Socialist Challenge No. 164, 18 September 1980
The scan: sc-n164-sep-18-1980.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 Chall MARCH AGAINST THE MISSILES.
MISSILE MADNESS is sweeping across the West. Britain is no exception.
It is MADNESS to spend f5,200m on Trident, the replacement for Polaris, when school meals, hospitals and social services are all being cut.
It is MADNESS to station Cruise missiles around the countryside, turining Britain into a prime nulear target in the event of war.
In is MADNESS to support the war hysteria whipped up by Carter, who simply wants to win world opinion behind new American imperialist adventures like that in Vietnam.
It is MADNESS to suggest that nuclear war might somehow be in the interests of working people in this country. In a nuclear war we would all be losers - only the politicians, generals and capitalists would be safe in their specially built bunkers.
We have no interest in encouraging the arrival of doomsday. Quite the reverse. But the only way to stop it is to call a halt to Thatcher's war drive.
The first step is a massive campaign to stop the arrival of Cruise missiles - planned for 1983 - and to stop the spending on Trident.
But stopping the missiles in the face of Thatcher's war hysteria needs the united strength of the entire labour movement. It definitely doesn't need 'leaders' like Shirley Williams, William Rodgers and David Owen who back arms drive.
And that also applies to their supporters in the trade union movement like Duffy and Boyd, leaders of the Engineering Union.
That's why anti-missile campaigners in the North-west have called a demonstration to the Labour Party conference on Sunday 28 September. Backed by Arthur Scargill, Tony Benn, Bob Wright, Labour Action for Peace, national CND and many other individuals and labour movement organisations.
The march can really put pressure on the Labour Party to come out against the missiles, which in turn would be a big step towards a movement that can really stop Cruise.
Labour must support a labour movement campaign against the missiles; it must support trade union action to boycott work on missile sites; and the next Labour government must be committed to cancelling the missiles contracts.
Come to Blackpool. Lobby the NEC. Lobby the AUEW delegation.
LABOUR
MARGH AGAINST
Sunday 28th Septer Assemble 10-45
(nr. Butlins H
CONFERENCE
MISSILES
ber am. War Memorial Blackpool
For details of coaches see centre pages Victoria Park, Newbury Sunday 21 September noon CRUISE GREENHAM COMMON DEMO AGAINST No.164 18 September 1980 20p
Page 2 scan of this page
HOME NEWS
AT THE TORIES'•
ference Thatcher will say
government Will remain
course. For millions of workers that
course means huge spending on arms,
unemployment,
poorer hospitals and
attacas on laac unhon rignts.
Even among the most militant sec-
tions of the working class, the ques-
tion will be raised: Have the Tories
succeeded in defeating the strength of
the working class?
At the same time, a mushrooming
of labour movement conferences and
demonstrations, meetings and lobbies
follow the TUC
conciercess offering the means to
discuss and act on the present Tory
attacks. The starting point for most
of these events is the growing appeal
of the policies and personalities of the
left wing of the
Labour
those fighting in the trade unions.
So what are the prospects for joint
action between the Labour Party and
the trade unions against the Tories?
Unemployment
Unemployment weapon of the Tories Drilish working class. million unemployed and many more on short-time working, with no clear lead from the TUC,
In the car industry, expected wage settlements 18 months in Talbot and 10 per cent
per claim) in the car components sector of Lucas, show the potential impact of ine recession on wages.
The Tory cuts in the public sector, Prior's Employment Act, and the attacks on women's rights are being pushed forward against background of the recession, despite the damage manufacturing base, is being allowed virtually a full head by the Tories.
But the defensive mood in the workers movement is ov no means the whole story. On the contrary, the steel strike (despile the threat massive closures following those al warrington and Consett); the coming dockers' strike and the fightback at the Brixton picket in defence of the
victimised. civil militants, show that the fighting spirit at the base of the trade unions is still there.
In other words, it is not defeat at the hands of the Tories appalling treachery of the leadership remains obstacle to a successful fightback.
Polarise
The Tories' attacks on the working class have upped the stakes in the class. struggle. Genesel acuons with naked praise of capitalist system and profits. They show cullellol
WHAT NEXT?
A guide for militants
through the Autumn. By Paul Smith
UCLODeT con-
that the firmly deal with the capitalism. inflation, schools and of import contros. auotas
Soviet Union.
British society.
- deep
and Labour Party AES
Party for
but create a means by dominate. In bourgeois power.
the main against the
With over two else.
masked a weaker the trade union
Coll
original cel witt lne poncies Labour government
Tom Jackson's successful
Transport and the
Britain's service union
but the union the main to large parts of
the Labour lefts.
However,
their the broad enough the need for
for Callaghan and Healey!
COLD
STELL
traditional tinkering with the system.
They reject any old-style two party
informal agreements about how to
problems of British
The Tories stand against systems
sidies and for massive defence spen-
ding and unwavering hostility to the
they try to polarise
Consequently, any mass anti-Tory
movement is bound to reflect a very
disillusionment with the
capitalist system itself. A successful
struggle against this government is a
much greater risk for the ruling class
than the fall of Heath in 1974.
The fall of Thatcher would not just create a crisis in the Tory Party, not just push to the left all of the organisations of the working class,
crisis affecting all the which the ruling •class short,
m tic lace or tne massively mounting Tory attacks, the TUC Congress was strong on rhetoric but very little
Even Scargill's impassioned opposition to the Employment
position than that adopted by the TUC against Heath's Industrial Relations Act a decade ago. Nothing significant was said about a TUC-coordinated fightback now.
What did emerge was greater con-
For a future committed to a pay deal in the terms of Bill Sirs' and
motion.
One apparent move to the left was the
General Workers Organise in the unions to defeat Labour's right wing. Union-led fight to get a commitment
the 'Alternative Economic Strategy. Along with party democracy this is the main plank of
the support, • In large hour part, offered by Jim Callaghan to this strategy demonstrated the woolly and ambiguous character of the AES - a
umbrella to shelter both the left in the Labour Party and
Faced with a problem in their ef-
forts to ally themselves with a section
of the trade union leadership
leadership for the most party unified
around a narrow conservative consen-
sus with all hopes pinned on a future
Labour government - the Bennites
are having to step up their appeals for
support to the trade unions.
Organise
After the battle on democracy and
disarmament at this year's Labour
Party conference, the whole left will
be forced to define themselves more
clearly. Already there is a shift
what they say.
Benn has made an appeal to trade
unions on the basis of rejecting any
incomes policy. Opposition to Cruise and Trident; a growing commitment
unilateral disarmament; controls and massive public expen-
diture; total rejection of Prior's law;
opposition to the Common Market
these policies are becoming the backbone of the left's platform
Whatever the result of the Labour Party conference, the lefts will continue to organise nationalv in Labour Party. But in addition the lefts need to organise in the unions if they are to start to overcome the opposition of trade union leaders lined
with Callaghan and Already, around the democracy battle some of the lefts have started to draw that conclusion.
They find a ready audience among those in the unlons. Tor whom the policies of the left have an obvious appeal in the fight against the Tories.
In this regard we must mount the most vigorous opposition to policies such as import controls, which feed off racism, attack workers abroad, and are based on a utopian economic strategy. But the extension and application of certain left policies, such as opposition to Cruise, for the 35
week, against any incomes policy, withdrawal from the EEC, for an affirmative action campaign, can encourage important trade union advances. A good example is the policies on unemployment to be discussed at ine conterence
STOP
THATCHER
in
import
At the conference the overwhelming need will be to turn speculation about the policies of a possible future Labour government into a line for ac tion against the Tories now Healey. The point will be made that pursu-
Wing the fightback now will do more than anything batle against the right wing inside the Labour Party and boost the challenge of the lett. Cruise At the moment, the biggest single issue that points the way in which the
EJOBS-FREEDOM
labour unions is the campaign against the Cruise and Trident missiles.
September, thousands of anti-missile demonstrators will march to lobby the Labour Party conference.
This action, initiated by the ManChester Against has won the support of big battalions in the trade unions. stand of Duffy, and the campaign in Manchester, has forced Bob Wright
else to promote the
tion campaign.
chester
within the
Labour Party,
the missiles,
Following demonstration, ordinating
Party organisation'
should organise in the
On 28 policy
Missiles campaign, LCC
The cold-war Equally
missed
conference
Trade
the first organisation
classes
emerging. on the
to take up the question of nuclear weapons as a part of his AUEW elec-
Accrington and North ManDistrict Committees of the
AUEW are backing the demonstra
and already there are moves AUÉW Sc up an
'Engineers Against the Missiles
The fullest possible national sup The Challenge tone leone l the
challenge of the and drive the issue even deeper in the unions. The lobby of the Labour Party and the 26 Oc. tober CND demonstration, which will attract tens of thousands opposed to
• the priorities this autumn.
the September the Labour CoCommittee conference Leeds on i November has set itself the task of discussing a role for a Labour
and file trade unior
Likewise the proposals to be put to the 'Local Government in Crisis' conferencé in Lambeth (unfortunate ly on the same day as the LCC con ference) is another example of how
against the cuts can be developed into a line for trade union action on a broad united basis.
the opportunity for fighting for action on these policies at the joint Liaison Committee for the Defence of the Trade Unions/Right to Work Lobby of the Tory Party conference on 10 October must not be
The LCC can call for a united to mass action against the Tories. The
should appeal to the Liaison Committee for the Defence of
Unions and Defend • Our Unions to join with the LCC in taking
. steps towards such through a joint campaign against unemployment and in defence of the trade unions:
So while the initiative is presently with the Tories the general tendency towards confrontation between the
Inside _both Labour Party and the trade unions a firmer, if as yet small, opposition is
‚To encourage their unity basis of a fight now, is/ the possibility and necessity this autumn!
Page 3 scan of this page
Bureaucracy sits Eon a time-bomb
KOR leader assesses strikes
POLAND
Baltic Sea
IN REVOLT
STEVE GRIFFITHS, AUEW convenor at Rover Solihull, and RICHARD ROZANSKI, editor of the socialist youth paper, :Revolution, have returnea from a two-week visit te Poland. Below they report on what is going. on and why British socialists must remain vigilant in their solidarity with the Polish workers.
RELIEF. that was the over. whelming feeling when it was. announced InaT the Polish government had reached agreement with the workers Gdansk and Szczecin.
•ute bureaucrats relieved because the agreement gave them a breathing space after the battering they gone through. The new party secretary, Stanislaw Kania, has already started on the task of trying to shore uo the Communist Party apparatus, with visits to Gdansk and Katowice.
The Sanke leaders relieved because they had time to take stock and consolidate their gains, establishing a firm base for the new unions.
Finally, almost everybody except the top officials were relieved because the threat of Soviet Union was lifted armed intervention only temporarily.
Clear
But relief in no way means •relaxation. message clear. Only by using their collective strength can the workers. safeguard their rights.
The trust they put in Gierek after the 1970 strike wave will not be extended to Kania. Strikes were still going on many areas when we left.. most cases the aim was to ensure that the Gdansk agreement would be applied in their area.
No-one is foolish enough to believe that the government will willingly allow free unions to be set up throughout the country. The workers know that they have to impose the LCHS agreement, because the bureaucracy will use every opportunity to undermine it.
At one of Poland's biggest aircraft factories, southern city of Mielec, employees were approached individualv to sign a statement saying that they were quite happy with the official union. 18,000 workers immediately struck, forcing the local party boss to back down.
Flooding
Workers literally flooding into the new unions wherever SLuCLuICS Where they don't, moves are underway to create them.
We visited the free. union headquarters in Gdansk a week atter the signing of the agreement. They have taken over an old hotel in the area of Wrzeszcz, just a short drive from the Lenin shipyard:
As soon as we explained that the purpose of our visit wen to lake te a backe British labour movement we were given a tremendous reception. Solidarity from workers in the West, they explained, was absolutely crucial to their future success.
One of the workers rushed just
off and brought • postcard of the Pope. 'I only have two, but you can have one as a souvenir of your visit.' We were put up free of charge ir one of the rooms of the hotel!
Deceptive
Eventually we troduced to one of the most prominent strike leaders, Anna Walentynowicz, who gave us a
in rundown on the situation.
Next day we were able to were speak to Joanna Duda Gwiaz-
another strike Here, as in Warsaw, it was obhad vious how deceptive the ap-
parent lull really is. The strike leaders are simply inundated with inquiries.
Democracy
were
We asked her what struc-. tures they are planning to enSUfIe the ¿icalcs democracy inside
the - if
In
Worker democracy is exhausting! unions. "This hasn't yet been discussed or decided upon', she trade told us. 'At the moment people
like myself and Lech have taken a month's unpaid holiday so that we can work full-time for the new 'union. However once it is established this situation will change. •My own opinion is that the the new unions should have no full-
The
JANLYTINSKI, an activist in the Social Self-Defence Committee (KOR) and its paper Robotnik, acted as an advisor to the exist. strike committee
Wroclaw. He was interviewed about the significance of trade the strike wave and the role
played by the KOR.
What is your assessment of the strike?
There were several phases to the strike, starting Then the demands were purely and it is connic, teresting to observe tne change to polițical demands In every strike economic demands masked You can observe iwo types : 675 Comanda ses and secondly, for.
Eyewitness - Poland
back were inleaders.
time officials. Every one of us hopefully go work in their factory.
"The union
then be elected by the mass of workers but they should continue to work in the factory.
DOSSIDIC This will ensure that there is no the free isolation of the leadership from
the workers.'
Because the national focus of the strug-
Walesa from workers id ofter calls steadily
asking how about setting up the new union properly in their own factories.
The differences Warsaw and Gdansk are immediately evident. Not merely do they have the use of much better distribution of food. The workers were saying: You give us these things and there will be peace, but since you can't meet these demands there will have Walbrzeg to be political changes.
in Therefore their became overtly they began to call for free trade
unions came out of the election of workers' delegations to meet the management and the election of strike which signified a great change in July. in both a political and organisa-
tional sense. very in- The first great change came
in Lublin. They voiced explicit for æn vc æv vv d
political Lublin. It was the first time that
the strike committees refused hirstiy foeo dissolve.
