very demand against the Government's empoyment poncies must nave sickened many.
Mick McGahey, leader of the Scottish miners and chairman of the Communist Party, wrote in the Morning Star on 7 May that to celebrate the anniversary of the General Strike with a deal that ensures cuts in workers' living standards is to commit the same crime as the betrayal of that great upsurge in May of 50 years ago?" So Jack Jones, architect of a crime against the working class comparable to me betrayal or tae beneral smike. has the pages of the Morning Star opened to him!
Similarly the Communist Party has been to the fore in enforcing the TUC's The tragedy was that after Red Friday, 31 July 1925, the influence national and the presence of the British letts on the Anglo-Russian Trade Union Committee led the CP leaders to ignore J.R. Campbell's warning in Party and the Minority Movement to place too much reliance on what we have called the official left wing.
the Communist Party denounced the role of the lefts. But by then it was too late. And the present day leaders of the CP fail to do even that.
......THE INTERNATIONAL SOCIALISTS HAVE THEIR OWN IDEAS 1926. Photo: South Wales Miners Library ing to defend the miners wages, the workers had - indeed, were forced by the ruling class - to challenge this self-same constitution. Yet the CP itself insisted that the sunke was simply doour tne miners, failing to raise even the question of a Labour Government until the third day of the strike.
To carry on the strike in face of the opposition of the bureaucracy, right and 'left", after 12 May meant saying openly that if defending the miners meant challenging the constitution, then to hell with the constitution. No amount of organisational creativity and self-sacrifice If the 50th anniversary of the General Strike provided an opportunity for the present reformist political strategy, for issue of Socialist Worker, Laurie Flynn dotes that recalled much of the flavour of those 'days of hope".
calling that the General Strike proves once again the creative capacity of the masses' an editorial warned that "for LEADERSHIP and file organisation:
for the future of the working class wages and not vast salaries, often with subject to regular recall strengthens the to get nd or tose who tail.
ential. To win through we also need to every inch of the way. We urge you to BOIR US. LESSONS for today would seem to be: build the Rank and File Organising Committee, it, and non-IS members join IS. Well....
the SW special stopped. What sort of rank and file organisation is needed?
unions as one between the membership and leadership.
union democracy and so on. that although crucially important splits and divisions take place inside the trade unon puraucracy, bom ngat and lert share common limitations.' sort of problems the young Communist tute for his lack of political preparation.
munist Party can draw no lessons from the General Strike for the struggle for socialism today. For what are the major political lessons? That absolutely no trust can be put in the words of any labour leader. That if under the impact of the capitalist crisis certain of these leadcis tar to te lent ana revoluton ary socialists form alliances with them, this must be on the basis of specific demands and actions to take the struggle forward. Communist Party to render historic" its the International Socialism group it was an occasion to "build the rank and file.
In an atractively produced special brought together stories, pictures and anec- movement of class struggle opposition to But whilst rethose who worship at the shrine of spon- words. taneity, however, the General Strike shows ue enormous importance or leadership.
That, at least, was a correct starting point. Unfortunately the SW special then went on to equate leadership with rank *The leadership necessary is leadership from the bottom up, leadership that draws together each and every militant anxious wishes.
•We need rank and file organisation fighting for leaders who are paid average perks on the side. Having leaders who are rank and file. It means that workers become part of a real army and not a stage version. It makes for better leaders, and a chance And the revolutionary party? The paper went on: '....the activity of socialists inside the militant rank and file movement is essbuild a new workers party that will fight So the lessons of the General Strike IS members step up your activities inside In fact all the problems start where The IS see the basic division in the Therefore the most important demands are those that centre around 'It means in ouer words, the is approach the Party had to confront with the emergence It is not surprising that the Comof the left bureaucrats - the question of the application of the united front tactic around specific demands and actions -simply by denouncing the equally traitorous role tese lert bureaucrats play today This may be a good recipe for building a rank and file sect, but it doesn't get to grips with the real problem of building a the policies of the Labour Government and the class colaboration of the TUC. This task clearly demands partial and episodic agreements with the 'left' reformists who seek to limit their opposition to mere Although it is always dangerous to draw precise analogies, the experience of the Minority Movement - which the SW special hardly mentioned - is instructive. It was precisely its initially correct applicaindividual unions and across union lines on a number of issues. that allowed the tiny Communist Party to win a mass audience for its policies. It thus helped to develop the ground swell of working class radicalism which forced the leaders of the TUC to call the General Strike against their In contrast to the Socialist Worker special, a much more serious attempt to General Strike 7 come to grips with the strategy of the Communist Party in the general strike appears in International Socialism 88 (May 1976). Here Duncan Hallas takes to task Hinton and Hyman, au thors of Trade omons ana revounon Tor aoso ving BIe Third International's increasingly Stalinist bureaucracy of its responsibility for the conduct of the CP.
The reality of Hinton and Hyman's position is clearly demonstrated when they suggest that the situation in the Twenties after the defeats of 1921-22 was 'profoundly untavouradie to bullding a mass revolutionary party and that the CP should have concentrated on propaganda work to build a 'quality' cadre party. As Hallas points out: It was the historie achievement of the CPB to overcome this tradition of abstract propagandism, a tradition with a long history in the British movement.' In a sense. it's not surprising that overal the IS presented a somewhat eclectic analysis or me lessons or me Generarounke For today they present an equally eclectic political strategy of rank-and-filism and joining IS as the way forward in Britain - and such positions are bound to show through in analysing the great events of the class struggle.
TUC President Alonzo Swales-a fake left, but how do you deal with him?
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20 May 1976 ET