Socialist Challenge No. 125, 6 December 1979
The scan: sc-n125-dec-06-1979.pdf (PDF, Marxists Internet Archive)
Uncorrected machine reading of the whole issue. This text was read by machine (Apple Vision OCR) from the scan and has not been corrected or cut into articles. Each page gives the headlines first, then the columns in order, so one article runs on into the next. Expect misread words. Use it to find things; quote from the scan.
Page 1 scan of this page
Socialist Challenge WARNING!
These men are after our rights
Has orange
terror
come to
Britain?
A WELL-financed witch-hunt has been launched against five Oxford left wingers.
But this is no normal witch-hunt; it is an incitement to the type of violence associated with extreme Loyalists in the North of Ireland.
The five victims are Pat Lally, Alan Thornett, Peter McKintyre, Tony Richardson, and Dave. Simpson. Their photographs and names appear in posters being widely circulated in Oxford.
The posters publicise the participation of the five in demonstration in Oxford on 20 October in support of political status for Irish Republican prisoners and the immediate withdrawal of British troops from the North of Ireland.
The poster is designed in such a way as to suggest the five are members of the IRA.
The poster's headline reads "Do you know these people?' It goes on: 'On 20 October people marched through the streets of Oxford in support of the IRA (the latter in bold, large letters). Most of us looked on in disgust and amazement and wondered who were these IRA sympathisers.'
Then, in large, bold letters: Well we thought we would tell you!'
The names, addresses, telephone numbers union positions, and workplaces of the five then follow under photographs of each of them.
Whoever is behind this poster is spending a lot of money. Thousands were distributed outside the workplace of the five by individuals paid £10 to do the dirty work. The posters were also mailed to every house in the street where the five live.
There are a number of obvious suspects with regard to the leaders of this witch-hunt - fascists, Loyalists, even right-wing management outfits.
That four of the five photographs appear to have been taken from a video film of the demonstration may even suggest that a more official, state institution could be orchestrating the campaign.
Whoever is responsible, one Tact is clear: the more people and the more times the issue of Ireland is raised in the labour movement the less effective any 'greens under the bed' campaign will be.
THESE men are supposed to
British industry - capital and labour. But they have one thing in
They agree that the power of the shop stewards movement needs to be curbed. This is what James Prior's proposals on the unions aim to do.
vames rror ex-public senool boy, ex-army officer, a farmer and director of several companies, he was a close mene or leo neat. mis
him as a moderate because he thinks Heath tried to change things too quickly.
But as Secretary of State for Employment, Prior is firmly committed to attacking shop stewards by stopping effective picketing, encouraging postal ballots in the unions, and cracking down on the closed shop.
poorest areas of Wolverhampton, a
associates in the Tory Party describe
tactory
nonest an
Terry Duffy: Born in one of the
boxer in the army, he first became a shop steward 30 years ago in a cycle
But Duffy doesn't seem to remember much about his past. He, too, was an admirer of Ted Heath, whom he described as a Very, very
The kind of moderate' trade union leader that Prior's reforms are out to boost, Duffy - as president of the AUEW - has shown just how the right-wing union leaders defend their
No. 125 6 December 1979 20p members' interests.
Duffy has openly aided the bosses' attempts to victimise Derek Robinson, convenor at Leyland (see pages 8 and 9) and now a shop steward at Charing Cross Hospital (see page 2).
We need shop stewards and effective picketing if we are to defend our jobs and living standards against the Tories. Prior and Duffy must be stopped.
Page 2 scan of this page
Heckling Callaghan is not enough
management was callous'
Licence to kill or self-defence?
OUR POLICIES
C'apitalism is in crisis. The leaders of the Lahour Party and the trade uninn» affer anlution: that are in 'ECRINN l delt
.I*H:
Triai hould
It: militänt• hold-
light tor the united
united
än øcn Ne ieen ar an
thrusands vü bön nız n
such an urganisation should be hard un the understanding thal: 1 The "trueule for
"eehs io unite the fight of iworher. against with that of other oppressed layers "i arciel! — nomen. black penple. 227 : ¡truggling for ¡heratinn. This socialism can only be achiered by creating new organs •* DaHer ano dereatino with ali neresar! means lhe power of the • apitalise sale. 2 ihan wha retke in Britin , tlur •!e iali-m
Ithan what erists in Britain nith full rights political parties and currents that do not lake up arms against the •ocialiststate. The Stalinist models "t 'vicialism' in the L.SSR and Fastern Europe hare discredited socialism in the eres of millions of workers throughout the worid. He are opposed to them and will
mighting ler cocialis democrae!.
3 The interests of workers and
capitalists are irreconcilsble on a world scaie. Capitalism not only created a tatarar it has created politics. Thuswetighi lor working cass uniy on an international «l'ale. This units will in the long run be derisise in deltating hoth Ihe imperialist repimes in the West and the brutal dicratorships they -ustain in Latin America. and Asin.
In Britain it implies demanding the immediate withdrawa! British treops from Ireland and letting the brish people delermine their nwn tuturs.
The C'ommoni parties in Europe are in crisis. Veither the *P.urocommunisi the pror-Mescon wings have any meaningtui tiraregy lor merthron of the capilalist state.
ven revolutionary socialist parties are more necessary than
C'onditions toda! more favourable than over the preceding three decades. But such Darle. Lall UHIY be rejecting sectarianism and seeing internal democracy not as a luxury hut as a vital necessity. This means the right do organise factions and tendencies.
Il you agree with these principles
The involved activities by Socialist ('hallenge ›apporters in your area. fill in the form helan and send it to us.
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Socialist Challenge 6 December 1979 Page 2
Wiirht!. lin Rt
the L and file.
the Torles out of office.
Jim Callaghan, and
troni
of
socialism
the bosses
their THATCHER
outside for all
Cross:
hospital which
after . OK
ill those
these
w orld
warld
while transporting labourer's job.
No enquiry
A frica
Wing Workers shop steward.
notice
refusal to reinstate the two.
пог
the
Never last winter. 4| C
built bs
By Valerie Coultas
Criminal appeal in Edinburgh. "There are
but a licence to NESTE
appeal judges.
displeasure
Thẹ DISSUIC referring to was Scottish
Pardon for
EDITORIAL
Way of last week saw Dennls Skinner receive a strading ovation for his speech on the anti-cuts demonstration when he told the leaders of
Party to listen to the mood of the rank He urged Labour councils to follow Lambeth's lead and refuse to implement the cuts and saggested that the movement today should follow the Pentonville dockers' example and force
"IE I really demonstrations of this kind, did not receive such a warm welcome. When he refused support to sacked
accused the pickets Charing Cross hospital of *callousiv disregarding humanıty 11 the House of Commons last weęk. As nurses, doctors and blanket-draped cancer patients clashed with pickets, she hinted at the use of troops.
The real story of the dispute shows that far from trade unionists placing patents' lives in jeopardy, it was the hospital authorities who deliberately. provoked this confrontation in order to smash trade unionism at Charing
Charing Cross is a new high rise
requires skilled engineers and electricians to run it.
the boilers, heating and electrical systems, and are a vital part of any modern hospital.
workers have long suffered from understaffing, and in January they began a work to rule. In July they refused to transport some air-conditioning filters. They argued that their job was fitting the filters,
them •Was
Seven weeks ago, after a further refusal to do this job, inanagement fired two engineers, one of whom was an Amalgamated Union of Engineer-.
day.
No. enquiry was conducted. No
taken normal procedures for complaints of this kind, Management was adamant in its
But when the case was referred to the AUEW the executive reacted as it did over Derek Robinson and refused to give its support; claiming that this West would infringe the Code of Conduct agreed between the government and unions during the lorry drivèrs' strike
For seven weeks the 40 men stayed out on unofficial strike, living off JUNE GREIG, jailed for six years for killing her brutai husband, lost her appeal two weeks ago at the Court of
various expedients open to a woman regularly subjected to rough treatment by her husband,
kill is not one of them,' said Lord Wheatley, one of the
He went on to express the court's
Jane spending of public. money on this appeal, pointing out that he thought the sentence was rather lenient. He finished by criticising 'pressure group activity' while an appeal was pending.
The was Women's Ajd, which has decided to seck a Royal
June as pall of their
Be the
dag 3 nine for Calai National Execative uceting vote sapporters' representation of right wingers on inquiring into A 'series of crushing defeats'
is delining rapidly
…home n
Charing Cross-the
PATIENTS protest-
funds donated by fellow workers and keeping a picket going for 24 hours a
They were not doing this because they were bloody minded. In management was far more stubborn than the workers.
The Ealing, Hammersmith and Hounslow Area Health Authority is LILL ULS for. union bashing. attacked union organisation at the
2100 Hammersmith Hospital and was responsible physically removing patients Hounslow Hospital without prior notification.
At Charing Cross it was using the engineers' and electricians'
campaign for a 'better deal for Scottish women'.
But perhaps Lord Wheatley has got a point. Can judges 'give women a icence to kill' as the popular press in Scotland emotively suggested?
June Greig had suffered a 'life of hell' for nine years, as her reiatives testified at the time of her trial. Her husband continually beat her. burnt her with cigarettes and even slashed her with a knife. Like many battered women June feared the violent retailiation of her husband if , she took any steps to protect herselt.
The legal system in general has
standards HICIr women. If men brutalise, rape or degrade their wives this is a privateaffair which the police and courts ignore. If women in an) desperation dare to retaliate this becomes a matter for public concern
. - i
demaocracy party. noted, Guardian explained. But what happers now? The Tories are giving the Labour lefts pleaty of opportunities to bare their leeth and Jim's prestige
• but will the pigeons comse home to roost? Will Callaghan be given the boot or not? A number of abstacles have lo be confronted he The right wing in the Labour Party are not
but choose the wrong target
staffing levels to try to whittle down opposition to cutbacks. 26 November decided to escalate their action and stopped an oi lörry going through.
Their action at no time threatened the closure of the hospital, because the engineers made sure that there was one full week's supply of oil.
It Despite this management closed the casualty for heat the child development trom and put a rumour around ine nospita. that it was to be closed bocause of the pickets' action. lay off all stand on indefinitely.
and legal punishment.
June's 'crime" stop her intimidation in the only way she knew how — by self-defence.
The 'various Wheatley particularly lacking Courtsregard wives as their husbands' chattels and He incidence of wife assault in Scotland there is no Domestic Violence Act. 1 Katherine Potter, who retaliated in a simlar. Tasmel three years probation by a judge in Newport, Wales:
Mitchell from Edinburgh said: and lawyers courts has led to missed opportunities to consolidate the wide public support that exists for June's case. was discussed at the STUC Women's
sioi to the right-wing.
the 'closer' co-operation betweer
be placed on them.
does not end up in his place. the . workers
the hospital.
agreement
work to rule department, refused to
centre,
They then threatened
• DarL-lirie staff NHS. was to attempt to for June.
expedients' that Dunfermline are aricilol Scotland.
despite the high
to une wa
June and Aileen
"Misguided faith in the advice of
Mau DuaLISIl
*A motion about domestic violence
defts harve l'ings all their the Imouth & ade union igares like role of the bailt bias
Finally, the attitude of the Labour lefts is itself a problem. Skinner calls for 'mity' whike Benn urges
fi e commis on ol enquiry and the PLP. The timidity of the Labour lefts in a real contest means that no reliance should
Daly by barnessing the power of the labour movement with the base of the Laboar Party can we ensure ibat Callaghan is forced to go and Healey
It was management which was risking patients lives to force tht unions to accept the sackings: It was never necessary to threaten to close Last Friday the unions came to an with management to recommend a return to work if an appeal was allowed for the two men on full pay. They are to continue the
What's at stake at Charing Cross is not trade unions disregarding other working people's lives but the right to fight back against staff cuts which threaten proper health care in the
Conference. The next step must be a mass demonstration to win a pardon 'Only last week a woman from Fife, Margaret received five years imprisonment on a similar charge.
We see this campaign as a fight to win freedom from suffering for all battered women, whether at the hands of their husbands of their lover. ain the party TATNH NA hamia 111 •tlenhg@ Court Rd. Lon £5 ocalst challenge xmas party
Page 3 scan of this page
50000 STRONG ANTI-CUTS DEMO
Industrial workers in the lead
CALLAGHAN COULD BARELY GET A WORD IN
HOME NEWS
Roy Hattersley addresses the crond of over 50,000
Dy Store fo
TENS reception as they tried to put on their anti-Tory clothes.
The demonstration topped 50,000 people workers joined in towards the were still waiting to leave Hyde Park way after the speeches started at Westminster at the afternoon's rally.
Anti-Tory feeling ran high
the demonstration.
Heffer's call to bring down the Tories as quickly as possible was echoed by every section of LIC CE
One hospital shop steward remarked on how different this demonstration was from that in
when 70,000 marched against the Labour ment's cuts. "Then it was just the public sector workers who took the cuts really seriously, she said, now it'severybody'.
And in truth everybody was there.
All photos: G. M. COOKSON [Soclalist Challenge
Dennis Skinner won a standing ovation
CALLS
OPPOSIION
TO THE
CUTS
London
Eric
The demonstration was led by the miners. gents came from Yorkshire and Wales, other major mining areas. The "HOSI popular them was 'One more cut -goverli Maggie's throat!'
Other sections of industrial workers, railway workers, and electricians, followed close with their slogan of 'Kick out
jof the mass
01 Xirs.
big behind the Campaigns But the
were. strike.
the inventiveness and the suital dra students took up Thatcher,
Huge contin-
right-wing as well as the
the way for the Tories.
slogan among
The women's
including engineers,
bebind
By Patrick Sikorski heckled about his role in the low pay dispute.
oration before he'd spoken.
the TUC, the
Shirley Williams
¡ the Tories!' reviving memories demonstrate against the Heath gomermaca Firefighters pecix secter workers were there, too, with contingents especially NUPE hospital closures figured largely among the ranks of the health service young
most noticeable :up? came from the free ter we are their unbowed after dents.
Youth were to the fore in of slogans vigour with which
not only but also - the Ligbour Party adeos had paved leaders
Womens' Aid movement was represented by scores 01 Women's Aid groups marching • to protest the likely etfects of the cuts on women's refuges.