Lech Walesa greeted by supporters.
back and
officials will unions already many local plants.
Prestige
the immense Gdansk
presidium CLCC
Warsaw Gdansk became
stream areas they should go
between the workers.
try. demands The strike political and started in
This idea of free trade and very
Listed. that they _cunniliccs.
ment.
the strikers develop?
• strikers to demands. In
eted fo contibte orgatising more mature right from tthe
larger offices in Gdansk, but the whole set-up seems much were there. more stable with the free trade
established in LOUS
This isn't surprising Bosi vee preslige the Soviet over the past month. The founding commit- This
(MKS) reigns dockworkers' supreme on the Baltic coast.
tne militants were still operating out of a tiny flat and were having trouble booking a hall for a local conference of the free trade union.
organisers, Jan Applause for strike leaders
start Then the Gdansk workers went on strike with demands which soon gained widespread support throughout the coun- nik's
20,000. in Gdansk defence of Anna Walentynowicz. This was a new
important develop- members ment: it showed that a new
Calil. workers movement already ex-
The workers were saying our release. wanted a complete We separation from the manage-
How did the relationship between KOR/Robotnik and the
KOR and Robotnik helped the strategy
articulate their Gdansk the workers" demands were much,
Regulski, was arrested while we
The government's aim is to isolate the different regions and
DHCVClI free trade union from emerging as a nationally organised force. It also hopes to take advantage of the move by some unions to disaffiate wholesale trom the cen trai state structure.
what the and seafarers' unions have decided to do in that • order to link up with the self-governing independent unions. But other moves in this direction are verv suspicious - tor instance, an announcement by the Centra Counci of Umon
trend because Robotnik was much more available than for example in Silesia.
Before the strike Robot-
circulation was about During strike went up to about 50,000 and it still wasn't enough.
arrests of KOR were quite signifiWe were freed because the Gdansk workers demanded
been arrested because the autorities feared we might become too strong. For the first time they realised that we had a crucial impact on the course of the strike.
With our release the whole
of the bureaucracy Focus came crashing down. They hạd hoped to clinch a deal with the workers, and would then have ri roger claimed that they could reach
'ROUND ONE
TO THE WORKERS Socialist Challenge forums on Poland featuring Steve Griffiths and Richard Rozanski (just returned from Poland) and Olive MacDonald (editor of Labour Focus on Eastern Europe).
Thur 18 Sept SWINDON. With Richard Rozanski. Phone Chris on 46498 for details.
OXFORD. • With Steve Griffiths au overreavomrion 47628 for details.
Fri 19 Sept BASN wa kachere l Rozanski. Dalston Library, Dalston Lane, E8, 7.30pm.
Weds 24 Sept
MANCHESTER. With Steve Griffiths and Oliver MacDonald. Star and Garter, Fairfield St, Piccadilly, 7.30pm.
Sun 28 Sept
HOUNSLOW. With Oliver
MacDonald. Phone 570 4700 for detals
Weds 1 Oct BIRMINGHAM. With Richard Rozanski and Oliver MacDonald. Phone 643 0669 for details. Fri 3 Oct
BRISTOL , With Oliver
MacDonald. Phone Harriet or 3550/ I0r aetalls LIVERPOOL. With Steve
Griffiths. Phone Mark on 728 9982 for details.
Tues 7 Oct
BRENT. Phone Tessa on 359
8371 for details.
Weds 8 Oct HEMEL. With Oliver
MacDonald. Phone Mick on 4US I Ior Octas
Weds 15 Oc
COVENTRY. With Steve
Griffiths. Phone 461138. for details.
two professional unions had disaffiliated to set up 'selfmanaged' ones. Control
Nevertheless, the general
is clear: big move toward. • the independent
As Lech Walesa has put it, this is the second phase of the movement. The third phase, he explained, concerned 'one of the things we want the most: to take control of the land and the factories where we work'
But to achieve this means destroying bureaucratic rule. It means challenging 'the leading role of the Communist Party. It means engaging in political struggle
• Forums for political discussion need to be opened up in order elaborate the best demands for winning the majority of the population behind the new umons. This is the challenge which now opens up. agreement with the workers without SHlcuC CIC from houdielllakels
Just holding us for one day after a signed agreement would have been a significant propaganda victory. But though
autorites and 'experts' giving advice to the Gdansk strikers urged them not to press
release KOR members, the workers knew what it meant to be arrested.
They understood our role in the strike and so they pushed forward the demand.
*This is part of a longer intervien carried out by Labour
•on Eastern Europe which will be published in full in the nev issue of the journal.
Page 4 scan of this page
Setting up the new union in Warsaw
By Steve Griffiths and Richard Rozanski
'HOW do we form a free trade union? Should party members be allowed in? Should they be allowed to hold office? Should we start paying dues straight away?'
These were the questions being fired at Jan Regulski by
group of workers after another in a small flat in Warsaw last week.
Regulski comes from FSO Zeran, a huge car plant on the east bank of the Together with the strike leaders at the Ursus tractor plant, the Zeran workers decided to form
organising committee for the trade unions Masowsze province, which includes the capital.
But although press censorship is supposed to have been relaxed, not one line has appeared in the official press telling workers about Masowsze committee. Even so, workers' delegations from all over the capital are seeking out the committee.
recognition
The regime is also denying the committee an office, work is being conducted from one member's flat. During the afternoon we spent aciegatons or tram workers from plants, museum workers and others kept arriving to discuss with members of the committee.
Some report management is hostile to moves to rommo new anons. Others report that management says they should go ahead, nothing Masowsze committee.
In the factories participated in the strike move-. ment, the workers' tion is stronger, the workers are more set-contident and perienced. Workers from other plants are starting from scratch ana want to know how to
strike
The delegations raise every sort of problem with the committee. How do they go about setting up a branch? Regulski patiently explains:
"Take this form, get it signed by workers who want to join, inform the management and the local prefect and elect workplace committee. copy of the statutes: although they're temporary, they re binding on all members.
What about the funds controlled by the still existing old unions and used by a very large tuner or workers lo loans? The workers in the old unions are worried that they will be forced to pay all these back immediately if they leave the old unions.
ballots
A committee member plains that LICW organisations outside the old unions should be elected to ad-
these funds, anyway should be outside the control OI the old bureaucrats.
What about the funds for the new unions? The committee explains wal inere Will be a system of dues but the amount is yet to be decided.
What about the clection to Socialist Challenge
INTERNATIONAL
the factory should put forward an independent slate of candidates. 'Our aims are very Regulski explained. to fight against all forms of corruption, lining of pockets at the expense of the state, As Gierek always said: *Thei must be fairly divided" "The working class must always watch over those with responsibility. nothing will
Vistula.
this and
there
workers, electronics
that their
Many
their
provided they have The left and Poland
that have
organisa-
ex-
By Brian Grogan
'TEACH Yourself Polish' was the
Worker (30 August) in welcoming with open arms the struggle of the Polish workers.
They understood that only gendeclaration mine socialists could advocate that
British workers should copy the methods against the Tories. out: The Tories' cheers would be
Take a
wideo orarer races a since second if the workers in this country suddenly took llcall rous workers are imported ust a few of their methods here.' impact tification has unfortunately been lessened by the per likes of the hatuse of dise view socienes m castem europe.
Unlike the bulk of the human race, the SWP Societ es dre capitalist countries of the West.
Socialist - Worker
awer ver soo de cor bureaucrats in Eastern Europe are 'capitalist, no more different from ex- Lic mana as or lau uacy are democratic TrOM nineteenth
The absence of private ownerwhich sit or tie acones meansence oi unemployment, the fixing of prices by a state plan -union not tere as tal as uncy are concern-
Such view demanderstands he power senates workers put forward.
How до risc in mcal barces Inrow Ine system into comp 18 September 1980
councils? We
'We're basic", 'We want tion of the
this. fof bread union
We know that of structures change with fine might have.
The Socialist
Workers Party
of Socialist
tonary.
such meat prices. allu Illas question the whole
As they pointed ed. They
from the Their
of this iden- ment. with the Polish struggle countries
capitalist West Socialist the DOWer that these ship of the factories.
identical
has therefore
This is why coupled the century mill
role of the party
munist Party
- this is neither here
democratic, completely oi striking • The • тоттанов This is why, ps political could the demand against
Be crisis if these agteement,
declarations; that's why we've that resorted to this kind of action.
going take responsibility for the distribu-
of the whole working class. The new unions will be the guarantors of
We spoke about what sort
the new unions Regulski told us states are the same as ours? How could the demand for independent unions strike at the heart of the pre-
ine triith of the matter is inal simple economic demands in these societies are immediately political. Democ ac demares are revolu
What the workers were doing when unev. camened ure. mse
• was throwing into plan - the whole way in wnich ine resource. of Polish society were to be decid-
were asking for
plan is a task of government.
action therefore im-
is is una makes nest different from the
The revolutionarv. character of democratic demands derives from
considerations. The Britain derives from their private owner-
The power of me bureaucas i rodid rests or their monopoly of political power
the one party system, total control of the media. and so on.
the bureaucrats concession to weansk sunkers or unc macochach
acknowledge the 'leading that is, the ponucal топороу or le coll
In reality of course, if the in-
renall the discussion cove policy for the union, and therefore
will inevitably lead to comtoetin and tendencies at the heart of the • there is such a time
the NOS WEC being organised on a regional basis, giving the examples of the Baltic coast, Masowsze, and Silesia.
"There will be a loose centralisation on a national level', he said, 'but not so much that the new unions will stagnate. There will obviously be differences between the trades car workers, doctors, builders, metal workers - and they will
359-8189.
it, sell it, read it!
link up nationally to put forward common demands for the trades as a whole 'We're exchanging mation and trying to together • common such as office accommodation, given that we're operating from private flat. organisational details have yet to be sorted out; they'll be decided after a period of consultation.'
Socialist
Challenge
The NEW STYLE SOCIALIST CHALLENGE
Next week's Socialist Challenge will be the edition of our new style paper. It will also contain a special supplement for the Labour Party conference, including a long interview with Tony Benn. IMG branches and Socialist Challenge supporters groups should remember that the new style paper will be heavily in demand -rush your orders for extra papers to Yvonne on
Socialist should also remember the special subscription offers we are offering with the new style paper. Next week's Socialist Challenge offers all our supporters a chance to extend their sales — buy
POLAND
Baltic Sea inforSove problems
The exact
IN REVOLT
Challenge supporters
Page 5 scan of this page
And if Labour councils refused to make cuts Isolation kills
Don't let St Benedict's
HOMENEWS
THE Tory government is
planning another
Tound of cuts in local ser-
vices which will force coun-
cils to make thousands of
their staff redundant.
›The Labour Party and
town hall
Lambeth, South London,
are making a stand against
further cuts. They are sponsoring a national conference for local councilors and
local councillors
trade unionists who
prepared to organise action
now.
PHYLLIS DUNIPACE,
chairperson of the Labour Party local government
committee in Lambeth and
a delegate to the conference
working party, Socialist Challenge
the aims of the conference
and how it is being built.
On the working party have representatives of all the local authority unions : Lambeth NALGO, T&GWU, •NUPE,
NUT. There are also delegates from each of the constituency By Steve Potter THE full force of the law is being aimed at the two hundred Staff at St Benedict's Hospital in South London, who have been in. occupation against closure.
Injunctions issued last week aimed to stop leading figures in the occupation committee blocking jurther raids private ambulances under the direction of the local health authority.
In the first raid on Tuesday of last week, 100 pickets foiled the first bid with only six of the 104 patients removed.
Aims of Lambeth conference
Labour Parties in the borough massive and from the trades council.
It is too early national support, but about a dozen councis have sponsored the LORCUICI with Labour Parties. NUPE is involved nationally,
in
and all the other unions at least. in London.
Delegation
and We are inviting the national
executives of the local authority and other unions to send official delegations. members of the NEC Lavin Most the Party have sent their support, and we are asking the NEC to back the conference. told
Response about
We expect a good response from unions and from Labour
we Parties nationally
the cuts which are threatened
in by the gövernment.
We hope that delegates at the conference themselve fight the
fight alone
Further clauses in the writs prohibit local union officials entering the hospital to speak to their members. Success One of those named in the writ is Nigel Beckett, regional officer of the Confederation of by Health Service Employees, who
said last Friday's picket: "This legal move is unprecedented. It is a measure of the determination of the staff and the success of the occupation that management has been
parties for joint action to force Tories …to ludge policies so far local authorities.
We need conference, councils are not to be isolated
and picked off one-by-one.
Labour refuse to make any cuts. The alcrnauve or rate which many adopted, is probably ruled out this year. Rate increases cannot fill the gap between what the governement is providing and the money needed to save jobs major and services.
Claw back
left-wing
The already authorities' money three times, and in November it will impose even more cuts. Some councils which • Hesletine overspent may also be liable to a claw. back in the rate support Al all. because of The latter provides most of
the money that local authorities receive from ment. In my opinion, rate inpledge creases should not be made as
the they are simply another from of constituency cut, and
forced to use such desperate measures as the raids and these Writs.
Staff anger at the hospital was running Tuesday raid. The snatch of the Six elderly patients disturbed other patients in this hospital.
The large patients still left make it dif mass
ficult for the management to mount a blitzkrieg raid of the type carried Out. by bosses in Hounslow two years ago.
Comply
Nevertheless has to comply with the directive of. Gerrard Minister of Health, to go ahead with closure Benedict's.
Ambulance workers have threatened action if the private
reverse their rates and inflation. and restore funds Rate
joint action tions which
councils should ing off workers.
increases, Support have
councils
• Januar
government has next year
the
thinks
Of the other unions.
affected by cuts in
central govern-
working people are
tion.
These high after the be left
courageous seriously hospitals in long-term geriatric the event of renewed raids.
