Socialist Challenge No. 149, 29 May 1980
The scan: sc-n149-may-29-1980.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 UNEMPLOYMENT THE ONLY GROWTH INDUSTRY IN TORY LIONS
ONLY one thing is growing in Tory Britain - the dole queues. * MacGregor, the new boss who cost British Steel £2m,
sack 100,000 steelworkers. Instead, he threatened to completely shut down steel plants in either Port Talbot or Llanwern. He wants to INCREASE the number and speed of sackings in steel. * Unemployed school leavers' prospects will receive a further blow following the increase in fees for youth retraining programmes. *Two million people will be out of work by the end of next year and this number will continue to rise, according to the National Institute of Economic and Social Research.
Everthing else in Britain is standing still or in decline. * Inflation will continue to be 17 per
Kick
out the
Torie
BRITAIN
standards despite
standards. has just scrapped
economy will contract,
go bankrupt.
job cannot guarantee a basic right TIguE tO WOrK. LI
the economy.
There
living standard.
time off, creased, fight such a solution like mad.
UHL.
Cut the dole
queues.
cent this year which means that those in work will not increase their living
increases. "hose out of work or in low paid Industries will suffer big cuts in living
* Gross Domestic Product will contract by one percent meaning that the
investment will fall, and more and more firms will
TORY policies are not working. They
La recession all the Tories can do is urge people to grin and bear it and wait for an 'upturn in
an alternative unemployment and capitalist stagnation, one that starts from the need of every person for a job and a decent
Work should be shared, holidays,
and training schemes inindustries that declare themselves bankrupt should be placed under workers controlana taken lato public ownership - without putting people on the dole in the meantime.
But this would cut into the bosses' profits. It would challenge their hold over the economy. They would resist with their law, their courts, and their
police. The Tories themselves would
That's why we must build a movement to kick this bosses government Share the work!
12.30pm
Socialist Challenge says:
No Cruise missiles!
Britain out of NATO! Demonstrate Saturday 22 June,
Assemble Embankment. March to Hyde Park Called by the Labour Party
No.149 THIS
an rugby team.
This
respectability
Africa.
ported the
shot,
In nesburg,
students Cal. cupation. has
invaded DOWCES
The batile
Do don
29 May 1980 20p
BLACK
YOUTH
-THE
REAL
weekend the all-white British Lions rugby team plays
all-white South African
sporting occasion is meanso we come Dack cabar theid regime to the world of
But this is one circus which even before it is staged, will have no chance of diverting attention from the real world of South
In Johannesburg last Monday, 52 church leaders were arrested by the racist regime. They had dared to demonstrate. calling forthe release of another cleric who sup
demands ot south Africa's black youth for an end to
During the past six weeks the youth themselves have been killed,
and tear-gassed by South African police.
Port Elizabeth, JohanSoweto. Cape Town, Bloemfontein, and Batho, school
have demonstrated, bovcotted their classes. and In return they have been savagely assaulted by the forces of white 'law and order
But the blacks have not taken their treatment lying down. Police
have been overturned. government offices have been set on fire, bricks have been hurled as the cops attacked.
And it is not just the youth. In Durban, black textile workers on strike for more money have also been on the streets. Tear gas has been used on them. There is also intensitication o the war in Namibia between SWAPO and the South African illegal army of oc-
Last week the South African army lost five officers and an undisclosed number of other soldiers in what has been described as the biggest military battle in Namibia
Now the An olat to chemant
anndunced that in the month South African forces have
11s territory Fighter bombers, gunships, and heavy ar tillery were used in the invasion. designed to punish Angolans lor supporting the national liberation struggie in Namibia
Whether openly or secretly, al this is supported by the Thatcher government and other Western
Tories have refused to disclose the names of 33 British firms in South Africa which are paying wages below the poverty
Rugby balls or no rugby balls the real contest in South Atrica is outside the sport stadiums. It is the regime and is black. ROCCOR
majority Storge cheer on the blacks.
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successful gesture to in.
of hyacinths and wallflowers.
describe a recent visit.
Only one half-hour visit is allowed each calendar month. Everything has to be said in that time.
In theory the prisoners are allowed one letter each month, but these frequently never reach them. So, in the absence of newspapers, radio, TV. or books, prisoners on protest political status rely on the monthly half-hour for all their intormation about the outside world.
The prisoners have to run a gauntlet of screws and mirror searches to reach the visiting cubicles. They are forced to squat naked over a mirror on the floor to have their back passages examined. If they refuse they are beaten
One former blanket man, Joe Maguire, told us that often he was so worried about the beating he was going to get on his way out that he could not concentrate on the visit at all.
The visitors have been wor-
Socialist Challenge 29 May 1980
AT AUSCHWITZ, they had an orchestra at the entrance to the death camp, a macabre and un-
disguise the within. At Long Kesh they say it with flowers.
In recent months, as a result of the increase in public concern about the conditions in the H Blocks at Long Kesh, five miles south of Belfast, a trickle of influential visitors has been allowed
So, in the midst of the great expanse of grey wire and machine-gun posts, the authorities have planted a couple of tiny regimented beds
LIZ CURTIS and ALASTAIR RENWICK
Trying for days about the visit. What will he be like? Will he be better or worse than the last time? What will he want to know? Will I remember everything 1 want to tell him?
The half-hour visit takes up the most of the day. Minibuses are for organised from the nationalist districts of Belfast.
They go first to the Prisoners Welfare Office in a small, endlessly busy building on the Falls Road. There have Loyalist sectarian here, and the front building is now wired in.
Most or une visitors are women, perhaps LOTTICE from visiting. They keep up a the moves out through the Belfast suburbs into the green countryside. Only the children are really cheerful, clambering about the packed bus.
We have been here before.
Page 2
• 18 months ago. It is still a shock to come up a country road and confronted horrors rugated iron and watchtowers
of HM concentration camp They have spruced up the
came. The huts at the entrance seem to be new, and you no longer qucue i me open auto show your ID.
Turnstile
They did it up to make us feel worse, son Kieran we are visiting. But while the visitors find it hard to take the contrast between the spotless walls and the degraded beforehand condition of their imprisoned
Telauves, the paintwork are response to the growing international Block regime.
We get out of the minibus and wait by a green-painted turnstile which breaks the acres of grey wire. climb up the turnstile, poking their hands through the bars and shouting at the screws the other side, 'Let us in, you horrible monsters.
Eventually a screw unlocks the gate. Over by a wall another
been murders tian dozing at his teet. of the into a hut and queue to show
our ID. People give in their handbags. Then we sit in rows
search. The few men are in a because are barred separate row from the women
'Next!" a shout comes from minibus behind a partition wall. You go
Around and a screw sends you into a tiny cubicle of a room with a second door opposite you A screw is sitting at a table.
The other screw
the ch.
your
the notes, counts them, and
tion,
says Betty, whose The standing
Your belt is
new huts and paper in it
in fact a
criticism of the
everything.
Two children
side.
Lighters
It seems there Wego another
four matches.
called for the
the screws somebody says. comes in refuse to talk to them.
behind you, orders you to open your jacket, and pats you all far over including round the crot-
Wing to Kieran.
The screw at the table takes
I and buts l an envelope, then asks for your purse. The screw takes out all
bizarrely - selotapes them into an envelope and puts it back in the purse, which is returned to
This is a recent innovawhich no one can understand. What can they buy in the Long H Blocks? The screws perhaps? daunted by it.
screw takes everything out of your pockets and shakes your handkerchief.
removed. Your cigarette packet is examined to make sure there is no silver
There is a lengthy list of forbidden items on the wall. Even chewing-gum is not allowed. It seems a subversive We use can be found for almost
The screw asks you to take off one of your shoes, shakes it and looks inside, then returns it. At last you are let out of the other door into a room the tar
onto a broad
cruelly flowerbeds. strange innovation. We
Till a fortnight before, visitors
were allowed to take through
Now these are
forbidden, and no lighters are allowed anyway. One woman
has managed to get through the
search with her cigarette lit. We all light up from her. From then
on somebody has to have a
cigarette alight all the time.
"They're trying to make us ask prisoner
light, because we
Inside Britain's c
A VISITT
We sit and wait. We spend cubicle
sitting and waiting than we will spend talk-
At last a screw starts to call out the names and numbers of come.
prisoners who are being visited. Mothers summon their children. We have Kieran's sixyear-old brother Liam with us. He is rushing about the room. Kieran has been two and a half years on the blanket, so Liam is
familiar with visiting Kesh and quite un-
Flowerbeds
We file through the door and into a waiting minibus. All the windows except the windscreen are covered in opaque material so that you can't see out. What are they hiding?
travel round the perimeter of the camp and arrive at an enormous pair of parallel gates. The bus is let through the first gate, which is locked after it. The next gafe is opened. The bus goes through and the gate is locked
We are let out of the bus out 'avenue' lined with corrugated iron and high wire fencing. We see the two
incongruous little
go through another turnstile into another waiting room. Again the prisoners' sur names and numbers are called out. A screw tells the visitors
the numbers of the cubicles where the visits will be.
We sit down at the table. It
has a board underneath so that
there can be no contact with the
There are high parti
tions on either side of us. Lian
promptly climbs on the table
and looks over into the next
The waiting is awful. We wait half an hour till Kieran comes out. Betty worries end lessly that he is never going to
happened before: visits have been stopped at the last minute.
As the blanket men come through the door at the end of the hut, visitors crane round the partitions to try and see who it is. They smile and say 'Hello' even if they don't know the blanket man.
The blanket men are very pale. Their hair is very long and greasy. They are wearing the most absurd outfits. The so-called uniforms are crumpled bits of demin which would even be rejected for sale as jumble. They are too small for the big men and too big for the small men, a deliberate attempt to humiliate them. The prisoners have no socks on and there are no laces in their boots.
Visits are the only time the men will wear the uniforms. They do so because without the visits there would be no means of getting any information in or
Ironically, - those who are not prisoncis n on the protest — do not have to wear uniforms for visits. But the blanket men are forced to.
Martin Vernan -COO through, immediately recognisable looking Tunous. Mechan has been a leading Republican for several vears: the previous week he was tramed in court so blatantly that ever priests protested about it. He got 12 years for something everyone knows he did not do
Liam is running up and
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oncentration camp DH BLOCK
down between the boxes. Betty calls him. He hides behind the table to give our kieran a surprise.
Al last Betty says, 'Here's our Kieran.' He is tall and very thin and pale. His arms protrude from shrunken uniform jacket. It's over a year
shaved off, and it has grown VCIV long. He walks with a SOOD and his eves are redrimmed. He is 20 years old.
Stooped
When he smiles at us we
catch a glimpse of the charm he
He sits
down and turns immediately to his mother. He is clearly very nervous and blinks a lot. 'I've got messages for you, can't remember them, Be says From time to time during the visit he repeats, remember my messages.
Memory loss Is common among the blanket men. tension of the visit makes it worse. Before someone takes a visit, his comrades on the wing
call down the messages they
want passed out. These are often about arrangements for their own visits.
Kieran desperate
news. We hadn't anticipated this. When he goes back to his cell he will be asked the 'sceal" (Gaelic for news). Speaking fast and under his breath he
asks us what is happening in Belfast, what is happening in
Zimbabwe and in Palestine,
What happening
England. 'Do people
support us there?' he asks.
He asks us whether the
Easter march in Belfast really was big. It was ICe Were
several thousands out.
blanket men like to check their intormation to make sure it's true. One visitor's account is not enough. Apparently news of Mountbatten's death last year, and the deaths of the 18 soldiers at Warrenpoint, was checked time and again before any of the prisoners believed it.
quietly so that the screws can't hear, he can't talk to all of us at once. He alternates between us. What happening England is very important to them, he says.
and the Bloody Sunday Commemoration. He finds it hard to believe that thousands will come out on the streets of Britain in their support. We tell him about public meetings, and that letters smuggled out of the but 1 H Blocks have been published
in English papers. He is pleased and careful nois to exaggerate the surprised. can't
support.
the Gaelic
Their conditions would be completely intolerable anyone without their clear and strong political motivation. We know from meeting Kieran and for
hearing what he before, and others who spent years on the blanket and are now released, psychologically phased tor and are physically in a way that the prisoners with "status' never were.
Kieran tells us that despite really everything there:
protesters will yield. "stinking', he says. going by learning Gaelic. The teacher shouts from behind the The cell door and they scratch the
words onto their cell walls with rosary Deads They run every scrap of information that comes in -sing Republican songs and pop songs — but we re right out of date. Sometimes we overhear bits of songs on the screws radios, but that's all.
He wants the latest football results. Fortunately one of us follows the football, so we can help with that. knowing the football results!'
We tell him Belty says later.
