Greatest day in history of Brilish Trotskyism

OVER 10,000 people at the Empire Pool, Wembley, on Sunday participated in a unique and unforgettable political experience.

They witnessed the making of the British working class in perhaps the most dramatic way ever presented. The Pageant The Road to Workers' Power' was not a play, a film, a meeting or a concert, but a political event that gathered together the representatives of the forces that will build the revolutionary party in Britain.

One thing is certain—no other movement in the country, including the Labour Party with all its resources, could have undertaken such an historic task with such outstanding success.

The scale was enormous. From nothing but the idea, and the determination to carry theory into practice and build the Party, the Pageant was created.

The total cast was 250. The bulk were workers and youth, some new to politics-almost all new to revolutionary politics. They were at the Empire Pool in costumes made by themselves-from the ragged children of the Durham mines to the railway workers of Taff Vale in 1901 in their blue serge uniforms, waistcoats and caps.

At the Empire Pool the teams from Jarrow, Manchester, Merthyr Tydfil and London met for the first time the army of technicians, lighting and sound experts and designers who all came forward and offered their services free to make the Pageant a blow against the hated Tory government.

Technically, the Pageant was one of the most advanced ever staged. Much of it was spectacle— union meetings, clashes with the police and fights with scabs. But there were many detailed scenes that could easily have been lost because of the vast size of the arena.

This is why the acquisition of an Eidophor closed-circuit television process was so important. This is a system of immediate transmission of television pictures onto a screen. The audience, therefore, could look from the floor of the Empire Pool itself to the 30 ft by 20 ft screen at the top of the arena to pick up magnified details of the action as it happened. The Eidophor was also used to carry etchings and other material of the periods depicted in the four Pageant episodes as well as film of Tory leader Heath making one of his many speeches on law and order.

Funeral hymn

Music played a vital role too. The Boldon colliery prize brass band played in the Jarrow episode, which showed the building of the first miners' union. One tune was a victory march played at a miners' meeting. The other was the Gresford hymn, written after the Gresford pit disaster in Wales. In the Pageant the hymn was played as a funeral march hanged ample for Jobling - the miner and gibbeted as an exto all miners who stood union.

Both the Boldon colliery band and Music Force, the Manchester musicians' co-operative, got a great reception from the audience.

Vic Brox of Music Force wrote three great songs—one was a celebration Peoples' Charter of 1837 which demanded a parliamentary voice for the working class. It captured the joy and power of the first workers' mass movement.

The audience also applauded the props which included colliery trucks, a gallows and gibbet, a spoke of tea it ford racind. cannon, a small electric car, and an amazing scabs' train used Taff auring the 1 an Stirring scenes But the final scenes of the Pageant were the most stirring of all. The Eidophor showed film of Lenin and Trotsky and the storming of the Winter Palace during the Russian Revolution.

The four main characters of the Pageant, the miner Jobling, Julian Harney the revolutionary Chartist, Karl Marx and Holmes the railway workers' leader at Then Comrade Rozer Smith a member of the Central Commitee of the Socialist Labour League and in overall control of the Pageant came forward to salute these men who struggled in the past. He pledged that the movement would struggle on until the working class had the power.

The Pageant ended with the 'Internationale'-sung by 10,000 people in the hall - the new British revolutionary unguard.

MORE PICTURES - Centre pages. Above: National secretary of the Socialist Labour League G. Healy on the platform and closed-circuit TV al. the Emnira HI MIG Pool rally. Below left: Sheila Torrance and Producer Roger Smith (SLL Central Committee members) and Corin Redgrave conducting the collection. Below centre: Gary Gurmeet (Editor 'Keep Left', top) and Dave Smart (Whittington Hospital). Below: Delwyn Hopkins (Shotton steelworks action committee, top) and Tom Thomas (Roehampton hospital).

March 13, 1973 OUR OWN CORDESPON