Threat
number The threat to
health ment by
TUC
management
Vaughan, the the mass picket last Friday:
of
already overburdened by high
increases would not
save the direct labour organisa-
are already being
affected by cuts in the capital
spending programme and lay
Benedict's shown
of the We hope that trades union-
ists will support the stand of the
OUL refusing to co- They
operate with the cuts and new demonstrated government legislation, such as
the sale of council houses. Our
main calt is for industrial action
when council budgets are being drawn up for
We think this should in volve extended strike action by
local authority unions to bring local government to a halt. I these strikes are to be successful they will need the full support
Every trades unionist will be
social ser- with vices and housing. If there is union the type of co-ordinated action Spanswick we propose, there is a good chance the Tories can be forced to change their policies and that we will save jobs and services.
The ambulance fleet is involved in another smash and grab opera-
workers should not alone their stand. Other
make pledges of stoppages in
the right to picket presented by the injunctions and continuous harass-
police of the pickets outside the hospital should be the subject of a broader campaign by the South-east Region
As Bert Luthers, Labour councillor for Tooting, said on
"The real aim of this closure is for the Tories to be able to and elderly? flog off the hospital to the private sector. It's a sick joke . Support that you get served with an in- Hospital.
hospital sit-ins
By Patrick Sikorski TEN months' occupation of St
Hospital have anyone still doubted it - the inhumanity of the Tory cuts and the savagery
Health Service ministrators in carrying them
have • also that it is the of hospital workers who run the NHS as a caring service, as best 01 they can with scandalously inadequate facilities. They don't need managers any more than steelworkers need McGregor.
Fighting
They are the people who are fighting for a decent free health service at the time of need.
If in the end the closure goes through the responsibility will
the trade leaders, especially of COHSE and Fisher of NUPE.
Where was the national action to support and build on the occupanion. And where, for that matter, were the calls for
pickets from the SE Region TUC when it mattered?
occupation at St junction for defending the ill support
Arthur
St Benedict's Rush messages of
Benedict's comes at the end of a series of hospital occupations Weren have included Hounslow., Elizabeth Garrett Anderson, and St George's at Hyde Park Corner.
Struggle
every grade the capacity every grade workers to organise the running
hospitals under workers' controt struggle against government cuts. But none of them managed to break out of the limits imposed by the union leaders to spread the struggle to other unions and sectors in th public services.
They have all been mainly dependent on local community support.
The Lambeth anti-cuts conference on i November can break down the isolation of these struggles and bring to gether the experience of campaigns such that Benedict's; the continuing success of union actions against local government cuts by, for example, Liverpool NALGO; and the fight waged against the cuts by the Lambeth Labour group.
and donations to:
Hautot, St Benedicts Hospital, Church Lane, Lon don SW17. Tel 01-672 2231 (days) 01-228 9154 (eves).
Page 6 scan of this page
Recall National Committee meets
HOME NEWS
AUEW
By Jonathan Silberman IN AN extraordinary move, the right-wing dominated executive of the Engineering Union recalled the union's national committee last Sunday.
Duffy leadership
determined to take advantage of their majority on the tional committee to hands of the delegations from all four sections of the AUEW
the Labour Party ference.
For some years the manner in which the union's votes are cast at the conference has been a highly contentious issue. It câme to a head two years ago. when Lord (then plain Hughie) Scanlon 'mistakenly' abstained on the vote on Labour Party democracy when the AUEW delegation had overwhelmingly voted in favour.
The question of party democracy continues dominate national committee
discussions. The right-wing
leadership wants to line up the
Cheap
Tricks
EVERY dirty trick in the book is being used to ensure a victory
over Wright in the TO DIBLYI AUEW election campaign. In a completely undemocratic fashion the September issue of the AUEW Journal callics article on unemployment, editor John Boyd, in praise of the so-called 'marvellous leadership' of the
Sick
Of course, Boyd has
engage in gymnastics to justify
this position. The idea
Duffy, who last year signed an
agreement which prevents
further reduction of the work-
ing week for four years,
What are
transi-
tional
demands?
By Brian Grogan
CAPITALISM isn't working.
But what is the strategy for
socialism?
Inside the labour movement
reformist misleaders
always tried to erect a divide
between the fight for
term aims - solving workers'
problems here and now
the eventual goal of socialism.
Socialist Challenge argues transitional
which link the immediate strug-
gle with the goal of socialism,
order overcome
divide. What
demands?
The policies which can de-
fend workers
unemployment and galloping
inflation are quite
forward. The available
should be shared among
workers with no loss of pay.
Wages should rise with the in-
crease in the
Of c
union with the right-wing in the
- Labour Party.
At the TUC, Terry Duffy was one of the speakers at a meeting organised by "Gang of Three'
Rodgers, Williams and Owen.
is
the
con-.
to
shown adequate leadership in the struggle against unemployment is the sickest of jokes.
Boyd's article
enough. Even worse is that, in the best traditions of Boyd's so-called democracy, native view is put in the journal to Boyd's own view of Duffy.
Invited
This is only the latest example of the undemocratic func-
by tioning of the campaign. At a
large meeting of recently union. Holdworth Hall, the platform
explained that Bob Wright was forced to take two weeks' holiday in order to wage his cam-
to paign. He
refused leave to go out of tne AUEW'S headquarters Peckham Road, even specifically invited.
But perhaps something even has more worrying was a point rais-
right across the profit motive. But this is what it takes to defend the workers' against those of a tiny handful of profit-makers.
Such policies fight; no capitalist class grant them unless the consequences of refusal are made too terrifying for them. struggle, mobilising the enormous power of the working class, would lead the workers to begin to impose their control over factories bosses, since sharing the work the same dramatically cut profits. have In such a situation the need
for other measures would short- raised fairly quickly
economic breakdown is to be - and avoided.
Control Opening the
this books to gain these economy; expropriation of the OCCLULS
key firms and the banks so that planning could begin; and the against self-defence of the
organisations against straight- physical attacks of the bosses' work thugs and the police are among
the
the measures: that necessary.
The que will then be
'President general secretary are planning to cement a rightwing block in the unions and Labour Party, including such clod warriors leaders Frank Chapple.
IN-MECH
KKE COMMITTE
Led at our engineers.
Eccles last week. John Tocher, the local divisional
bad explained how
organised in the campaign. John Boyd and two
alter- others were the only people en-
titled to attend the count John Boyd intends to keep it like that.
Not only have the AUEW leadership refused to have the Electoral Reform Society in to the count, refusing the demands of candidates to attend. engineers that Boyd wants to hide?' askManchester's ed Tocher.
What indeed!
The only response to the bureaucratic manoeuves of the right-wing leaders is for the left consistently to conduct the most open and
democratic campaign, based on the fullest workers democracy.
when This means mass meetings in
the factories where supporters of either side can present their views.
interests
require r will
Such a
workers' and the
workers' control and extended
would
of the be Transitional demands thus pose definite solutions to the problems which workers face, but they the whole capitalism and system based on socialist planncapitalists ing. control over This approach to workers' of the everyday struggles is a complete
break with that of mists, who never link today's struggles with the socialist goal. workers Thus the
the adopted a packet of measures to deal with the immediate problems facing workers. These inwill clude some splended proposals
along the lines we have already mentioned. who rules Sors Resisting closures and
Duffy and Many
John Boyd
to this objective. tional committee in May the!
as electricians' branches
duce moves
EETPU.
Elected
Nevertheless democratic engineers led to the committee deciding
elected by the branches.
Boyd and Duffy
be developed AUEW
democracy and
tions.
, meeting in
the count was
presidential but they are also
'What is it wing block
Arguments for Socialism
large-scale
of pay'.
with some throw into question
operation of
to a proposal Ol
Thatcher!
the refor-
TUC has just
Congress called crash programme
veloping 2½ million
of the Duffy-Boyd plans for the AUEW are geared
At the na-
proposed the amalgamation of
would have full-time secretaries, appointed and employed by the executive.
are intended bring the union closer to the
• the strong tradition
that the full-time secretaries should be
can be defeated. This will be determined by whether a campaign can
among membership against the rôle of the national committee. This is the best way of ensuring that Boyd and Duffy are defeated on the issue of party
are removea from office in the coming elec-
engineering
North
Wing membership.
show
Needless AUEW
Duity give NATO cluding Cruise.
Labour
JOHN BOYD: toward a right-
the
the bosses.
The demands
socially useful products, and a
programme public works' and for: 'Reducing working hours and over-
time with an immediate goal of the 35-hour week without loss mouth is.
It coupled these proposals Shrink reactionar such as the call for import controls. But the worst of it was the The
how to win the
demands ... by kow towing to demands
In other words the TUC imagines that the type of demands
which could begin to meet the 'the end
problems workers are now en-
countering are compatible with
the interests of the bosses.
acts as if the call for workshar- while
ing is the same sort of thing as
the call for import controls. posed on
Yet a régime of workshar-
ing with no loss of pay and a
publis
works sufficient to mop up the
like a short
BOB WRIGHT: opposing missiles
Engineers
say No to
missiles
SUPPORT is mounting among
workers the North-west for the campaign arainst Cruise missiles The
Manchester AUEW district committee has given full backing to the lobby of the Labour Party conference to be held on 28 September
It has elected six delegates for the lobby, and it is mobilis-
among the district The committee will be showing the film The War Game. Plans for a film-
are also underway among engineers and boiler. makers in Stockport.
to -say these for members are angry about the statements by Terry
that the union should its backing to Britain's commitments, in- area. venor
They are determined. to organise an effective lobby of the AUEW delegation at the
Party conference to ensure that Duffy doesn't cast
union's block vote
wipe out the bosses' profits. To impose capitalist limits on the fight for these demands, would very quickly entail easing into
In reality, the only way to bring about such measures is to fight to impose workers control. This means mobilising the working class for action now.
fight for transitional is insenatable from the fight for the united front. The task of socialists is to ensure that the paper positions of the TUC are translated into ac-
put their money where their
implications of struggle for these • will see the
bureaucrats shrinking from the
consequences and refusing to
follow the struggle through to
In the steelworks at the pre- up
sent time, overtime for some
sections is still being worked
massive redundancies
and short-time working is im-
others. • Yet when
steelworkers in Llanwern slap-
ped on an overtime ban, Brian
Connolly, a right-wing ISTO
official, was down to Llanwern
jetting the action
ENGINEERS
NO LE S
favour of NATO
The campaign against missiles has become an im portant issue in the AUEW residential elections. The leit-wing candidate, Bob Wright, explained his opposi tion to Cruise at a meeting of engineers in Oldham.
Bolton the shop stewards quarterly meeting supported of Bolton al ainst members Missiles to back and mobilise
the Labour Party con ference demonstration.
Leaflets: are now circulating in many of the biggest Taccone. • It the Manchester
Betty Crawford, conat Ferranti Measurements, has taken 500 leaflets for her workplace.
in the next fortnight activists will be going all-out for the maximum turnout of engineering workers.
called off.
Similarly in British Rail, where even management acknowledges that there is a shortfall of 70,000 workers. yet a ban on recruitment has been introduced, forcing the workforce to put in long hours of overtime. The union leaders who voted for the TUE resolution have acquiesced in this situation.
Experience of this cowardly behaviour of the top officials in the face of an effective fight mounted by socialists will lead to an understanding of the rôle
leaders. will show that the object can only be workers' power, not a vain hope for collaboration with the bosses.
The fight for transitional demands is thus inseparable from the methods of struggle adopted. Transitional demands are not some sort of trick whereby workers are invited to fight for demands to solve their immediate problems and end
unwittingly establishing socialism.
The experience of fighting for these demands will lead to an appreciation o the sociati
system socialist measures and an expulsion of the bosses from political and economic power as a conditien: of their lasting implementas tion:
Page 7 scan of this page
HOMENEWS
Tough
deal for
the sick
By Alison Cooper WHEN the government's new Social Security regulations come into eftect on 14 September life is going to get decidedly harder for us all especially for. those unfortunate enough to fall sick.
Under the new regulations entitlement sickness benefit will not begin until the fourth day or sickness, ralner lan tre third day as at present. In addition doctors will not be obliged to issue free national health sickness certificates until • fou days of sickness — so if your boss wants a certificate for two days of ill-. ness then you'll just have
this weren't bad enough, the Tories' Green Paper, 'Income during initial sickness', would make things even worse. This paper proposes that employers, rather than the state, should be responsible for payments in the first eight of sickness. The rationale presented for this is that it will make the taxing benefits easier and cut costs.
The costs will be cut because une paper proposes a flat rate sickness payment of f30 per week, regardless of family size. And just to punish the low paid, those already on £30, or less, will only get 75 per cent of their usual wage.
riany, Just lo rub sall in the wound, while the employer is paying the sick worker their National Insurance contributions will •oc.cul, the workers contribution rate will remain the same.
Responses to the Green Paper can be submitted up to 30 September. Already many unions and pressure groups have condemned 21NO| rejecica ine Green Paper. Make sure that yours does too.
Squat
against
cuts
By Piers Corbyn
LAST Wednesday London syualiers hit the television news when they disrupted a property auc-
al the Cumberland Hotel in London to advise dealers not to buy any of a group or proverties which the London Squatters' Union had earmarked for squatting.
Kladasi Anandji and I appeared on Thames at Six for the London Squatters' Union.
The houses are part of
forced sale' by the Family Housing Association which at the behest of the housing corporation, is asset-stripping itself!
The 'squat against the cuts campaign began on Sunday, September, when squatters took over one of the properties, 62 Claverton Street Chelsea. After illegal eviction and two arrests on Monday' they reoccupied Union and negotiate, the,
THE Labour Coordinating Com-
muce comerence on
will present rank
Party members and trade unionists
with a big opportunity to organise the fightback against the cisive.
Since being elected,
and friends have shown their determination to roll back every gain won Audrey Wise MP
Police defend
Nazis in Preston
By Paul Corry
vote of thanks.
the march out of Preston town centre and through
one of the densest immigrant areas.
the house, and have now taken over other properties in different parts of London. The squalling will proceed whether the houses have been sold or not.
Ivan Beavis, secretary of NALGO's housing association branch, said: 'We support these squats as they are helping to prevent the sale of properties to private speculators.'
The campaign would welcome resolutions rom labour movement organisations supporting the campaign and demanding that Family Housing Association drop the charges, stop the sales, and allow the squatters to stay. Messages of support lo. oz Liaverton St, London SWI; enquiries: 01-701 5691.