But nearly all the marchers
THE two meetings held in Central Hall on Wednesday of last week were as militant as the march had been. The reception given to the Labour leaders who had payed the way for the present Tory onslaught on the public services was implacably hostile. Former Labour ministers Jim Callaghan, Stan Orme, Michael Foot, and Peter Shore, who have suddenly discovered compassion for the elderly and sick, were drowned out in booing and heckling.
There were some surprising faces: Strange, for example, to see Albert Spanswick, general secretary of COHSE, daring to show his face after he and Alan Fisher had been thrown off the platform at the low pay rally last January. This time the union leaders took the precaution of staying out of the main hall and splitting the rank and file into two meetings. Spanswick was inaudible es he was
Dennis Skinner saved the day for the platform. His record of fighting for the reform of the Labour Party gained him a standing
'We've got to get rid of the Tories and we're not going to wait five years to do it, either' Skinner declared. 'Howdo we do it? At
Furniture Makers' resolution, narrowly defeated, called for days of action. We don't just need days of action, we need weeks of action as well.'
'Labour councils, he added, 'must follow Lambeth and refuse to implement the cuts. We need actions like those at Clay Cross, and around the Pentonville dockers; like the actions of the miners and the actions against the Industrial Relations Act. We must unite
is spotted ITS I T TED THIS JE MICATE
sect to sere Marte
CANCE SE lines of potice in the corridors.
Many militants had last
at the Grunwick picket lines. and the siogan raised by some
Scottish workers Help the police. Beat yourself
- raised a cheer from the ranks of the demonstration and a snarl from the suberinten-
Thumbs
Some marchers declared their intention of putting down resolutions to ensure that the next labour movement demonstration would be stewarded by the labour movement and not kept under the thumbs of the Metropolitan Police.
Action was the theme of the demonstration The trade union leaders who marched will be jett under no doubt that unless they name the date for strike action against the cuts, then others will be willing to start without them.
path last time.
which was only
morement.
HERES A NICE CUT"
HESELTINE) SCHOICE L
= to get rid of Thatcher and build a socialist Britain.'
The next Labour government, implement socialist policies which are drawn up for it in a manifesto not written by the people who had led us up the garden
He explained the fate of the 1974 Labour Party manifesto in terms of the attacks on the Labour government by the CBI, which launched an investment strike; the IMF, which dictated to the elected government; and by the unelected House of Lords, which wrecked Labour's legislative programme.
Skinner called for maximum unity, adding that Spanswick and Foot [who was in the chair] had something to offer in the fighe. "The leadership, ' he said, 'has got to listen to the mood of this demonstration and meeting'.
The problem is that the leaders represented on the platform alongside Skinner gave no sign of listening to the rank and file the last time they got into office, let alone using the sort of demonstration we had just seen to fight against the international bankers and the ruling class when they wrecked the Labour programme [with hardly a murmur from those who were supposed to be implementing it.
What now? 'Do you support Derek Robinson?' Callaghan was repeatedly asked by one militant — to sustained applause from the meetil g. Sunny Jim declined to comment. Part of ensuring that there are no repeats of the disasters of the last Labour government must be to get rid of Callaghan and his supporters throughout the
WHO'S NEXT
TORYCUT
Skinner continued, Socialist Challenge 6 December 1979 Pagt3.
Page 4 scan of this page
STOP US WAR THREAT
INTERNATIONAL
PRESIDENT CARTER is threatening against Iran and the overthrew the Shah. warships are standing off the Iranian coast and the seizure continues apace.
occupation of the US embassy in Tehran - a condemnation to which the Soviet Union also gave its assent - is intended to isolate Iran further in the face of Carter's threats.
underestimated the reaction when it allowed the Shah to enter the US. Mexico now says he won't be allowed back, and the rumour is that he may end up in South Africa recipient of Iranian oil before his overthrow.
policeman in defence of imperialist Interests has been seriously eroded by its defeat in
(Angola, Iran, Nicaragua). The slightest wrong
the events in Iran.
interventions since 1945.
THERE is one big reason why Carter is holding back from military action against Yet it Is hardly publicly. That reason is USSR.
Imperialism's hold on the globe been weakened by the one-third of the population from its control.
The abolition property relations in the USSR and other workers states means that they exert attraction towards the oppressed masses of the world.
The workers states acts not merely as a deterrent to tae smicnical warmongers; it provides a basis for further shifting the balance of forces against imperialism.
Yet the Kremlin
studied neutrality recent events in Iran. Worse, its representatives at the United Nations actually voted for the US-sponsored manding release embassy hostages, sanctioning continued protection of the Shab.
war revolution which A fleet of American
Iranian holdings. abroad
The United Nations' condemnation of the
But Washington has to move carefully. It
- a favoured
The ability of the US to act as world
Vietnam and a series of subsequent setbacks step and the whole Middle East could blow up - particularly as it now seems clear that the mosque seizure in Mecca reflected internal unrest against the Saudi regime sparked off by
International solidarity with the embassy seizure and the demand for the return of the Shah to Iran is vital to further tie imperialism's hands. To do this it is necessary to counter the media's smears that the overthrow of the Shah heralded a return to 'an age of darkness' in Iran.
Below we look at the different aspects of this conflict, and the continuing history of US
The bloodstained
hands of US
imperialism
Why Moscow stays silent
They
Iranian mentioned special meeting the American imperialists'
mortally removal of world's held.
capitalist
dock powerful the Iranian Hitler? of the "peacelul with capitalism. jeopardise
bureaua position of revolution. towards In other
deof the thereby US latter will
ber 1979 Page 4
SAUDI:
ARABIA
DHAHRAN Saudi Air Base. • Mecca MILES US 'baddie'
genocide suppori the initial demand of the refused
government 0I the UN cing.
Security Council to discuss the
threat of war against Iran, insisting that the hostages be released before any meeting would be
wars
Why has Moscow ducked
people such a golden opportunity to about put the US government in the
world public opinion and expose its record LU of three decades of support to
The answer lies in its policy
co-existence'
Rather than 11 IT: ratification of the SALT treaty with the US, the Kremlin bureaucrats refuse to come to the aid of the Iranian
WOrdS. starting from the premise of 'building socialism in one country, they put the interests of their own privileged caste above those of the workers of the world. And there can be no doubt that the
increasingly their own political conclusions.
BAHRAIN
Base for 5 US. Warships. AMERICAN FLEET 1 Aircraft Carrier. 1,000 1 Missile Cruiser 3 Frigates 10 BRITISH SHIPS By Geoff Bell
PROPAGANDA about situation in Iran most resembles one of those Hollywood Westerns.
There they are, the innocent white hostages, surrounded and threatened by a mob of screaming brownskins.
drama unfolds with question: can the cavalry make it in time? In this case the cavalry are 160 planes waiting on aircraft carriers to bomb Iran into 'civilisation'.
But the US film industry rarely makes movies these days allotting the
role to Indians 'goodie' role to the white settlers. The emergence of the truth - a war of
against original American settlers — nas made the John Wayne syndrome less convin-
In that sense some comparison can be made between the real story of the American West and that of the US in Iran; the truth being that the United States of America has a record of 'hot
"cold wars', and war subversion which makes the Iranian
• understandably suspicious what those American 'diplomats' in Tehran were really up
Peace-terms Matthews, Us Secretary of State, pul 1950 Francis it this way when justifying the US
courtesy of the United Nations: "We should boldly proclaim our undeniable objective to
be world peace. To have peace we should be willing, and declare our intention, to pay any price, even the price of instituting a war, to compe
co-operation for peace.
Or, to put it another way, if any country in the world fails to agree
with what America means by "peace,
then it will be invaded or bombed to
smithereens until it does.
This principle has not just been
verbally stated. The Iranian people
Teheran
IRAN
EARABIANE
ESEA
know to their cost that it was US support for the 1953 saddled them with the Shah until the beginning of this year.
'Glorious chapter'
The US president at the time, the General Eisenhower, boast of this adventure. He said in 1954: 'We have done good things especially, and overseas too, in Iran, Guatemala. the By •Guatemala, Eisenhower referring to the democrațically elected and its replacement by a right-wing dictatorship Secretary of State John Foster Dulles described Guatemala as glorious chapter in the tradition of the the American states'.
chapter in 19s the Us landed 2, 02st
marines in the Dominican Republic to defend a right-wing which two years overthrown an elected government
Four years earlier there was the US-sponsored invasion which ended disastrously.
Americans at the Bay of Pigs. The aim
that particular described -as follows by one of its
'We those who have dispossessed that all their assets will be returned.'
Those who had been
dispossessed' were the US companies
which had been kicked out by Castro,
and also the Mafia
suffered the same fate and
hand-in-glove with
plotting to bring Castro down. Revelations
Revelations by an ex-CIA agent
last year show
efforts in this direction did not end at
the Bay of Pigs. Numerous attempts
have been made by assluding sending him a cigar laced assassinate
with explosives.
US interference in the affairs of
others has not always
Islamabado
_Lahore@
PAKISTAN
coup which published
American
Makarios was later to
some damn Just "human
was overthrow OI
government
thanks to the CIA.
Perhaps 'a new and
fought dictatorship before had CIA left-leaning
of Cuba, for the CIA had not action was operations MPLA forces, emphatically assure
been unjustly
coming warmongers. 'unjustly
- which had worked the CIA in
assassinations.
the Cambodia, that Washington's
the US
Cuban
deleted).
been so
INDIA
FROM PHILIPPINES
1 US. Carrier 11 Missile Cruiser 1 Fleet Oiler
unsubtle or direct. In 1977 a list was
revealing that political leaders throughout the world had receiyed secret hand-outs for acting in
interests. Among them were King Hussein of Jordan, Will Brandt of West Germany, Presiden
of Cyprus of Kenya, Mobutu of Zaire, and Forbes Burnham of Guyana.
before the • story broke rights' champion Jimmy Carter called in the editor of the newspaper concerned and demanded it be censored. The editor refused.
Mercenaries significal recent exposures of Us
policy relates to the played by the CIA in Angola. William Colby, CIA boss from 1973 to 1976 admitted that US military advisers
. on side •LIC pro-imperialist FNLA, and that the
organised the recruitment, payment, and delivery of European and American mercenaries
Colby also stated that the Cubans would not have entered Angola if the
launched its secret against the left-wing because the MPLA could have won without them. That statement just about sums up hypocrisy of the present utterances
from the Washington
"Territory'
The Iranians, like the Cubans in
Angola, are simply responding to an
American foreign policy • which
steeped in mass murder, coups and
For a state which has done what has done Vietnam, Guatemala, the Domini-
can Republic and many other places
to turn round now and protest about
the occupation of a couple of acres of
its territory' in Iran is... (expletive
Page 5 scan of this page
move to
THE MEDIA have tried to portray Iran as being in the grip of a fanatical regime more reactionary than even the Shah. The reality is somewhat different.
It' is true that last Khomeini launched repression against all those opposing the Islamic Republic.
Lan sels were the nationalities, socialists, also press freedom. But this onslaught couldn't be carried through.
The reason: Islamic alone doesn't feed people and answer their daily needs. And because of the overwhelmingly popular nature of the revolution that overthrew the Shah, there was no social base independent of the masses that Khomeini could lean on.
The Kurdish people beat back the Islamic Revolutionary (Pasdaran), who had to bear the brunt of the fighting because many of the army ranks were unwilling to be involved in repression of the national struggle: demonstration in the kurdish city of November Saqqez combined support for embassy occupation for withdrawal of all Pasdaran from Kurdistan and an end to radio and TV censorship of their struggle. Similar solidarity demonstrations occurred in Mahabad, other Kurdish cities.
On 17 November Khomeini was forced television acknowledge that the Kurdish people had been wronged, people in Iran, and promise major economic reconstruction.
The council formed in Kurdistan to coordinate negotiations with the delegation from central government includes the previously.
Kurdish Democratic Party Revolutionary Party of Kurdistan.
Another sign of how the regime has been forced to draw back is the fact that almost all the newspapers and magazines which were banned during the summer, including Trotskyist paper Kargar; been allowed to reappear legally
The way in which the struggle for the extradition of the Shah has begun
embrace more thoroughgoing anti-imperialist demands can be seen in the slogans raised by some of the workers' contingents who have come to the US embassy in Tehran express their solidarity occupiers.
Persian Gulf workers, for example, banner with the slogan, permanent struggle against imperialism is the key to the unity of Iranian nationalities'. Car workers from the Khaver plant called for the abolition of all military treaties while steelworkers demanded nationalisation of all US-controlled holdings.
A similar development was a sit-in on 18 November by more than 4,000 drilling workers in US companies in Ahwaz to demand the creation of a cational drilling company.
On the same day peasants from curside Tehran came to ambassy for the first time. In addition i calling for extradition of the Shah, hey carried banners demanding the
TOIRAN
Iranian masses
centre stage
ITe the unity
aave
will come into The main Khomeini's Kurds and other
women. and tions can
such a test. ideology
Solidarity
picket
been called Guards
Down with US imperialism!'
mostly Iranian
the US get out of Iran, demands masses Members
have held afterwards.
Bukan, and
fran' at 2pm
other
outlawed and the Toilers of
the have now 10 with the
shipbuilding carried The
with the Us,
the the
nationalisation of all land belonging to the US imperialists, the Pahlavi dynasty, and those connected with them. One of their slogans was: Long
of the workers, peasants, and oppressed of Iran.'
Sooner or later these aspirations open conflict with plans for an Islamic Republic. But the present mobilisa-
only assist class combativity that will be needed in
A PICKET of the US embassy in Grosvenor Square, London W1, has
for this Saturday December) at 1pm by the Committee to Defend Democratic Rights in Iran • under the slogans US hands off Iran!
Last Saturday over 300 people,
students, marched through Edinburgh. Slogans, raised included 'Iran the next Vietnam?
Support the - send the Shah back'. of the International Marxist Group supported the march held arervatos peals the meeting
This Saturday December) they are holding their own public meeting to demand 'Hands off
at Edinburgh Trades Council, Picardy Place. Speakers will
• local trade anionist and an Iranian Trotskyist from the HKS. IRANIANS jailed in the United States as part of Carter's witch-hunt.
WORKING PEOPLE SHOULD
— have an interest in fighting the Iranian masses...
'You know,
me your murderers. your Thieus and your Kys and your dictators the world over.
working people of Iran. Who is being 'kicked around'?
things we need too?