Kieran asks us to write him a letter - a big might let it in if it comes from England,' he says. writing about would censor it. He asks us to write about other international news and the football results latest pop songs uddenly, all too soon, th time is up. about. That would only lead to more beatings. Kieran kisses his mother and Liam, and shakes hands with us. Then he is away. led off by a screw We go back, dazed, to the bus with the opaque windows to Gradually the post mortems on Ine start. share their news as we are funnelled back through the system was like signing for bags and belts and from meeting being let out through the turn
stile.
As we travel back towards Belfast we recall the Sean O'Casey's Thomas Ashe, 1917 after being force-fed while on hunger-strike. • no way the His cell is You cannot put a rope around ine neck or an They keep
Postscript
quizzes - using
and they sing. "We
from visiting
names were locked into a
'You saved me.
totally false accusation.
letter. "They for Gaelic, It's no use (wo articles
Ireland: they
Zimbabwe and
There is no hangin
Betty, as
anything in.
Led.
sanitary towel.
The visitors stound.
visiting
words of had anything, lament for
who died in
told he ta Darrack- W CIC boards' in
munion. Later
* We visited Kieran in April. After his May visit his mother Betty, his sister Deborah and his brother-in-law were banned
him or anvone
At the end of the visit their
were called out. They van and driven back to the search area.
had passed them letters - a
Knowing that Kieran is anx-
anything written in had clipped ment. in Gaelic trom Republican News and smuggled them through the search.
she dian i give tem to Kieran, because screws were standing over them all the time. Now she pulled out the articles and threw them at the screws, saying they were all she had and nothing had gone in or out.
we ourselves knew. war. categorically refuses to take
Then all three were searchBetty was made to pull down her pants and show her
Nothing was
Then they were summoned to see a senior screw, who told them they were banned from
Kieran or any other prisoner for life. Deborah protested that it was only her who
and she didn't pass the articles in anyway -and they were hardly dangerous
• but to no avail The following Sunday two priests tried to see Kieran. They
on the the punishment cells, and they were not allowed to see him or give him com-
from visitors to other prisoners that Kieran had been beaten
As we go to press we have heard that Betty wrote to the governor of Long Kesh and received a reply saying the mat-
THE ISSUE
THE H blocks were a creation of the last Labour govern-
In 1972 the Heath government recognised the exceptional nature of those in prison for 'crimes' connected with the political situation in the North of Ireland and granted those prisoners 'special category status.
This meant that the prisoners were allowed to wear their own clothes, mix freely and take orders only from their officers rather than from prison staff.
Their status was similar to that given to prisoners of
This procedure was abolished by the Labour govern ment in 1976. But the prisoners refused to accept the change and refused to wear prison uniforms. The British reacted to this by denying prisoners the usual facilities and by harassing them. One example was that unless prisoners wore prison uniforms they weren't allowed to go to the toilet.
The British insist that the prisoners are ordinary "criminals' but, from the minute they are picked up to the minute that they are convicted, those 'on the blanket' are treated entirely differently from criminals. They are con victed by special 'Diplock' courts, in which the normal laws regulating trials are ignored. There are no juries in these courts, the accused are tried by judges alone and those making accusations are not required to appear in court and therefore need not be cross-examined.
A new campaign has recently been started in Britain to support the demands of Irish political prisoners. Details of this campaign, called Charter 80, will appear in subsequent issues of Socialist Challenge
Socialist Challenge
ter would be overlooked and she would be allowed in
We have also heard that Father Denis Faul visited Kieran, who told him that after the visit he was subjected to a
on the boards for two days and the screws examined all his excrement to see if had swallowed any letters. Nothing was found.
29 May 1980 Page 3
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British Oxygen workers explode over safety
HOME NEWS
By Geoffrey Sheridan
tration.
workplaces.
The Labour government didn't say that trades unionists could only depend on their own action to protect their lives and health at work, but that was a conclusion that has been drawn by the workers at British Oxygen's depot in Hackney East London - with good reason.
Each day they work among a thousand potential bombs -Sft-high steel cylinders filled with compressed oxygen. If one of the containers, known as
25%
Photo: PETE GRANT (Sociallst Challenge)
BETTER health and safety at work was meant to be one of the presents that the last Labour government gave to the trade unions in return for defeating the Heath adminis-
The Health and Safety Executive was set up, chaired by Bill Simpson, former general secretary of the Engineering Union's foundry section, and legal provision was made for union safety representatives to be appointed in most
bottles, goes up, like a high explosive.
So you would think that improvements in health and safety would mean more frequent testing of the bottles. In fact BOC has changed the scheme whereby each bottle is tested once in five years. pany is now testing them once every ten years.
Bottles have exploded. One worker at BOC's depot was blown to pieces by an explosion in 1955, and another
MANUFACTURING
ASSISTANTS
SWEETS FOR CHILDREN/
SUBSIDISED CAMTEEN FREE CHERALLS NO NIGHT SHUFT
worker had his stomach smashed.
The remains workers ended up in the streets around the after an explosion while a bottle was being filled in 1965. Six years later another worker was killed in Wembley when a bottie exploded.
Mickey Boulter, the deputy convenor and union safety rep the effect is at the Hackney
siders reason why management is cutting the tests workers' position, he adds, is that profit must before safety. 'We should be moving forThe com- wards not backwards, he says.
•We should be testing the bottles every year. We have no idea what happens to the bottles Greenwich when they are out of the depot
- they could be dropped from a roof or anything.
NEED
RO HELP US NAKE CHEX
of since
feel.'
Hackney depot
week. As a result the
at the
depot, that there is only one tion.
- money. The
implement 10-year tests not come
one side They're a joke.? basic By Oliver New
women workers at the Chix bubble-gum factory in Slough heard last Friday that their strike had been called off.
This decisior which
eaves most or ine strikers ou
the cold, was taken by officials of the General and
Workers wincine Union after consultation with only a few of those involved.
Before the walk-out of 96 Chix workers began in October, they were paid 95p
hour and treated like The fight against intolerable sull has brought the dispute much
within the labour movement, but there has been only paichy support on tne picket line and in supporting a boycott.
Yet the determination of the strikers succeeded in getting supplies shut off, and on occasiona days or acron u
people joined the picket line.
Chix boss Denis Rose was forced to the negotiating table earlier this month
The agreement reached with the GMWU means that although the company has given way on the principle of union recognition, •The majority of the remaining strikers 28 part-time WOrKCIS are to receive redundancy pay as a result of "lost contracts'.
But this apparent shortage of work does not affect the scabs who have been recruited
Chix
SuCC •OIC
We want more tests not less. That's the way we feel and that's the way the testers here
But not the company. Paul acetylene Foot wrote about the danger at 26 BOC in the Daily Mirror last months.
union representatives and the testers
Hackney depot hauled in by management and quizzed for several hours and Наскиву threatened with disciplinary ac-
Hackney is the only one of BOC's 46 depots refusing to Blatant
AS Mickey Boulter puts it: 'We're holding out for all the depots:
And the Health and Safety Executive? 'They don't want to know,' Mickey says. "They play the solidarity
against the other.
Tessa Van Gelderen adds: the son, the
rights of trade union branch organisation are under attack stewara,
SELL-OUT AT CHIX
AFTER just over seven months of picketing, Asian keeping their jobs.
started. The returning stukers • WIll Row • OU numbered by scabs.
Whatever arguments the GMWU employs to justify this agreement, its failure to
most certainly cannot justified. The only people consulted. were the 19 dav shift workers who will be
Public employees vote for
a fight on union rights
File Code of Practice on union rights. The motion, proposed by Bert Ellicot, district secretary Manchester South rosoilals. was carried by approximately 5,100 votes to 4,300. It stated:
Conference supports the
malarial disp the promo-
ticular urges: promotion and defence of one hundred per cent closed shops throughout the public sector *Industrial disputes involving NUPE members to be run by "stewards and/or district com-
at BOC. On Tuesday at the Hackney depot management met all the shop stewards and announced the closure of the
department, with workers to go in three the
The work will go to depots out in Bristol and Cardiff. It just se happens that werkers at the
depot have been in the forefront for improving safety conditions in BOC and fighting for better pay and conditions all round.
won't
John Walsh, convenor a Hackney, says: 'It's a blatam attack on the union to break
at the depot. scheduled redundancies include the branch chairper.
vice chairperson, shop and assistant conThroughout the strike, the Chix women have been patronised by white men who were their supporters.
The fact that they have not even been consulted over the ente or me sanke is amar ther insult to Asian women whose militancy and deter•showo nave been taken as an example to the whole trade union movement. une ser-oll wow save been more difficult if the strike had been run bi an elected strike committee DELEGATES at the annual conference of the National Union of Public Employees earlier this week defied the recommendation of the executive and carried a motion in support of the Rank and
*The establishment of picket lines in all disputes in the public services and respect 101 the same by all NUPE members. contadon with the members concerned in all disputes, including full report baCK a 00 decision making by all involved at mass membership meetings
Many enforced arbitration.
The conference backed an economic policy. Watement embracing the Labour left's
The cutbacks will be fought, and they are not the only attack by management.
An all-out strike began at
Wembley depot on Tuesday, when the plant came
after installation engineers were suspended by
ment. The engineers
used to accept the splitting
which t in a weakening of union organisation. 'Manage
thinks we support the other depots because we have our Walsh. But the wale union problems, says John must support both disputes.
They are linked and defeat of either will be a big blow to the union inside BOC. This is a make or break situa tion and we intend to fight all along the line.'
Telegrams of congratula-
Brar, now to be made redun-
dant and CP member Mohammed Anwar, the local
GMWU branch secretary,
showing that many in . the lavoul movement have the
impression that a victory was
won.
There is a possibility that
the Chix women may con-
tinue their strike, which with rapid labour movement
backing — would oblige the
union to renegotiate the set-
Alternative Economic Strategy, which will now be the union's
divisions. with only one vot
against, delegates supported a resolution calling for a fight
for full equality for gays.
A resolution totally opthe use of nuclear power for whatever purpose. was carried against desperate NICOS 101 caution trom the platform.
A solid minority emerged
to support a resolution pro-
posed by Ray Varnes, ILEA
district delegate, calling for mass action to get rid of the
Tories. Support for this posi-
as conference
split on the wages debate.
However, a motion calling for an f85 minimum wage and
a recal conference to
Many settlement tell with 5.000 votes against and 3,500 for.
Page 5 scan of this page
POEU demand 30% and 35 hours
Negotiation:
HOMENEWS
Post Office Engineering Union
By Colin Talbot, Westminster branch, POEU
A 30 per cent wage increase and an immediate 35-hour week will be among the issues discussed at the Engineering Union's annual conference next week.
Delegates to the conference gather against a background of profound changes. Post Office Telecommunications is in the process of being separated from the rest of the Post Office, into a new corporation - British Telecom.
A massive modernisation underway, including THESE contributions from Bill Sirs (ISTC General Secretary) and George
Wrote of the Wales Tel
surprised many workers who observed the Wales Labour Party Conference in Swansea on 17 May.
These are not the words they remember when demanded a strong lead from the ISTC and the TUC during the steel strike. For all Sirs' and Wright's retrospective demagogy on jobs, their record in the steel strike is not forgotten. the last week of the strike, Sirs explained his position in the Steel Workers Banner:
"Practically all of the important principals demanded by the corporation have been conceded. It will not be easy for us. It will mean the surrender of many customs and habits. will negotiating many jobs.'
Retreat
In February, Wright explained away Wales TUC retreat from a call tor maustral action to oppose steel and coal redundancies: "We have never called. will not call, and never intend to call a general strike.
Demagogy aside, this is the real face of the leaders who have alloweu loos Talbot to be negotiated away in return for pitiful redundancy payments and the prospects of permanent unemployment.
Tommy Lyons, branch secretary at Port Talbot Steelworks, explained disgust to Socialist Challenge:
The ISTC, NUB, AUEW in Port Talbot have signed the BSC proposals. The EEPTU and the TGWU have so far refused to sign. The other
have accepted slimline hook line and sinker.
They have negotiated the golden handshake deal. In my
telephone
Post Office
neatly
programme is over 6.000 converting away
George
the
them, if possible, out of office.' Bill Sirs, ISTC.
opinion, the lay delegates are too interested in getting their Port
own redundancy pay. aren't looking tomorrow. Even workers have themselves to the situation.
EEPTU 'Many of them will have a
ruae snock wiel
his find jobs in Port Talbot. Just
last week a building firm shut
and down with the loss of another
1,000 jobs so the area.
The arrectici Port Talbot will set the scene for the rest of the country.
the Thirty six thousand jobs are
planned to go, on top of those Wales. :411 ments made now in Port Talbot
exchanges from electro-mechanical systems to systems. Post Office Telecommunications continues to be highly profitable industry, £347m were made in 1979. This is despite paying out almost £500m in interest payments.