By Mick Archer PICKETTING at Tandy's hi-fi equipment warehouse
Wolverhampton, Wednesbury, Lical
Calle under attack last Monday when • ponce arrestea • 01 the 50 pickets. A little later all but 10 of the pickets were ordered to disperse or face arrest for obstruction.
The dispute began on 21 May when the company refused tecognise the. Transport
Labour Coordinating Committee conference
A chance to fight back
November ed labour movement. and file Labour
Tory of- ment to unaermme our ablity
Thatcher and shackle the power of the unions.
SOME 400 National Front demonstrators marched through Preston on Sunday protected by three columns of police on foot, horseback, and motorcycles.
At least five coachloads of police were drafted in from all over Lancashire to protect the Front. Martin Webster duly praised them for their co-operation, and called on the demonstration to give the cops a
The help given to the Front included re-routing
An Anti Nazi League rally and march in the morn-
Shipyard
strikers
arrested
By Marion Weir FORTY-eight pickets were arrested outside Ayrshire Marine Constructors, Hunterston Yard, Ayrshire on Wednesday, 10 September. Workers at the yard are out on strike, fighting for safe working conditions and recognition of shop stewards and safety representatives.
The strike began on 28 urust unter workers were asked to work under a
Tandy's strike for
union recognition
Spending wages review.
When union officials reported this _LU the 54 people, WUIKLUICE. manual workers,
subsequent 17 weeks management has done evervthing possible break the strike.
On 14 August, the
sacking them. Their jobs were advertised and new wörkers" rechúited, while those ton, strike were
undermine the power of the organis-
The main elements of the Tories' strategy are clear: mass unemploystruggle, a media campaign to divide and distort, and legislation to limit policies.
Stopping this offensive requires
sacrifices
HILCISES
Labour
Socialist
their trade Labour
there yourself.
London WI.
ing attracted some 300 supporters, but at that stage
Members of Revolution Youth, Workers Party, and the International Marxist Group led the way in confronting the fascists, by linking arms across the road. It was then that the local West Indian and Asian youth completed the barriers.
'by the police, we continually reformed along the route of the march.
Arrests began early in the afternoon when ANL members were attacked by Front supporters. Three arrests were made, all of them were Asians.
On the counter-demonstration itself there were another 20 arrests, including young West Indian and Asians, along with members of Preston IMG and kevolution Iouln.
A defence committee has been formed to demand that all charges are dropped, Donations and messages of support to: Preston Defence Campaign, Nines St, Preston.
suspended ring weighing 120 tons which the union said was unsafe. When workers refused to work in these conditions, management. declared that they were in dispute and stopped time. After trade union representatives had held a sata meetin which management, they voted to bring 900 workers out on strike in support of the 110 involved.
Workers organised pickets of the yard gates to stop supplies and to stop the supervisors scabbing.
the first firednesday io day picketing, September management complained to the police that pickets had stopped the supervisors.
The police responded reemployed on condition that they gave membership. The workers were taken on a substantially higher rates than those sacked.
Janet Marsh, member of the strike committee, is one of those still on strike. While about 15 of the strikers have gone back to work, and others have given up the fight, 25. remain on strike. As Janet Marsh says: There's no way wete going to get rid
unions and from the Labour Party. The LCC conference on 1 November aims to begin the discussion on how to fight the Tories, and how to achieve the election Labour government committed to socialist
All this demands democratic accountabilitv in our own movement. to ensure that the struggle against the Tories is not led off track, and to guarantee that the next Labour government does not end up like all the others before it demanding
from working people rather than changing things in their
The conference is sponsored by the Labour Coorainaung Commiltee, the Socialist Campaign for a
Victory, Ine Independent Labour Party and Clause IV.
Challenge supporters should start now to make sure that
unions branches or Parties are sending delegates to the conference — or get
Details from: LCC, 9 Poland St,
the Socialist
Although these barriers were attacked and broken
Gc/o 32
by arresting 48 pickets, all charged with a breach of the peace.
Since the dispute began local GMWU and Boilermakers officials have not been near the shop stewards committee. The ultitune of the general council of the Scottish TUC has been even worse.
A strikers delegation to the general council told workers to go back to work.
The strikers need money badly. Please send contributions Irvine Trade Union Club, Irvine, Ayrshire.
THE deadline for short news articles for this page is 10.30am Monday. Articles up to 200 words can be through on Sundays on 01-359 8189.
of our union cards.
If the Tandy's dispute is to be successful they need much broader support. Support for pickets needed at the daily picket at the warehouse, Bilston Road, just outside Wednesbury. Boycotts of Tandy's stores should be organised in every town Financial contributions should be sent to: J District Officer, TGWU, Transport House, 33 Berry St, Wolverhampton, West Midlands.
Dewsbury anti-
racists hit back
By Erica Barnett A PIG'S head placed in a
Dewsbury sparked off a near riot as Asian Youth, immediately and spontaneously, marched to the police station chanting 'We demand justice'.
Reassured by the police that was 'youthful prank' and not a racist attack, and ignoring
• number of other incidents in the Dewsbury area, the elders of the community refused to particpale in a demonstration called for following Saturday by the Asian youth movement.
The demonstration was well-attended with banners from anti-racist committees in Hudders. field, Leeds, and Dewsbury, from Labour Parties and from branches of the SWP and IMG. The
Fly the flag -
at gunpoint
By Geoffrey Sheridan TWO men were escorted to Heathrow last week and forcibly put on a plane to Teheran. Their deportation brought howls of delight from much of the mass media.
Yet the two Iranians had not, for example, been buying arms to mow down
hundreds thousands of Iranian people.
That was the privilege of the late Shah of Iran, whose Britain • Were accompanied by ceremonies at Buckingham Palace and the neighbouring Palace of Westminster.
Neither had the two deportees been spying on Iranians in kritain. which was the role of Savak, the former Iranian policeterrorist squad, who received the hospitality and assistance of the British Home Office.
The two Iranians were among the 72 arrested outside the 'American Embassy in London for the
STAR
RIDDANCE!!
students.
. editor of Labour Weekly
Care
march went to the mosque and then to a meeting in the town hall. A speaker
Asian Youth Movement tha they would continue to fight all racist altacks.
Other speakers pointed to the need to fight the Immigration Laws, the need for Asian self-defence and the need to involve Asian women in the : campaign. One speaker called for greater police protection but others argued that this would be no defence.
C crime of protesting at the country's support for the tyrant Shah and its continuing attempts to bludgeon the Iranian peo ple into accepting the rule of imperialism.
The demonstrators also had the audacity to protest at being assaulted by the Metropolitan Police. They ought, of
to know that it is 'unBritish' to object to being beaten up by the cops on picket lines.
For these assorted threatsto civilisation as we know it, 44 of those arrested face deportation.
For the the magistrates, and the
press such as the Daily Mail (front page headline: 'Exit a trouble maker'), the deportations are an opportunity to wave the shrivelled fist of British imperialism at the people who dared to overthrow the West's puppet.
Socialists should oppose the deportations, and condemn the racism and chauvinism which accompany them.
It's the old
heave-ho
as Britain turfs out first of 83mpg METRO MISER MICHAE
Daily Star's racist front page, denounces Iranian .. One of the authors, is former deputy
Page 8 scan of this page
DON'T DIE FOR THA
SINCE the USA destroyed the Japanese cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki with atom bombs in 1945 it has set the pace in the nuclear arms race. Its clear object has been to maintain a decisive military and nuclear superiority over the USSR.
By 1945 Japan had lost control of the Pacific Ocean and was already a defeated power. There was no military reason for the use of the A-bomb by the USA. In fact 250,000 people died when the cities of Nagasaki and Hiroshima wereydestroyed simply to show the world that the United States' rulers not only possessed the most terrifying weapon in human history, but that they were also prepared to use it. demonstration was directed in particular at the USSR. Since then almost every major step in accelerating the arms race has been taken by the USA.
At no time has this been more true than today. The USA has almost twice as many nuclear warheads stockpiled as the USSR, and the combined missile systems of the USA, Britain and France easily outnumber those of the Soviet Union. The aim of the US in developing a new generation of nuclear weapons is not to 'deter' the growing Soviet military threat. deterrent force is already more than sufficient, as President Carter explained in a recent speech:
'Our deterrent is overwhelming, just one of our relatively invulnerable Poseidon submarines — comprising less than two per cent of our total nuclear force - carries enough warheads to destroy every large and medium-size city in the Soviet Union.'
The American government plans to spend 100 billion dollars building the new MX missile system precisely in order to break out of the logic of deterrence (you destroy us - we'!! destroy you). The aim is to achieve a 'first strike capacity" the ability to destroy the Soviet missiles before they leave the ground. 460 new Cruise missiles are to be sited in Europe. They are not covered by the arms limitation treaties because they do not have the range to hit the USSR from the USA. However, whereas the Soyiet equivalent, the SS20, cannot reach the USA from its bases in Southern Russia, Cruise will be able to destroy much of Russia from its European base.
The American objective in developing the Cruise and MX systems was summed up by the head of the National Security Agency of the US, Brzezinski:
I am saying that the United States, in order to maintain effective deterrence, has choices that give us a wider range of options than either a spasmodic nuclear exchange or limited conventional warfare.'
In other words deterrence no longer means. preventing nuclear war, but rather winning a 'limited nuclear war', quite possibly in the European 'theatre'. Behind the Arms Race: A War Drive
SINCE it cannot be seriously maintained that the USA is in danger of lagging behind the USSR in nuclear weaponry, perhaps there is more truth in the claim that "soviet expansionism' threatens 'Western interests'.
When American defence strategists speak of expansionism they generally refer to the threat to Middle East oil, to America's 'vital interests' in Central America, or to 'the advance of communism in South East Asia'.
Undoubtedly the Vietnamese revolution has
shaken Américan control of the Pacific Ocean. Certainly the fall of the Shah, who was armed to the teeth by America and Britain, has introduced increasing 'instability' in the oil-rich Middle East.
No objective observer can deny that South Africa - that bulwark of anti-communism and 'the West' — is today increasingly threatened by the struggle of black people from Zimbabwe to Namibia against their racist oppressors. And it is certainly true that on America's very doorstep, in Central America, every right-wing military dictatorship fears that their own workers and peasants wil draw encouragement from the That Nicaraguan revolution and Cuba's aid to it.
If these revolutions were the result of the activity of 'Russian spies' diplomacy, then we would have to admit that the Soviet rulers do indeed have powers of thought control far military might. But for our part we see both these and the hostility American and British ruling classes towards them, as explicable in much more mundane terms - in a word 'money'!
The US
In the world today 65 per cent of the popula. tion live in underdeveloped countries, yet these to have countries account for no more than two per cent of the world's industrial production. 450 million people in the underdeveloped world suffer from malnutrition. 900 million people were illiterate in 1979. Per capita income in the advanced capitalist countries, like the USA and Britain, is,
average, fourteen times underdeveloped world.
These facts are a thousand times more convincing as explanations of the wave of revolutions in the Third World since 1945 than any 'Soviet conspiracy. They also reasons for America's alarm. This massive inequality in the world's wealth and resources is the product of economic domination and exploitation of the Third World - as a source of cheap labour and raw materials — by the ruling classes of a small number of imperialist countries.
In order to maintain this economic domination the imperialist countries must organise a system of military domination. The First and Second World Wars were fought out between the great capitalist powers to determine control of the 'colonies', and so control of the fate of the overwncling majonity or humanily.
tain and the USA - at Yalta,
or even Soviet elsewhere in the world.
However, despite
exceeding 'America's
of the nam and Korea.
- that only by
that in the
from poverty -
revolution, of the
aggression'.
indicate the 50 countries.
The USA emerged from the Second World War as the most powerful imperialist power on earth. But the war at the same time weakened imperialism as a whole and unleashed a wave of revolutions in the colonial countries. These revolutions were not fomented by Stalin and the Soviet rulers. In fact the opposite is true.
On the basis of the nationalistic theory of 'socialism in one country', Stalin entered into agreements with the imperialists of France, Bri-
Potsdam and Teheran — to divide the world into 'spheres of influence. In exchange for guarantees that the imperialists would not launch a new war to restore capitalism in the Soviet Union, Stalin agreed to oppose revolutionary developments
Stalin's instructions, in 1949 the Chinese Communist Party led an almighty revolution which overturned capitalism in the world's most populous nation. The same happened in Yugoslavia and later in North Viet-
The lesson of the 1917 revolution in Russia
freeing themselves from borders. sion':
capitalism and from imperialist domination can the peoples of the colonial world free themselves
was more powerful than Stalin's policy of peaceful coexistence with imperialism. It is this example of the Russian
elmination of hunger in China, of the elimination of illiteracy in Cuba, that the American ruling classes fear, not 'Soviet
That is why between 1949 and 1970 the USA intervened on average into one Third World country every 14 months. That is why, in order to maintain its economic dominance of the world, the USA has 450,000 troops stationed in
-That is why the USA and Britain have financed and armed some of the
HOW TO
The new campaigns a
and the threat of nuc
different interpretatio
both superpowers ec
United States prepari
Should we be neutral
United States and the
reproduce an excer
pamphlet, 'Don't Die
most brutal dictators in history from the Shah of Iran to Somoza in Nicaragua
It is only in this light that the renewe American war drive can be understood. Afte the USA had lost the war in Vietnam - despi dropping more bombs there than were used the whole of the Second World War American working class and youth called a h They made it clear that their taxes and their lis were no longer available for adventures to fend the profits of oil companies and banks a result the Pentagon had to watch impoter while the revolutions in Iran, Nicaragua, At and the Caribbean unfolded. They had to w impotently when the USSR sent troops Afghanistan to prevent a right-wing imperi backed regime from coming to power
The new war drive and rearmament is ab all about launching a counter-offensive agai these developments. That is why 25 billio dollars is to be spent on developing the Rapi Deployment Force (RDF). The RDF is a force o 200,000 American soldiers specially trained an equipped for mobility and available for im mediate use anywhere in the world especially in the Middle East and Centra America. Its commander, General Paul Kelley recently explained quite openly that the RDF i not designed simply to counter 'Soviet aggres
Campaign
Events
Labour Conference March
Blackpool demo assembles
at 10:45am at the War
Memorial
near Butlin's Hotel rallying at Ipm al
the South Pier. It will then lobby the
AUEW delegation at 1.45pm at the
AUEW headquarters in Station
Road. Then the march goes on to
lobby the Labour Party NEC at 2pm
at the Grand Hotel.
