dancies last week With thousands of jobs already disappearing in the cur industry. a furtber 2,000 workers, this time at Vauxhall's Ellesmere Part plant, accepted voluntary redunThis comes hard on the heels of the introduction of short-time working at all Ford's plants the last of the big car firms to he hit. Meanwhile the American multi-national, Chrysler, has threatened to stop all investment in Britain unless Industry Secretary Tony Benn gives firm guarantees of future profits.
But at the same timo Chrysler shop stewards at the Linwond plant in Scotland have taken a decision which opens the road to a very ditferent solution to the crisis in the motor industry. They have decided to approach stewards' organisations at British Leyland, Ford and Vauxhall to pain support for a national conference of senior stewards to discuss the crisis.
The engine plant and foundry joint shop stewards short time, have also called for a national combine stewards conference to prepare a united fight on pay and job protection.
These moves can be the first steps in uniting all car workers against short-time working, and in preparing a trade union plan to combat the crisis racking the international capitalist car industry. Short-time, the thin end of the wedge for future redundancies,must be smashed by stewards organisutions monitoring the amount of work available in the plants and sharing it between the whole workforce with no loss of pay.
The initiative of the Chrysler stewards strust be seized as the first move towards a campaign by the union plant leaderships for the nationalisation without compensation of the entire motor industry. Only by imposing this workers solucion to the crisis can car workers defend their jobs and living standards, and put the cost of the crisis in the motor industry where