The Thatcher government wants to divide up Post and Telecommunications so that they can weaken trade union resistance to their plans for both parts of the business. It would also divide the profitable profitable sections of the Post Office, preparing for the run-down of the latter and opening up the former to private ownership.
The POEU leadership has gone along with the Post Office, or rather the Telecommunications, management, even to the extent of sup-
South Wales jobs
'Jobs are more important than wages. We should be fighting for jobs to protect the future of our children. We wanted to strike for jobs but every other union on the TUC Steel Committee turned us down. When we went to the TUC to fight for jobs they turned us down.... we must unite against a common enemy and get rid of the Tory Government. We cannot afford to have them in office for another four years. We must use every method to push
and Llanwern will set a precedent for the BSC in these areas.
They further than the young Labour Party conference that resigned the jobs fight should be taken ир. not issued a national directive they try to that the local leaderships stop the negotiations? Why has the national Steel Committee not taken this up?
made in letter to the local plants arguing against negotiating these deals.
They whether they want a jobs fight The force or not. stick out on our own
old-fashioned porting the split. all-electronic
agreement.
from the non-
to the level of 1978.
On hours,
a sick joke
had in Wales.' a national directive.
•Bill Sirs said at the Welsh
So why has the executive Pathetic "The They should have sent a
Our problem
clean Half the We cannot afford to we need
Two years ago they sold out the campaign for the 35-hour week, capitulating to management and settling for a 37½-hour, 'nil cost',
After this campaign the POEU Broad Left was formed, which now has supporters in over 70 union branches and seven supporters on the current National Executive Council.
The Broad Left is opposing the split in the Post Office and organising with militant forces in the other PO unions against its effects. Un wages, we are fighting for a 1980 claim of 30 per cent, without strings, to bring our wages back
we want a campaign of industrial action for the 35-hour week now, and the 32'The CBI, BSC and the Government have won in Port Talbot. It is a tragedy that over six thousand jobs and the futures of our children have been sold in Port Talbot. Those who did not turn out on 14 May bear some of the responsibility. They have destroyed the only chance we
George Wright, Secretary of Welsh TUC
"The EEPTU in Port Talbot has demanded a meeting with our national official so that he can tell us what the national position is. If the jobs are going to be signed away it must be clear that this is a directive from our national officials. threats
jobs.
British TUC and Wales TUC have been pathetic.
redundancies. leaders, people like Sirs, ..and Duffy, are not giving a lead. Resist
workforce of Port Talbot will go with this deal.
The other half will have a real
in the face of modernisation.
security.
Stacks on our standard of living On the other hand,
easy when Buzby goes off the air Coal fight on their hands to stop the same happening to them But their fight has already been undermined by of response from a national level.
In Llanwern too, negotiations are in progress over BSC
cut almost 5,000 Steel Sheet, the bulletin produced by ISTC, NUB and AUEW members in Llanwern,
these talks and for a fight against the
wide
A call has been issued to the 400 pickets who agreed at the before it is too late.
hour week by 1984 is being proposed, to main tain and increase the number of jobs in telecom
Demands are also being made for increased annual leave, better training facilities and job
Every activist in the union understands that we are in for a tough time. The management has made a 'final offer' of only 15 per cent productivity. The government imposed cash-limits are going to make it even harder to rebuff at-
PO engineers have tremendous power — if only we bring ourselves - to use it. Maggie Thatcher might just find that pushing the working class around isn't quite so
end of the strike to resist the redundancies to meet again on 4 June to plan this opposition one contributor to Steel Sheet argues:
air-conditioned offices
the government They have isolated from the
workers industry •as ines accept their role as the "third arm of government" 'Negotiation at Llanwern is a sick joke. A fightback within these rules is doomed to failure.
The time for action is near. The leadership you are looking foi is ready to assert itself, if you give it your backing. It is now up to you, the victims of Tory. manipulated BSC, to hit back.
Many are now looking to the miners to act. They too art faced with devastating redundancies. Philip Weekes, South Wales Director of the National Board, announced this week that 6,500 miners will face the dole queue by the new year as six pits close and a government subsidy on Welsh coaking coal to Llanwern is withdrawn.
Miners
This is only a start. At the South Wales miners conference held a fortnight ago, 15 lodges submitted an emergency resolution opposing NCB plans to recall 21 pits for investigation with the possible loss of 15,000 jobs in the next year.
Workers other unions were called on to support a fight against these redundan cies and Welsh miners will campaign at the national conference in July for countryaction against the pit closures. The squeeze is on, but there is still time to fight for the trade leaders to act
Page 6 scan of this page
Workers plan for better health
HOMENEWS
Nottingham
teachers step
up action
By John Hobbs EILEEN Crosbie was not
maintank, Just a conscientious nursery school teacher who fused to teach a class of 39 when the official recom-
size is two-thirds of that figure. Eileen Crosbie was dismissed.
Nottingham county council has unilaterally upped the rao or emerer to tenorers 1n
classes and determined ahead with ins cur come wintmay. Teachers have no say in the
Councilor Bird. 2000strap Tory, has said that education policy is of no concern National Union of Teachers should 'mind its business' about class size.
When Eileen Crosbie came up for . a disciplinary hearing, WU thousand teachers in Nottingham took strike action in her support. This was coupled with the implementation of class-size ratios.
The council retaliated by locking out teachers taking action, including the whole staff school
OLIC HasTwood.
The union response has been to escalate the fightback.
SChools TOOK Enree days' strike action, then 30 schools the following week.
Photo: SOCIALIST CHALLENGE
Now so schools are our arrec ting some ten thousand school students.
With other local authorities watching to see if the Tories succeed in imposmeaner Cus Noman. the teachers are pressing the NUT's national action committee tor a murder stedoing. up of the local action, and a national demonstration and
Donations and messages of support to: : Eileen Crosbie,
111 Portland Rd, Nottingham.
The strange
case of TB
or not TB
By Rob Patterson 'VIRGINITY tests' are not the only medical ploy being used to exclude black people from Britain. Mohammed Butt presently faces deportation because an immigration service doctor says he has infectious tuberculosis.
Mohammed arrived in Britain in February atter being cleared by Home Office officials, including a doctor, in Pakistan. But he was immediately arrested
pending deportation.
Pressure on the Home Office resulted in his tempo. rary release trom nospital. provided Mohammed paid
private medical treatment.
Now a private consul tant says that Mohammec has onlv a mild form of TB which does not prevent him from working and that in anv case the ilness will be cured in less than three months.
has been lodged against the refusal of leave to enter Britain, and even it thr is successiul -which will be known in? few days - Mohammed will still have to reapply for permission to enter me colntry.
A defence campaign is being set up. aimed at the labour movement •and
workers. risens Mohammed Butt, c/o 301 Cheetham Hill Rd, Manchester 8.
By Hilary Wainwright
Workers in the
organising a meeting on better health?
Certainly not part of the normal run of
trade union activity.
But then of the
stewards at Lucas Aerospace go well beyond the
ДОКОСИНОЛО e NOSIO!
last Saturday in London on Workers plan for bet-
ter health' was no
for Alternative
Systems, which they run jointly with the North-eas
London Poly.
The Lucas Aerosnace stewards have long been
challenging the way that trade unions separate the
workers' needs as producers from their needs as
consumers and members of the community. 'By Kay Bastin THE employers at Klein's clothing factory Salford have given in after an 11-week strike. The strikers were mainly women who'd never been out before, and they carried on despite the hardships involved.
The agreement is to abide by the outcome of an ACAS ballot on union recognition, which will be held when the workers return on Thursday.
WOMEN in Fleet Street last Friday, outside the law courts, protesting at the treatment Irish women are receiving in Armagh Goal, in the North of Ireland.
Contact: been confined to their cells for 23 hours a day, denied washing and toilet facilities, physical harassment from male and female wardens.
aerospace industry
initiatives of shop cuts campaigns. made by 50 Speakers organised it through CAITS, the Centre FLASHBACK to a successful strike — on the Klein's picket line
VICTORY AT KLEINS
in
The outcome is not in doubt - it will be a resounding Yes to the union, the Tailors and arren worker.
Although recognition not immediate, the workers 32 women who are demanding political status have
and have suffered
The stewards' plan for socially useful production was based on bringing together these needs.
Many of the products proposed were for the health service; improved kidney machines and more advanced equipment for the disabled were examples.
These products and the new tactic of organising around alternative plans based on attracted a lot of interest among health workers and
This wider awareness was reflected in the points
with experience fighting hospitals in Brent and Hounslow talked
alternative generating enthusiasm for their campaigns.
The other link between workers' plans and the movement for better health was brought out by thi Politics for Health group and workers from Guy's
They argued against the take care of yourself'
Mobll feel they have won a victory, forcing an employer reminiscent of Victorian days to recognise their rights. which brought this about were picketing and boycotting PrOdUCES alt a day or acuon 14 May when Salford Trades Council demonstration past the facThe employers for the day and went to Blackpool! allow the women prisoners to live in humane condi-
Armagh goal. If you are interested in supporting the activities of the Women's Co-ordinating Committee on Armagh please ring Sophie on 01-485 4432.
tions. social need has
over financial
save damaging products. of how Deed
munity ОНЬ UUL group or people to More contact could have been made will tac surroulding clothing factories, but the union feels that organisation or me may oner morans workplaces will now be possible.
The clothing industry is notoriously bad shop industry. Now that Klein
an agreement, others had betwatch out.
The picketers called on the British Government to
A similar picket took place at the same time outside
maividualism or most preventive mecicine and em phasised instead the social causes of ill-health: high unemployment, the poor nutritional content of the
time working; increasingly stressful working condi-
came under criticism on these and other issues for bargaining
compensation for unhealthy work ne condon themselves; and for failing to challenge health.
Speakers from women's and tenants' group raised the problem of trade unions drawing up social plans without organised contact with com-
WOLLSIU Carl d help CAITS turn the papers written for the conferénce into a pamphlet.
Further details from: Jane Barker, CAITS, NE London Poly, Longbridge Rd, Dagenham, Essex.
Youths
оссиру
over
gay
sacking
THERE has been a sudden change at the Third Feathers youth club; just off the Earls Court Road in West London.
Members sell the food and coffee, cope with the phon information, and keep the premises clean.
There is a general air of
to this private club.
The explanation is
- on banners and posters announcing management committene dib is owned i owned bi wardread s brewery and un til recently the management committee were pleased witl
McMullen until they discovered he is gay. chaired ice champed s the sacked him spot. That was on 15 May, and McMullen was ordered to quit his tied flat by the end of the month.
When the staff and club enders port, the staff were sacked and management attempted to cose me cun, tenses to speak • to anyone involved, and so the occupation con
Support io: Third Feathers, Braham Gardens, London SWS.
Journalists counter
lockout with
a work-in
the world.
on weakening the unions.
their demands, together with a day's strike action.
work-in, to demand the right to work.
action.
straight occupation is on the cards, together with a right-towork demonstration at the end of this week Donations and support to:
Branch, NUJ, 314 Gray's Inn Rd, London WCI.
Pressing for
workers' say
By Colin Robinson THE right of working class le colerage in hostile the media WaS among the issues stressed at the first annual meeting of the Campaign for Press Freedom last Saturday. It was held in the wake of Fleet Street's rampage over the 14 May "Day of Shame'.
Some hundred delegates and individual supporters attended, fewer than
view of the support the campaign has gained within the
John Jennings, the cam-
120012 affiliated. including all the - print unions.
But the issues which the campaign is raising the opening up of the existing media and the need for alternauve pres. - the 0 yet been taken to the union rank and file and into the comin Many delegates nised that this was where the Campaigl White, from the East End News, emphasised the need to
rights and to defend their living standards with those working in the media Freeman NATSOPA official, reiterated his , union's willingness on behalf of those receiving rough treatment in the press.
pae or the case at torun-
workers' at Grunwick.' he said. 'We can do i1 again.'
The campaign's national communities
activists, and
proposals put forward undred copies of Socialist NC V The Tory Press and How to Fight It, were sold at the con-
The Tory Press & How to Fight It Now in its second edition,
Let pila re and e
that lie behind media's assault on the TUC's Day of Action, and how the working class can fight for its own voice to be heard Single copies 10p (plus рвр), bulk orders 8p a copy prepaid, sale or return) to:
Challenge 328 Upper St, Lor wust you SIR Alex Jarrett is boss of Reed International, the outfit which owns the Daily Mirror and IPC, which is about the biggest magazine company in
Jarrett also chairs the CBI's committee on the 'Balance of Power', a high-powered group of bosses who formulate strategy
This might well explain why 1,500 journalists at IPC have been locked out for the past month. They had put in a pay claim for 32 per cent, and worked a strict 40-hour week to back up
When the journalists rejected management's final' offer of 17 per cent, they were all dismissed. The NUJ chapel decided to
There has been good financial support, including £1,400 collected over night from journalists on the Daily Mirror. The Mirror Group Chapel has declared its full support for the magazine journalists, and will now consider taking solidarity
inis demand for tull back pay is a furiner ractor i lne negotiations, over which management is extremely obstinate. A
IPC dispute, c/o Magazine
Page 7 scan of this page
FREE ECONOMY STRONG STATE
HOMENEWS
that defends the liberties
overweening state.