Page 9 scan of this page
STOP THE MISSILES
CHER
st nuclear weapons
var have produced
the arms race. Are
sto blame? Is the
a new world war? clash between the
et Union? Here we
om the new IMG
atcher' by
EDMOND O'NEILL.
The force could be ordered to launch a prentive strike to seize threatened ground before Russians got there.
What does this mean? It means that if a olution overthrows an important US ally en, on the assumption that this is an aspect of wiet aggression', US troops will rush in to deid democracy and freedom' with napalm and
is, as they did in Vietnam.
reclear rearmament fits into
ework: If decisive nuclear superiority over USSR can be attained, especially a
e capacity' and the possibility of limited
car war', then the American ruling class can ectively deter the USSR from aiding or sup-
ing such revolutions.
In the great revolutionary struggles of China, gaslavia, Vietnam and Cuba, and in the fight
nst racism in southern Africa, huge inspira-
has been taken from the ideas of the Oc-
1 1917 Russian revolution and the existence ¿workers' state outside of the control of imalism. Simply the fact that the USSR today ruled by a conservative, geriatric, bureaucracy ich, to maintain its power, crushes socialist emocracy in Eastern Europe and intervenes in e most bureaucratic way possible against the dord rebellion in Afghanistan, does not te the USSR the same as the USA. It does
make it 'equally responsible' for the threat war and nuclear annihilation.
hmon CND National Demo
inst the siting of 96
Victoria CND's national demonstration takes
es leave from place
demo starts 11am at Speakers
from London will and marches to a rally
Trafalgar Square.
od should be book- is demanding No Trident, No Cruise : 01-242 0362 (days) Missiles,
n Hall. 9aт. coact £3 material from CND, London WCI. Telephone 01-242
East, c/o 0362.
To claim that 'guilt lies squarely upon both parties,', as does the European Nuclear Disarnament Campaign (END) and other neutralist or pacifist groups, can only help the rulers of the United States and Britain. They seize every opportunity to employ the genuine disgust at the Soviet bureaucracy's suppression of democracy for their own ends — to gain support for new wars against colonial peoples and to add further twists to the spiral of nuclear rearmament. Just as workers will support even a hopelessly bureaucratised trade union against the bosses, because it nonetheless remains a union, so too the USSR remains a workers' state despite its bureaucratic leaders. If it was crushed by imperialism, the working class of the entire world would suffer its gravest tury. The war drive is an imperialist war drive?. Understanding that fact is key to countering: it.
this How to Stop the War
Drive first
'WE propose to make in Europe a theatre of peace. This will not, even if we succeed, remove the danger of confrontation in non-European theatres. It offers at least the small hope of European survival.'
That is how EP Thompson summed up the approach of the European Nuclear Disarmament campaign. Its strategy assumption that 'power blocs', East and West, have been taken over by the logic of the nuclear arms race. The aim is a neutralist Europe as the first step to dissolving the altogether.
But as Thompson himself points out: "This will not remove the danger of confrontation in non-European theatres.' In fact, such confrontations are taking place every day, although not at nuclear level. For example, as we write, in El
Scotland Marchers against the Scotland will be participating in their 26 October. Corner The own demonstration in October. demonstration will be held in Glasgon on Saturday 25 October.
at 2:30om at The demonstration Cut Arms spending. Publicity 29 Great James
economic domination.
the new world crisis bites defeat this cen-
of wars and revolutions, with Cruise missiles!
is based on the
be divisive' to 'ground
blocs' capitalist'.
ment, for example,
missiles
The
movement 'unpatriotic', the back', mediate withdrawal was adopted.
elsewhere, Salvador it is a US-backed dictatorship, financ- worldwide. ed by American corporations, that is gunning down 30 people a day with American rifles and helicopter gunships. America fears losing yet another area of the world from the grip of its
Nor can the European theatre be lifted out of this world political and economic context. As
deeper into the economies of the West the imperialist powers become ever more unremittingly hostile to that third of the world that has already escaped from their economic and political control. It is this permanent hostility that drives a rift through Europe — the arms race is generated by the imperialist powers as a result of this. Europe cannot be turned into an island of peace in a world
and the Western governments know it! That's why there will be 460 Cruise missiles aimed at the USSR
Wishful thinking about a 'neutral Europe' will not be effective in countering this real escalation in the 'arms race'. Such an approach falls into the lap of Thatcher and Schmidt because their argument is precisely that they need Cruise in order to persuade the Soviets to disarm. By accepting the logic of 'mutual disarmament' - multi-lateralism - END is unable to counter Thatcher's argument that to achieve this a strong negotiating position is necessary for the West - a negotiating position backed up
For EP Thompson it is 'unrealistic and could
our actions ona preference for one or the other blocs'. Because: 'So long as each bloc's resistance movement can be categorised as the ally of the other, exterminism will be able to police its own territory...'
In other words, any stand other than pacifist neutralism — arguing for Europe to drop out of the class struggles and antagonism between different social systems - will be labelled in the West as 'pro-communist' and in the East as 'pro-
This is undoubtedly true. The Tory govern-
will certainly label any serious movement against its war preparations as 'communist or Trotskyist inspired', just as they label any movement against their war in Ireland as 'terrorist'. In the United States the first debate in the movement against the war in Vietnam was whether to adopt the demand "Troops out now'. Those pacifists who were against the slogan. argued that the administration would call the
'stabbing our boys in 'communist, if the position for im-
The American anti-war movement had to take sides. The same applies today. To be effective the movement to stop Trident and Cruise
missiles must demand unconditional, that is unilateral, nuclear disarmament. This is all the more vital given the nature of the campaign which is used to justify rearmament. Thatcher and Carter are out to convince workers in the West that the economic crisis is not a crisis of capitalism but the product of Soviet 'exper sionism' - in the form of revolutions - while threatens 'our most vital interests': oil in the Middle East, raw materials and investments
and 'democracy and freedom'
So their recipe for prosperity is economic sacrifices by the workers at home combined with a show of military force overseas.
In the West today trade unionists cannot even take strike action without being labelled 'reds' The frenzy of witch-hunting that will greet any serious anti-war movement will be a thousand times more venomous. But, as in any strike, the answer to the red scare is to prove the justice of our actions, not to bend over backwards to accommodate the Fleet Street press..
If the ruling class succeeds in dividing and defeating the Western working class and in crushing the colonial revolution, then the threat of a Third World War would become a real one as they moved on to try to restore capitalism in the rest of the world. The interests of British workers in this situation are not served by neutralism or non-alignment, but rather by militant opposition to austerity at home and solidari-
with every -struggle against imperialism overseas. The history of our own century should tell us that as long as imperialism exists it will use all means, including war, to defend its profits and bank balances. The war threat will exist until the warmongers are disarmed by their own working class — MX, Cruise and Trident are ineffective in a civil war.
THA •HER
HOW TO
'Don't Die for
Thatcher -How to Stop the
Missiles'
New Socialist Challenge pamphlet by
Redmond O Neil price 20p from The
Other Bookshop' 328 Upper St. London
NI add 10p p&p
Page 10 scan of this page
NEW STYLE SOCIALIST
AGENDA
some TOT une to become much more accessible worker militants and first time readers.
Let me put it simply.
Recently a member of our direct editorial board went to an Socialist Challenge will be IMG branch to discuss the just as revolutionary, just paper. • A miner comrade as internationalist. said: 'OK, I take Socialist Some people like it, bit.
Some people like it, some people bring it back and say they can't understand it.
That's the situation we've got to change. need a paper which comrades are much more con- of the fident of taking into the labour movement.
Socialist Challenge
BENEFIT with RED RINSE
OXY &
THE MORONS
and disco Food available,
bar extension applied for SATURDAY 27 SEPTEMBER
METROPOLITAN pub,
Farringdon Road, EC1 (Farringdon tube)
Admission £1.50 (£1 unwaged)
галлалания
WOMEN AND WORK, by Sheila Lewenhak. Fontana, £2.25. Drawing on anthropological and historical evidence this book shows how women's status as workers has declined in recent times.
Writers and Readers, £1.95. The latest addi
anto the cartoon book series expla
Coming next week
CHALLENGE
fundamental the paper. will be less political!
No. It's a question of explaining our political ideas In a simpier and more But
Is it really possible to produce in which everything will be understood by the first time reader?
No. Our paper has to serve We a variety of needs.
For one thing, it's one most important means of communication with members of the IMG £2.90!)
SPECIAL OFFER * 12 MONTHS
Name ..
Address
Other
THE /BOOKSHOP
MAO FOR BEGINNERS, by Rius and Friends. REVOLT, by Ernest Harsch. Pathfinder, £3.95
rescued China from rock-bottora ruina
alle from The Ocher Bookshop, 328 Upper Street, Lordon Nul. (tel 01-226.0571),
Featuring: *Secondhand book and record sale *Disco dance *Great food on sale *Bar
taken at the time.
Socialist Challenge.
Nearest tube: advance, 21.25 on
DON'T MISS IT! an explanation or some of towards india ree
if a worker militant who is
SUBSCRIBE TO SOCIALIST CHALLENGE For new readers we are offering TEN ISSUES of Socialist Challenge for the incredibly low price of £1. (Real value
With subscriptions for 12 months we are giving away a FREE COPY of Trotsky for Beginners by Tariq Ali and Phil Evans, published by the Writers and Readers Publishing Cooperative. (Usual price £1.95!)
£12.50 plus free copy of Trotsky for Beginners * 10 issues for £1 only * delete where appropriate
Socialist Challenge, 328 Upper Street, London N1
THE SECOND SLUMP, by Ernest Mandel. Verso, £2.95. This important work of Marxist economics is now postscript.
SOUTH AFRICA - WHITE RULE, BLACK
This book tells the story of South Africa's black majority from Dutch colonialism to the Soweto ons and devana.
Add 15% if ordering by post.
To celebrate the launching of the new look Socialist Challenge, why not join us all at the mammoth
SOCIALIST CHALLENGE SOCIAL
*Film With Babies and Banners' (55 mins) - the story of the sit-in at General Motors in the 1930s as told by woren who were involved in the 'Women's Emergency Brigades' and children's picket lines which played a decisive role in winning the strike. Contains much film
*Exhibition 'Red Mole to Socialist Challenge':' *Sale of souvenir copies of Red Mole, Red Weekly,
SATURDAY 20 SEPTEMBER, 6.30-11.15pm.
CAXTON HOUSE, 129 St John's Way, London N19
Archway (Northern line). Tickets £1 in the door (in advance from The Other Bookshop, 328 Upper Street, N1).
and those who support its 10 per cent of it, then ob- Socialist Challenge was
viously they're not going
It's the balance that paper was wrong?
of determines the whole way *6 months £6.50 in paperback with a new
prioritise great strengths of Socialist
ing class to have a united
realistic. Socialist Challenge an be the
that
doesn't exist.
other revoutionary forces, in par! ticular the Socialist Workers Party, have slammed the door on unity with the IMG. That's very bad
- bad for them, bad for us.
Take this 'Beyond the Fragments' development. These people are drifting, going nowhere. They have no organisation, no
no perspectives, nothing.
If there were serious I moves towards revolutionary unity, the best of these people would be won over. But there no revolutionary unity.
Socialist Challenge is sponsored by the IMG and we're going to defend our line in it.
Let me also say that we want Socialist Challenge to be open in a much more fundamental way to the rank and file leaders of struggle, to speak out and express their views on the way ahead This is something we tried to do with the steel strike.
So there's going to be a
dramatic change?
Yes and no. We're going to change the way the
paper looks, and a lot of its features. Bat whethe
there's going to be a sustained change depends on what the IMG does in the next period. Ultimatelv. a revolutionary newspaper will reflect the organisation which takes responsibility for producing it.
you Dave an organisation Waler "chronically sectarian, then
of brilliant journalism will save the paper.
But if the organisation . continues to focus its activity around the key features of the class struggle, rooting itself more deeply the workers movement, then the preconditions are created for a more vital workers' paper.
Changing Socialist Challenge is going to be a long term process.
What do you mean by the 'key features of the class struggle that Socialist Challenge will cover?
64,000 dollar ques The tion! In terms of the broad sweep of the British class struggle, what's most ob• viouș today is the way in which the struggle in the unions increasingly bound up with what is going on in the Labour Party.
good example something the paper has been campaigning on in a big way - is the fight over Cruise missiles the Labour Party. Whom do
'gang of three Williams, Rodgers and Owen — approach for an alliance but union leaders Terry Duffy and Frank Chapple! The fight inside the party immediately links up with the fight against Duffy - in the Engineering Union.
Socialist • Challenge is going to have to focus a lot of attention on the emergence of the new left wing in the Labour Party. What should Socialist Challenge supporters be 'doing to promote the new paper?
More than ever, the revolutionary press has to be at the centre of building a - revolutionary party. New opportunities are opening up all the time to expand our influence.
So we hope that all comrades, whether the are members of the IMG or just supporters of the paper, will feel a new confidence about taking it to contacts in the labour movement.
We particularly want to run a campaign for new subscriptions, to firm up our base of regular sales.
There's also one other thing. We want IMG branches and other supporters to be discussing where they sell Socialist Challenge.
If there are new opportunities for selling the paper in the labour move ment, then comrades have to be thinking about more factory gate sales, regular sales at trade union branches even where we have no supporters - and so on.
That item should be on the agenda of all our supporters! in the coming
SCEVENTS
Ground, Haymarket For more infe
x2 Coo sales Newpo e from res 3 Books.
Salisbu
,30pm, Friday 4-5.30pm, Satur
with Richard Rozanski (edito a spea Friday 19 Sepptember
HACKNEY jumble sale: Saturdas
Centerprise, 13
Sat. outside
Piazza. SC 8, 50.
