Narrow ACTT vote to lift black on Boultings Danger stage at Shepperton studio

IAN Shepperton film studi is has now entered its most dangerous stage.

At the point where asset-stripper John Bentley looked set to scuttle himself on the rocks of workers' opposition to his plans, J. H. Vavasseur Ltd moved in.

Company officials have told union representatives that they are prepared to wait 'a year or so' to realize a return on their newlyacquired assets at Shepperton.

Simultaneously the Boulting Brothers, who were major owners in the old British Lion, have announced they will make a new film, 'Soft Beds, Hard Battles', • at the studios.

Vavasseur has removed the immediate threat of a studio rundown and the Boultings are offering the prospect of work adding extra sugar to the pill, with the hint of yet more films in the pipeline.

But before the Boultings make a start on 'Soft Beds, Hard Battles' they want the unions to lift a black imposed on them last summer.

Shepperton workers backed by three unions-ACTT, NATKE and FFU-imposed the black last August to prevent any of the British Lion directors, including the Boultings, making films anywhere but at Shepperton.

Last week the Boultings followed up their threat not to make films at Shepperton unless the black was • lifted campaign. with vicious anti-'reds' John Boulting accused a *little cabal of communists who are ideologically motivated' of preventing the black being lifted.

He and his brother would not accept any qualification to their position as 'free producers in a free society'.

He claimed the people who put up money for films did so for a 'programme' and Franco raises minimum pay: Now £7 for 48-hour week THE COUNCIL of Ministers presided over by General Franco decided at the weekend to increase the minimum wage by 30 pesetas to 186 pesetas a day.

This minimum-the maximum for many workers-will be paid as from April 1 and works out at a weekly wage of £7 for the basic 48 hours.

The fascist Press has begun a roe great sopal ustice rais this measure which will convince no worker, though it will attract even more investment from Europe and the United States.

It will certainly not deter would not be placed in a position where they had to do business with only one studio which could then make terms which were not commercial.

In the face of these offers and attacks from Vavasseur and the Boultings on Friday, March 16 a meeting of the ACT executive, which has led the fight at Shepperton, narrowly passed a resolution offering to lift the black.

It added the proviso that the Boultings give Shepperton first consideration for any future films.

The wrangle continues.

The Boultings are reluctant to give any guarantees whatever and the executive continues to insist on the proviso.

Both the unions and the workforce are mistrustful that the Boultings will make further films at Shepperton after 'Soft Beds' Hard.

If the present disagreement is solved the Boultings will be free to make films wherever they please and with labour from any source.

But even it they give the ACIl the promise it wants, giving Shepperton first consideration falls far short of a cast-iron guarantee that more films will be made.

Deadline In the combination of the time extension given by Vavasseur and the lifting of the black on Boulting Brothers' films, workers see a new danger - that their numbers will be reduced and their solidarity undermined.

Among the magnates and bankers of the film industry the opinion has long been held that Shepperton should be closed and work concentrated at Pinewood-a view recently reiterated by Lord Rank.

If the Boultings starve Shepperton of films, up to a third of the 380 workers might accept offers of permanent employment already being made from Pinewood. Others on no-work pay could drift away.

steady flow of Stalinists to tascist On Sunday, the official bulletin of state published the final ratification of the protocol for trade between Spain and the Soviet Union, signed by Franco in February.

Two of the basic points in protocol are: • The buildings necessary for the tions will have munity. • The members of respective delegations will enjoy freedom of movement in the country, but will not be able to carry out any commercial or professional business for personal gain.

As Franco himself sealed the rapprochement, between Moscow considered as use of delegadiplomatic imISH TIC If in a year's time-Vavasseur's deadline—it turns out that there is little or no new film work in sight for the studio and the workforce has been depleted, workers fear the new owners would then seize the chance to implement the original Bentley plan , for carving up Shepperton.

Under it 60 prime acres are to be sold for building development and the studio stages, workshops and cutting rooms drastically truncated.

Counting Three weeks ago a mass meeting of the studio workers formally rejected the Bentley deal-including its offer of 50 per cent of the shares in the new company.

Vavasseur are almost certainly counting on how much this rejection will be worth in a year's time, possibly under very different circumstances.

and Madrid publicly, the president of the Soviet firm 'Mashinoexport, Borontsov, arrived in Madrid.

He is to attend the inauguration of a new factory in Alcala de Henares devoted to building pre-fabricated houses. It is equipped entirely with Soviet machinery.

Borontsov and his entourage of bureaucrats will then go to Barcelona for talks with Catalan employers and will visit the 'Carbones de Berga' mines shortly to be fitted with Russian machinery.

In Vigo, Ol Tuski, technical chief of the Cuban fishing fleet, has been discussing orders for several ships to be built in the yards where police have clashed violently with strikers. John Boulting of the Boulting Brothers team which is to make 'Soft Beds, Hard Battles' at Shepperton. They are not bound in any way to use the studio for any future work, especially since the film union ACTT lifted its black on any move.

SLL LECTURE

SERIES Socialist Revolution Middleton Manchester •angley Community Centre Middleton Sundays: April 1 and Lectures given by Cliff Slaughter (SLL Central Committee) The Socialist Revolution In Britain: 2. The roots of capitalist crisis: Marxism and the contradictions of capitalism. Britain and the world crisis. 3. The state and revolution. Reformism and revolution in Britain. The fight for democratic rights today means preparing for working-class power. Basic reading:

Perspectives for transforming the SLL into a Marxist Analysis of the Crisis. Problems of the British Revolution (Trotsky).

Death Agony of Capitalism and the Tasks of the Fourth International, Communist Manifesto