forcing the TUC to stop its seabbing on those threatened with loss of jobs. For a recall TUC - break with the Government's policies!
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A decision All hands must be set Photo: JOHN STURROCK (Report)