Wed 24
Fairfiel St., Piccadilly. MANCHESTER. S At Star an
SLAM outside the Yorkshire Bani
St; at
tre; and in MANCHESTER outside the Sic sport in
i saporter needs
SWINDON: SC on sale 11-1 every Sat.,
outside Woolworths on Stockton High from: Carole Reagan, 29 Wayland Ave
Sat 20 Sept, Carde - Rooms, 8 Camden Road, Lon
eft press in New Cro litho work. Some experience preferrec 0.732 335. Phone Ry Expres TU
stood for
WIRRAL* TRADES a Lambeth 1G a Bout and Lambeth m
prisons nurderous regime;
banks earhead stranglehold or
Other
developments; the PTA attack on FRFI
BIRMINGHAM RALLY FOR
LABOUR DEMOCRACY Speakers: Tony Benn Bob Wright Les Huckfiel MP, Audrey Wise
Monday 12 September,
7.15pn
Digbeth Civic Hall
Birminghai Organised by West Midlanc Trade Union Committee for Labour Democrac
Page 11 scan of this page
Why we won't give in
JOSEPH MAGUIRE is 27 years old, married with two young children. He spent three and a half years on the blanket, and was released on 25 January this year.
Because he was a short-term prisoner, he served the first fifteen months of his sentence in Crumlin Road Prison, Belfast. When the blanket men in Crumlin Road joined the 'no slop out' protest they were transferred to the H Blocks at Long Kesh.
Here Joseph Maguire talks to three members of the Troops Out Movement about his experiences.
The degrading search, which he describes in horrific detail, still continues. The authorities have now added insult to injury by offering as an 'alternative' to mirror search visits in special partitioned box, which prisoners separated from relatives by perspex screen: the blanket men are refusing such visits, regarding them as an attempt to degrade their visitors as well as themselves.
Socialist Challenge proud " 10 publish remarkable account of the ways in which Republican prisoners are resisting all the attempts of the authorities to them.
I WAS brought into reception at Crumlin Road and given the prison clothes. eased la
them. sidered myself to be a political prisoner and not a criminal. I think it's obvious to everybody that the Six Counties in Ireland are being occupied, as were the Twenty Six Counties before the Treaty. Wife
On that same day a prison officer came to me in the reception and said, 'Your wife's here LONGEVI and VOUS ONLOC said, 'Dead on'. He says, have to wear prison clothes'. I refused to wear them therefore I was denied my visit.
So i never saw mv wite on the day I was sentenced. This is a thing that is granted to every prisoner when they are sentenced - a committal visit, it's called.
So I was brought into B Wing and put into a cell, and my clothes were taken off me, the prison uniform was sent in, and a baker Do t out lne blanket on myself.
And out the back, I noticed it right away, there was a heavy droning sound. This was a big boiler house, right behind these cells. This constant drone was going on all the time, and if you tried to shout to someone in another cell, or out of the door, you could never make out what they were saying. It was very monotonous, very penetrating.
That night I found out there was another two men pothe
aket in this wing. I eventual-
INTERNATIONAL
H Block prisoners story
ly found out that there were three cells between each one of We were isolated, one man to a cell.
So they came with my tea, and that night again they came incy openca me door and said, 'Sop out'. This means you lift your chamber pot and your water gallon, and you go Wing, down and empty your pot and
fill your water gallon.
Well, I was going to do this with the blanket on me, but the prison officer stopped me and said, "Take the blanket off'. 1 didn't know says, 'Take the blanket off. You chose not to wear prison cotnes and not to do work, so any time you step out of that cell, you'll step out naked. You'll go to the slophouse naked. You'll go to the Governaked.
British you'll go naked.
So this lasted every day I was there.
the a. Abuse
Every 11 days we before the Governor their punishment
prison regulations. were going up the wing, was always a full criminals who were going out LO WOrK You just had to walk right
is through all these people, nak-
Led. There was abuse from the this
criminals, and from the
the
break CC
thing con-
the prison 'You
and
Mass. we no material, cigarettes, radio, sometimes letters in't get. pletely from other.
Protest
Well, that was for fifteen months I was in the Crumlin on my own in a cell.
The Block escalated to 'no slop out'. . heard about this and we decided ourselves that we would carry this out; that we would followshe H Block protest and refuse to slop out.
So we refused to slop out and we were transferred from the Crum straight to H3.
When we arrived at the Blocks, there was a wing move
completely what to do. He
prison
Anywhere at all
Square, London WC1.
went for with When you
there
wing of
HIGH other, so that they could clean the dirty wing.
pect. They opened my door and always abuse the card that sits outside your gave me my celt card ornicers. cell, it gives details
name, your age, religion, your sentence. As soon as you take that your blanket's drawn off you, and you're grabbed by the hair and arms up your back, and run up the wing. called
Circle
when 1
wing, and the crossbar is the centre of the block, and that's water called the Circle. That's where the doctor and the POs' office, welfare, everything is the heart of the building. You must cross this Circle to get to the other side of the block. So if you were being moved from one wing to the other side of the block, you have to go through the Circle.
were going through the Circle and I was run up the wing. All the prison officers were wearing
reading and no hats.
no the wing another two prison ofmonth ficers took me and run me in
YUu the same fashion into the Circle. each screws. They were all standing round a small table. They said 'Bend over it.' wanted me to bend my body over the table with my arms out. I refused.
I then felt my wrists being taken and my ankles.
protest naked and I felt myself being
We lifted up in the air, and I endec up in a horizontal position as if I was flying. And my two legs were pulled apart. I thought I was gullig to felt. it in my hips, they pulled apart so wide that it was really painful. were pulled from me, as if I was being stretched. And then 1 felt ands at my backside
RALLY FOR
CHARTER 80
Saturday, 27 September THE CALL for the British government to agree to the demands of the political prisoners in H Block and the women prisoners in Armagh is growing stronger every
Apart from Tony Benn, the prisoners in their demands for: have signed the Charter 80 petition which supports
'The right of prisoners to wear their own clothes.
*The right to refrain from prison work.
*The right to free association among other
*The right to organise their own educational and recreational facilities and to receive one visit, one letter The righp to full remission of sentence.
The issue will be raised loud and clear for this month's Labour Party conference from the founding ally of the Charter 80 campaign which takes place o
it begins at Lpm and speakers include Irish trade SWAPO and Chris Myant, deputy editor of the Morn-
- they had started to move the my
one wing to the thumbs.
After that they
We didn't know what to ex-
this is your mother and
of your
Now each leg of the His a
- that's
This particular morning we
blue overalls, zipped up,
When I went up
And there I saw about 25
They
I was
be torn apart, l •were
And my
you.
about you things
They ground seven other Labour MPs
put
hidden.
joke.
There back passage with his. taran •moD,
down and slapped me about, weren't a kicking me and abusing me.
They like abusing you about person,
your wife.
This seems to be a favourite.
They say the worst things that humiliated
they can say about your wife. It's'usually sex, something that they think will really bother
They even make references that they have been with your wife, and they'll be with her tonight. 'We'll laugh
tonight.' There's I wouldn't repeat, would be embarrassed if I was to say them to vou now
stand you on the spreadeagled, your arms in the air. And they search under your armpits, they search between your fingers, search your hair, search your ears, search your mouth, and they
their finger into your mouth, to search behind your lips to see if you've anything
They search the soles of your feet, between your toes. They all stand and say whatever they want to say - it's a great
was big outcry about this table search procedure that they were carrying out, so they changed it to the mirror search. The same again: you were run up the wing, run to the Circle, the same squad was there to meet you. The impression I used to get was, it was just like going into a sec. so
because titude of them was as if you just
being.
It was as if you weren't a
you were just something to be teased about, something to be abused and
torch down lips.
And when arrived at the Circle they had this mirror sitting in the middle of the Circle, a standard-size mirror like you would see in a public toilet. Maybe it's about 10 or 12 inches broad, 18 inches long. It's lying on the ground, there's no frame or anything.
There were two bits of tape on each side of this, and you put your feet on these. That left you in the position that your legs were apart, over the mirror, and the mirror was just directly between your legs.
So then they said to you, "Squat'. They wanted you to squat down onto your hunkers,
that back passage would be open and it would be directly over this mirror, so that they could have a good view Well, this you refused to do because I don't think personal. ly that anybody would openly squat down to be searched like Kidneys
They then started to punch you, mainly round the body, and the back of the kidneys, and at the back of the head. At times they'd punch you in the face. There was men got their nose broke, black eyes
When they see that. you're not going to go down, two will parison officers wear heavy duty take your wrists, and boots - they'll then kick you and they kick your ass,
they'll kick they're kicking a ball and trying to score a goal
At times my legs have flew right out and I've landed on the mirror. Men have landed on this mirror and it has broke and they ve received cuts on their backsides. We were getting moved once a week and the backs of our legs were per manently black and blue.
When they have you down for a length of time, they shine
big torch on your back passage. One would shine
and another would get and pull at your back maybe put a pencil in, poke with tweezers, and mayb put his finger right into your backside and search it
It's a terrible feeling. And then the finger that they've us ed to search your back passage, they've mouths to search behind thei men's
Next Week: Joseph Maguin tells what it's like on visitin day at the H Black, and how the prisoners leamed Gadd
Page 12 scan of this page
The people of El Salvador must not stand alone
The general
strike —
SucceSs
THE general strike of 13-15 • August closed down 80 per cent of industry and 70 percent of public transport, according to
Nicaraguan daily ricada. It also had an impact on shops, government facilities, banks and offices. Half million workers were estimated -to be involved on the first day.
Although some 60 per cent
shops eventualty opened their doors under military and government pressure, spanish agency. reported that they had few customers. Many were closed by early afternoon.
The junta also militarised urban transport in the capital, San Salvador. The bus tersinals were occupied, forcing buses and taxis onto the streets. The regime then pointed to this activity as evidence of support for its policies!
The scale of
the repression
IN the single week of 'August, the archbishop's office in San Salvador listed 219 peo. ple from the popular and pro.
asive sectors of El Salvador'
dered for political reasons. They included 120 peasants and agricultural WOLLEN. students, five industrial workers, public employees, two schoolteachers, two journalists, and two small
By Soleiman Ehmet
DURING the days
Turkish sultans, the Ottoman
Debt (the amount of mone!
owed by the Ottoman empire to
its creditors in the West) was a
banker's nightmare.
Today the situation is not so
different. the ast tew
years Turkey has been involved
the largest
negotiation in financial history.
Swiss, German, American and
British banks all have big com-
mitments there.
The world crisis
capitalist system has affected
Turkey rather dramatically.
• Ine result has ocell a growilig
political polarisation and the
rapid growth of the fascist Na-
tionalist Action Party.
Gangsters
The NAP developed
organisation of armed gangster
units known
Wolves, who carried
systematic campaign of terror
against the working class and
the left groups. Dozens of peo-
ple were killed every day.
The Turkish left suffered
further splits and tiny groups
modeled on the Red Brigades
and the German Red
Faction responded in
Successive governments refus-
ed to distinguish between the
fascists and the left, although
the state moved mainly against
he len
Socialist militants
brutally tortured in Turkish
prisons at the same
trade unionists and left-wing
•rolessors and stuaenis were
being mown, down, on the tant
streets by fascist gangs.
INTERNATIONAL
In fact, despite the sharpness of the confrontation, the strike showed that surgent forces strength. For the uniformed guerilla and militia forces entered
Revolutionary : tacked a number posts and set up barricades in Bar- many areas of San Salvador.
During the course of the strike they were able to cut the roads linking San Salvador with San Miguel, Santa Ana, Aguilares.
Many neighbourhoods in and around the capital were in the hands of the flick at some pomt auring une EFE strike. The largest battle took
plase in El Coro, on the outskirts of San Salvador, again
guerillas ambushed a military canvoy, engaging army forces for three hours.
The combined opposition grouping, the Democratic Front claimed that 700 government troops were killed or wounded during the three days strike.
merchants. T'be occupations of the others were anknown. repressive responsible for the were also named: '105 murders committed by combined con-
1-8 tingents of the armed forces; 34
murders committed National Guard; four murders committed by the paramilitary ORDEN;
National Police;
18 committed by civilian agents;
and 15 murders the Death Squad.' The remaining four were carried out by unknown assailants.
Turkey - the IMF's coup
The economic and political of the chaos WON
foundations of thé state: fiercely secular and committed Parliament was paralysed and the malor ponucal partes ulterly discredited.
Violence
re-
Bulent Ecevit, the main opposition leader, had proved inof the
capable of dealing with fascist violence. Indeed, fice he had gone so far as to ban
police which wanted to resist fascist encroachments. acevit's successor. Demire - who was unseated by the army early last Friday equally incapable. He authorised the state-sponsored persecu-
and even fascists.
The generals oul a Turkey for the third time in
three decades. In military arrested and hanged Prime Minister, Menderes, a politician of the right. In 1971 they intervened to oust Demirel. Now it has happened again.
Army
press notwithstanding, it is obvious that the coup was carried a out on the instructions of the United States (probably under
Monetary Fund,
were
about the state of the country. time as
Turkey is a crucially imporpart of NATO military bases and radar in
the inare gaining in
first time,
San Salvador
forces
of military
population. and
mercenaries are revolutionary
repressive operations.
where
bloodier.
Revolutionary
(FDR),
of the
forces murders
by the
four by the murders
committed by
stallations there provide the Pentagon with Turkish quarter of its information on the missile 'modernisation' USSR
The the country had reached such a pass that a civil war could not be excluded in the coming months. The coup was designed to Such: a and to 'stabilise Turkey".
was to ban the unions (where
ship and impose a curfew. But while in the Turkey wants the army to 'stabilise' is democratic organisations in the not the same as it was in 1960 or
The economic created large unemployed. The turning back - proved of Turkish immigrant workers from Germany has dealt a further blow to the economy. The tion of the trade unions and the generals thus confront a set of
backed In e tasks which it will not be easy to
resolve. take over
a bo tee Temporary
Adnan The l0 per cent wage in crease which has been decreed
the army to move immediately The coyness of the Western to crush the workers
Wing to buy time. But that is only temporary cannot prevent a new strike action in several months
The coup had been expected wnose olficials were in e state of despair for some time,
new rulers will be able to carry out the aims desired by the US State Department US moot peint. And if it can't then *the Turkish cauldron will begin • to bubble again.
