The Asian workers" strike at Jaffe's in Nottingham for union recognition and the reinstatement of a victimised worker has still not been made official by the Transport and General Workers Union after nearly three weeks. Indeed the local T&G official has even advised the strikers to return to work and accept the management's offer, which does not include union recognition and would merely change the status of the victimised worker from 'sacked' to 'suspended."
ROGER TANNER and MIKE HAMLIN But the workers are determined to stay out until their demands are met. The first of a series of support meetings and rallies was held last Sunday with about 160 attending. Those present included members of the Pakistani and West indian community as well as representatives from the Indian Workers Association, Nottingham Trades Council, the Mansfield Hosiery Strike Committee and other strike committees formed in similar disputes, and the International Marxist Group, who also provided a speaker. Over 260 was collected. Another support rally is being held on Saturday 26 May, after a demonstration to the city CONFERENCE These developments come on the eve of the conference on the Trade Unions and Racialism on 2 June at the Digbeth Hall, Birmingham, which will give the trade union movement a valuable opportunity to come to grips with the lessons of struggles like that at Jaffe's, This conference will attempt to begin the process of making the trade union movement aware of the need to actively combat the problems of racialism and the exploitation of immigrant workers. The conference was called by the strikers at Mansfield Hosiery Mills after their experience of the un wüllingness of the movement to act as an organising centre of the fight against racialism.
The conference will discuss the nature of the problem, the origins of racialism, its extent within society as a whole, and the situation of black workers in Britain. Papers will be presented by Tom Sibley (Industrial Organiser of the Runnymede Trust), Mike Cooley (AUEW-TASS), and Winston Pinder (Black Workers Co-ordinating Committed). But the central discussion will prohably follow on from a paper by Ernie Roberts (ALEW) on *Whut the trade union movement can do PRACTICAL STEPS This discussion will be of value only if it draws cut certain practical steps which can be taken Fled Weekly 25 May 1973 Page 2 by the trade union movement to combat racialism. It must face up to the need to make the movement the fighting organisation of all workers, including black workers. This will bring out such questions as the unionisation of black workers, their special needs and forms of oppression, and recognition of their right to self-organisation within the unions to combat racialism if the movement itself. The conference must also consider how trade unions can relate to the problem of racialism at all levels of society, not just in industry The conference has come about largely from the experience of workers in particular strugeles involving these questions. A central part of the conference will therefore be a discussion of the practical steps that have already been taken and how these can be more widely applied. Especially important in this respect are such (at the moment) isolated organisational forms as Trades Council subcommittees against racialism, the International branch of the T&GWU in London, local action committees of workers against racialism, etc. The Birmingham conference will only be a first step, but it is a very necessary one. Every effort must be made not only to build for it but to seize this opportunity of going beyond empty resolution-passing to practical steps which can smash the hold of racialism and unite the working class, For further details contact: B. Bunsee, 20:03 Victoria Centre, Nottingham (tel. 47304).
As the strike at Fine Tubes in Plymouth moves