Iranians. Nor by the Cubans, nor the Vietnamese.
the Vietnamese, by
backs.
'We should join with the Iranians, Vietnamese, the black Africans and help them *kick around' world will be a better place for it.'
WORKERS IN 1980
ALIST
SOCIALISTS CHALLENGE
CARTER'S WARMONGERING
CARTER's warmongering against Iran is being challenged within the heartland of imperialism by the American Trotskyists of the Socialist Workers Party. The SWP candidate for the 1980 presidential elections, former GI Andrew Pulley, had this to say at a campaign meeting in Detroit on 18 November:
'American working people have no interest — no interest whatever — in a war against the Iranian people. Only the oil companies and the rest of the bikionaires that run this country — and, of coutse, their loyal servant the Shah
It's inscribed on the Statue of Liberty: Send me your downtrodden, your exploited, your oppressed. But the US government does not follow that principle. Just the opposite. That inscription should say:
Send me your Shahs. Send me your Somozas.
"The reason they won't extradite the Shah is because they know that if he is convicted of the grave crimes he committed, they also stand convicted before the world and before the American people. That's because the government of this country represents the Rockefellers and other imperialist rulers who benefited from the policies of the Shah. The Shah was their puppet!...
'A war with Iran would only benefit the Rockefellers, the tycoons. interests of the American working people are the same as the interests of the
Just think about some of the things the Iranian people are fighing for. T nationalise the big industries. To win workers control ever these indescries a curb inflation, provide jobs for the unemplosed, give land to the pezsases Ensure the rights of oppressed national minorities. Aren't these the kind of
"The rulers of this country want us to believe that "we" are being "kicked around" by the Iranian people. Well, I'm not being "kicked around" by the didn't lose any sugar mills in Cuba and I have nothing to lose if the people of Indochina establish their independence and deepen their revolution. sure the overwhelming majority of the American people are like me
'No, it's not us that are being "kicked around" by the Iranians, toe Cubans.
the black African masses, by the Nicaraguans.
Rockefeller and the DuPonts. And we should welcome their getting —as they see it — "kicked around" by people who are simply trying to get them off their
the Cubans, the Nicaraguans, the
RUN THE COUNTR
people.
Although the mast against
break
"Send Send me
The tion of
' some more. The
unify the i US troops shoald Kurdistan *That
and favouring the HKS
province.
regime to retreat
supported against Iran. Copies Tehran Avenue,
How to
deepen
the
revolution
KHOMEINI has tried to the US
occupation
rallying point to divert atte
his failure to solve many
pressing problems facing
But it is a doul atilising
US
regime's faili
its refasal to
La planned
agricultare, education and housing.
*That a government representi y the majority forces of society -workers and peasants government
set up to resist the imperialis offensive and act in the real interests Oi the mass of people Iran.
FREE IRANIAN
TROTSKYISTS!
FOURTEEN members of the Iraniau section of the Fourth International,
[Socialist Workers Partyl, are still imprisoned in HIYATES
They were arrested in May and June for distributing leaflets and a
time threatened with execution until a worldwide campaig to save their lives forced the Khome
In a recent letter demanding cbci
14 wrote they the mass mobilisations US imperialism. Bat 'authorities in Ahwaz demand that we denounce our ideas and the HKS Because we refuse to do that, they still keep us in prison.'
The international campaign to win the release of the HKS 14 continues. Protest telegrams should be sent to Avatoran kunollad knomell, von.
should be sent to the daily Baamdad, •Hatez 24 Zartoshtian Alley, Tehran, Iran; to Ettala'at, Khayam Avenue, Tehran, Iran: and Kayhan, Ferdowsi Avenue, Tehran, Iran. Socialist Challenge 6 December 1979 Page 5
Page 6 scan of this page
HOME NEWS
Teachers conference National Union of Teachers is to be SPECIAL conference held on Saturday to discuss how to respond to the cuts imposed education by the Tories.
To date, the NUT executive has failed to launch an effective national campaign by teachers, refused to work jointly with other unions. opposed participating in the demonstration on the pretext that it was 'political'!
Union branches led by the left have put forward amendments the motion for the special conference. These branches are demanding: joint action with other unions; a national strike; no cover made redundant; no extra work-load; and national implementation of the union's pulley would highlight the fact that 55,000 teachers are needed now to reduce class sizes to a maximum of thirty.
With decline membership of 4.5 percent this year it is clear that the NUT could suffer even greater setbacks unless it changes
hopeful sign alc achieved by Bernard Regan, Socialist Teachers Association, Dick North, from Rank and File, in the election of officers.
Regan polled 7,079 votes against 26,000 by his right-wing opponent -the highest vote ever achieved in the
by a left candidate. polled 4,670 votes in an election with five other candidates candidate accumulated just 12,000 votes.
Scottish students march By George Kerevan OVER 1,500 students through Edinburgh on Wednesday of last week to protest against the Tory cuts. The demonstration, called by Scottish ares NUS, support from universities and college! all over Scotland. The Scottish TÚC also sponsored the march, number of NUPE banners joined the students,
Militancy in the Scottish colleges has been at a low ebb in the past three years, and this was the first sign of a
At some march was chanting in unison: No cuts, Tories out!'
*Tory councillors in Lothian have taken legal action Labour-controlled Lothian regional council from paying the counci emniovees who attended the 28 November anti-cuts demonstration in London.
Lothian is one of the few councils to have declared that implement the Tory cuts, and agreed to pay the wages of any trade union delegate to the London Tory councillors have taken out an interim edict (equivalent to an English injunction) lo stop these payments. Sit-in at Preston poly BY a vote of 105 for and only one against, students Polytechnic decided to occupy the administration building against the • in students fees.
Thespur to this action was a visit to the poly by the Education Secretary, Mark Carlisle. When Carlisle arrived on Friday he was greeted by some three Socialist Challenge, 6 December 1972, Pageó
CUTTING
UP
ROUGH
to get rid of the Tories'.
of the
NATFHE branches there.
Trades Council's
Southampton
teachers lobby 28. November
By Mike NALGO series of executive's
trade hialisa
one-day Ior starT and social services.
Called by the Trade Union which unions, together councils in union NUS.
Tory-controlled
the votes
schools,
of the
nursery and gramme. we are
national
firmer required than workplace delegations
North
LaC top
over cuts. Several of the
indirectly cut wages.
attack
marched By Alison Cooper
which was White Paper on the
drew Supplementary
and
recommended include:
"poverty line'
points the entire
£30m a year:
stop the
wages of
liable in law for
will
For earnings as at present.
Although march. The
bringing
packed with dangers. for discretionary benefits, äbolished,
Preston
last • week
security stem.
position to
the labour movement.
out, expected
General
hundred people chanting. 'Tories out' and "The Tories, the Tories, we've got
Support for the occupation and opposition to the racist fees increase has come from TGWU members at the Poly, together with the NALGO and
With the support, too, of Preston
mittee, the students now aim to visit executive 'com- firm local factories and union branches. days
Said
Tucker, Southampton
OVER eight hundred public sector
and students marched in Winchester last Thursday to lobby Hampshire country council against its proposed euts in education
Hampshire Joint Committee, the lobby was supported by all the public sector and a
trades work.
Southampton, Portsmouth and Havant, and Wessex area
The lobby had little effect on the
council, which decided to raise the price of school meals to 50p, ban the sale of milk in
and cutback the already education range
to • reverse action. will be simply sending to lobby the council, as happened last Thursday. We should build for strike action. we re
And if we are to secure the support of industrial workers in the area, we will need an alternauve swalc g to
trade union officials who spoke on the lobby said that they oppose rate increases, which
Claimants under
THE government has just produced a
'Reform of the • Benefits Scheme, and has introduced a Social Security Bill in Parliament. These proposals offer little to the five million people:
SS. . The changes:
*Knocking 20-30p a week off the
AT supplementary benefits to bring these into line with National Insurance benefits. This will result in a loss to claimants of about
*Denying supplementary benefits to school leavers until the end of the holiday following their last term at school, thus keeping them dependent on their parents for even longer.
maintaining them. *Benefits will be increased in line with inflation, rather than with prices
there at. SOLIC advantages in the proposals, such as
long-term rates after one year instead of the present two years, they are also
The secret 'A Code', which allows is to be but the legislation which will replace it also abolishes several 0f* these benefits. At the same time, the Supplementary Benefits Commission is to go, removing even the fig leaf of 'independent' scrutiny of the social
Claimants are not in a strong resist these measures.
That's why they need the support of
IN 1970 there were two thousand workers at the Meccano factory in Merseyside. Last Friday, remaining 931 workers at the plant were handed their cards. But they decided to stay put.
With management now locked
the occupying have produclon underway by the middlé of this week; and to hold a toy fair at the factory to unveil the 1980 models.
FRANK BLOOR, convenor of the
and Municipal •Worker Union at Meccano — which has the largest number of members there — told John Sexton and Geoff Carrole about the decision to occupy.
It was at 3.45pm last Friday that the managing director of Airfix, the owning company, called in all the senior stewards here to tell us that in three-quarters of word cease to Suncin hour the
When we raised the question of 90
notice, the managing director "you'll have to take us to court", and while we were sitting in the meeting management was issuing everyone on the shopfloor with their redundancy notices.
That was it.
Our first decision was that we'd work the 90 days' notice whether management liked it or not, and that
wouldn't allow them to anything out of the factory. Practically the whole workforce was at the meeting which decided to occupy. We've got a very good product
workforce which wants to of the figures management is giving out living in cloud cuckoo land. 'They're just not for real. We've got the people on the shopfloor who can pull this company round.
We're trying to point out to the company that we are a viable concern and that with our new 1980 product
we can make
They've put out in the media that we have been disruptive and have had disputes. It's not true. We've operated with management all along the line. This is a stab in the back, and
not taking lying They've definitely hoodwinked us.
We've had redundancies before, in 1976-77 for example. We thought at that time that it was the best thing
do because was saving majority of peoples' jobs.
We've realised that's not the right way. You get stabbed. You get killed. So anyone else who's in a position like us, don't accept redundancy. Fight it all the way!
As far as we're concerned, if any more factories close on Merseyside they may as well drop a bomb on it.
MARCH
Wed
Sat 23 Sen
30 Camden Rd, London N1.
the they're good
We were with the workers at the Speke No 2 plant and all the other places down. which closed. We feel that this is the last stand for Liverpool.
The first basic step was to occupy the plant, to ensure that we have enouch deodle on site to secure the plant for ourselves. We intend to keep WOrKTOILE about developments.
We would like the help of the trade union movement country to assist us in this struggle.
And we'd be very pleased if anyone who has been through this experience of occupation would get in touch with us.
SNOOKERED
fightback
CALENDAR 1980
Fight Health Cuts. + Fight Every Cut THE STRUGGLE CONTINUES
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MECCANO WORKERS OCCUPY
'If any more factories
go on Merseyside,
they may as well
bomb the place'
everyday
throughout the Union,
vote.
petition
Although
invaded by
these
home?
1. Fuli executives
Sheila
The only thing that management has asked of us is if they could use the computer to get the wages out. We said certainly, but we'll have one ol our computer people with them to makesure it's only the wages.
WHEN women were banned from playing snooker at the City Working Men's Club in Wakefield it was the last straw for one woman.
Despite changes in legislation the
of the Clubs and Institutes to which many clubs are affiliated, prevent women having a
• Women in Wakefield organised »
and picketed the club's committee to demand their rights.
the committee eventually accepted the petition they remained intransigent about the snooker table.
Given that most members of these clubs are trades unionists and Labour Party members, it seems high time that these bastions of patriarchy were
women who have every right to be full members. Or have
committees forgotten that women work both in and outside the
Equal Rights In Clubs Campaign for Action is fighting for the following in working men's clubs:
membership rights women. 2. The right to affiliate to the Club and Institute Union. 3. The right to vote in clubs. 4. The right to vote at CIU conferences. 5. The righ to use all club facilifies. 6. The right to introduce visitors to clubs. 7. The right to nominate and stand for club
and committees. 8. To change the name of working men's clubs to workers' clubs. Contact
Capstick, 26 South Street, Wakefield if you want to know more.
Page 7 scan of this page
combine members management.
workers redundant.
many thousands more had been laid off. By Pat Kane
WHAT was behind Edwardes' 'survival plan' has become çlear with the company's recently issued five per cent pay offer and the 85-page productivity deal which was attached to it.
order implement Edwardes had to take on the unions.
opposed the plan, they Inside British Leyland the Combine Committee was the only nationally organised trade union body that had the potential of focusing opposition to Edwardes.
The sacking of Derek Robinson is the first major attack on the rank and file leadership inside the unions that
have seen under the Edwardes has set a every other employer.
CYCL UPAL sacking clearly showed the strength of the organised trade unions. unofficial stoppages of over workers were the result
opposition management.
But inside the plants there were divisions. In many plants the long years of participation and the success of BL in closing down factories like Speke: had left sections workforce demoralised.
In every plant there was a minority work. In other plants, like Canley and Castie Bromwich. strike action was overwhelming. strike action was overwhelming.
The division between the workers was between those fight • and those who support Edwardes. Terry betrayal gave a massive boost to the right wing in the plants.
During the strike the leadership of the Combine Committee themselves very limited strategy was to contain the dispute to wherever they could get support easily - and to wait for the unions to make it official.
Official
With official backing TGWU and the AUEW, victory was clear.
But to rely on this alone — not to call for all-out strike action and to
pickets - meant that the AUEW officials could get away with it.
The success of the Duffy partnership has meant that the first phase in the struggle has been lost. It will be a hard fight to reinstate Robinson.
The outrage. that was expressed by thousands of Leyland
can rekindled
ROBINSON
ONMONDAY 19 November BL management announced the dismissal of Derek Robinson, convenor of the British Leyland shop stewards combine. Three other; leading
received official warnings from Their crime was that they distributed a pamphlet attacking BL's plans to make at least 25,000
The victimisation led to a series of walk-outs and unofficial strikes. An example was a mass meeting at BL's Canley plant where 6,000 workers voted to take indefinite
By 22 November 37,000 BL workers were on strike and
A week after the sacking 5,000 people took part in a demonstration in Birmingham in support of Robinson. The same day the leadership of the Transport and General Workers Union said they intended making the. strike
Dare to struggle...
Michael
GRAND HOT , this,
Committee bad had to go.