THE three day general strike in El Salvador last month was said to be a flop by the international press. in fact it was the most hard-fought confrontation yet between the regime and the forces of the popular opposition.
The ruling junta, made up of the military and the Christian Democrats, has the total backing of the imperialist powers. It is fully prepared to carry out a massacre of the
Plans for imperialist intervention are well advanced. American 'advisors' and foreign
already taking part in
Appeals for solidarity therefore have a real urgency. Since the start of the year, 4,500 workers and peasants have been kilt ed. The struggle is likely to become still
That is why action is vital to frustrate Washington's manoeuvres. For details solidarity activity in Britain contact the El Salvador Solidarity Campaign, 27 Islington Park Street, London N1.
J.S. to Give El Salvador
$20 Million More in Aid
up to one-
capacity of the
growing instability in
development
The first act of the generals
main trade the left introduce censor-
the United States
crisis has pool of - it is try-
solution which • Wave WI
, but whether the
remains a
tionary (FDR)
of year as
as well as
cess.
'The United States will never
permit a new Nicaragua, even
if it must take the most
reprehensible, measures to
prevent it.' Zbigniew National Security Advisor to President Carter. 'TOTAL WAR 'WE are in a situation of total war.' That is how events in El Salvador were summed up by a representative of the Revolu.
Democratic al a press conference earlier this month.
Rutilio Sanchez described the three general strikes this
"tests by which to measure our influence among the masses'. According to him, the August strike 'allowed us to test out the self-defence and of fensive capacities of the people,
the state of the government forces. And from that point of view it was a suc
'The unity around the FDR has allowed us to advance on the ideological level. The peo
Brzezinski,
Phemselves aase contrat they are GwNe that destiny.
The FDR unites the main left-wing groupings as well as the mass organisations of the workers and peasants and im portant sectors of the petty. bourgeoisie.
Its main priority is to integrate the mass struggle with
military actions of the vanguard oreanisation Increased popular involvement in the armed struggle has been shown in the mushrooming of neighbourhood committees. people's militias, and other such structures.
'If the USA did not support the junta, the Salvadoran people could win without shedding a drop of blood', says Rutilio Sanchez.
Page 13 scan of this page
Pulley for President
By Pat Kane AN AGEING cowboy Ronald: Reagan, may be next president of the United States.
The British press tell us that the only alternatives to Reagan are Jimmy Carter or the outsider John Anderson.
But in 30 states working people will be able to vote for a socialist alternative to these politicians.
Andrew Pulley, steelworker from Gary,
• also running Ior te Socialist Workers Party American supporters of the Fourth International.
Myth
His campaign challenges the myth that the only road for the American labour ment is Io support Carter's Democratic Party.
Pulley became a socialist -during the Vietnam war. While
opposed the war, and along with seven other GIS was arrested and court-marshalled.
e. He became nationally known through the Care. campaign as one of the Fort Jackson Eight. Later he was to become prominent in the struggle for black rights throughout tre United States.
Pulley believes that working people should have their own A MIL presidential elections.
Oil
'Working people need their own party. Both the Democrats. and Republicans represent the oil, steel and auto companies. We need our own labour party, fased on the unions. workers their own voice.
More and more American • trade unionists are becoming aware of the need for a new independent party.
INTERNATIONAL
US election campaign hots up
The Democratic Party has always been associated with the actor, the union movement: But disillusionment with policies has question of who trade unionists should back.
Anthony Mazzocchi, health and safety director of the Oil, Chemical, and Workers Union, expressed this sentiment pointed out that In- Democratic Party is the party of Oil. We have to be naive not • Ene move-
later to see that, and we need a new political mechanism, and that's the a labour party.'
Mazzocchi was speaking at à major union-sponsored conference to discuss Big Business on the Rampage'.
He told the conference that they should be running didates who are products of the labour movement. I don't want individual the entire community. I want someone who represents us, period.'
Other leading unionists, like Henning Californian AFL-CIO equivalent of the TUC)
VOTE
Socialist Workers
PULLEY
for President
also supported the demand for a new party.
When Pulley Carter's right- labour party, he also says what posed the that party should do
He wants a fighting labour party, that could halt the rundown of industry for the nationalisation of those industries causing
Atomic cies.
Pulley says that the labour when he party he wants
'the organise massive support for demonstrations in the interests working people,
M Pulley&
Zimmermann
in 80
SOCIALIST
ORKERS!
marches to support the Equal Rights Amendment (ERA for women's rights), stop the draft, shut down nuclear power plants, and end Ku Klux Klan terror and police shootings of blacks':
can- Miami
Pulley and his SWP supporters aren't wald represcils
waiting for this party to be formed by the union leaders.
They are using their campaign to talk with ordinary workers, the black militants, (the rights activists have take the next steps towards it. They have produced extensive material on a variety of national campaigns, and are using the opportunity of the elections demonstrations like those publicise support of the ERA.
THERE's not much difference between the three main didates running for president. Carter. Reagan and Anderson all share the outlook.
Writing election manifestos for American politicians is a very tricky job.
The main yardstick is that they should be as vague as possible and avoid committing the candidate to any specific actions.
But the sallic isn't present when it comes to which class they support.
It should be easy to spot which class Carter supports. As president he has masterminded the attempted invasion of Iran, eight million unemployed, and increased against immigrants and blacks.
But although Carter, like the other main represents the interests of a tiny minority, he has to have the votes, of working- people M
demands
their solidarity
by fighting harassment.
redundan-
emphasis
would . 'help
revolution.
next president of sitting around
and women's about how
and build
order to get elected. can-
Carter
same basic
MX missile ruling CaSS
Hissues bombers. varucics.
Call ll.
host around the world.
discrimination
candidates,
services.
When blacks took to the streets in Miami against the racist acquittal of a white cop, Pulley and a team of campaign workers went down to show
and help organise against further police
He has also campaigned to defend the popular revolutions in Iran and the Caribbean, and a feature of the campaign is its
on organising solidarity with the Nicaraguan
Andrew Pulley won't be the SO
the United States. But it would be a better world to live in if he was.
Socialist Workers
candidates say...
"Working people
keep the country
running: working
people should run
the country."
Three of a kind
So the
ampaign is spiced with pro
nises of jobs and a better life government
opposes federal funding for jobs programmes and abortions for poor women.
Yet he supports the $34 billion
sysicill. Reagan also supports this new system.
Anderson is against it but only because he prefers more concentration on Cruise for
and long-range Anderson schemes
They differ not on whether dependency' there should be military expansion, but simply on the best way
All three can didates support NATO, and a American
reactionary regimes them has
At home they all favour more tax cuts for the rich American workers do not have a National Health Service, other benefits like free schools.
But none of these candidates proposes to establish such basic.
STOP
NUCLEAR
POWER!
VOr
nato
the
Illai SWP ed
man.
Reagan talks about 'fiscal and monetary restraint' to curb
spending They •propose to cut the small welfare benefits that already exist.
The economic recession is now starting to hit American
have Unemployment short-time working are increasing in steel, cars and rail.
Again there is no provision unemployment denounces such 'fostering
All these Canoearer are financed and supported by the
bosses. None of policies that can counter the threat of war, stop
and defend democratic rights.
With 20 million trade union members, and three candidates who all want to introduce anti-union laws. it is becoming more has and, more obvious that working people need them own party.
Democrats
THE United States is supposed to be the home of democracy. The electoral system is used as a model for other countries.
But in actual fact the two party system is designed to ex. clude other candidates from the
especially socialists like the SWP
The Democratic Governor of California, Jerry Brown, is currently trying to prevent all
SWP candidates from apeparing on the state's ballot form. Apart from Pulley for president and Matilde Zimmer-
for vice-president, . the are running George Jackson for the Senate and Mark Friedman for Congress.
The campaign is particularly embarrassing for Governor Brown, since Friedman's "Democratic opponent is the Grand Dragon of the racist Ku Klux Klan.
The Democratic and Republican appear automatically on the ballot, but minority parties have to collect signatures from registered elec • specified number
The California legislators demanded 101,300 signatures for the SWP candidates to get on the ballot. They were hand.
145,000 for Pulles 139,000 for Johnson and Fried.
Electoral officials ruled however that most of the • signatures Welc not from registered voters and were therefore invalid. Johnson claims that this attack on the SWP's democrati rights Dolitically motivated
"The Democrats', he says, 'see the SWP's campaign as encouraging independent political action at the very
when the state trade umon movement is aiscussing the need for a labour party.
Johnson and Friedman taken * Governor Brown to court for open violations of the state election laws. They are confident that they will win, and that their case will help to expose the real nature of the American electoral system.
For this kind of harassment is not just confined to Califor nia. In Missouri, for instance the authorities are trying the same trick although the SWP has collected almost double the number of signatures required.
By the time of the elections the SWP will have collected hundreds thousands of signatures to place socialists on the ballot in more states than
Never previously been achieved by a socialist party:
Page 14 scan of this page
LETTERS
YOUR article 'A political revolution is needed in Poland' contained more than the usual number of Leninist falsifications. You claim that 'in no theoretical document of Marx, Engels, Lenin or Trotsky and in no programmatic document of the Third International under Lenin (sic!) did... defence of the one-party system appear'.
Lenin first: 'Yes, it is a dictatorship of one party! This is what : we stand for, and we shall not shift from that position... 1919, in Collected Works, Vol. 29, p 535). Next, Trotsky: '...we are the only party in the country, and in the period of the dictatorship it could not be otherwise' ("The New Course', 22 December 1923, in The Challenge of the Left Opposition, p.78).
Even when driven into opposition by Stalin, Trotsky did not yield on this point, insisting on "the Leninist principle, inviolable for every Bolshevik, that the dictatorship is and can be realised through the dictatorship of the party, and that 'the dictatorship of the proletariat demands at its very core a single proletarian party': (The Plat, form of the Left Opposition, 1927, pp. 62, 111).
As late as 1937, we find Trotsky still defending the objective necessity' of 'the revolutionary dictatorship of a proletarian party' ('Dictatorship and Revolution', 23 October 1937, in Writings 1936-1937, p. 513).
The same concepts of party dictatorship are discernible in basic documents of the pre-Stalinist Comintern. 'Political power cannot be seized, organised and operated except through a political party',
No lesser evil
IN your 28 August issue in the 'Around the World' column you have a little piece on the United States which deserves a comment.
The piece describes the victory of Gerald Carlson in a Republican Party primary in Michigan, pointing out that Carison is a member of the Ku Klux Klan, the John Birch Society, and
It concludes: With S0 Or. allies like that the prospect of Ronald Reagan becoming the next president gets more frightening every day.
You could have easily written a piece about Tom Metzger winning the Domocratic Porty's Congressional primary in San Diego, California. Metzger is an open member of the KKK and is running a campaign he describes as 'racist'.
Would you then write: 'With allies like that the prospect of Jimmy Carter becoming the next president gets more frightening every day"?
The unfortionate implication of the piece is that somehow Carter is a lesser evil than Ronald
Reagan and the
Republican Party is
somehow "to the right' of
I think you should be
careful about getting
caught up in the Ronald
Reagan Neahderthal' syndrome since it implies
.......
Party or class?
' (31 July, Martin Luther King pulls a KKK burning cross out of his lawn that individual candidates rather than ruling class interests determine policies of the number one imperialist power.
I am reminded of a letter I saw in a newspaper here in 1965, after the Johnson-
More on the F.I.
please
IN the new, improved but tain (edited)
hopefully not 'more-
recognition that the paper
is sponsored by the Inter-
national Marxist Group,
British section of the
Fourth Internatipnal (no from
initials please
still some people who
don't know whạt they
"stand for)?
Will it regularly con-
insisted the 'Theses on the Role of the Communist Party in the Proletarian Revolution' (July 1920). 'Only if there is such a disciplined organisation of the working class elite (sic!) is it possible to surmount all the difficulties confronting the workers' dictatorship on the mor-
therefore to 'take in tow' the Soviets, thereby making nonsense of Lenin's cynical slogan issued before the October Revolution of 'all power to the Soviets'. And was it not the same Lenin who told the Ninth Congress of the Bolshevik Party in March 1920 that 'the will of a class may sometimes be carried out by a dictator, who sometimes does more alone and is frequently more necessary' (CW, Vol. 30, p.
Marx's admirable axiom that 'the emancipation of the working classes must be conquered by the working classes themselves': Yet I quote: "The thesis that the emancipation of the proletariat can only be accomplished by the proletariat itself must be modified, either in theory or in practice, to mean that it is the revolutionary party's task to emancipate the proletariat and to establish the workers' state on behalf of the proletariat - first in the latter's name and then, in certain historical situations, against
outlines what he terms the 'dialectic between the vanguard and the
Bureaucracy which, I see, you are advertising. Your comments please.
Goldwater race, when Johnson ran and won on a 'peace platform against the 'war monger'
The letter extolled the virtues of the US democratic process.
The writer stated: "They told me that if I voted for Goldwater we'd statemen from United workerist-than-thou' Secretariat of the Fourth Socialist Challenge will we International? Will it refer perhaps begin to see some to the work of the Fl's
other sections more than it has done? Will it perhaps ticles or even comments SCARIN on events in their countries?
I bloody well hope so,
ROB' JONES, London N16
that the
Trotsky
be.
Was it
that the dicFestival for women's rights labour movement, but this has proved difficult. the venue, (4) the day's events.
NAC Steering Committee.
I voted for Goldwater and sure enough we have a half a million troops in Vietnam.
Finally, regarding the electoral preferences of
Shattering the
past JACKIE Charlton left the pitch in tears. Why the press outrage? He and the Sheffield Wednesday players he manages had just been
Oldham.
Cup.
to accept the theory - a totally idealist one from the viewpoint of historical materialism -that the dictatorship of the proletariat can only be expressed through a regime of workers councils. This theory, common among state capitalists and anarchists, would put the destruction of the Russian revolution somewhere in 1918! Indeed, to be very strict, was there ever a socialist revolution in Russia at all?
