and mass sacking Al British Leyland the coming three-day week won't solve their problems cither. There is no doubt that the inquiry headed by Wilson's pet tycoon, Sir Don Ryder, will come out emphatically for boosting the work load, peeing wages and 'pruning the labour force. This accounted for the intransigence of the Cowley management towards the engine tuners strike. car industry is going to be followed by farther short-time working At Chryster UK 18,000 workers are now working only three days a week. It is no well-kept secret that the American bosses of this crisis-ridden conpany are considering closing down their loss-making British subsidiary.
Emboldened by Wilson's threat to workers that they cannot go on expecting the Government to save companies from the effects of disruption caused by "pointless industrial disputes, the car bosses are pusting for a showdown.
PALTRY
The paltry ES0 million guaranteed by the Government apainst BEMC'S bank borrowing pending compiction of Ryder's report is a drop in the oce an and will de nothing to solve the firm's problems. Even before the latest oil crisis sent petrol prices on another upward spiral BEMC was hopelessly in debt.
For years BLMC has been on the slide, Under-investment, grossly inflated profit returns in the more halycon days of increasing sales and inefficient management put BEMC in the worst possible position to meet the world crisis that is blowing like a hurticane throughout the international car industryAll the 'experts" are pessimistic and forecasts for 1975 vary from the hopeful-it will be as bad-to the realistic-it will get much worse. Competition must get fiercer. The car giants will battle for an ever shrinking market. The weaker compames will go to the wall. Crippling financial burdens will be hung round the necks of the survivors as they lurch into turther indebtedness when they are forced into massive borrowing to finance their new competitive products.
In this situation the outlook for debt-ridden BLMC is bleak. Last year a series of industrial disputes in the car industry masked the depth of the crisis as this made sure insufficient vehicles were produced to meet demand. Production is now back to Against the background of the British 1962 levels and registrations are down by 25 per cent last year. Higher petrol prices, moenting unemployment and spiralling steel costs will make sure 1975 is a bad year.
SAVAGE ATTACK
The solutions of the Labour Government made in alliance with, and at the bohest of the car bosses to keep BI.MC afloat mean a savage attack on car workers. The major task is for car workers to produce an alternative plan to that of the Labour Government. Failing to do that ineans mass sackings, lower reat wages and back-breaking effort for those allowed to keep their jobs.
The BLMC stewards must not permit Wilson to take the initiatise This means a break from Detroit. Now there is talk that its British subsidiary will be shut down permanently.
fight to save jobs. increases. Lumbered with 120 days" supply of unsold cars, Chrysler has already been forced to lay off its workers in the Amarican city of their present 'wait and see' tactics and a decisive turn on their part to involve the entire work force in a The workers must not be forced to pay for the crisis imposed on thein by the capitalist system and should demand that all car workers Teceive their average weekly pay irrespective of cuts in Jours.
Instead of pouring moncy into the coffers of the car bosses the demand has to be for the nationalisation of the industry. Nationalisation must have built-in guarantees that no jobs will be axed and there will be no deterioration in working conditions. Workers' committees in the lactories must have the right of veto over all sackings and production The workers must have full inforsaation at every stage of the nationalisation process. This means full access to financial records and future company pians. Ryder and his friends must he dismissed and replaced by workers committees responsible lo the workforce. This is in flat opposition to the participatory fairyland being advanced by the TUC and Benn, which is nothing more than a ulopian scheme to run BLMC as a viable capitalist enterprise.
Of course, these demands will not be obtained by letters to Mr. Wilson ora lobby of parliament. They will only be achieved by uniting cat war kers i a massive fight to win them. Such a fight will call for factory occupations, mass pickets and strikes. The alternative is the dole and reduced pay packets Bob Pennington