Tories. precedent for
followed the
30,000 of the the into action.
The recently
of the him or not.
policies that Leyland the decision for
wanted to Duffy's
set goals. Their from MICHAEL EDWARDES
TR7), nationalisation and flying safeguard jobs.
Edwardes has no Edwardes/ saving Leyland as it is. wants to safeguard
the line and give the lowest initially unions is the stopped.
RE-INSTATE
first. Robinson is & member of the AUEW. announced.
The next day Terry
read on ...
Eater un
AMBROSE
BARTE
MARCHING tbrough Birmingham last week Combine Committèe must be forced
formed Leyland Action Committee will be fighting for action from all union members to defend Robinson whether the enquiry cooked up by Duffy finds in favour of
It will also be arguing for the only
can defend jobs week, worksharing with no loss of pay, no transfer of work from one factory to anomer las was attemoico with tot
the car industry as a whole with a plan to
intention of He simply the profits of Leylaud and his own fat pay cheque. that
He's out to sack workers, speed up
pay rise. possible. A massive fight by the trade
only way he'll be
official but were waiting 'out of courtesy' for the Amalgamated Union of Engineering Workers to do so
The next day the executive of the AUEW broke up their own meeting to have a secret one with BL boss Michael Edwardes. Led by right-wing president Terry Duffy the executive gave in to Edwardes. They announced their own internal enquiry into Robinson's activities and ordered their members to return to work. Robinson remains sacked but will be paid by BL until the results of the enquiry are
BL said that even if the enquiry declared Robinson 'innocent' he would not be reinstated.
Duffy said Edwardes had threatened to close down BL for good if the strike had been made official. All employees at BL are now back at work.
A battle has been lost, but the war need not be. Now
SHARDŁOW'S WORKERS OF THE WORLD By Rich Palsei taken the sack without a fight?
confrontation?
But
which 'right' was so clearly on the side of the unions.
plants are full of outdated machinery.
workers have the strength involves defending those members who do struggle. Thi
primary reasons for workers belonging to a union.
How to fight the blackmail
TERRY Duffy'sexcuse for giving into Edwardes was the threat the Leyland boss made to close down the entire company if the strikes were made official.
*But - this is the oldest management trick in the book. Almost every time a major strike breaks out, the bosses offer some sort of similar threat.
.. But - even if Edwardes was serious, could he have got away with closing BL? Remember that not only do 100,000 people work at BL but at least that many again work in companies which are dependent for their survival on Leyland. Would Michael Edwardes really have got away with throwing that many people on the dole queue? Would hundreds of thousands of workers have
•But — if Terry Duffy had told Edwardes that the AUEW did not accept the victimisation of its members, if he had reminded the BL boss that the TGWU was just waiting for a word from the AUEW to make the strike official and that the AUEW intended doing the same, would Edwardes have risked such a
even if Edwardes had not backed down government have allowed Edwardes to invite such a confrontstion, which could have grown into immense proportions involving even wider ser tons of the trade union movement? Remember Jim Prior is about to announce his own plans for union 'reform', and he might not have welcomed such a struggle in
*But - it is said that the government 'gives' BL millions and millions of pounds and that the Tory government was threatening that i would give no more if Edwardes gave in. The fact is that BL has been 'giver" nothing. The state owns BL and has also lent the company large sums. But on the money it has lent the government is getting high rates of interest - up to 15.5 per cent. The money is lent not to pay 'idle workers' but to invest in a company whose
*But — mostof all, remember what trade unions are for. They are for fighting for higher wages and conditions for their members. A unic 7 is nt ›ded to ensure
and power tr ¿ what rest of the AUEW executive did not. In so doing they cook away one of the
And that is what Terry Duffy should have told M hael Ewardes.
ROBINSON — no backing down from the fight
Longbridge AS WOrked
book. It reads: removal.'
ballot
county passed
the executive.
the active
higher
would the Tory
of defending
replace leadership?
emerges that interests
A
fight back. That
offy and the to Duffy
WAIT 15
DUFFY
MUST GO
MOVES have already begun to force Duffy and the rest of the scabbing AUEW executive out of office.
Last Thursday a demand for the removal of the executive came fron the Northfield branch of the AUEW
Birmingham. The overwhelming majority of the branch work at the
plant where Robinson
In demanding the removal of the executive the Northfield branch are citing rule 15, para 5 of the union rule
"The executive council, or any member thereof, may be removed from office by a ballot vote of the membership of the union provided that such a ballot is demanded by 10 per cent or more of the branches anc that not less than two-thirds of the membership are in favour of such
The Northfield branch demand a
because • the executive's treatment of Robinson, who was 'victimised in a completely uncon-
A drive should now be made in AUEW branches up and down the
similar in obtain the necessary 10 per cent for a ballot on
The truth is that the strength of the AUEW has always lain with the shop stewards movement. This has allowed
Not many thousands of workers in the running of the union. The result has been a
level of democracy and accountability over full-time officials man exists in many ouncr umlons.
A removal of Duffy is one means
the shop stewards
But in any ballot the first question AUEW members will ask is. who will
the present right-wing
That is why it is important to make sure that in the fight to remove the Duffy scab machine a new leade sulp
doesn't suppurt the of the employers and government against the needs of the AUEW members.
campaign needed which can unite all militants. For this an open conference should be held as soon as possible for all those opposed
who are dedicated to re-building the left in the union. The aim should oe to win sponsorship for such 9 conference from the Broad
-a Engineering Charter.
Suvalst Challenge 6 December 1979 Page 7
Page 8 scan of this page
THE MAKING OFA LEYLAND VICTIM
IF IT is possible to pinpoint one occasion in the past five years when the victimisation of Derek Robiuson became a dot on the horizon, it was » time paradoxically compliance with management wishes was never more complete.
That date was 1 February 1978. The place, Kenilworth, meeting of 650 trade union representatives and management from four months after Michael Edwardes had been appointed as the new Leyland boss.
The Kenilworth meeting was the first real opportunity Edwardes had to explain his strategy for managing Leyland. seven-point resolution to the meeting, involved — among other things 12,500 jobs through redundancy programmes, plant closures, some combination of these'
On the day of the meeting, Derek Robinson, writing in the Morning Star, called on the labour movement to 'close ranks, unite and fight the plan to carve up Leyland' itself Robinson, together with the vast majonty of the other stewards present, voted acceptance of this, the first Edwardes
The next day, the Morning Star declared it would have been "irresponsible to vote against'. Job loss
From that meeting Edwardes has never Looked presided over a 20,000 job loss in the past two ycals, promised 25,000 more redundancies, although and his most recent 'survival plan' has
the real figure will probably be nearer double that.
The latest DIan has Robinson and the rest of the Leyland stewards movement, and it is this opposition which has led to the sacking of Robinson. more indirect sense, it was that Kenilworth vote which prepared for the sacking.
The vote at that meeting accepted the logic of what Edwardes did when he demanded the latest round of sackings, and Robinson's vote at the Kenilworth maste responsible. argued opposition was Edwardes has now punished such irresponsıbility with the dismissal of Robinson.
in anollel way, allowed for the success, temporary though it may be, that Edwardes has had in carrying through the victimisation. For at Kenilworth the Leyland shop stewards movement presented itself, bound hand and foot, to the company management.
It gave in to a management strategy which had incorporated the leadership of the trade union movement into plans to movement and lose its members' jobs. Workers' interests
It would be an exaggeration to say. that the union leadership represented at Kenilworth had agreed to become certainly lost its ability to act independently on the sole basis of workers' interests.
Kenilworth may have been the low point, but the process had started three years with the publication of the Ryder report into British Leyland. Ryder promised a bright future for the Leyland workers, politicians at the time were only too happy to emphasise
Prime Minister Harold Wilson declared: "We are confident that if the recommendations of the (Ryder) report are implemented it will lead to no loss of jobs and that the Leyland workforce ... In
the 1980s will be as great as it is today.'
The Ryder report was part of a government rescue of Leyland which involved the company being run by the state-owned National Enterprise Board.
As with the Ryder report, great things were promised with the creation of the NEB. The 1974
Labour Party manifesto vowed: 'It will for the
first time provide an instrument for exercising
control in the area of profitable manufacturing
industry. It offers the opportunity to pursue new paths in job creating.
Dream
In pursuit of this dream, a whole host of trade
union leaders were placed on the board of the NEB. Among them was Hugh Scanlon, Duffy's predecessor as president of the AUEW. It was
'participation' at the
'participation' in the
another carrot offered by union leadership at Leyland.
Among the foremost
participation was Derek Robinson
said: 'If we make Leyland successful it will be a
political victory. It will prove that
working people LAYC
when Robinson's
Warwickshire. The event,
British Leyland. This waS
He put forward which - the loss of 'natural and
but at the meeting
"survival' plan.
onwards Michael He has
been opposed by
But in a deeper, if
that indeed Michael
the Kenilworth meeting
weaken that a company union, but it
previous v
La future which
board,
succeed. highest level, while
Leyland context
was Ryder to the trade
to this In 1976 he
got guts and bi
TIMS NSMM of members victimised for union activity.
sell-outs the
determination to run industry.'
That was rather an exaggerated vision of the participation scheme introduced by the Ryder report. There wasn't even provision for workers' representatives to be placed
and the provisions that it did involved a watering-down of the traditional functions of trade unions.
Frank Chapter, a division organiser of the AUEW, put it this way: 'Radical workers' attitudes are needed participation within the new British Leyland is to
*Participation means that we'll now involved decision-making responsibility that brings. Employee representatives will no longer have to answer just to their members. Their actions will also have to be acceptable to the public.'
In shorthand, what Chapter was saying was that the trade union leadership at Leyland was now in the business of serving two masters. On the one hand was their members, on the other 'the public'.
But what exactly was 'the public"? assumption was that because Leyland had been nationalised it was now to be run in the interests of the public'; that no longer would it be run in. the interests of its owners, and that accordingly mahagement attitudes towards the workforce would change.
That looks somewhat criterion by which Leyland was run under the auspices of the NEB was the same criterion by which it was run under private ownership. Edwardes put it in his recent letter promising nis "recovery plan', the aim was to ensure that
"LONCBRIDCE
TERRY Duffy, president of the Amalgamated Union of Engineering Workers, and the rest of his union's executive, reneged last week on a
founding principle of trade unionism — defence
By ordering to go back to work those of its
members at British Leyland who had been on strike over the sacking of Leyland convenor Derek Robinson, Duffy made one of the biggest
union movement this good the Leyland make
changes in employee
warned be with the
revealed.
The changes this big
the members.
sick today. The voluntarily by Leyland and
As by the
OINT SHOP STEWARDS COMMITTEE
company was 'operating at a profit'.
The trade union leadership inside and outside Leyland was reluctant to acknowledge that it was
: capitalist principle participation was meant to serve.
Did it willingly
On the contrary, Communist Party members in particular were quick to promote and to praise the new arrangement. Ironically, one of the men
when Robinson sacked Adams, said the following of a participation subcommittee on plans for the new Mini which involved new working practices:
experience, before in has so much information Almost everything that we requested was made available.
'Obviously the company was very keen to get our co-operation. I think it is fair to say that it is only in cases where trade unions have been faced with confrontations or plant closures that they have indicated they are willing to talk about
'And we did it willingly and voluntarily,' Adams added, 'convinced that we were acting in
best interests of the company
Indeed, much was done willingly
the trade union the Halona. especially AÚEW - leadership outside. The most obvious example concerned the continual struggle waged
toolmakers and other craft Leyland over their own rates of pay. Robinson's
AUSTIN LONCBRIDCE
LEYL
witnessed for years. occurrences the sell-out was not unprepare neither was it an isolated incident.
What happened at Leyland last week ha been signaled by any number of warning sig over the past five years.
To protest and organise against the sacki of Derek Robinson is vital; but to appreciate ho and why it happened is the best insuran against a repetition. GEOFF BELL reports
which
Many other strike.
management
This is further testified Jack
our fought so been
The drive
an unfortunate _ LI
and leadership at the
Edwardes. workers at
UPA But like all SUI attitude was summed up by what he said duri toolmakers' strike in February and March 1
"The worst thing that can happen to B Leyland and the country is for groups of wo to think that they have the God-given rig take sectional action in defence of their conditions. We can't afford a toolroom stri
The expression of such sentiments shows
had used Robin participation philosophy to its own advar
. by an article Robi wrote in The Times in February 1978:
«The trade unions understand as clearly s Edwardes that productivity must be raised level of our international competilors ...
hard to recover that comp position after the unofficial and damaging ! by some toolmakers in March...
'We have taken an unprecedented initiat try and improve output and quality.'
productivity meant anything which came in its way tended denounced. A productivity and parity agree of December 1978 was enthusiastically back Robinson. The anti-Communist witch hunt being launched against Robinson and other
Robi denounced those who opposed this agreeme 'the lunatic left, the Trots and their henchm We are prepared to be reasonable'
Included in this 'we' was Len Brindle, chairperson of the combine, and another ‹
disciplined two weeks ago Just before his formai 'war Brindle wrote indignantly:
'Over the last two years we have nego
Page 9 scan of this page
agreements with the company that give British Leyland management mobility and flexibility; change of working practice agreements; virtual elimination of inter-union rows on who-doeswhat.
'We have clearly defined agreements on productivity that go. far employer of labour within the (car) industry in Great Britain. So how can myself and convenors like me throughout saboteurs?' Scaffolding
The protest is a justified one, Brindle does not appear to appreciate is that his and others' notions of an identity of interest with management meant scaffolding from which any who broke from such an identity of themselves hung.
Not that it was just a case of the individual views of Robinson, Brindle, or other trade union representatives within Leyland. They reflected a philosophy which gained wide acceptance in the abour movement. The threats which Edwardes now makes against anyone who strikes at British Leyland are merely a repetition of what others have said before.
In March Secretary, Eric Varley, who offered himself as a management mouthpiece: I want all workers at Leyland, including those on anofficial strike, to be quite clear that their employment and the future of their company is row in their hands. They can kill it or they can save it. They have no one else to blame or thank.'
walk-out beyond any other
BL be accused of being
but what
had erected a
interests could find 1977 it was I abour's Industry
Varley went on to call for 'an early return to work, higher levels of output and a radical improvement in industrial relations'.