WE are now in the middle of a deep and decisive towards authoritarian kind This drift into a 'Law and Order' society is no temporary affair; nor is it a mere backlash against the 'permissive excesses' 1960s.
It has its roots in the structural backwardness of the economy, a fact which has been with us since the closing decades of the last century, only temporarily hidden by a brief period of 'affluence' after the war.
Governments in trouble, it might be said, always have a strong temptation reach for regulation in times of social crisis. These are not times treedoms and liberties flourish.
But those in power today have the means of communication available to shape public opinion in such a way as to create a popular demand for more Law and Order'.
The popular press can give voice to the silent majority, representing it in its most virulently traditionalist
The Tory Party claims that it is the party
of the individual against the domination of the
Stuart Hall, a Professor of Sociology at the Open University, explains in his new pamphlet Drifting into a Law and
single memorandum disciplinary, Whitehall to Fleet Street. of society. support and powerless, who
of the
authoritarian development British populism.
amounts to "subversive'.
Federation feels policemen discipline and criticisms of
when human
La dangerous pass.
When Sir Metropolitan
title...usually
from this pamphlet. and authoritarian disguise, without a
passing. from
Thereby the drift to Law and Order secures a degree of popular
legitimacy among other alter-
Against this background, we must speak not only of moving towards an
state but also the of
To raise the question of rights and cIVil Ilberties in such an atmosphere
declaring oneself
When the Chairman of the Police
free to tell local Merseyside that the police are "mischievous or misguided', when a
Jimmy Kelly, has died while in their hands we have come to
Robert Mark, the last Commissioner accuses the National. Council of Civil Liberties in The Office of Constable of being a 'self-appointed political
group with • a misleading trying usurp
Order Society that the policies of the radical right in allowing 'social market values (to) rip', rather than 'rolling the state back', do exactly the opposite and encourage a strong authoritarian state.
Below we reprint an edited extract
function of the democratically appolitical change' authoritarian climate is confirmed.
The racical right hostile to the creeping collectivism of the welfare state. But lt nas hostility to the strong state. The new laissez faire doctrine in which market forces have free rein is, laissez faire, not at all inconsistent with a strong disciplinary state. 'social market doctrine' the state should intervene less in some areas, but more in others. Its preferred slogan is "Free Economy: Strong State'.
There is much talk within this doctrine of 'Liberty'. 'Liberty' is highly selective.
It is the "Liberty' of property and contract, of the free movement of capital, of unbridled market forces and of the competitive 'possessive individualism' to which this slogan refers.
It is not the 'liberty of those who have nothing to sell but only their labour to withdraw. mistake about it: under this regime the market is to be Free; the people are to be Disciplined.
WELFARE RIGHTS 'Supplementary benefit
known as in a less
It should be a safety net,
luck case around.' militantly Daily Telegraph
no
like the old OF LABOUR
'There is no such right known to law'
Rolls
But here too EQUALITY
BEFORE THE LAW of Sir Robert Mark, on the Shrewsbury pickets:
Make • no of all crimes, worse even
achieve an industrial or
should be what it used to be
euphemistic era: assistance.
strictly for emergencies, not a featherbed for every hard
WITHDRAWAL
Lord Denning Master of the
1973:
'They committed the worst
than murder, the attempt to
political objective by criminal violence.
Sir Robert Mark on George Ward, the employer at Grun-
'He courageously and successfully stood firm against politically motivated violence.
Sir Robert Mark on pressures on the Metropolitan Police in
'72,750 burglaries, 2,680 robberies and 450 demonstrations.'
'Drifting Into a Law and Order Society' by Stuart Hall. Available from The Other Bookshop, price 80 pence.
Page 8 scan of this page
LABOUR IN C
LABOUR PARTY
harsh monetarism of the Tories. at election time.
socialist society.
demonstrated this fact.
direct control of workers.
necessary.
society in Britain today.
ON SATURDAY 31 May the Labour Party has called a special conference to discuss what programme it should adopt as an alternative to the
With Labour's electoral defeat still fresh in party members' minds, the left wing of the party has the initiative. Despite Jim Callaghan's attempts to turn the conference into a rally, it seems likely that the National Executive's programme 'Peace, Jobs, Freedom' will go through without opposition. (There will be no chance for amendment either from the left or the right!)
The Labour Party, despite a decline in the active participation of rank and file workers, re mains the mass political party of the working class. No other party has the affiliations of millions of trade unionists, nor can any other party count on receiving mass working class support
Socialist Challenge has no confidence in the Labour Party. It is not a fighting political party that organises its members in struggle to take over the running of the country and build a
It is a party of reform, not revolution, whose overriding aim is to win concessions within the capitalist system rather than overthrowing that system. The last Labour government graphically
Socialist Challenge does not believe it is possi ble to reform the Labour Party. We believe that a new workers party must be built that is under the
But we will still support all those Labour Party members who are fighting to democratise the Labour Party today, all those who are trying to commit the Labour Party to building a socialist society, all those who are arguing that the party should break with electoralism and begin to use its influence to mobilise workers to actively op pose the Tory government today. The more attive and aware Labour Party members become the more ob vious it will be that a new party is
Here we print two articles. One from Tony Banks, a member of the Labour Co-ordinating Committee (a newly formed group in the Labour Party) and General Secretary of the Association of Broadcasting Staffs, who puts the case for a radical reform of the Labour Party. The second is from Alan Freeman who argues that while the new programme of the Labour Party is a step in the right direction it does not go far enough in
elaborating a strategy for building a socialist
Lobby the Labour Party one-day conference Joint action now to kick out the Tories! Fight the Tories' Employment Bill!
No cuts: support action against redundancies!
Assemble 31 May, 9am, Wembley Conference Halls
Wembley Park tube; Wembley Conference British Rail station Called by 31 May Lobby Colamittee Supporters include Battersea and Wandsworth Trades councils and Swindon and Hackney North Constituency Labour
·1980
mittees and wards.
The result has
and union activists.
local affairs as
nany trade union activists
Secondly, 'governmentalisation' trade unions which sucil d Involved
Many
is unnecessary.
time.
The effect on
will be aisastrous
voting for
Labour.
develop
ever to bring
within the working class.
has failed conspicuously.
The
become far too
orientated
representative
effective platform by
and as
BUILDING A
MASS LABOUR
PARTY
state of relations between
at the grass-roots level it is far from satisfac-
tor he problem is not the
number of union branches
number of delegates sent by
Active those branches to the party general management com-
been decline in the influence unions at local level and insufficient political dialogue their between rank-and-file party
Two reasons for this situation may be identified. First, the the case, lack of influence of the Labour Party over national and often
perceived b cessful the growth in the activists. of the has been pronounced feature of recent Labour goverments and, until Thatcher, under the Tories.
working accountable trade union leaders tatives, obviously feel that with this high level of national contact and influence the need to be deeply involved within the Labour Party
Activity in the affairs of local everyday parties is thus too often seen by workplace the unions at both national and local level as at best irrelevant and at worst a waste of valuable
the Labour Party should the drift continue
If Labour is to develop as a mass party it must be based on the unions, and yet an increasing percentage of trade unionists re
parties than In addition the party needs to massive parliamentary support if it is
about socialist change, which in turn requires a high level of political awareness
In this latter respect the party
Labour Party has parliamentary nationally and at local level is often little more than an election machine. Winning elections is vital in any
democracy clearly it is not an end in itself.
Parliament can be used as an socialists means of achieving reformist measures but there is
no way that capitalism will be legislated out of existence or not require the active involvement of
level
Our need to build a mass party, therefore, is not simply to ment. machine but to develop an extraparliamentary force which can
Labour will secure active working class support if it is seen to present a genuine alternative to capitalism and that those who join the party will be able to play
part making policy which in turn will be implemented by a Labour government.
It is because this has not been
certainly since 1945, that the campaign for greater accountability within the party has been so overwhelmingly suc-
among rank-and-file
Trade unions in particular should realise that they can pass all the resolutions they wish the Labour Party conference but until the party is solidly based on an active and politically aware
class, in control of public represensuch resolutions will remain pious hopes.
Workplace branches integral part of constituency organisations offer one way relating socialist solutions to the
problems of the
If the 1974 industrial strategy based on the National Enterprise Board and planning agreements had been given a better grounding within the trade union movement it would not have been possible for Harold Wilson to sabotage it so effectively.
Certainly, no major policies of the party should be simply tee.
CLAY CROSS UDC.
WILL NOT
RIFLEMENT THE ACT
handed down from the top, and least of all should they be made by ministers. or shadow spokes persons, sitting their backsides.
However, the formulation of Labour's industrial and economic for the next election will not wait upon the setting up of workplace branches.
The extension. of public ownership, renationalisation and industrial democracy now under consideration within the party must involve the workers in those industries most concerned.
But the party has no machinery for consulting directly with shop stewards and combine committees and while policy discussions at national union
alc vital they no substitute for shop-floor involve-
Despite all the obvious difficulties, the Labour Party must find a way round. The unions themselves could organising factory meetings and encouraging detailed discussions on Labour's emerging policies in their branches.
Political action groups like that set up by AUEW-TASS party members in the British Aircraft Corporation offer another • useful forum for consideration of industrial policies. , Rank-and-File
The Labour Co-ordinating
Committee intends to play its
nart bi orgalising meetings of
Labour Party rank-and-file trade
unionists SOCHIIN
policies for industry. The Labour
Party cannot simply rely on a three-week election campaign to
gain support for its policies, par-
ticularly from working
people most affected.
At that stage it is too late, and
the best we can hope to do is win
by default. This can never be a
substitute for the commitment to socialist policies that can be ex-
pected from trade unionists who are actively involved in their for-
mulation.
It must be Labour's aim to
achieve such involvement
because without it we seem likely to repeat past mistakes against a
background of declining support
among working people.
The above is an extract from
Tony Banks' article which appears in the May 1980 issue of
Labour Activist, the organ of he
Labour Co-ordinating Commit-
Kick
By Alan Freeman THE National Exer bang and ends with happen to a governi
They open with a st •Peace Jobs and Their draft isn't sho promises: planning; expansion; cracy; redistribution and even the 35-hour
There's just one Will a new Labour g carry out these promi is a familiar ring to heard them 1n Febr when the last Laboi ment came into office
What wasn't in the then was a set of fighti for carrying out these ! ises. This difference h made good. Repeat
The only defen against a repeat of closing appeal for a effective party organi for "socialist policies ported and underst electorate'.
Why won't
Capitalism is in crisis tionally as Even the mildest r meet violent resistan the multinationals, tional Monetary Fu civil service in White
The Wilson gove! ed in to this_resist
Went Wrong, the L own inquest on the g explains how big bus national banking, W the millionaire press thwart Labour's ma ensure the right wing
day
Only the organis of the unions could h this. But they were the Social Contract not any lack of vot tion, led to defeat.
How can we stop this situation? With
Page 9 scan of this page
ONFERENCE
he bosses out of the boardroom
etter
ау.
Committee's draft starts with a per. This is exactly what would cted on their policies. mobilise the working class in action against the capitalists. stead we are presented with half
and 1 OUC whose aim to duck capitalists' resistance.
Let us take the most burning problem - jobs. One and a half million people are on the dole.
Thas epr beatsy Aleededo ple
badly needed, resources. This waste happens because private owners will not and cannot invest in what society needs.
The NEC proposes planning
• negotiations with ariccics -Te ome crovesanc But the CBI, Tine IMF Whitehall made clear Wilson that investment is nonnegotiable. In Callaghan's term of office the CBl said it would break off all relations with the
uLLeSS agreements were dropped.
This is not an idle threat. It would be the first stage in a Chile-style destabilisation. Brigadier Kitson's army is now training in Ireland for the second
— courtesy of two Labour governments. Defeat
We have to defeat owners, not bargain with them.
NEC WalEs o 'statutory powers' to control industry. But who will get these powers? We need
La tutoy right for workers in every industry and city to take over production and investment in the public interest.
This means full workers' control 'participation' 'tripartite management' gets workers to share power with management and Whitehall. Otherwise workers' leaders will
simply be dragged into manageschemes workforce - like in Leyland and BSC. If any control is left in the owners' hands, they will use it to In- conspire against the government
and subvert planning.
the private owners from the board-
rooms — in the public as well as the private sector. policy should take on the multinationals, and any firm threatening redundancies, placing workers' control them public without compensation.
the civil part of the capitalists' state. It saoulagc den s maustry pro posals. rich, for the rich. It is accountable to no one. and to Workers should
LEUSL in Whitehall managers of British industry, but rely on their own strength. self-confidence of the planning Movenc can be
now. Labour Party leaders could stimulate that self confidence by giving a political focus to trade union resistance to the Employment Bill. attacks on living standards, and unemployment.