Or again, let's take the quote that Blick has dug up from the Comintern that 'Political power cannot be seized, organised and operated except through a political party. Only the most biased reading of that quote could suggest that it was meant a: anything other than an emphasis on the need A PLANNING group, open to all women, has been meeting to organise a broad-based event which would attract as many women as possible who would support a festival for women's rights -against Tory attacks. We decided it was importan to have as wide a sponsorship as possible from women's organisations, unions, campaigns and the
At the national planning meeting of the National Abortion Campaign in July the aims and motiva
However there were disagreements over the date suggested (7 March - International Women's Day Women's Day (which will be 7 March next year) is traditionally the day for women-only marches and events and NAC therefore will not sponsor the festival on that date and proposes that either (1) the date be changed or (2) the festival' is made women-only, in which case sponsorship would be
The planning group definitely wants to organise a festival for womens rights against Tory attacks
this decision of NAC has been reiterated by other groups and individuals in the women's movement, it is essential that the date of this festival and whether it is women-only should be rediscussed and finally decided at a planning meeting from 2pm to 6pm on October 4 at the intensive English School, 21 Star Street, London W2.
It is essential that all women supporting this festival are involved in making the final decisions. The agenda for the day will be: (1) the date of the festival, (2) whether it should be women-only, (3)
THE PLANNING GROUP (with agreement
the KKK has, , in fact, been part of the Democratic Party, not the Republican Party.
WILL REISSNER, New York
image of Charlton. alone, struggling
Kings and desires.
even family at-
for a revolutionary party to prepare for the seizure of power.
But why is it that if you have a revolutionary party then you cannot also have soviets? If you say the two are mutually exclusive, then you end up with an anarchist theory of opposition ic poltical parties as such. The workers should just wait around for the soviets to arise!
Robin Blick has managed to find some quotes in which Lenin appears to say that the Bolsheviks stand for one party dictatorship as such. For every one of these, you can find dozens which say the precise opposite.
The danger of selec tive quotation is best highlighted by his cita tion from Mandel. In fact this is a proof reading error! In the first edition of the pamphlet (we'll We're a union — support us
Last year the Nationa
— allack•
send a photocopy to Blick on request), the sentence reads: "The thesis that the eman cipation of the pro letariat can only be ac: complished by the pro letariat itself must not be moditied..
The quotation as it stands is so obviously in contradiction to the whole of the rest of the pamphlet that it is difficult to see how Blick could genuinely have taken this to be Mande real position Perhaps the fact that Robin Blick's experience of Trotskyism' has been that of the Healy/Lambert school has led him to believe that Trotskyism serious ly stands for the libera tion of the working class 'on behalf of the workins class or even against it'. Rest assured com rade Blick, that is not our view. —EDS banned. you soon.
They are kriown as 'football thugs'. but iust as a supporter doesn't stop thinking of his/her club after leaving the ground, so youth, passing through the turnstile on the way in, don't discard men conalton as unemployeu o low paid, sexually and racially op pressed, prospectless victims of the capitalist crisis.
The response to their anger will presumably be more rigid crowd control - as a consequence of the crisis the strong state is needed in the football ground as well as outside the factory. The outrage of the police, national, and local icons for a few minutes on a Satur day afternoon — all these are measures of the potential of a correct revolutionary strategy for youth struggles.
KEVIN DAVEY, Brighton
Page 15 scan of this page
Bias, distortion, and plain lies
For Pol Pot, thank Washington
UNDER REVIEW
By Colin Robinson Socialist Challenge readers who failed to switch off their TVs after Playhour couple Thursdays ago will have seen the TUC passing a resolution which attacked the bias of the mass media and demanded the right of reply for the workers'
The issue will come in for further When Labour Party meets Blackpool at the end of this month. An opportune time, then, for the appearance of two new publications dealing with the right-wing distortions of press and broadcasting.
In The Media Machine (Pluto Press, £4.95), Downing takes a long and comprehensive look at the sympBy Paul Lawson JOHN Pilger's film shown on TV last year, Cambodia Year Zero, brought home millions of people in the devastation wrought on Kampuchea, first by the secret war waged by Nixon and Kiss. inger, then by the barbaric régime of Pol Pot.
The response to Year Zero was incredible. British people forked out millions of pounds for famine relief and medical aid. As Pilger says, they were mainly ordinary people could least afford it.
ATV's Cambodia One, shown on Wednesday of last week, recounted the progress that has been made since Pilger's original film. The new Vietnamese-backea regime mas been able to bring a semblance of normality to most of the
Phnom Penh has gradually brought back to life, through Hospitals have been re-built and starvation eliminated. in most parts of Kampuchea.
Jeopardy
Now the bad that have been made,
vith aid from reliel agencies, Vietnam, and the Soviet Union, are
pardy. The new régime has to put priority on rice arung, ramer Ian col
is putting an immense Kampuchea's but it a view of the need t the country's Pilger visited the 'refugee
camps in northern Thailand. These camps today are more than staging posts for Pol Pot's army.
Pilger interviewed
American advisor
The Media Machine
Atoms and mechanisms of this distortion. concentraling the way that trade disputes, blacks,
of alC unfavourably
there is much of interest in the BOOK
Absent
He mentions, the survey • ФТ 345
in bulletins on industrial disputes
in which only one out of 12 interviews. were with workers actually involved in the strike. here is an examination of the pro-police media on race issues along by the John 'public relations'
of Scotland Yard.
'Cambodia Year One'
britain who
Year
region who claimed that they been were there to co-ordinate relief
work. In fact some aid. same relief workers
Led in William book Sideshow ordinators of the American war in Kampuchea, when the US was fighting Pol Pot rather than backing him. ::The Why switch
American foreign policy in the region is now based on a tactical alliance with China against
in the Soviet Union.
backed by China; Vietnam by the Soviet Union. Blemish fight The role of the is in- States is to try, by channelling
relief to Pol Pot's army rather than the Kampuchean governand by
the recogni: ›n of the new govern. with ment, to de-stabilise the coun-
try and disrupt construction effort.
Pilger's film is an excellent exposé of the role of the West in keeping Pol Pot's guerilla ar-
carre interview in one of the refaget camps ader sted on •Monsieer Le Presideni. little I shower how
linked agencies pressarised by Western govera. ments into hel
the how the relief effort
study of the trivialisation of women's lives by the press from the 'chocolate box' covers and women of. WONCIS
portrayed, the portrayal
Castle's talks workers at Ford's as popping in for a chat and a cup of tea'.
The examples rather out of date (the chapter for example, on reporting
news disputes is illustrated, exclusively, by reference to the 1970 dock luminating nonetheless.
some of the left press for failing stance of the to provide an alternative forum
- helped
. burgeoning for the frustrations of working
department people and, while his manner is
offhand, reference to the mere And the author provides a 1 per cent of front page and inJohn Pilger with Kampuchean children. A year ago they were
puchea, financed by thousanas of ordinary people, or Inese sabotaged.
were nam-
Shawcross's
CIA co- which John Pilger's story was previous told is, at best, confused. Pol Pet, the 'Hitler of our time', appeared to have carried out mass 'fanatically left-wing'.
Pol Pot is
United
blocking UN
the rewith a Khmer
who inreferred to as
the UNwere
and
ching over of Barbara with women the Morning weight to economism. used are The one of trade union almost Machine, weakness, strike), but
Downing also has a go at Despite
describing offering solutions. arving.
is being effort theories which led the
The political framework in massacre millions.
Despite this
murder because he was
Repulsed by their methods, on target.
side lead stories on women's
Socialist Worker (from a sample survey stret-
eight years: 1970-78), and the similar paucity of attention paid to racism in
Star, does lend his argument of
thing which is totally absent from The Media
and It is big is any reference to action that could be taken to fight the bias of the media.
fascinating chapter on workers' radio stations in Italy, which have been used in a very dynamic way to promote and strengthen strug gles, the book ends up merely (TUC, 60p);
problems without
proposed
misleading,
Jer any at all.
Lest
open media: Reply
grudgingly media Pilger hasn't made much of an
understand Khmer Rouge to empty the cities and
blemish, the overwhelming thrust of Pilger's report was to blame the West for what had happened in Kam. puchea over the past decade.
Once again, John Pilger is right
Behind
The
Headlines
FOR JOBLESS
Behind The Headlines produced by the Media Working Group of the TUC, is certainly not lacking in ing.
solutions. Unfortunately, these are so flabby,
and generally useless that it would almost be better if the pamphlet didn't of-
anyone should ever doubt the TUC's commitment to good old British democracy, right from the outset the pamphlet points out how fortunate we are to have such a free and
'There is much to be proud of' in the British press and 'Our broadcasting services are widely regarded as being among the best in the world.
Amidst all this patriotic flag-waving the pamphlet does
admit the misrepresents trade union disputes.
The main problem, as the TUC sees it, is not that strike reports nearly always give only one stat of the story, our that w a society where 'the number of workers in dispute at any one time is tiny' there are any strike wuy reports at all!
In many countries strikes are simply not regarded as news but in Britain they are news and recorded in far more detail than will similar events would be in the national press in other coun tries', the pamphlet complains.
Presumably regards Pravda's coverage of the recent Polish strikes as the that sort of ideal for which we should all be working.
So what should be done about this misrepresentation of the 'tiny numbers" involved in,
jahn Downing say, the 14 May Day of Action?
The sheer audacity of the TUC's proposals is breathtak-
Print workers, lor in stance, have an important role to play by 'examining in conjunction with newspaper owners methods of achieving industrial democracy. Times workers, who recently returned to work after nearly a year of being locked-out by their management, will surely find this advice very helpful.
So, too, will workers on the Observer whose management have been trying the same trick recently, though regard their determination 1o secure a right of reply for the Grunwick strikers, securing a front-page spot after stoppin work on a Saturday night, as a tactic more likely to succeed
As to an alternative dail!" workers' well, course, this is solely marketing problem, a question of 'identifying and reaching the appropriate market'. Nothing would be worse than a well. publicised launch for newspaper which then proves 10 be non-viable; the TUC concludes in its usual rousing
You can almost hear Len leaning over 'But if this daily Terri and whispering: newspaper thing gets off the ground, thousands of workers
be reading • about policies every day — god forbid!'
That the pamphlet should • be published on the same day
Congress voted over whelmingly to secure the right of reply suggests that it will be up to militants - and not the trade union leaders - to demand and secure this right. Socialist Challenge 18 September 1980 Paise 15
Page 16 scan of this page
Socialist Challenge Dockers fight for the right to work
their jobs.
As we go to press a national meeting of dockers' delegates from the Transport Union the successful 1972 strike, has agreed to support indefinite strike action to save 178 jobs at the Liverpool docks. Tories are worried that this strike could cost British business over £100m each day.
has LLOW
Liverpool doikers could find other jobs. Liverpool is typical of most major industrial areas - the Tories want to close it down.
But now Liverpool's dockers have decided to fight for their right to work. This is the biggest challenge to Thatcher's policies yet.
The bosses are scared. The Docks Labour Board has asked the Liverpool employers to find the dockers alternative jobs.
The employers want to buy their jobs through increased redundancy terms. Liverpool's dockers have rejected this. Instead they are preparing for all-out action.
If the strike takes place it will show every worker faced with redundancy how to fight -by militant, national, industrial action.
All over the country thousands of workers face the sack. A victory on the docks will
BRITISH dockers are ready to strike to save transform the prospects for a fightback
against unemployment.
The dockers need to organise to win. In non-registered ports to break the strike. This The ahme ricy should be closed down through mass picketing.
Prior's law shouldn't stop the pickets. The reached two steel strike showed that effective picketing is million. and there is little chance that the needed to win, and that means closing down
manufacturing industry.
Fords import most of their components -they should be closed down. All food imports should "be stopped.
Dockers have always been the first to support other strikers. In Liverpoo hey the National willing to take strike action to help steelworkers. Solidarity from movement will make sure they win The Tory press has already started to attack the dockers. Only last week the same hack writers were applauding the actions of Polish dockers in toppling the Gierek regime.
If the strike starts, the employers and their friends In the Tory government everything to make sure their side wins. We have to do the same. A victory for the dockers will be a victory for the right to work.
INDIA & MILLMALL DOCKS
JOINT SHER STEVANS COMMITTEE
DOCKERS
PICKET
Turkey
the Tories used
THElong expected military coup in turkey ha occurred. Over the past lew weeks poinica murders have rocketed, Party government had been incapable of solv ing.
an even handed approach. All
the labour
'eft and right unions have been banned. the Confederation of Prosressive
the organised workers broken,
will
generals are no friends of the workers.
too?
10).
start. underlining the chronic political crisis which Demirers Justice
The army has tried to give the impression o
the leading politicians have been arrested, and political ac
Owed with the trade unions - both
But the main target 1s the biggest union
Workers Unions (DiSK), The generais are just putting a temporary muzde on the Grey Wolves so that
movement can be
No-one should have any Illusions the
* Turkey Under the Generals - see page
'COVERAGE of Poland has been brilliant'; writes Mike Holbrook this week with an £8 donation to the Fund Drive. If you agree and wish to see Socialist Challenge continue to give full coverage to important workers' struggles in the rest of the world then why not send a donation
Next week we'll be producing the first issue of the new look Socialist Challenge. To celebrate the event — and to raise some funds — there will be a mammoth social in London on Saturday 2t September at Caxton House (for details see page
Outside London, we hope that readers will make a massive effort to send in donations so that we can announce a really big total next week to help give the new look paper a good financial
Our thanks this week to:
D. Ross £10.00 Bath IMG 2.75 E. Mahood 10.00 D. Power 5.00 G. Tomlinson 10.00 I. Miles 2.50 M. Holbrook WEEK'S TOTAL £48.25 GRAND TOTAL £440.02 ROUT THE TORIES!
Demonstrate
10 October
Midlands Carworkers and Inner London Schoolkeepers are among the latest to pledge support to the 10 October demonstration against unemployment at the Tory confernec in Brighton. Tickets for train (leaves Victoria 10am £3 return) from RTWC, 265a Seven Sisters Rd., London N4
← Socialist Challenge No. 163, 11 September 1980Socialist Challenge No. 165, 25 September 1980 →