Similarly the threats that Tory Industry Secretary Keith Joseph made over the Robinson
that public money withdrawn if the strike continued warning taken from another Varley script when the Labour minister said this February:
*BL cannot sustain a long strike, nor could the government sustain a long strike on the basis of providing public funds."
The 'public funds' directed through Leyland were channelled the National Board and on that body Hugh Scanlon fully backed the Varley line. put it in August 1978, Scanion had trequently
(DON'T WE HAVE GREAT TRADE UNION
their fullest part
Toolmakers
mean? For the AUEW
one of their disputes.
confined to Leyland;
its successor to Scanlon,
November 1977.
record of Scanlon,
management.
propaganda to its emerged successful.
Scanlon,
adding, vote for me And because
Wright.
Nonsense
the productivity leadership
report itself said, reason for the low changed would Enterprise
As the Financial Times
HIS MEMBERS!
and passionately appealed to his members to play
making the state-owned financed rescue (of Leyland) a suceess'.
But what did making a 'success' of Leyland
it was most interpreted in the spring of 1977 when the union executive voted for a resolution which effectively allowed Leyland to sack the toolmakers during
The consequences of such actions were not
they affected the entire Broad Left in the AUEW. For instance, those who voted for the toolmakers' sacking was. Les Dixon, a member of the Communist Party. When the time came for the Broad Left to put up
and Bob Wright was chosen, it was Dixon who was the key-note speaker at a Broad Left national assembly in
The subsequent defeat of Wright and the election of Terry Duffy owes much to the dismal
Dixon and others Broad Left in the years preceding the election At Leyland and elsewhere they had sought to outlaw trade union militancy and to preach the value to their members of "participation' with
It was hardly surprising that when Scanion's successor was eventually elected, it was Terry Duffy, who had merely taken the Broad Left
logical conclusion, 'Responsibility'
Dixon, •Robinson, and Brindlee had in the years before denounced strikers and 'Trots', and had demanded 'responsibility' from
Therefore, Terry Duffy was the Broad Left had itself 'educated' AUEW members on the dangers of militancy, they did indeed vote for Duffy, or if they didn't they found little reason to vote for
In Leyland itself the price workers paid for such leadership kept increasing. In supporting
the trade union has echoed propaganda of 'lazy' car workers as being the reason for all Leyland's ills.
Such a diagnosis is nonsense. As the Ryderr
'under-investment is the maim productivity But nothing From 1976 investment at Leyland has been £375 per worker, Vauxhall's has been £1,030, and VW £1,110.
Other prospects presented in the Ryder report have gone the same way, and by early 1977 The Times was declaring that the plans for expansion outlined in Ryder were 'in ruins'. The bulldozer to sweep away the ruins came in October 1977 in the shape of Michael Edwardes. Token opposition
One indication of the nature of the new regime was seen in a meeting Edwardes had with national union officials in January 1978. I am not here to negotiate,' he said, 'merely to tell you what is on my mind and to hear your views.'
What was on Edwardes' mind soon emerged
Although the unions offered a token opposition
national unioh leadership or by the Leylanc
As late as February 1979 Michael Edwardes was telling the Daily Mirror: If anything I would
that the Communist shop stewards
VER TERO THE BOAT
and reliable.
leadership of the Leyland stewards
from the sky.
starkly arranged
disillusionment with parțicipation.
endorse a letter from
among down' of Leyland.
and sent out. some more months,
from it.
Already happening
in the
who
name of an Edwardes "survival plan'. chance of winning
class
Tragedy
Ryder
capita
similar priorities Scanion,
the very
which could have
that another way was possible.
Broad depends, heir Robinson,
such actions which control and
lost at that time.
stronger position today.
A NICHT TOEDLINGE HIS
Leyland are among the most efficient, conce
By then the participation rainbow which chasing for three years had completely fades
In September 1978, four hundred stewards
meeting discuss tbei suddenly caled to an energieaty se ton or the cars" council - the top tier in the participatio machinery. There they were told that they had to
Edwardes threatening striking toolmakers and promising. a 'slimming
The stewards were not consulted about the letter, they were meiely told it had been written
'Participation' staggered on for but it was the meeting in September when Edwardes effectively withdrew
It would be easy to blame all this on Michael
words, the 'limited workers' control' established
accelerate what was happening at Leyland before he arrived. Toolmakers were attacked by their own union before and after Edwardes arrived; arrived; there were speed-ups and redundancies before and after Edwardes came. It mattered little to the victims whether they were abused or sacked in the name of participation or in the
There is little use pretending that Leyland management has not gained a number of notable victories in the last couple of years. The reason it has is that through a fake 'nationalisation' and a unions and their national and plant leadership into collaborating with management plans.
This union identification with management so weakened and confused the left at Leyland that when Robinson finally protested and said
sacking Robinson was a gamble he stood a
Leyland justified that sacking by saying that
oner
recovery programme, threatening market share and confidence in the company's future."
The expression for such sentiments is not new from Leyland management; the tragedy is that
have been stated by Hugh Eric Varley and, yes Derek Robinson in the past four years
Could things have been different? Could a successful fightback have been organised?
It would have meant fighting Edwardes from
would have Micall discussing concrete proposals for an alternative meant using the weight of the shop stewards to campaign inside the factories and show workers
Socialists can never offer guarantees success. But they can and they should point to the
consciousness and mobilisation of the rank and
rejected 'participation' and sought to popularise
involved real workers' raised the possibilities of occupation to defend jobs, they might well have
But they would have been in an infinitely
JIN MY DAYS WE ATTLES
TO THAT ANSWER
Page 10 scan of this page
When the CAP doesnt fit....
AFGHANISTAN IN CHAOS
SOCIALIST
CHALLENGER
EVENTS
ABERDEEN: SC sold Saturdavs ourside CRAs - for more into phone conn, 274068. EDINBURGH: SC on sale every Sai, Princes St 12.30-2. For more info phone 554 0196 or write: Box 6, Ist May Bookshop, 45 Niddry St. PADDINGTON SC
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It against the Speaker Duggan (NAC steering committee). BRADFORD: SC available from Fourth Idea DOORSIOD14300296 COVENTRY: SC available from Bookshor . For more info about local activities phone 46|138 LEICESTER Highfields Community Centre 8pm: 'Marxism
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Better Frights' Disco plus food. Stanle
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XMAS FAYRE; Sat Caribbean Centre, Upper Parliament St. Food, Xmas gifts, LIVERPOOL SC meetings: 20 Deo "The Tories Merseyside Campaign Against the Immigratior gee immorator cools Laws; 10 Jan, The Cuban Revolution, speaker Richmond Si (oftiNassington Square). meetings start al PADDINGTON SC group presents:
Berger's La Salamandre (1971 Lanner Jonn Sw. 129 mins.) An earlier film from the makers of Jomah Who Will be 25 in the Year 2000. How
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INTERNATIONAL
info
Rooms.
Penny By John Marston
Wedge
Dec, Tigerss Box i; DOX Nine, suffers accordingly.
By Charles Lister in Kabul
WHEN the Party of
and surprise in the
Queen Mary
factions, Parcham Khalq (The People), crumbled. were sent abroad as
responded.
This deputy
*socia is deficult to
speaker fron It is difficult
happened in
Alain previous regimes
Ogier) weren't anything new.
Marxist Growth
to have taken place.
Planning, "Total
Call
agricultural products
per cent; and production of
The land reform,
typical peasant Street to refuse to sow,
been for nothing.
т 1979 Page 10
THATCHER lays down the line at Dublin A MAJOR CRISIS faces the Common Market after last week's Dublin summit failed to reach agreement on the budget dispute between Britain
The dispute is over the difference between what Britain puts into the Common Market and what it gets back. This is expected to rise to £1.2 billion
The deficit arises because the vast bulk of the EEC budget (75 per cent) goes on farm spending. under the common agricultural policy (CAP) and Britain, as the least agricultural country of the
But if these are the 'facts' of the dispute, they don't explain why it can't be solved in the usual
People's Democratic Afghanistan [PDPA] overthrew President Daoud in April
West. Was it a revolution or a coup? And the debate
The takeover was the product of a fragile alliance between two PDPA
(The Flag) and which rapidly The Parchami ministers 'ambassadors' and then recalled for consultations -a classic scheme to which few if any
This left the way clear for Khalg leader Nur Mohammed Taraki and
Hafizullah Amin to
assess what AlgialIslan April 1978 and the early months of this year. It appears that the 'countryside sat still, passively observing. The
had also relied heavily on Soviet aid, so the Russians
But some economic growth seems
According to figures released by the Ministry of
volume of gross increased by for about 6 per cent; total volume of gross industrial production increased by 4
the total gross public and mixed enterprises increased by 6 per cent."
however, • has the as run into considerable problems in the form of Afghan traditionalism. The
response the government's gift of parcels of land is
fearing that the government officials will return and take back both land and crops meaning that the work would all have
The feudal relationship between the landless, the sharecropper and the
developing international recession.
each national ruling class
La drain on public expenditure is Marketeers.
election campaign next year.
US S
HEARAT
IRAN
landlord (based on clans, blood ties, backwardness and a particular form of patriarchy) has been challenged but so far not weakened at all. The vast scale of the rebellion in the hills is. sufficient proot of that. And time is running short.
To win back the countryside, the Soviet Union has been pouring in yast quantities of farm and factory aid. And the government has embarked on
bold five-year-plan, "Planning is an important instrument
the implementation of programme of the PDPA to create a man shall never exist'. But the future remains uncertain.
Most confusion has been sown by
yet unexplained purging Taraki and his replacement by Amin. One minute Taraki was 'The Great Leader of the People of Afghanistan, General Secretary of the CC of the PDPA, President of the Revolutionary Council, and President of the Homeland's High Defence Council'; the next minute his death was being announced in an eight line column at the bottom of the back page of the Kabul Times.
As the capitalist world faces slump once more,
begins to feel pressure. And none more so than the British. The crisis-ridden state of the economy means that such
unacceptable.
Furthermore, it plays into the hands of the anti-
But the other main countries in the EEC aren't over-inclined to play ball and help Thatcher out of her difficulties. The recession will affect them too, and they already have their own problems: the French government is in disarray after a series of scandals, while Chancellor Schmidt faces a bitter
So Thatcher stands firm; even at the price of jeopardising the fragile institutions of the EEC which the capitalists look to in the long run to
R
KABUL
URUZGAN Afghanistan PAKTIA
Pakis
very strange, quite normally associated with a repressive regime. People are willing to talk foreigner, for the PDPA. Even students sporting the Khalqi insignia are unwilling to discuss the merits of their party.
Even in the ministries, questions are often met with cryptic stating: and ambiguous answers. occasion the government employee when we were interrupted by demonstration. He said he had to go. "What is it about?, I asked. 'I don't know', he said. T'll shout whatever they want me to shout.' of the day in government's purges internal dissensions; but the Islamic rebels (the majority of whom don't even both to soften reactionary views) are also divided Therefore chaos reigns supreme.
The socialist Afghanistan is living dangerously. If the government can claim any mass support at all, it is only in the purged
problems whichever option it takes. the
the drawbridge.
been clearer. Instead
to screw the working class.
across Europe coordinated nan for stee casure
Europe, work,
JALALABAD. evidence
majority
SNANGAHAR
"tribesmen'
military
accompany
Tions.
The atmosphere here in Kabul is
unlike that
usually very politics with , but few have a kind word dream
probing
On talking
'impromptu'
weekly Inprecor (Vol Division seems to be the order of
Afghanistan. The Cuba don't conceal revolution.
Up&p, their
issues), 13 for movement in Stella! continental
safeguard their profits. British capitalism faces
But Thatcher has one advantage. By waving the Union Jack she disarms the Labour lefts whose only solution is to get out of the EEC and pull up
The need for a socialist alternative has rarely
lining up this confrontation to defend the national interest', it is necessary to show that this is g conflic between different sets of capitalists over how best
By fighting for increasing working class unity
— starting with issues like the EECwe can begin. to pose the only viable alternative to the Common Market: a United Socialist. States of
and pampered army. Even this has seen unrest and defections; as a social base for the revolution it is certainly no substitute for the masses.
Amin is desperate for time. But it will require a considerable amount of sweet-talking and material persuauc the great of Afghans to forget old feudal values and forgive the regime's ruthless acts. And so, since fierce cannot be expected to respond to mere requests for patience. the napalming of villages goes on.
Revolutionary Marxists will argue that the solution to the crisis is not a promises for doaberul whatever wonderful credibility) it The solution essentially political: the first steps being a healthy nationalities policy and conditions of workers demcoracy which extend beyond paper declarat-
Unfortunately for the Afghan people there is no group or party willing to fight on these questions. Yel without them a genuine independent socialist Afghanistan remains a pipe few disconcerted idealists in Kabul Intercontinental Press/ Inprecor THE background to the overtbrow of the Gairy regime in Grenada is one of the features in the latest issue of the Intercontinental Press/ 17, No 44). Other material covers the Trotsky centenary commemoration in Mexico, the twentieth year of
Single copies cost 30p plus 10p but subscriptions work our much cheaper: Ell for one year (48 for months 10 weeks. made outto "Inter Press' and sent IP/I, PO Box 50, London N1 2XP.
Page 11 scan of this page
NO CHRISTMAS TREES
IRELAND
IRA's youth wing]:
the no jury court. He got 14 years.
one 30-minute visit each month.
I HAD received a pass to see Joe on 23 December; that was a Saturday, the day before Christmas Eve. I hadn't seen him _ nearly three months. My friend had seen her son about three days before wouldn't hardly talk about it. She just kept saying: "Thank God it's over.'
When my daughter Sarah, my friend Kevin, and I went down on the Saturday morning we didn't know that Joe had already been force. washed. It was very, very cold. It was freezing. And we tried to make ourselves as looking as we could because it was Christmas. We had Sarah's baby with us and we had her dressed in her good clothes.
We didn't recognise Joe. We didn't even know who he was. I says to Sarah: first.' She walked past him and he called her. She looked at him and 1 looked and I didn't know who hie was — and I didn't want to know that that was my son sitting there. I says: 'Oh, Jesus Christ, what have they done?' Holocaust
He was blue, blue with cold. I had never seen before with the dirt and all the hair that was on him just how thin he was. He was like Belsen, like what you see on Holocaust on television.