Colle workers to opening panies' books so that the case for nationalisation could be made to the the whole workforce.
leaders could go out and explain establish that the erosion
power democratic rights worker in Britain. workers redundancies technology Dy pollils Out tild! the work the working week shortened.
which damenta richt that evervone in g
modern society guaranteed. An can't guarantee such a basic right
jobs, is the
Neither
The aim must be to remove
COuILTC
socialist
banking and finance,
them under and taking ownership Cuts It is equally useless to rely on should service in Whitehall -
Whitehall is run by the
hospitals
they place no welfare state. or the
The labour proposal to encouragcu manufactures' course if industry
foreign private Whitehall encourage
campaign for the
'bankrupt'
They
Labour
of shopfloor •LACK .on of every They could tor. not ic accol Import from ailing capitalists. could be shared, and
The righito work is a fun-
should .be builders have economy thật At
isn't worth protecting. Action row, by those workers who have
key stopping employers discarding labour at
should British
workers allow themselves to br
cụt off from workers in othe
- often in the case of multinationals they are working for the same employer - in the fight to protect jobs. Thatcher was surprised by the militancy of the all-out strike on pay in the steel industry. Think how power-
left. ful a European-wide movement for the 35 hour week would be!
welfare receive the same treatment. It's all very well promising to 'increase public expenditure'
in 1984 but people are being kick-
ed out of old peoples' homes and
now. The Labour leaders will be judged on how
fight now to protect the
We cannot accept the NEC's plan out trade in . .ao serious. Of was planned, then trade could be planned via a complete state monopoly
trade. But under ownership and with capitalist hands, 'planned' import controls would be counterproductive.
would not solve the underlying problem of the bosses refusal to invest. Redundancy comes from the owners' need to rationalise production to boost
rofits — which they impose oi
controls would amount to a workers' subsidy to
We would buyhigher priced manufactures from peopie wnlo would use the pronts not to save jobs but to save their
- just as tne snipdone with fifty years of public subsidies.
same time protect-
Labour
The better
way.
ionism would atack the very people whose solidarity need against the multinationals workers abroad
Most timid of all is the Party's programme for 'peace' Seventeen years ago Labour Party concrence al least nad luc guts to come out for unilateral nuclear disarmament.
The NEC SLACHTIL. with America demanding that Britain participates as a European 'cop' in its war drive, refuses to mention this historic demand of the
glosses over Britain's membership of NATO and keeps absolutely silent on Britan's contribution international tension - its occupation of the North of Ireland - while it does remember to condemn the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan. Allies
The real reason is that the NEC refuses to break with Britain's imperialist allies. 'We will work together with all those who desire peace', it declares. But the American air forces' slogan in Vietnam was 'peace Qur business'. They called their genocide (pacification'.
The peoples of the ex-colonial world also want peact
peace from 300 years foreign domination, enslave ment and barbarous repression. There will be no peace until their just demands are met and until capitalism — the cause of war — is defeated.
Instead of 'negotiating' arms reduction. with our Američan and European 'allies', and 'seeking reforms' to the EEC, should fight now for immediate withdrawal from all capitalist military alliances, full support ror nauonal noclaton struggics. withdrawal from the EEC and international workers solidarity against imperialism.
This is the only road to peace, jobs, freedom, and socialism in our time.
Freedom...
and
capitalism
Labour's new And it is to that we must now turn.'
1) A commitment maintenance of full employment. 2) The
be introduced.
expansion
trois will be introduced.
етрюуесь, established ссопюту. compania. omership include
dustries that the Tories denationalise. study, longer holidays, ment
ing the quality of people's lives.
full control of powers
not the Labour withdrawal.
Information Act.
we for international manufacture and deployment of
into disarmament negotiating
the UN committee on disarmament.
'inside and outside' parliament.
Peace, Jobs,
"THE Tory strategy will fail because it is founded on false economic thinking. It is un. fair. It will not work.' This is the verdict of
programme 'Peace, Jobs, Freedom'. Its failure will impose heavy sacrifices on the British people: industrial stagnation, social contlict and a poorer and more unequal society. We are told by the government — and the media which backs them — that all this is necessary. That there is no alternative to tough Tory measures. There is the alternative is democratic socialism.
Labour promises a new economic strategy bas. ed on public ownership, expansion and democratic planning. The central points are the following:
to the restoration and spearheaded by increased public expenpitse economic expansion; 3) To deai with intiation, co-operation with the trade unions is proftered and price controls will
4) World trade will be stimulated by economic
the programme suggests, but Bri tain's manufacturing industries must be protected from foreign competition - import con-
5) Stricter controls will be introduced over international movements of capital along with plans țo protect sterling from a run on the pound. 6) Planning afreements between the govern-
and employees, should ith the major industries in the ear-marker tol public pharmaceuticals, medical equipment, microelectronics, construction and buliding materials, North Sea oil and all other in
7) The Tory Employment Bill will be repealer and 'industrial democracy will be promoted ir both the public and private sector of industry y A progressive move to the 35 hour week i romised in order to combat the eftects of ne technology and the economic crisis. Time off for
earlier voluntary retire and expanded training and retraining facilities are also suggested as ways of improv-
9) Fundamental reforms of the EEC are sought,
of law-making and _tax-gathering will be restored to the House of Commons. If satisfactory terms of membership are
Party will 'discuss'
10) Democracy will be strengthened in Britain by the abolition of the House of Lords, the conse quent increase in the powers of the House of Commons and the introduction of a Freedom ol
The Labour Party commits itself to campaign
bedte lindi opposing Cruise Missiles and the neutron bomb in Britain. To halt the 'arms race' the Labour Party wants to breathe new life
through a comprehensive test ban treaty. It gives full support to
The pro. gramme ends by urging Labour Party members to take the programme and campaign for it boldly
Socialist Challenge, 29 May 1980 Pase 9
Page 10 scan of this page
So what are we
Labour Party, and
Ireland
Party is going to hold a special meeting on
them have been following since 1968.
Labour's official spokesperson on Ireland,
that he will oppose any vote at the meeting. Northern Ireland Group' of MPs,
tee on Ireland at the special conference this weekend.
begin the process' of British withdrawal from Ireland.
Conference Centre. It will be held at lunchtime
Hill, London N16.
Needed... a
campaign to get
THE Labour Party has call-
ed a national demonstration
against the siting
Cruise missiles in Britain.
The protest will
place in London on 22 June.
The decision OI
Labour Party to organise
the demonstration will be
welcomed by all opponents
of US militarism.
Cruise missies gre
due to arrive in Britain in
two or three years time and
their use will be entirely con-
trolled by the US. In effect
we Cruise missile sites
turn Britain into a military
colony of Uncle Sam.
But the missiles are only
one tentacle on the octopus
No lessons learned
from Corrie
creed or sex.'
women's rights'. provision authorities.
changes.
London SE21,
LABOUR PARTY
conference, to meet on
FOR the first time in many years the Parliamentary Labour
Backbenchers will discuss the bi-partisan approach which, at the behest of the Labour leadership, the vast majority of
The meeting will discuss the Tory proposals on the North of Ireland which will be published in the next couple of weeks. But
Brynmor John, former secretary of state in charge of Army recruitment, has said
"the initistive for the discussion has come from the backbench
whose chairperson is Jock Stallard. It is hoped that Stallard will be one of the speakers at a fringe meeting organised by the recently formed Labour Commit-
At the end of March the founding conference of the LCI was attended by representatives of 43 CLPs. A model resolution was agreed which, it is hoped, will be passed by as many Labour Parties as possible so that a full debate will be had on Ireland at the annual Labour Party conference later this year. Among other things, the resolution calls for the next Labour government to immediately
The fringe meeting this Saturday will be held at the Greyhound public house, which is just round the corner from the Wembley
Further details of the LCI can be obtained from 5 Stamford
Britain out of NATO
that the name of NATO, and while it is imUS portant to cut off the tentacle, it is the NATO beast take itself which has to be opposed. the That is why Challenge, while for the demonstration, is also arguing that a necessary addition to the opposition to Cruise missiles should De withdrawal of Britain from NATO.
All readers of •Will Challenge and branches are urged to build for the anti-Cruise missiles demonstration on Saturday 22 June.
THE manifesto being discussed at the Labour Party special conference this weekend does not have much to say about women. But we are told: 'The labour movement stands for fairness, equality and justice — and against all forms of discrimination whether on the grounds of race, colour,
We are also told that the Tory government means 'attacks on
One essential issue of women's rights, that has been under severe attack since the election of the Tory government, is the right to abortion. But abortion is not mentioned in the draft manifesto.
Two weeks ago the National Abortion Campaign held its national conference and decided on three main priorities.
campaiglung priority the National Health abortion facilities was brought to the fore, with the aim of fighting NHS cuts and changing the NHS Act to make
of abortion facilities mandatory on local
It was also agreed to campaign for a commitment to positive legislation on abortion in the Labour Party manifesto, and to change the current position which makes abortion a 'non-party' issue allowing Labour MPs to vote how they like on abortion law
The draft manifesto shows that the Labour Party NEC has not absorbed the lessons of campaigns like NAC and the Labour Abortion Rights Campaign. This is an issue that real lefts in the Labour Party should show themselves willing to fight on.
Those Labour Party members who are willing to fight on abortion rights will be attending the LARC annual general meeting on 31 May. Open to all Labour Party members who support women's abortion rights, it will be held in Lambeth Town Hall, cost £1 plus pooled fare, a creche and refreshments will be available. Contact LARC at: Flat 1, 160 Rosendale Rd, West Dulwich,
Ireland.
Socialist building 22 June
the
By Dave Hudson Socialist
disappointed.
The discussion at the conference will be entirely around the draft NEC policy declaration which manifesto for a future Labour government. There are no proposals for action now to roll back the Tory offensive.
conference has blunted by the decision not to allow SICW amendments to the NEC policy document. This on the part of the 'lefts' will make the conference even less likely to rise above the level of "talking shop'.
Of performance Callaghan/Healey question of in the last Labour government
there is a pressing need for a full discussion of Labour's prohealth gramme. This is not in dispute But by concentrating solely on the question of the next Labour
So burning need for steps
burning political leadership in the struggles ment today.
Succeed
of Labour office in 1984 disaster for the working class.
If the Tories succeed with their plans to drive down living standards, to limit trade union and democratic rights, mass unemployment, dismantle the welfare state then
THE Labour Party has put itself at the head of demonstrations like this TUC-sponsored anti-cuts march last November. But why won't it lead an all-out fight against the Tory government? AFTER a year of Thatcher's scourging attacks on working class living standards, the special Labour Party conference this weekend will be greeted hopefully by many militants. But if they expect this conference to begin a real fightback against the Tory government then they are likely to be
economic defeat. seen as the 1984 would
arily win an
The possible impact of the these circumstances?
also been
resolutions for the coses. compromise
Tories.
after the of the leadership
of Commons.
manipulated
need for clear
against the Tory govern-
manipulate the
Waiting for the possibility
being returned to to court That's why
on democracy to create barons make a
waiting for?
ruling class
the solution the labour movement will have chose suffered a massive political and
arrive with a major shift in the balance of power in favour of the bosses Tories
and would Labour necess-
election under
The timid policy of waiting
"constitutional' propursued by the entire Labour left, is not an effective method of dealing with the
The Tories were not given a mandate to take-the British working class back Socialist
Sports the horrors of the 1930s. Recent by-elections have already which revealed a swing away from the Tories that could give Labour a 100-seat majority in the House
democratic
The ruling class has always
and subverted government through economic blackmail, both nationally and
view. on an international level. It exercised pressure and constraint Ground through the various institutions of the state and civil service, through the law courts and so Healey on. It uses the mass media to
'democratic processes' that the bosses' press policies itself loves to bleat on about. under
was such hypocrisy for the millionaires press to denounce 14 May as a 'day of shame', and an attack
press mockery of democracy virtually every time their personal notepads go on
rICKES A NICE CUT"
HESELTINE CHOICE L
And on a world scale we know that if manipulation and pressure fails to work, then the
is not afraid to abandon all idea of 'democratic processes' and turn to force -
that the bosses LICW in Chile not automatically confined to other parts of the world! fend
That's why it's not good enough to wait until 1984. The
have already • lost • the support of the mass of British working people, so we have to rely on our own strength and ty organisations to call a halt. The
Party particularly those leaders of the Labour Party who consider themselves 'lefts', has a big responsibility to lead and organise the fight against the Tories
Challenge the lobby of this weekend's special conference
calling joint Labour Party and trade union action against the Tories now. What is needed is an open and
conference to organise and plan this action, May. where all sections of the move. ment can put their point of
That the present Callaghan/ - conference
leadership will refuse to organise such a fight is ob. vious from their record. The
of Labour in office these leaders simply ing prepared the ground for Thatcher's austerity measures. Even out in opposition they have put up a miserable fight. They sup. ported some sections of Prior's obnoxious Employment Bill, such as state-financed compulsory ballots on strike action. Tories
These leaders have to be pushed aside and replaced with those more willing to lead a consistent fight in defence of working class interests.
That's why a central task today lies in drawing together a
left-wing in the labour movement that is prepared to take on that fight now - to de-
jobs, wages, and the welfare state against the Tory attacks. Links
Activists in the Labour Par-
need to build links with militants in the trade unions who are prepared to fight. Such an organised left wing would have to fight to replace the right-wing leadership at every level of the labour movement.
Any serious attempt to rebuild the Labour Party as a mass, fighting organisation of the working class has to start with the minority of militant workers in the trade unions who want to start fighting back now; like the 250,000 who marched against the Tories on 14
Moreover it's only through organising a broad-based left opposition in the unions that the Labour left can successfully combat the right-wing trade union block votes at annua
It's those Labour Party militants who are interested in taking their politics into the broad labour movement, bas.
their activity on that of trade unionists, who can break
of the vicious circle of Labour Party politics. They can use this conference as a springboard to extend the fight for a left wing that really is ready and willing to take on the
Page 11 scan of this page
AGENDA
This time
Marxism from the
horse's mouth
REPRODUCED here - an advertisement from week's Observer, asking executives and company directors to shell out a mere f185 for weekend course on Marxism.
creasing need bourgeoisie to keep up with the growth Marxism abour movement, it also casts an interesting light on the new and exciting ways in which Ken
is furthering democratic alliance.
But we agree with Ken Gill and Management in Action Ltd on the urgent need for people
better informed Marxism. That's why organising summer from 12-18 July this year.
It won't cost you the world - only £47.50 for the whole week, which includes all meals, accommodation, snacks We can't offer you Ken Gill and Harold Wilson, but in our view speakers like Mandel, Robin Blackburn, Margaret Coulson, John Ross and Charles Udry know more about it anyway.
Neither will our focus be 'how to respond to (combat)
Marxism', but how to put it into action. In addition you'll be able to enjoy the films, sports and social activities we've organised.
All you need to do is send £10 deposit to Dave Hudson, c/o PO Box 50, London N1 and pay the rest a couple of weeks before the school takes place.
IMG 1980
CADRE
SCHOOL
The school will take place between the 12th and 18th July 1980. A deposit of £10 will secure you a place, but the full £47-50 has to be paid in advance by the 31st of June, 1980. This will cover your accommodation, all meals, morning and afternoon coffee and the full programme of events. Detailed programme, reading lists and information venue will be received on registration.
MAIN SESSIONS
The main sessions are grouped into three parts: The Colonial Revolution, Workers States, and Europe. 1) Permanent Revolution and Strategy in the Third World.
Stalinist Afghanistan.
The Cuban Revolution.
Revolution in Nicaragua.
2) Political Revolution in the Workers States - Hungary and Czechoslovakia (Debate on Afghanistan)
3) The German Revolution 1918/19. Revolution and Spain, 1936.
Revolution in Portugal 1974/5. The nature of the Coming British Revolution. (debates on the Trades Unions in Late Capitalism, and State Capitalism)
A Weekend Seminar
last MARXISM AND MANAGEMENT 6 10 8 June 1980 The Larch Foundation Seminer Centre lane. End, High Wycembe HP 14 3 ММ Programme :
the British Labour
Movement P Policies Practice Hon.
broad Philosophy ordos. Cohen, ReAder
University College Karl Theory of History.'
How my bedred under about kobert wow. mal Laylor, oraboi we're
copulacul school
" Why I am a Marxist "
Ken Gill, Administrative and Super
etc.
should Manage ments rcallr G. Llywelyn Jones, Ernest tor Manage-
ment in Action Limited. noisite Hope .
Non-residential: €100.00 Enquiries Reservations to :
Management In Action Limited,
LONDON SW17 T RP (01-767 01-672 7166) which The net proceeds OTEERS
sewunar new me remarkaole work taperes currenD
Hockaday leagues Radcliffe Infirmary, Oxford. 3) 4)
regarding the Global Policy from Yalta to Counterrevolution
M.P.
and Marx's
Decade?
By Our Cricket Correspondent the nets.
bowling or batting time Derek to recall at any time.
will be gratefully acknowledged.
OPTIONAL COURSES
As well as the main lecture course there will be a series of optional three part courses.
Two introductory courses are planned:
An Introduction to Revolutionary politics.
Introduction to Marxist economics.
There will be two other subsidiary courses on:
Marxism and the Family.
Aspects of the history of the British Labour Movement.
I am interested in coming to the summer school. 1 am a member of the IMG/Revolution I am a sympathiser of IMG/Revolution from
Name/Address..
I enclose a cheque/PO for.... towards the £47.50 cost of the school.
Please indicate which options you wish to take.
Note: It is only possible to take two options. 1.......
2)....
It would be very helpful if comrades would state their first preference on the application form provided. It will not be possible for comrades to attend more than two optional courses.
The Match of the
TRIALS to select the Socialist Challenge cricket team for the first ever fixture against Socialist Worker in July (o Jay One of the IMG Summer School) began in earnes last week. several young - and not so young - hopefuls could be seen sweating it out at the first session in Highbury Fields. The venue is expected to move to the nets in Regents Park over the coming weeks
We have been deluged with offers to play for SC from supporters in different parts of the country. However the team can only be selected after extensive trials and com rades wishing to play will have to come and perform at
In response to other questions the answers are as
foll. Yes, there will be a captain - we refuse to tolerate
libertarian nonsense in this regard — and no, tendencies in our team will not be given a proportional length of
2. The captain, however, will be elected and subject
3. Naturally we will be fielding a mixed side.
4. All offers of cricket equipment (on loan, of course)
......(Town)
things leaflets, with
against OUT now! International, the IMG'S theoretical journal, price 85p.
This issue includes a reply to Beyond the Fragments by Valerie Coultas arguing that Leninism and feminism are not incompatible, and that socialists should challenge both male domination and bourgeois power.
Alan Freeman scrutinizes the Alternative Economic Strategy as popularised by the Labour lett highlighting the inadequate understanding this strategy has of workers, revealing the flaws in
€6,000
THAT'S WHAT
WE NEED
TO BEAT
INFLATION
TWO weeks ago the IMG launched an emergency fund drive. Inflation is hitting us hard.
Inflation under Thatcher is steel strike; and over the comnow well over 20 per cent and ing weeks we will be launching for a revolutionary organisation it is even worse. All the missile and British membership
which we need - of NATO. posters, pamphlets, our newspaper — have gone up more than 20 per cent over the last year. Rent, rates, electricity and gas charges have risen enormously. Meanwhile, our income has not gone up by anything like 20 per cent.
Despite our financial dif- 16 pages. Help us ensure that ficulties we have collaborated
Revolution in launching the South Wales Youth March
Unemployment; we have thrown resources into the
INTERNATIONAL
Theoretical Journal of the International Marxist Group
Drie
'h
Irag Wait
Vol 5 No2
Spring 1980
capitalist sabotage
Historic Compromise, Socialist CI
La campaign against the Cruise
We are doing everything we can to reduce our costs. But there is one thing which. we cannot afford to cut back on our political campaigns.
That's why we are making an urgent appeal to all our supporters and sympathisers.
Help us keep our paper at
we can sustain our political work. Make sure that Tory inflation doesn't cripple our ability to fight to bring the •Tories down! the AES approach to tackling capitalist monopolies and pointing out how the Labour lefts underestimate the effects of
Anna Libera, in a chapter from her book, The Bitter Fruits of the
, analyses the • failure of the Italian Communist Party to seize power at the end of the Second World War and Davic Tettadoro examines the Thatcher government and argues against some of the more alarmist analyses fashionable on the left.
1980 раве у
Page 12 scan of this page
Mass uprisings shake
INTERNATIONAL
SOUTH AFRICA
black woman is 'the worst of all possible worlds'.
national Labour Organisation.
even if none exists.
to sustain healthy life'.
El Savador
ed by goverment forces.
try's 'popular organisations; many were peasants.
killings.
United States
seventh such test this year.
Australia
enact horrific anti-abortion laws has failed.
tion.
The right-wing coalition government
гаре.
stringent anti-abortion laws in Australia.
Spain
under laws enacted by the Franco regime.
ficers. major.
Hong Kong
siderable interest.
MacLeannan
be normal for Hong Kong's fatives, but because he was gay.
chest.
inflicted or done by somebody else.
AROUND THE WORLD
TO BE black in South Africa is bad enough, but to be a
: This is the conclusion of a report on apartheid and sex discrimination issued in Switzerland last week by the Inter-
The author, Francis Blanchard, documented how unsupported women in black homelands are denied the use of land and are assumed to be supported by a male relative,
The report said that only if a woman 'can prove total destitution' will she be able to apply for discretionary pauper's rations', and even these are "medically insufficient
THE right-wing junta in El Salvador in Central America is continuing its campaign of terror. The acting Archbishop of San Salvador, Arturo River y Damas, revealed last week that in the first two weeks of May 215 people had been kill-
He said that all the victims were members of the coun-
The El Salvador Green Cross has also testified to the
THE US Government exploded another nuclear weapon in an underground test site in Nevada on 22 May. It was the
THE attempt of the regional government in Queensland to
Among the proposals in the Bill, which was defeated in Parliament last Thursday by 45 votes to 30, was a possible 14 year sentence of hard labour for carrying out an abor-
proposed that abortions would be limited to women facing death or suicide, or to women who had been victims of incest or
Despite the Bill's defeat Queensland still has the most
JUAN Luis Cebrian, editor of the Spanish daily paper El Pais, is now serving three months in prison for criticising Spain's judicial system in an editorial published two years
Cebrian was recently sentenced by a military tribunal
Two other editors are also facing prosecution for publishing reports of discontent among right-wing army of-
Such officers themselves are treated leniently. Two weeks ago a colonel and captain were found guilty of planning a military attack on the residence of Spain's prime minister and of attempting to overthrow the government.
The colonel was sentenced to seven months imprisonment, the captain to six. As they had already served that length of time in custody they were released immediately. The military establishment then promoted the captain to
BRITAIN's colony of Hong Kong is probably the most corrupt place in the world. Accordingly, the recent death there of Police Inspector John MacLeannan has aroused con-
was under investigation by his police bosses, not for being in the pay of gangsters, which would
'law and order' represen-
Then he was found shot dead with five bullets in his
The suspicion is that his own colleagues decided to punish MacLeannan. But at the inquest last week the police pathologist did his best to cover up the whole affair. He tola the court: I cannot say whether the wounds were self-
a country ripe for revolution. THE SOUTH Korean army should by now be the best educated in the world. It has spent more time universities than South Korea's students. Divide
Ever since the United States intervened in the peninsula to divide Korea southern part has been ruled by a succession of dictators of whom the first, Syngman Rhee, was also the most notorious.
Despite democracy the Rhee regime was based on open repression of the mass movement and relied on coercion. The South Korean army was backed by a number of Us troops, main aim was to keep a puppet regime in power
On 19 April 1960 there were massive demonstrations every South Korean city against the rigged election results which had, usual, Syngman Rhee to power. Since по opposition allowed it was the universities and the schools which became the focal point of resistance to the dictatorship.
In country democratic rights did not exist and demonstration. public meetings were allowed it
not surprising campuses were spearhead the political opposition. The scale of the resistance surprised the administration. Rhee was forced to resign. Liberties
In June a new constitution was adopted and free elections took place on 29 July 1960. A certain measure of democratic liberties now. prevailed, before could spread their roots military struck 1961 the generals led a coup d'état and in July of the same year a new strongman emerged: Park Chung Hee.
strations were easily suppressed and Park consolidated his rule by the use of brutal force. For 18 years Park presided over one of the most brutal and corrupt
South Korean
dictatorship
MASS uprisings in a number of cities have shaken the US backed dictatorship in South Korea. TARIQ ALI examines the background of
military world.
regime in the most of
fought on the Haven 1950, the At the same time of the country
investment, multinationals. cheap
pretence of
tion costs.
large whose cent and the peasants decreased 45 per workforce in
returned The student
parties were
precious ally, links began to be forged
where brought
that the
utilised to movement, the
vital.
plosion extend decades, but
post-Park regime to
government. but
organisations students are
the democracy. Kwangju,
On 16 May,
the best-known leader of democratic Dae Jung. demon- The
ago receiving support
dictatorships in the
The South Korean military
received massive economic and military aid fron. the United States and the West.