And he was all bruised, and his hair was shaved right into his head, with big shaved right into the skin and other sticking out. His skin was scrubbed off his neck and you could see all the raw skin. And his ears - had big blackheads inside them. cheekbones were like two razor blades sticking o" The screws laughed at us.
You see, Cocause it as such a deaden shock. You because it was such a dreadful shock. couldn't éven try, it was such a shock. couldn't disguise the horror. I just said: Jesus Christ. Oh, Jesus Christ.' That's all I could say. Well, when the screws saw our faces they just stood and they laughed.
And the baby had a wee blue suit on her, blue with red-and white check, and one of the screws said: 'Lovely colours for a blanket man.
With the massive screws behind me I couldn't speak to him, and Sarah couldn't speak very much. She only says to him: 'What happened, Joe?' And he says: done', and then he started telling happened.
I couldn't listen. I kept just sitting looking at him. And Sarah just sat and looked at him. She just kept looking over at me and shaking her head, So Kevin just kept on talking to him to make it not so bad
He wouldn't talk above a whisper. He just kept on saying: 'It's brutal, it's brutal. Now, our Joe always used to "Magic, no problem, Magic, no problem.' Kicking
He couldn't move his back, there was something wrong with it. him what was wrong with his back and he says: 'Weil, we got a bit of kicking in the middle of the night last night.' And he says: 'Ma, don't be looking round, it was him behind you done it.'
I says: T've got a stiletto-heeled shoe on me I'll put it in his eye and he'll never see again.'
He says: "Ma, please don't, for I couldn't take no more of a kicking.'
So I says to him: Look, son, let me tell you ei enough's enough. There's no man should even try to suffer this."..
Sarah says: *Joe, this is awful. How dare they do that."
INHBLOCK
JOE is a blanket prisoner. He is 19 years old, and by this Christmas he will have spent two years and two months in H Block, Long Kesh. He is serving 19 years altogether. As a member of a staunchly Republican family, Joe was singled out by the 'security forces' for arrest. He was first charged when he was just 16 with a hoax bombing and membership of Na Fianna Eireann (the
Joe refused to sign a statement and refused to recognise the no-Jury court. He got five years. On bail prior to his first court appearance, he was taken to Castlereagh and badly beaten for three days. He signed a statement admitting burning a bus depot. Once again he refused to recognise
In September 1978, Socialist Challenge published an article by Joe's mother describing what had happened to him and how it telt to visit a son in H Block: She said that when Joe was charged a Special Branch officer told her: 'He'll see no more Christmas trees.' Blanket men are allowed
Here Joe's mother describes a visit to her son in H Block last Christmas.
He says: "Let them do whatever they Like.
They can do this and worse. And if I have to go then for on hunger-strike I'll do it. For they're not going to beat me.' and she Well, I thought I was going to break down in front of him then. I but Kevin asked him what happened.
Joe said: "They came in and said, "Come on", 'and we said, 'No" us by the hair in the nude and they trailed us up the wing.' Joe told us that the screw shouted: bright- 'Hey, you', at Joe's friend, round and the screw just smashed his boot right into his face and smashed his nose in. 'Happy Christmas' *You go It was like a nightmare. I couldn't believe that was my son. I just couldn't believe that in any country, any civilised country, especially in Western Europe, it would be allowed.
Our Sarah, she never forget it till God calls me. I think I could take anything now.
Joe gave Sarah a kiss and then he put his arms round me. I put my hand on his hair where they had shaved it, and it was like a yard brush, or a deck scrubber, rather. And he had lovely hair — though it doesn't matter if he had lovelv hair or • IOL. thinking of himself, lumps mother, wish everybody a happy Christmas. bits all When I looked at him I thought I was going to die, and Sarah ran out.
A man was sitting there with his son and he His jumped up and ran out and started on the
I'm not starved and I'il take you on myself.
But I wasn't able to start on them.
And a woman was sitting there when my Joe was standing. Joe says: 'Don't worry about me Ma, I'm all right.' And the woman looked up at him and tears ran down her cheeks.
When that's your, own son and people you don't know are starting to cry, you can guess the state you're in.
which is
'We got this us what
why you
brutal, it's
say. should
and I knew
We asked come
to this
couldn't ask him,
So they just grabbed
• and he turned was in an awful state. I'll
and I was numb.
But he said he wasn't
and he says:
o'clock the next morning.
heart was going to break in two.
died, or that he blanket,
hope you
Well, I came out of it and I didn't know what day it was. I never was as angry in my life,
Eve.
Everybody was waiting to hear what the visit was like when we came back in the district, because everybody was hearing the stories of it.
When I got off the bus I was so stunned with what I had seen 1 couldn't speak. So Sarah had to go round and tell the different people what it Nothing, was like. That night I cried from 11 o'clock to 5
The next day was Christmas Eve and every time anybody said, 'Christmas', I thought my
I really thought he was going to die, and so did Sarah. I thought that either he would have
would have come off the one of the two. I was worried sick peace. about his physical condition, and still I knew that they were right to do what they do.
Now January was an awful month for cold.
I got one wee note from him and it said: 'Ma, I
are praying for me, because we
National Conference
December 8/9 Cityof London Poly
thought we were going to freeze to death without any clothes, especially on New Year's
When I next went down to see him I says 'Did you get any Christmas cards, my son? You got over 50 sent to you.'
He said: 'They let me see three.'
You can't give them anything at Christmas. absolutely nothing.
I said to him: 'How long do you think this is going to last?'
He said: "I don't care how long it's going to last, but I'm not going to put on any prison gear for nobody.'
I've always felt the same about the British being in this country. They have no right to be here, and while they're here there will never be They destroyed this country and destroyed half of the people in it. No matter how many Irish people die for it, no matter how many mothers sit with broken hearts, it will make no odds, because the Irish will still fight against the British.
BUILD THE MOVEMENT
TO GET THEM OUT NOW
United Troops Out Movement
Stident Union, Fairholt House, Whitechapel High Rd E1, Aldgate East Tabe Open to all members and supporters of the UTOM. Food and creche provided.
Socialist Challenge 6 December 1979, Page 11
Page 12 scan of this page
INTERNATIONAL
By John Hunt SEVEN hundred Ford workers have been sacked after going on strike over the issues of victimisation and racist insults from white foremen in Port Elizabeth, South Africa.
The strikers are members of the black Automobile Workers which has won recognition from Ford
spread support among black workers. Ford workers are also the mainstay of the powerful Port Elizabeth Civic Association [Pebca]..
was sacking of president Thozamile Botha by Ford two weeks ago because of his political activities that started. the Complaints by a racist foreman that black. integrated canteen further sharpening of the struggle:
Ford's 'enlightened' ional management responded typical fashion - by calling out the riot police to disperse a mass meeting or strikers sacking (ne entre black workforce. This is the reality behind the 'liberalisation'
Africa's trade union legislation.
The Ford strike is just one of a
major struggles in the Port Elizabeth area. Major battles for trade union recognition are taking place at the Tire and Crosse
mill.
Elsewhere, too, workers
relusiot lo Dow dowa Delore Ine house arrests, harassment and killings apartheid regime has trade unionists in recent years.
In Capetown, a heroic six-month strike against redundancy at Fatti's and Moni's food factory has gained
support from organisations. Even ers have been forced to boycott Fatti's and Moni's products.
The F&M strikers are raising a comprehensive set of demands which suggest the growing back workers: CHILDHO health care; and a minimum There can be little doubt that this is the beginning of the biggest wave of
WORLD CONGRESS
and North and South America.
Iran and Nicaracua.
Iranian Socialist matters under consideration.
tasks of the International in capitalist Europe:
sections of the International in the previous period.
Women's Liberation
will be taken on them at a later time.
Ford workers lead
new strike wave
in South Africa
since 1976.
Workers
your employers
plants in this country.
Union, face of
Black able to defend themselves.
Pebca out recently proposed to
onem... South Atrica.
made the 'dirty' led to a Leyland's multinat- operations. That in support south African alliance of METERINEDIRIA solidarity. of South
General Blackwell
are
imprisonment, which the
black black shopkeep-
solidarity
confidence of Liaison Committee. day; wage. Further NWTUAALC, Manchester M20 8ND.
FOURTH INTERNATIONAL HOLDS
THE ELEVENTH WORLD CONGRESS (Fifth since reunification) of the Fourth International, world party of socialist revolution, was held in Belgium
November. Delegates represented sympathising organisations in 48 countries in Europe, Asia, Africa, Oceania,
The discussions at the World Congress were held in the context of the deepening of the international class struggle exemplified by the revolutions in
Of special note was the presence of delegates from the Workers Party [HKS], an expression of the geographical extension of the forces of the Fourth International since its last World Congress in 1974, as well as its deepening roots in the worldwide revolutionary struggle.
The World Congress is the highest body of the Fourth International.
• 01: congress from each national section after extensive, democratic debate and discussion, including an international written discussion, representing the various points of view in the Internațional on the
The Congress adopted by resolutions on the following points: (1) the world political situation and the
Fourth International; (2) building (3) Latin. America; (4) the international women siperate orelent, clue tvow m Nicaragua.
To prepare for the major class battles to come, the congress also decided to make a radical turn to place in industry & majority of the cadres won to the
The adoption of the resolution Socialist Revolution and the Struggle for
marked the first time the Marrist developed such a comprehensive programmatic document on this question.
Indicative votes were taken on resolutions on the conflicts in Indochina, and on the relation between socialist democracy and the dictatorship of the proletariat. Discussion on these points will continue, and a definitive decision
The congress elected an International Executive Committee,
* a year. Immediately following the congress, the IEC elected the United
tarial, a smaller body which acts for the IEC between IEC meetings.
про 12
struggles by South African workers
in multinational companies in Britain should take note. If
plants in South Africa, the effect is the same as that of having non-union
Ine. wąrktorce is aviace mn the
management attacks. The heaviest burden is placed on the least organised. Management places its capital where the workers are least
That's what ICL workers found
when management close the Dukinfield plant in Britain and open an identical
1977 Rover trade unionists organised a week of action during which no parts from Solihull went to
South African kind needed now by facing the Botha and the The word is
LINKS AN example of trade union initiative
with African workers is the formation of the North West Trade Union Anti-Apartheid
has started to bring out a regular bulletin,
details from 59 Tintern Avenue, sections and majority vote
the fourth that Stivetle l
parties which is the The IEC will meet
HOW many more massacres like this!
to come in
By Richard Carver SALISBURY, 29 FEBRUARY 1980: The British Governor of Southern Rhodesia today rejected calls for the postponement of the election because of repeated ceasefire violations.
The most serious was the massacre last week of 257 ZANU members by Bishop Muzorewa's auxiiaries. ZANU supporters, unarmed under the terms of the ceasefire agreement, were attending a pre-election rally in a Salisbury suburb. The auxiliaries were on routine policing duties members of the armed forces
The Governor expressed sincere condolences to the relatives of those killed and of the victims of a
incident a fortnight when several dozen ZAPU members died. But he said that if these deaths were not to be in vain it was vital that the election went ahead as planned.
*Zimbabwe Rhodesia has many long years of bloodshed and murder,' he said, reáding from a prepared statement. 'Now 1s the time to bury the old rivalries that divide us
The Governor also pointed out
postponement would 'grossly unfair' on those parties which had been campaigning for so long: some starting even before the tormal signature of the Lancaster agreement.
'We have all of us suffered greatly as a result of the Rhodesian tragedy, he said. "But we have also all made a firm commitment that this settlement should work. I am sure leaders of all
agree. that the Lancaster House agreement stands above petty partisan interests.'
However, the Governor did admit
special measure. would necessary to deal with ceasefire violations. Extra troops were to be
LANCASTER HOUSE PROPOSALS
The shape of things
Zimbabwe?
flown in from Britain to strengthen the Commonwealth force, presently engaged in keeping the two sides apart.
Five hundred men of the 2nd Parachute Regiment the Special Regiment will Wiltshire, The has also agreed to requests from Mr
Nkomo and Mr. Mugabe that the reinforcements should be strengthened by the addition of 30 Nigerian military observers
as Like the other British, Australian
and New Zealand forces posted in the
his sensitive bush areas the new arrivals
will have instructions to shoot to kill if they see guerillas straying from their predesignated assembly points.
The Governor paid special tribute to the Southern Rhodesian Air Force, of which he is titular head, for the regular reconnaisance flights it has seen made, which have been 'invaluable' in
helping the monitoring force to detect ceasefire violators In the face of hostile questioning from African Governor denied that some of these flights had been. made
be African Mirages
Rhodesian markings aliegations that personnel had ever seen active service House in the country as 'absurd'.
'The Prime Minister, Mr Botha, and the Foreign Minister, Mr Botha, both assure me that they pleased with the Lancaster in eem last month has ace a month completely routine combined operations exercise, involving 30,000 men, Limpopo she border with Rhodesia). southern *Although they are not required to, the South African government is nevertheless adhering to an informal
and advisers Services leave Lineham, tomorrow. The Governor
The
Glossy
force ale
journalists. the all cly
journalists. my word for it.
Dy South
flying under
and dismissed geniemen
South Atrican
well House
banks the speaker,
JOSHUA NKOMO
understanding that all border areas should be demilitarised.'
Governor added: If the gentlemen of the press do not believe me they can go and see for themselves.
brochures describing the activities of the ceasefire monitoring
ayallable here the Government Press Centre and the
organises regular trips for You don't have to take
Thank you for your cooperation,
NAMIBIA
Oppose the British government's
pro-South African deals Wednesday 12 December
MASS PICKET 6-7pm outside South Africa House, Trafalgar Square
PUBLIC MEETING with SWAPO
7.30pm, National Liberal Club, 1 Whitehall Plac
Organised by Namibia Suppor
Committee [388 5539
Page 13 scan of this page
SWP CONFERENCE
HOME NEWS
By Davy Jones and Rich Palser
THE Socialist Workers Party is the largest revolutionary organisation in Western Europe or North America. Of its 3,600 members, 33.5 per cent are members of manual unions, 34 per cent of white collar unions and 14 per cent are students. A quarter of its members are women. Its paper, Socialist Worker, has a paid circulation of 13,000, wociaist keview sels 4.501 contes. and the quarterly Socialism has a print order of 3,000 LubIcs, The national conference of the
SWP was held in mid-November. Whereas the last two conferences had essentially rubber-stamped the line of the leadership, the 1979 conference was preceded by a sharp and lively internal discussion on three issues: the character of the period; LemnSn the movements; and inner-party democracy.