In return, South Korean troops
side the Americans in the Vietnam war.
South Korea was a haven for foreign
especially It provided a without trade-unionism. It offered the multinationals enormous profits and extremely low produc-
From 1960 to 1977 the proportion of the labour force in industry rose from 9 to 33 per
number from 66 to of the total
This sharp increase in in- dent struggle dustrialisation and the growth raising of the urban proletariat created a new situation in the cities. the
movement that it had and clandestine
The assassination of Park Chung Hee by his former secret police chief in October last year
the simmering crisis within the South Korean state has already to a head. Fearful that these divisions could spark off a mass
United States (which has 30,000 troops in the Doo Hwan. country) 'recommended' that a measure of democratic rule was
The roots of the present ex-
back three its immediate cause was the failure of the
accelerate a return to an elected civilian Options
The main demands of the
concerned with the city which is the focus of the upris- the ing, is also the home town of Japanese
the indicated his opposition, Kim the Chon main difference bet- Japanese ween the present struggle and the one launched two decades little
is that the students are 'displeasure'
• TOM the Korean working class. The stu-
tators. run is consistently Sung the slogan *For the Three Rights of Labour' and
student-worker-peasant alliance has now reached explosive proportions the Kwangju uprising indicates.
Kwangju uprising is remarkable on every count. It represents the most advanced struggle in terms of uniting the workers with the students; it
seen the masses arming themselves and combatting the riot police and troops coval to the new dictator. Chor
At its peak the number of people fighting the troops numbered 200,000
The Kwangju masses also seized the key points in the city and destroyed the radio station in an effective demonstration of their hatred for the heavilycensored pro-military media.
At the recent talks between chieftains of US and ching imperialism, Carter displeasure with distasteful methods of Doo Hwan. The itself. leader, Ohira, concurred. But both powers have
option except with the methods employed by Chon Doo Hwan. Their options are limited.
Carter knows full well what happens when support withdrawn from corrupt dic-
The lessons of the February insurrection Tehran are seared on his consciousness. The Japanese and American ruling classes can do little except support the main prop of the South Korean state: the army. The alternative, for them, is fraught with dangers Reality
It is true that by not backing the democratic movement they
the risk of a growing radicalisation. But there another factor of some assistance character regime in North Korea.
While the existence • of North Korea is regarded as a threat by the South Korean military, in reality the Kim Il
regime, grotesque parody of Stalinist Russia in the 30s, is not seen as a particularly attractive alternative by the South Korean masses. A Nortl Korean Castro would have been somewhat different, but the existing regime presents no threat at the level of the masses.
As we go to press the crack regiments of the South Korean army have encircled Kwangju. There can be little doubt that they are planning a bloodbath, but their victory in the medium term is by no means certain.
The combination of the fight for democratic demands and the continuing economic crisis reflected in an 18 per cent inflation rate, growing unemployment and stagnant production is likely to remain explosive
And if the struggle and the revolutionary forms that it has taken — in particular the raids on armouries, the capture of army vehicles and armoured personnel carriers, miners mar-
with explosives spreads to the country as a whole it could begin to see rifts and mutinies inside the army
The imperialists in Washington and Tokyo should listen carefully to the bells that are being tolled in Kwangju. For they toll not just for Chon Doo Hwan, but also for them
Page 13 scan of this page
DEFEND ARABS FROM
OPEN FORUM
By Firooz Shoostari IT SHOULD come as no surprise that Thatcher came to the aid of Khomeini in freeing the hostages guerillas in London's Iranian embassy. Historically Britain has been no friend to the Arab nationality in Iran.
Arabistan, named Khuzestan by the Shahs, is the main oil producing area of Iran and lies on the Iraqi border. The people of the area are Arab, and traditionally hostile to the Farsidominated central government of Iran.
In 1921 a British-backed coup by an Iranian military unit, led by Reza Khan, founder of the Pahlavi dynasty of Shahs, overthrew independent government in several provinces including the Arabistan.
The new Farsi-dominated central government did not allow the national demands of any of the minorities inside Iran.
Independent Arab government and culture were destoyed and the use of the Arab language was banned.
A number of uprisings around national demands were crushed by the central government with the aid of British and American imperialism. British imperialism in particular had a vested interest in shoring up the power of the central government to ensure a stable regime. Up to 1951 all of Iran's oil was under the control of the British-owned Anglo-Iranian Oil Company.
Peasant
Arabistan is under occupation, its streets are patrolled by Chieftain tanks. under occupation for 50 years. This occupation has been the precondition for the plundering of the oil wealth of Arabistan and the exploitation of Arab workers.
The development of the oil industry in the area not destroy character of its economy. In effect two modes of production existed and hence two forms of struggle developed.
The struggle today is a mixture of an anticapitalist struggle by the oil proletariat and a struggle for national independence against the central government whole.
The proletariat of Arabistan played a major
held by the Arab
expression of the It has been of the Mossadeq. super-
last year.
by the population as a
KURDESTAI
IRAC
LURESTAN
IUZESTAN
Guil
SALON ARABIA role in the struggle against the Shah and against.
Anglo-Iranian: Oil Company
nationalised by the Iranian government under
Since then the Arab developed to become the most conscious and experienced section of the proletariat in Iran. The strikes and militancy of oil-workers played a major role in finally overthrowing the Shah
Now these same workers are struggling for their democratic rights.
The rest of the population of Arabistan did not become as highly organised as the oil workers, due to the isolation of peasant lives and because of the high level of political repression. However during the upsurge of popular
a KHOMEINI
USSR
MAZANDARAN •TEHRAN KHORASAN
IRAN
Karen a a Shiraz
FARS
Bander Abba AHRAIN were demands.
An Arab oil-workers have
Four
Dantel 2
Mashed a
APGHANISTAR PAKISTAN DALUCHESAN
Chen Sahe GULF OF. OMAN
consciousness created by the revolution against the Shah they began to articulate their national
nationalist organisation founded called the Kanoon-e Farhangi-e Siyasie Khalgh-e Arab (political and cultural institution of the Arab people). From this starting point the whole nation was organised against imperialism and against the central government up to the overthrow of the Shah.
months after the Shah was overthrown Khomeini launched an attack on the Arab people. In an atmosphere of preparations for war in Kurdistan and growing attacks on the left, Arab nationalists in Arabistan organised a big demonstration demanding regional autonomy and cultural rights. Khomeini and General Medeni turned this demonstration into
THOUSANDS
The
fire on number throughout Many
warmly endorsed team Thatcher. rugby
the apartheid
rugby tournament.
discriminațion
for each
boycotting their
stead
history.
Following the
attempt to put
the Arab population.
New ways
industry.
Ahwaz, joined by non-Arab wor the Ministry of Culty picketed by large num The demonstration d Arab political prisoners a
turning his guns on them.
executed, without trial.
Support
was SAS to kill them.
done.
Revolutionary Guard,
Britain and Iran.
their demands democratic rights.
Black youth
aren't
playing games
of black South African youth are on the streets in protest against Saturday the racist education system operating in the country. centre.
South African Government have replied with bullets and tear-gas. At least two black youth have already ple were been killed after cops opened
demonstrators in a of different towns South Africa. other protesters have been seriously injured.
All this is taking place while the British Lions rugby team
South Africa radios. before the left Britain by Dennis And ironically it is which has once more highlighted the racist nature of
system. Last month Prime Minister Botha stepped in to ban two mixedrace teams playing in a school's
Behind the protests of the last month is the continuing
in the South African education system. The government spends only £30 a year on the education of each black youth, compared to £342
white Tens of thousands of blacks have been
schools, and have taken to the streets- in-
one of the bloouiest events in the region's
Hundreds of youth, and older people, were left lying in their own blood in the streets of Khoramshar - mown down by tanks.
demonstration fourteen members of the HKS (Iranian section of the Fourth International) were arrested and came very close to being executed. Their crime was to
forward sócialist demands bridging the gap between the two sections of
of fighting began to emerge among the Arab youth - roads, pipelines and railways were destroyed to disrupt the oi
• February a demonstration of 3000 people started out from the Arab area of
, chief town of the province, and it wat i They marched Awhich was beit on unemployed. inded the release rself-determinatie for the Arab nation withme free and democra tic Iran, as well as general demands around land reform and against unemployment.
Khomeini reacted to this united demonstra tion of Arabs and unemployed by once more
Despite the repression, the Arab people continue their fight, even though many are arrested every day, often imprisoned, and even
These are the reasons that the guerillas took the hostages in Khomeini's London embassy And why we have to oppose Thatcher in de facto lending support to Khomeini by using the
* Khomeini, Bani-Sadr and Thatcher are all reactionaries and we condemn what they have
* We condemn the SAS and Khomeini's
* We condemn the killing and persecution of the Arab nation both in Iran and in London.
* End the political relationship between
* For international solidarity with the anti-imperialist struggle of the Arab nation and with
for self-determination and Cape Town was the scene of the latest violence when on several thousands demonstrated in a shopping Police baton-charged the youth repeatedly.
A few days earlier a black youth was killed and three peo seriously hurt in Bloemfontein in the Orange Free State. Police shot at demonstrators who replied by overturning cars and buses and stoning military vehicles and government buildings. Orders for the police to open fire on the youth were heard on police
Police have also fired on demonstrators in Por Elizabeth and Batho. At the start of this month cops in Johannesburg invaded a black school in which pupils were demonstrating. Hundreds arrests have been made and one of the demands of the youth is for the release of all those being held.
Strikers have also been vic. tims of the latest waves of in South Africa.
Black textile workers on strike in Durban over a pay demand were subject to a tear-gas attack by the police on Saturday they were preparing march on their factories.
Socialist Challenge 29 May 1980 Page 13
Page 14 scan of this page
BIRMINGHAM: SC on sale at The Ramp, Fri 4.30-5.30, Sat 10-4. For more info phone Bookshop, 14 Sec ayalable from Fourth Idea
14 Southgate.
BRIGHTON: For info phone Nick, 605052. BRISTOL: SC on sale 11-1, 'Hole in Gr
11230-
INFIELD:
• Here Hil Britisl every Friday TUDO
Thursday and Mander c
Slander Centre, near SC Public at Coach and Horses
Evel Waysis • Now he intends from SC sellers
WHAT'S LEFT
Ret word or appear it. Weathe:
GLASGOW:
Michella
the pratees ton
is Against , 2/4 Cumberland on to 4pm.
Sun 1 June in
Tracion, sat 2i June. Note change of ction, Sun 1 June, 12noon ships aggregate, Sun 22 neeting, Fri 27 it Sat rate al
SCEVENTS LETTERS
The SWP
and 'unity
in action'
Nelsons
Because the the party
wonels yorke
T, ba os.
W 201.
OCCL.
LOMOND HANDLEY, Poole
Rewriting the
history of
1968
THE Communist Party didn't lead the general strike in France in May 1908 as Douglas Chalmers
in Nantes,
Trotskyists).
Workers.
workers. announced the
Communist
June), manualco CF more or les
Yes, unity of the left must be built. but not unity of inaction proposed by the PCF and French Socialists, but unity in struggle. TERRY SHEAN, Libertarian Communist Group, York Never
mind the
language...
is non-existent.
tion of 46,000.
League
Upholding the
cause of the
Palestinians
THERE are not many articles on the ralestine question appearing in Socialist Challenge, one does appear it untortunately
urns on to de ust noter bec
your Journal
high title, supported by
control i
same page 1113 at acarl
(12 May 1945). In we slate.
HE INSANT ONE
journal such wide designs.
: town the
Fined for resisting true left youth
police racism on 21 and 22 April сксерноп о1 29 May Swansea
Although
29 May North London
(Labour MP). 7.30pm 30 May Nottingham meatier, carry
2 June • you would Preston
Tariq Ali (IMG)
never-
KICK OUT THE RIGHT
4.30pm
London N4 GET DELEGATED!
IT TAKE HEAD FOR THE OPEN SO received London May
Huddersfield. police attacks
CP secretar
IN your 24 April issue you carried a report about the march to de.
Tena me racer may allas
We went to court and, with the police couldn't get anything to
, we have all been found
McClean the magistrate didn't called for only fine my family for fighting
Socialism in the
Eighties Tour
Speakers invited from Labour Party,
Communist Party,
and Socialist Workers Party
3 June
Phil Hearse (IMG)
4 June
Tariq Ali (IMG) Reg Race
Manor Gardens Library,
6 June Liverpool
Phil Hearse (IMG)
10 June
CHARTER
STOP THE ROT
Conference for Rank and File Engineering Workers Holborn Library Hall, London Saturday 28 June 11amCredentials from Jack _Robertson, 265a Seven Sisters Rd, Finsbury Park,
against police attacks but is forcing us to pay towards legal aid and costs. Why? Because we had organised a defence committee and the magistrate didn't like the publicity and support we had
Fi from the community:
"the defence committee is ask ing everyone who supports our fight against the police attack
• fight - to help us tor we don t pay them ne wists.
we don't pay them we will be sent to brison. Thank you fol your help and support.
Please send donations to: Earlington Family Defence Commuce cos kenon Road, London SE24 TREVOR EARLINGTON,
How we stopped the buses on 14
THE Day of Action on 14 May was a testing ground for the labour movement in
As in manv other areas. thi trades council — heavily influenced by the Communist Party -ordinating strike action. But the
of the trades coun cl, along will is presidcut, had a passive attitude towards campaigning. Ine! expected the fullume union oncas o denvertt goods for them
The International Marxis Group in Huddersfield had a different view of how to mobilise Two trades council delegates, one from the Transport Unpr 1 and the other from the Teachers' Union
Or a meeting with all shop stewards in Huddersfield to camManchester Stephen Marks (IMG)
Middlesbrough Valerie Coultas (IMG) Borough Hotel, Corporation Rd, 7.30pm
Phil Hearse (IMG)
East London Phil Hearse (IMG) Ernie
Equal
Opportunities and
Nalgo: A Day
Conference on
Problems and
Solutions
A conference on equal opportunities
I of Liverp verpoo NALGI
EOC in NAL Stella Smith, chairpersor
ter Blanks, legal advisor to Nationa
NALGO, workpla
14 May. CP leaders
• Five
necessary government
out, however.
action.
trounced the
turned up to Roberts (Labour MP).
Northwold Primar School, Northwold Rd London E5
11 June Leicester Stephen Marks (IMG) 16 June South London Valerie Coultas (IMG)
Brixton Town Hall, 7.30pm
•17 June Wolverhampton Steve Potter (IMG)
20 June Cardiff Tariq Ali (IMG)
Phone Socialist Challenge on 01-359 8180 with details of venue and other speakers if not included in this list
provesion. maternity, and paternity ation forms from Vicky 240 051-236 1945
Annual Conference of the Conference of Socialist tconomists 'CAPITALIST OFFENSIVE SOCIALIST RESISTANCE' 1!-13 July Manchester Uni Book: CSE, Dept. Sociology Warwick Uni. Coventry
Page 15 scan of this page
From Ronnie Scott's to Rockley Sands
TV NAC: 2 new video films
UNDER REVIEW
EARL (Fatha) Hines plays jazz to a hushed audience at Ronnie Scott's - a big band plays 3½ hours of continuous dance music at Rockly Sands Ballroom in Poole.
ANN SWART was at both events and describes her reaction to the two cultures linked by the same music.
Ronnie Scott's sophisticated jazz club in Soho in London's West End has an atmosphere supposedly conducive to listening to serious jazz. The club is só expensive that it can limit its clientele to those who can afford to consider themselves dedicated jazz lovers.
The • kudos the management nas set un around their exclusiveness means that the club attracts the best musicians. 'These artists can be guaranteed the prestige of one of the most classy jazz clubs in Britain.
When the legendary Earl Hines, in his seventies, sat down and played his piano the hush that descended was real. when it came was generated by honest appreciation and pleasure and was accompanied by mumblings of 'yeah' and 'Swing it, Fatha'.
The 'Fatha' handed on to the young, white and female co-workers in his band the skill, rhythm and craft learned in half a century of playing jazz. The evening showed that process in action: a worker handing on his trade. As Earl explained: 'I'm the Fatha and these, co-workers, are the greatest young people I can find.'
The result, although lacking the real emotion I associate with Kansas City in the '30s, was a polished, skilful performance too high in entertainment value to have the excitement of spontanicous icalive music. bul licarig lac old man is an experience I will remember with pleasure and will savour for years.
At Rockly Sands, a crushed caravan holiday camp on the mud flats of Poole harbour, the local branch of USDAW, the shopworkers' union, danced to two '30s-style big bands.
The ballroom is cheap out of season and over tive hundred Co-on members attended the event. Since they couldn't afford (and didn't want) the luxury of the canned atmosphere of Ronnie Scott's, alcohol was used effectively to The National Abortion Campaign, with the help of Liberation Films, has ventured into television. It has produced two video films, You've got to be careful which tackles the tricky area of sex, contraception, and abortion, and A day-care abortion which shows how such an abortion is performed at Professor Huntingford's clinic in Mile End, East London.
The first film is designed to provoke discussion among young people about the consequences of their sexual activity. Three women and one man talk frankly about the choices involved in parenthood.
These interviews in black and white are interspersed with a narrative, (in colour) about a young nurse, Karen, who discovers she is pregnant, cannot contact her boyfriend, Peter, and decides, with the help of her friend, to have an abortion.
Leonora Lloyd, mother of two, explains the dilemma of many women who find themselves pregnant: 'I do love babies but you cannot be selfish'. At 35, pregnant for the third time because the coil had let her down, was not the right time to have a child. 'Life's not very just, she plains. 'A lot of women get pregnant when they don't want to and a lot of women can't get pregnant when they do want to.'
Jan McKinley, at 16, also decided she didn't want to be pregnant. The interview with her drew out the naivey of young people engaged in their first sexual encounters:
. The applause
my induce an electricity which was tuned and ex-
tended by the bands.
To ensure the hall was full and the audience ready for a long evening before closing time, the ticket includes an hour of free wine from 7.30pm.
By the time the first band started 1, like the rest of the room, and ready for the ball. listen to the music but to be enveloped by it, to be energised by it, to physically respond to the saxophone solos.
Applause was not for big names but for the technical competence and craft of the musicians' ability to extend the audience and give us the chance to escape the dullness of our working lives.
Given this set-up, the music of Basie and
''You're on the pill aren't you?" he said to me. "Yes, of course", I replied not wanting him to think I was not in the know. After that I couldn't go back to him when I got pregnant and admit that I wasn't on the pill!'
The interviews were fascinating, but when shown in schools the story of Karen and Peter grabbed the limelight. Why does Peter not contact Karen? Why did Karen, who was a nurse, get pregnant when she should
Ellington was tunes.
was tanked ap, uninhibited We were there not to while the soloist was introduced.
leading to more and more deskilling.
tion of apprenticeships, • autumialull. have known about contraception? Is it possible to get pregnant at any age?
Was Karen right to reject adoption wich sac repuca to ner friend. Aler nine months I'd love it, I couldn't give it up!' This is what young people wanted to talk about.
The second film is aimed at medical students. Introducing the film, Professor Huntingford explains that most women know after about
discernible only by familiar
The audience response, though,
was tal had given big bands their popularity 40 years ago. The dance floor was jammed with bodies their craft. swaying to the music. There was no pause for the sexist jokes of Ronnie Scott; just time to grab the wine you had stored in your pint mug
The connections between the '30s and now were seen not only in the music but also in the perience. topics of drunken conversation, chiefly around the fear of unemployment for the shop worker, with the 1980s dimension of-new technology and
Older workers talked of continual deskilling of their trade through the decades, the eradica-
and the fears of esoteric. six or seven weeks if they want to continue with the pregnancy or have a terA day care abortion is a simple way of having an abortion. It can carried out close to the woman's home wnere a counsello. will listen to her reasons for wanting an abortion and enable her to make ner own choice.
Elaine is given a local anaesthetic and the abortion takes place using vacuum extraction. The counsellor
Two consecutive nights, two cultures, each alien to the other, linked by music generated from the ancient music of Africa; old workers recounting and handing on the knowledge of
Ronnie Scott's is a luxury I, for one, can live without, but however I felt about hearing 'Kan. sas City' played between 'Blue Suede Shoes' "and "Lets Twist Again', visiting our class al play was an exciting as well as a political ex-
Earl (Fatha) Hines would have been loved
appreciated . OS the audience in the ballroom but in a completely different way from the motionless (emotionless?) jazz lovers of Ronnie Scott's. The fact is that the Co-op workers could not afford him and jazz is too
stays with the woman at the head of the bed while Professor Huntingford chats to the woman to put her at ease: 'You know I've told you about the bee sting.. Well it comes four times ....and the fourth and last bee sting ...this is the last one of the dilators. Professol Huntingford remembers Elaine's name and tells her what he is doing throughout the short operation. Comments bv a mar in the audience that Professor Huntingford was too patronising are dismissed by most of the women although they do agree that perhaps the film could have focussed a little more on the counsellor's role Elaine herself gives the impression that she is glad that the Mile End Clinic exists: "I'd never have been able to cope with two children on my own ...I was thinking of leaving my rent for 3 weeks ...I didn't think it was going to be like it was.
Both films help to demystify sex, contraception, and abortion and in doing so show how contro over ter tility allows women to lead freer and happier lives They both cost f22 to buy or £6 to hire. Decide which format you want, VHS or three-quarter inch U-matic and ring Liberation Films on 01-450 7855. Teachers notes are supplied and strips • available for young people for an additional 50p.
The Under Review page would like volunteers to review plays in London. If you are interested ring Socialist Challenge or 01-359 8180.
ат 1980 1
Page 16 scan of this page
Socialist Challenge WHATEVER THE VERDICT, THE SPG IS GUILTY-
The verdict was predictable.
police involvement in the death.
their own way, shown their guilt.
At the weekend Inspector Alan Murray, who was in charge of the SPG unit suspected of inflicting the fatal blow that killed Blair, announced his decision to quit the police. I've been worried about the behaviour of the senior officers investigating the incident', said Murray.
This resignation comes on top of the transfers and suspensions of other members of the SPG who appeared as witnesses during the inquest.
*PC Raymond White has been, suspended since last June, just a couple of weeks after Blair's death. He was the driver of one of the two SPG vans whose occupants led the attack on Anti-Nazi League demonstrators.
court White evidence of other SPG members who said they were in his van when Blair was killed.
*PC Anthony Richardson has been transferred out Richardson admitted at the inquest that chased demonstrators into a cul-de-sac at the entrance of which Blair was struck
*PC Michael Freestone has also been transferred from the SPG. Freestone appeared in court he was one of a number of police witnesses who claimed loss of memory. He said he didn't remember who was in the police with him, describe the demonstrator he had chased when couldn't remember who was in the van when he returned to it.
*PC James Scottow has now left the SPG. At Blair Peach's inquest he agreed that he swung his truncheon at anti-Nazi demonstrators used 'strong language'. He was the only SPG member who admitted to having seen Scottow said he saw Peach sitting on the pavement and told him to get ou your bike.
Neither Scottow nor any other witness has offered one evidence that Blair Peach was involved in any riot situation.
Yet despite this, the West London
coroner, Dr John Burton,
presiding over the inquest raised this
possibility in his summing-up. He told
the jury that they had to consider
'whether the police used reasonable
THE coroner's jury at the Blair Peach inquest has decided that the anti-Nazi, who was killed a year ago when demonstrating against the fascist National Front, died by 'misadventure'.
police's own investigation into Blair's killing, and it was directed by a coroner who stated repeatedly his opposition to any verdict hinting at
And yet, even before the verdict was announced, the Special Patrol Group involved in the incident which led to Blair being killed had, in
verdicts
'unlawful
heard allegation.
contradicted the
Friday.
of the SPG. •HOW SPG Raymond Michael number of kicharason ana
Killing Blair.
When
the
The couldn't
. the van and had
and spoken to Peach.
our
shred. of
who is
The jury was denied access to the force and 'whether Mr Peach was one of the rioters.
Burton also told the jury that they could return any one of three possible
death by misadventure, unlawful killing or an open verdict.
He has made it clear that even if
killing' is returned this would not necessarily mean that the SPG were the killers.
He has raised the possibility that Blair was killed by a demonstrator, altnougn again no evidence las been
in court to substantiate this
On the other hand a number of witnesses have testified that they saw Blair being attacked by the police.
*Socialist Challenge was visited by two officers from Scotland Yard last
They wanted to know what evidence we had for stating that six
officers Alan Murray, White, James Scottow; Freestone, Anthony Anthony Lake were suspected by the police's own investigation department, CIB 2, of
Members of Socialist Challenge staff told the cops that, as the issue of our paper dated 20 March had stated,
information we published based on a story in the Sunday Times.
When we asked the cops whether they had visited the Sunday they said no. This suggests that the visit paid to us was a deliberate act of
WHO KILLED J.R.?
WE WOULD HAVE!
IN the week when J.R. of Dallas -the capitalist everyone loved to hate — finally got his just deserts, we hope
supporters will be similarly spired to help us bring down the curtain on the Tories.
A good week has just brought in £157 but we need more than that every week till the end of June to meet our target of £2,500. Just think of every pound you send to us representing another bullet in J.R. and all the other filthy capitalists like him!
. Was
Times,
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