In passing it should be noted that the political debates were unfortunatelv not reflected in the pages of Socialist Worker. It seems pointless to conceal the richness of the discussion from a wider audience which could benefit. Far from being a sign of 'softness' or 'iberalsm'. such a move would demonstrate the and strength of the organisation.
The ultimate logic of differences could be seen in the bland ICOVII of the oillcoc appeared in Socialist Worker. On this front, at least, even the Communist Party is much more open in admitting ana aedalng amerences mn puduc.
The character of
the period
The central debate conference was a discussion. state of the class struggle in Britain. T'his debate has been eoing on in the SWP for some time and leading protagonists, Tony Cliff and Steve Jeffreys, ventilated thoughts in public (and length).in the last two issues oi International Socialism.
Ciiff, supported by a majority of the Central Committee, argued in the pre-conference debate that there had been a sharo downturn in the class 'struggle. He ascribed this to certain structural changes typified, in his opinion, by the partial bureaucratisation and incorporation of shop stewards. would be limited, defensive in character, with a clearcut logic for the practice of the SWP.
Some of Cliff's more exuberant supporters argued that there had been a decisive defeat of the working class: 'Grunwicks defeated, the sold out, the low paid betrayed, the miners divided, Deep Duffryn closed, Leyland demolished, the smashed, Fleet Street solidarity seldom, collections puny, pickets tiny, lock-outs back, normal, se -Ols expecicu prevented. The catalogue is endless.'
Jeffreys accepted that there had been a downturn, but explained this by the coincidence OI economic crisis and government in office. In other words, it was the ideological weaknesses of the working class and the lack of a viable socialist alternative that paved the way for setbacks, culminating in the return of a Tory government.
Jeffreys and those supporting his political positions denied setbacks constituted a shift in the relation of class forces. They pointed to the eneineering workers' denied that the miners
Which way forward?
weekly
the monthly
'International
major
anotonoes
confiderice
hiding
which
management
of the majority.
the on the risen, Dur wilnn lac
the LW U
their su anst conciousucos. at great mausi y
Hence struggles
essentially
be suicidal.
firemen class as such,
majority. shipyards flattened, Autonomous lay-offs Movements
sharp Labour
SWP 'organisational
resulted in
that these conference. fundamental
recent struggles,
had been rather strange.
STOP
defeated, pointed out that The Times
had capitulated, and argued that the situation was much more complex than the one-sided view
Jeffreys explained that from 1977 the level of struggle and wages had in
iramework of reformism. Expressed in a different way the point being made is an axiom of Leninism: industrial militancy does not automatically lead to a growth of
In the course of the debate there were continual reterences to the. 19?4 decision of the SWP to 'steer left' the phase when the politics of the SWP reached a peak of ultraleftism. While the majority defended that SWP orientation, the Glasgow leaders of the SWP argued that 'the success of the steer left policy sometimes seemed to be measured bv how isolated you could make yourself?. They explained that a signiticant number of workers had left the organisation as a result and that a repeat performance would
In the final resolution put to the vote the majority conceded that there had been no defeat of the working
The vote revealed 60-40 division in favour of the CC
The most heated discussion was on the vexed question of Women's Voice and the relation of WV groups to the SWP. At its last conterence the
had evolved the formula of but not political independence'. This was an attempt to avoid taking a clear decision and it
Witer internand rae W inside the WV groups and the
similar debate took slace en the relation of Flame to the
manv readers ot sociaisi Challenge these debates will appear
as we are
Anti
Lea
concerned there is no counterposition between building a socialist feminist current inside the women's liberation movement and building our own revolutionary organisation
The formal position of all currents
the SWP vor anisato naly to counterpose themselves women's movement The majority argued that Women's Voice should be explicitly seen as an SWP tou slin reongst worka og ciass
SWP amongst working women. Those opposing this position made many correct political points on women's oppression, but counterposed an independent revolutionary women's organisation to both the
and the existing women's movement.
A similar discussion persisted on the question of independent black OIAHSAIOIS non-existence of a black liberation movement Britain today, debate essentially boiled down whether or not it was a priority for the SWP to make a permanent political intervention inside the communities.
The majority felt that membership returns so far did not justify such a priority at the present time. On both Women's Yoice and Flame the CC majority won the day by a substantial margin.
Internal democracy
The internal regime of the SWP has, since 1974, resembled that of an organisation operating in conditions
clandestinity under a military dictatorship. Less than militants (all full-timers) constituted the leadership of the organisation after the 1975 expulsions of former leaders who resisted steered to the left.
According Martin writing in the 1978 Sociatst Register *Faced with strone challenge. the keadership bad hanget the rules and made
STOR
Jazi
THE
self-perpetuating, exclusive and virtually monolithic discussions were not even reported in any detail to the membership.
Shaw predicted: 'It was simply not conceivable that could change it (the leadership) in any
the way, and any alterations would have
cC to come from the top.
This year a small but significant change took place pressure from the class outgoing CC was, forced to accept
constitutional changes.
Committee ot 40 making powers on was elected directly by the conference, and the Central Committee was also elected by the conference.
However, an important Leninist principle representation on all leading bodies was studiously ignored. It was only a
the rank-and-file revolt
to that Steve Jeffreys was added on to
the official NC slate adopted by the conference. black
thế
Conclusions
The 1979 conference of the SWP revealed both strengths of that organisation ability to assess the present penod wa: clearly aided by the base which it stil retains in the manual unions. other hand pragmatism and 'Cliff's instincts' are not going to be sufficient in this period.
There was little or no discussion on ruling class strategy and tactics a major dozen
victory and itS discussion on Labour mas essentialt io red te oo moratrs al die o cens SOIEC being
Shar HEg ie sTicy
Lint mar 1 policica Brist
cesseralely donations
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MIKE CARVER
the weaknesses :and
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. On the
ITERNATIONAL
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Page 14 scan of this page
LETTERS 328/9 UPPER STREET LONDON N1
LETTERS published on this page will normally be cut to at least 400 words, of readers can express their views.
Anonymous letters will not be published unless there is a very special reason, but real names will be withheld from publication on request. Miners on the cheap I AM forwarding this letter on the miners' pay claim for publication in Socialist Challenge, because I live in a mining area and work on a coal face. I feel that we have to explain the implications of the pay deal involving the present Tory government and the National Union of Mineworkers.
On 30 November there will be a pit-head ballot to decide the outcome of the £140 per week pay claim for face-workers. This would be scaled down by work differentials to give a minimum of £80 per week to surface. workers
The NCB has offered only 20 per cent, stating that this is their final offer. The national executive of the NUM has requested a measly 5 per cent more. But this was refused on the grounds it would cost a further £55m on top of the £180m already offered — as if a further 5 per cent would be adequate anyway.
Sir Derek Ezra, for reasons of marketing coal, has said: 'It is a very, very sad day mine mie or tac coal industry.' Guardian 22 November. He is right - but his reasons are not.
For the past two years the miners pay claims have been for £110 and £135, now it's for £140 per week. Even last year's claim of £110 would not be achieved if the 20 per cent offer is accepted. The face-workers' basic pay, at present £15.79 a shift, will only be f94.75 if the offer is accepted.
Those who argue that the 'bonus system' will increase this figure are unaware of the unfairness of the productivity scheme.
The "magic' £23.50 extra in every face-workers pay packet was hammered home in the media but in reality some pits have been on a lot less bonus than this. On the other hand, some pits have bçen payıng much higher bonuses.
This is only to be expected when geological and working conditions vary so much between different pits. roadways for new panels of coal to be worked) have been on the highest bonus rates of all.
These only outline the unfairness. of the miners' bonus scheme and so they should not be taken into account in any wage claim at all. Basic pay for a basic week is what we need. that 20 per cent is the best offer ever If the miners believe, as many do, made to them by any government then they had better look again.
If the 20 per cent is accepted it will mean a drop in living standards for the ininers with inflation running at nearly 19 per cent. When the tax is deducted from the 20 per cent rise we'll be losing money.
Sir Derek Ezra has also stated that: When the mineworkers know all the facts and bear in mind what is at stake they will feel it worth carrying on', Guardian 22 November. Again he is right, but only for our reasons.
Selling cheap coal does not mean cheap labour and falling living standards. During the Labour government the miners accepted 10 per cent here, t6.50 across the board there and negotiated a productivity deal. These did not achieve the original demands and it is obvious that the 20 per cent offered during the Tory (cut the services profits) government will not achieve our aims again.
On 6 December the result of the pit-head ballot will be known. 55 per cent is needed for national strike action.
The only way to combat such offers and safeguard wages is by having a 'sliding scale of wages (index linked with inflation) determined by the trade union movement toral workers. Ihis would protect the buy power' of our wages and prevent a further failin living standards.
PH Wilson, M Alsop (NUM North Derbyshire), H Alsop (NUM North Notts)
Socialist Challenge 6 December 1979 Page 14
Sexist garbage
AS A feminist I would never presume to talk for the 'vast majority of women', (Tommy Cusack's letter, SC 22 Nov), Tommy Cusack obviously thinks he has such a richt. Not on v this, but he can also define what a feminist is!
When the hell will men on the left get off our backs, and stop defining what thev think women to be in order that they can dismiss us and our politics? What access does this particular man have to the WLM that he can decide who and who is not a feminist!
Naturally, though, being able to claim to be such an authority enables some people to go on to spout the biggest load of crass and sexist bal vage
Isn't it marvellous, for what some have been struggling to ana vse tor years, has all of a sudden been summed up in a nutshell: 'the material basis for sexism is quite simply class society."!
Such a crude analysis is what the WLM is constantly fighting against. Perhaps the comrade will inform us
little cliched statement?
Iam glad, however, that Cusack does not want us to leave the fight for women's liberation until after the revolution; some of us came to that very conclusion quite some time ago. LOUISE SMITH, Leeds
Tracking Blunt
SOCIALIST CHALLENGE'S coverage of the Blunt affair (SC 123) sèems to have missed out on what is the most revealing aspect of the Philby-Burgess-Maclean-Blunt saga,
The whole network was recruited at the time of Popular Fronts and Moscow trials, when all pretences of building revolutionary parties were being abandoned. Only in these circumstances is it explicable how a number of intelectvas attracted towards socialism and mistakenly seeing it embodied in the Stalinist regime, were so easily manipulated by the bureaucracy.
If revolution was off the agenda, and defence of the Soviet Union was the key task, then what better way of helping than by exposing bourgeois secrets. Much more useful than devoting one's time to bulldinz a revolutionary party that was no longer needed.
Stalinism succeeded in demoralising a whole number of intellectuals by turning them away from the task of building a revolutionary leadership for the working class, some to build a Stalinist party in Britain, others apparently to practise 'entryism' into the state.
Blunt is just one tragedy among many. Perhaps if he'd realised the real meaning of the Moscow trials he might today be art critic for Socialist
PETE EVANS, Stockport 'Roots' reviewer
deserves night out
IAGREE with Gerry Kelly's view (SC 123) that Roots: the Next Generation had limitations. This arose from the constraints of its narrative structure centring on a family over 100 years. Therefore it concentrates on the America black experience of racism and consciousness in a restricted way.
Similarly to maintain narrative continuity there seemed to be an obsession with births, marriages and deaths.
But to dismiss it in Gerry Kelly's terms as a black 'Waltons' is to offer merely a superficial response. The series might not have had as much misery as he would have liked but it did attempt to allude to problems of class and race in American society.
The coverage of blacks' campaigns for the vote, of the political nature of the KKK's anti-semitism and anti-black views, of the question of participation in the
First World War, of the struggle of black and white sharecroppers, of the growth of black consciousness epitomised by Malcolm X, cannot be dismissed as soap opera 'wholesomeness'. portrayal of women as not simply wives and mothers but as oral transmitters of black culture was surely positive?
that the last episode suggested open racism was confined to the American Nazi Party. Racism was shown as a continuous presence from the KKK, rednecks, Nazis, racist motel owners, to white liberals who invited token blacks to parties
appearance was missed. Here was an actor known for his liberal stance on the oppression of American Indians acting a Nazi leader in a deliberately exaggerated and distanced style.
of racism, Brando's condensed appearance drew together many of the themes of racism presented earlier.
did the series have on working class awareness? Was it better than the normal Sunday fare of God and the Onedin Line?
me a powerful essay explaining that Roots 2 was a history of racism in America and that it was showing black people their history and why they should be proud of it, I begin to wonder whether Gerry Kelly would have been better off sticking to the pub on Sunday nights!
RANDALL THOMAS, London E5 Workers' states re-visited
IWOULD like to add my voiceto Ailean O'Callaghan (Letters, 8 November) for a release of major resources for a full debate over it raises about the criteria for a workers' state, proletarian democracy, and permanent revolution.
the recent disagreements and
state debate back on the agenda for reconsideration and reformulation.
find the strongest elements of each position are its criticisms of theweaknesses of its opponents' position. Ailean O'Callaghan's statement of the FI's 'theoretical gains' over the criteria of a workers' state — private capital eliminated, a nationalised and planned economy. monopoly of foreign trade — is only specifies economic features.
The concept workers' state
the location and exercise of power.
transition towards socialism, ie. towards the self-emancipation and
class etc.
in no very long run to expropriate
of production cannot exist without proletarian democracy, le. soviet power.
Marxism-as-it-were-Leninism as a party or state ideology, the ruthless
the expense of the working class although in its name, even passive popular support for various anti-imperialist measures, cannot constitute a workers' state if the
its own political organs. In what
criticism that to abandon the organised political activity of the working class as a fundamental the resulting workers' state, as
. Further the
He is also mistaken in thinking
The point of Marlon Brando's
and his opposition to the Vietnam war
Rather than being an isolated example
Wealso have to ask what effect
When a 12-year-old student writes
S M
12 13 14
Challenge, 01-359 8371.
Kampuchea and the urgent questions
Marxism?
The recent political developments in Iran, Latin America and Southern Africa, as well as in Kampuchea, and
disastrous splits within and from the Fourth international relating to these developments, have surely put the old state capitalism/ degenerate workers'
In trying to follow these debates, I fundamentally inadequate because it
requires political criteria that specify
direct self-government of the working
Within a nationalised economy, to expropriate the workers politically is
them economically. Socialist relations
The existence of some form of
primitive accumulation of capital at
"semi-fascist project'
working class as such do not exercise a significant degree of power through discontent.. so-called Marxist state is this the case?
Surely the FI must respond to the
support of it.'
feature of proletarian revolution and
INTERNATIONAL
OCTOBER 1980
T W 1 2 3 4 5 15 16 17 18 19 20 26 27 28 29 30 31
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Mandel seems to have done in his • Intercontinental Press article, isto abandon the proletarian basis of
Does the logic of the American comrades' analysis of Kampuchea in Intercontinental Press lead to a form of bureaucratic state capitalist model as the recent IS critique claims? The state capitalist must also answer Mandel's demands that the operation of the law of value be demonstrated in the nationalised economies of Russia and Kampuchea. The claim that international competition plays the role of the internal competition of private capita s lt bourgeon economies needs also to be substantiated in particular instances.
With the spread of national liberation movements and the virtual
Marxist party anywhere, the current crop of anti-imperialist overturns are going to produce more regimes that are not in practice proletarian (whatever their claims to be socialist or Marxist), but bear some as yet undefined relation to capital modes of development and exploitation.
Surely this is an urgent priority for all sections of the rourth International if more splits and disorientations over these new developments are to be avoided and political progress made?
JOHN FLETCHER, London N16 Anti-imperialism
MOHAMMAD J'Afar's letter on recent events in Iran (22 November) paints a gloomy picture. He characterises the occupațion of the US embassy and the demands for the extradition of the Shah as Khomeini's
He argues that 'Khomeini is engaged in a populist manoeuvre designed to head off growing
.. and chastises SC for "falling, hook, line and sinker for such an obvious manoeuvre, just because the Iranian masses are backward enough to mobilise in
Unfortunately, J'Afar takes no position on the role of the US in the 'Iranian crisis'. Yet this must be our
M T W F S •9 10 11 21 22 23 24 25 which dislodged the Shah struck a massive blow against US impenalist interests in the Middle East.
We must oppose any intervention We must support the Iranian people against imperialism, not because of 'guilt complexes but from a clear position of class solidarity.
Opposition to US intervention does not amount to support for Khomeini. His war against the Kurds, his attacks on the left and on press freedom, his contempt for women's rights must be severely condemned. • We must reject the formula that because there is nothing anti-imperialist in Khomeini's mobilisation on... the American hostages', it follows that there can be nothing anti-imperialist in the demands which the masses raise
Did the fact that, in February, Khomeini was at the head of the anti-Shah movement make it any less anti-imperialist? Of course it didn't!
J'Afar asserts that 'Khomeini is clearing the road for the consolidation of a fully fledged clerical state.? This is no doubt his intention, but the road is littered with pot-holes.
Defeated by the Kurds; confronted by continuing unrest among the Arab nation and in the oll-fields; under pressure from the Turkomans, Azerbaijanis, and Baluchis; and with the pro-clerical forces divided, it cannot be seriously maintained that Khomeini is in an uncontestably strong position.
The low vote in the referendum strengthens this argument.
The struggle which erupted last year has not yet run its course. Despondency at the reactionary character of Khomeini's policies should not cause socialists to abstain when the masses are raising demands that strike Western capital in its very heart.
Imperialist threats are real. They seek to re-establish US hegemony in the country. Bazargan's fall and the US embassy mobilisations are ensuring that this path will remain blocked for some time. Barring intervention, this is a gain for the Iranian masses , and one which even Khomeini will find difficult to steal. JOHN LEADBETTER (London ₩CI)
Page 15 scan of this page
THE THIRTIES
UNDER REVIEW
by Megan Martin THE Thirties is an ambitious exhibition and one which has taken the Arts Council and the Victoria and organise. sculpture of the period and architecture, graphics and decorative art but it also covers design as it was reflected In transport, industry at the time. All this plus a documentary section entitled 'Society Observed'.
'modernism') with straightforward nostalgia and so provides something for everyone.
fascinating. time but the amateur days were over and the BBC could claim 5 million licenced receivers in 1932. The advance of the popular newspapers took place in the 30's and it was a boom building. It was the beginning of the development of the mass media into the powerful, sophisticated force for controlling ideas that it is today. Weaknesses
advertising posters are certainly entertaining.
downright hilarious
the Whitehouse Westbury tothat of the stern faced lantern-jawed Australian cricketers.
clearly demonstrated in the
decade was a time of misery for the mass of people.
1932; the dole was cut; millions lived in slutt COLORS the speaking.
screened by ATV next Tuesday at opm.
Albert Museum more than four years to Not only does it cover painting and
communications
It is worth going to see. It combines a survey of in design [the battle
The picture of the mass media it gives Broadcasting was still young at this
time for cinema
Advertising too was in its infancy in the 30's,
much more self conscicus, and the display of Shell
In the documentary section there is much that is. from the photograph of the
Ramblers Association West of England Rally at
But the weaknesses of the exhibition are most 'Society Observed'
section which aims to reflect the social concerns of
It is not at all apparent from this section that the
Unemployment reached nearly four million in "Before the Monsoon' is a trilogy of three one-hour films, two of which have already been screened, on India. Directed with passion and flair by Michael Grigsby they break with traditional documentaries by letting the people do all
One of the central figures is Ashok Kumar (above), an engine-driver who is a militant of the Communist Party of India (Marxist). The last film will be
Nor is it apparent that against these conditions. In 1931 12,000 sailors of the Atlantic Fleet at Invergardia passed resolutions against pay cuts; in 1932 there Birkenhead against the means test; in Hyde park there was a succession of huge demonstrations by the unemployed; in : bellas acmanals work resulted establishing control with fixed; there was the crushing defeat of Mosley's black-shirts at Cable Streetjand there famous hunger marches.
Out of 245 exhibits in this section we are offered only a couple of pictures of the Jarrow marchers and one of these is a 'witty' painting of a bourgeois couple in evening dress looking down from their window on the arrival of the marchers in London.
are
people fought back
WEA were riots
demonstrations : In 2,000 police. gunfire and bayonets missing.
were the By Bisi Williams
A COMIC is a good way of opening up a discussion among young people about the causes of some of problems. Arc, by Leeds Against Racism and (WARF), deals with racist violence, the National Front, racial discrimination and employment.
The comic attempts to discuss racist stereotyping. An unemployed white youth sees a black driving down the road and says: "He's on the scrounge like the rest of them. Is this intended to imply that blacks who are on the dole are scroungers?
A story about the National Front focuses on the racist, anti-WollE
they were in govenrment. A shop steward is arrested for being a 'red'. But the sacking of Derek Robinson and the proposed Nationalities
happening linder government. It is misleading associate such extremist and racist measures with the NF only.
Ignored
If this comic leads to discussion among young white people about the nature of state racism, and helps them bring out these points themselves, this would be highly educative. But what about young blacks? They koen that racism is not the NF. but disruptive units at school and no job The NF doesn't stand for much thes haven't already experienced to some degree.
The comic completely. ignores black self-organisation and concenLale Community Councils to combat the racism they
TELEVISI
To be fair, there is some representation of the work of the Ashington Group which began as a
class in art appreciation, members of which are miners and the Artists' International Association whose exhibition was Artists against war and fascism'.
But these themes are not dominant in exhibition. The reality of working class
This is partly because most of the photographs in the exhibition were originally taken from the Daily Herald between 1931 and 1939 and the romantic rustic scenes were all part of the editor's own campaign against 'modernism'
Attempts could have been made to go beyond the editorial emphasis of the Daily Herald. example the decade resounded with pit disasters.
But what about state racism?
their
women
Fascism Bill Tory people unfairly in the future'
Relations know better.
Race
recurred on the pages of the Daily Herald.
more acculalcy
marchers.
Whatever the
the classes. It was a decade of class Britain as well as internationally.
with the situation today. most of the
first major Lamning, the £2.95. life is For
B8 CANTEEN
8L CANTEEN
them (the employers) treating oche
This liberal rubbish may deceive young whites but many black youth
relations legislation has
Instead of one or two cheerful photos of miners waiting to go down the pit, there could have been photos of the rescues and pit-head vigils which
For that matter why rely on the Daily Herald for the depiction of reality? Surely the Arts Council could have collaborated with the National Museum of Labour History to represent social conditions
The Bede Gallery would have let the Arts council display the banners of the hunger
reason, the result romanticised view of the 30's. Despite increasing social mobility as represented by Shell's posters and BP Ethyl ads, there remained a huge guif between
conflict, in the powers that be are afraid of us drawing parallels
THE OTHER BOOKSHOP
NEW TITLES
In the Ditch by Buchi Emecheta, Allison and Busby, £1.95
Season of Adventure, by George Allison and Busby,
One Azania, One Nation: The National Question in Africa, by No Sizwe, Zed Press, £2.95.
328 Upper Street, London N1 2XQ (tel. 01-226-0571) @O CANTEEN araoys ruining a deepe cold • CANTEENÇE /CANTEEN
Page 16 scan of this page
Socialist Challenge SOUTHALL SHOW TRIALS GOON
found guilty
ber at St Albans Crown Court. after by an aunt. ***
On 23 April she View wearing a black scarf. the window at the time.
even the police! **********
smashed,
is respected'.
Registered with the Post Office as
AND ON
SEVERAL weeks ago Juliana Henry, a 22-year-old West Indian sister, was
at Barnet magistrates court of assaulting a police officer and threatening behaviour during the anti-NF demo in Southall on 23 April. Her appeal was heard on 21 Novem-
The Crown Court confirmed the verdict and Juliana was sentenced to one month in prison. She was immediately transported to Holloway Prison. Juliana is a single parent and her two-year-old child is being looked
* * was at 26 Park - the headquarters of Misty and Peoples Unite in Southall. It was attacked by the police with great force and brutality. Clarence Baker, Misty's manager, was nearly killed as a result, and hundreds were arrested.
The police claimed that Juliana was on the top floor throwing bricks. She was seen by a polceman for 'fifteen seconds'. He stated in court that he recognised her because she was
When the defence asked whether the policeman was aware that lots of black women wore black scarves, the judge said that the question was irrelevant. The judge also stated that she was the only coloured person at
Such an obvious lie must have embarrassed
**.
In sentencing Juliana the judge stated: "The blue uniform must be
black people battered, provided the 'blue uniform
Southal!
immigration controls court in his own way'.
West Indian organisation. trial. The
that there is still
stopped.
speaker at 25 November dem against
Parita Trivedy from the Southall Campaign Committee was in the public gallery when Juliana was sentenced. She was not allowed to take notes and her notepad was snatched from her by the police. She was told that the judge rules this
Peoples Unite is a predominantly
It especially hated by the local police. Five of the thirteen people so far sent to prison are from Peoples Unite.
On Monday 17. December four members of Peoples Unite will be up before the Barnet magistrates and the next day Clarence Baker will face
Southall Campaign Committee and Peoples Unite are calling for a picket of the Barnet magistrates court on 17 December at 9.30am (nearest tube High Barnet).
Committee members are enraged
no consistent campaign by the labour movement to demand that these show trials
ver: Published by Relgocrest, Lid. for Socialist Challenge, 328/9 Upper St, London N1.
PADDINGTON Socialist Challenge group are organising their film/social night December with Alain Tanner and John Berger's classic La Salamandre.
Last ume they showed The Spiral, about Chile, and made 180 for KELLAWAY of the Paddington fund group makes some suggestions as to how other supporters could go about organising similar events.
Choose a good night (Fridays are suitable) at least six weeks in advance to allow for booking problems and publicity.
2. time. Make sure it is okay for showing films - plugs, seating, tolerance from the landlord.
3. Budget for 60-100 at about fl a head donation: Film distributors demand a cut if you advertise and charge allows for a film costing about £25 which really works out at £32 once VAT and carriage is added, Plenty of good films are available for hire at that price.
4. Catalogues are available from all the main distributors for this sort of film: Connoisseur Films Oxford St London temporary Films Ltd, 55 Greek St, London WI; Other Cinema, 12 Little Newport Films, Surbiton, Surrey; Cuban and Soviet films can be sorted out via the embassies; The British Film Institute are very friendly and where you can get the film you want.
5. Choose a film for the audience you are capable •of doesn't have to be Z or a 'purely' political film.
Get your is publicity out at least three weeks in advance. Give a brief "come-on' type synopsis of the film and the when,
Britain:
Abroad: 12 months -
Name.
Address
'Socialist Challenge'. are
second on Friday 14 Out or
• course the Here DAVE projector,
things).
Arrange a room at the same during the film blackout and Of
an audience you around the film.
This Ltd, 167 • Swindon SC WI; Con- P. Scott M. Thomas
London WC2; Harris P. Shafee Anon Week's total will tell you Also.
mobilising P. Ling S. Austin well produced Manchester seller N. Beeton L. Thalman
SUBSCRIBE NOW
12 months £12.50; 6 months £6.5 Surface Mail £13.50 Airmail £16.00 Molti-Reader institutions: Double the above rate li enclose a donation for the Fighting Fund of Cheques. POs and Money Orders should be made pavable to Complete and relurn to: Socialist Challenge, 328 Upper Street, London NI
P.O. Box 82, London E2
where, wny details. Then it can be easily used as a notice. Get it in Time
other progressive Journals where you don't have to pay much as well as Socialist Challenge, of
Arrange borrow the all other equipment (teachers and community workers usually have access to such
Check that the plugs match and the lead reaches before the night. Make sure one comrade knows how to project and have a trial run through.
8. Finally, make sure the social is close to the film venue. You can flog food and drink for extra revenue
course the above doesn't completely apply to the use of films as part of a campaign meeting or where
want to organise discussions
YOU'D better gét moving with some kind of fund-raising activity because we're well behind schedule in fighting to meet this quarter's f2,500 target. Our thanks this week to
£5.00 4.00 2.00 Outer West London IMG 50.00
.60.00 1.00 £122.00 OVERALL TOTAL
our apologies IO those whom we inadvertentiy forgot to credit two weeks ago. They were:
£5.00 5.00 2.00 1.72 10.00 10.00 Printed by East End (offset) Lid,
← Socialist Challenge No. 123, No v, 1979Socialist Challenge No. 126, 13 December 1979 →