Rootes, Linwood Procedure deal must be rejected

By our Industrial reporter described in that deal as stuck as dockers strike Workers' Press reporter A LIGHTNING one-day strike by 30 Southampton dock workers delayed the dry docking of the liner 'Queen Elizabeth 2' on Thursday.

Other ships were trapped inside the docks.

The liner 'United States', arriving from New York, was forced to anchor in Cowes Roads and unload by tender.

The strikers, members of the National Union of Railwad the berthing of ships is Southampton's dry docks.

The dispute is over working conditions and overtime rates.

paper works the 'high', or more accurately, 'controlled , dayrate' system, Rootes obtained almost unlimited speed-up possibilities in return for very definitely limited wage improvements.

The basis for real saving in manpower' was firmly laic by the acceptance of workshe wong it of three.

Rootes' worsening financial position and falling market share means that company attempts to reap the full benefits of that agreement cannot be long delayed.

One of the questions left outstanding in Septemberlateness and timekeeping-was dealt with in a new disciplinary procedure introduced within two months of the pay deal.

That left two loopholes, the need to break the relative independence of shop stewards and to establish a cast-iron framework for pay negotia ions following the expiry o the present three-year deal.

NOT SEEN In its 'proposed recognition and procedure agreement, drawn up in September this Rootes attempts close these loopholes.

Although the agreement is due to come into force in January, we believe that few stewards have as yet had the opportunity to study its proposed terms.

One of the few who has told the Workers Press last week that Linwood workers 'should have nothing to do with it'.

The key clauses reproduced here, we believe, prove him absolutely right.

Section one-'general principles'—begins with a statement that:

"The management • believes that the efficiency and prosperity of the company car best be assisted by the closest co-operation between management and the unions.' This, on the face of it, is simply nonsense. Rootes' present economic difficulties are not determined by whether organized workers co-operate with it or not, but by the deepening crisis of the capitalist system world scale.

But it would be a mistake asked to goes on, the board simply announced that its new policy was to recruit only indentured craftsmen.

Employment

The Acton men banned overtime and the movement of staff because suitably qualified craftsmen were being denied employment to cover the vacancies that had occurred.

But nothing more was heard from the board until June this year.

Strikers allege that the NUR executive has been pressurizing the board to allow its semi-skilled members to be upgraded as craftsmen, but stress that it was the board itself which broke the agreed procedure.

Mr Victor Feather, Trades Union Congress general secretary, has been having talks with both unions in an attempt to end the strike.

TALKS on non-registered labour doing London dockers' work begin this week between the Transport and General Workers' Union and the Department of Employment and Productivity.

The talks are being held in response to pressure from the rank and file dockers committee on the No. 1 group of docks.

regard such statemer ny trade union militants as mere 'waffle'.

Rootes carefully writes them at the beginning of each of its deals as part of its irs ratind the totes othe company-an alm which is then worked out in detail in the following Once such a perspective is accepted, of counse be a positive advantage for the employer introduce 'closed-shop trade union or into plants-i order to discipline the labour for Union all edition of employment for employees who join the company on or after the effectin the event of a union mem- date this agreement. ber being expelled from his union and wishing to appeal Be retained xin em employment will pending the outcome of the appea the unions deal with there union will consult with management or shop sarward represe tatie Linwood procedure accepted, Rootes would act against militant she phrase have virtual carte-blanche to Covered over by that this will only be done in exceptional circumstances', the draft states :

'If a shop steward . . . is transferred to work permanently in another constituency, his appointment as shop stew ard automatically terminates and a by-election will be held during the following TWO weeks.' Linwood's management has recent v been giving them time off on Wednesday afternoons to watch BBC-I's 'Represent ing the Union' series.

Workers also say that Moral Re-Armament is active in the ards were recently thatanded factory and allege stewtickets for an MRA evening by a member of the manage.

JOINT TRAINING Attempts are, of course, always heing made to bring stewards stewas orbit. Rootes monoge to step up these attempts:

'Management and unions will jointly suitable training stewards in the required to enable them to carry out their duties.

'Newly-elected shop stewards will attend an induction course conducted by ployees joint , managementunion consultative committees on a departmental or shop basis in order to discuss all matters affecting the efficiency of the shop or department and thereby achieve the productivity increases required to ensure the future development pany Prosperity of the comThe lynch-pin of the whole procedure would, of course, be no unofficial or unconstitutional action by workers of any kind.

'There will be no lock-out, stoppage of work or any other action which would interfere with the normal working of the department or location until this procedure has been exhausted.' Not only Linwood workers should study these proposals.

They are the poisonous fruit of a long period of rotten local and national level treachery brought to an end.

Rootes' proposed agreement must be decisively rejected.

Basque wo Franco SHIPYARD workers in the Spanish city of Bilbao struck on Thursday when it became known that the worker shot by police in Wednesday's demonstration had died.

Police now occupy the Bilbao suburb of Erandio, which is only one of many Basque Springboks:

Sporting envoys for apartheid team, arrived in London on Thursday at the start of THE SPRINGBOKS, the South African rugby touring their 25-match tour of Britain.

kers fight regime industrial areas affected by this latest wave of unrest.

The movement is given added impetus because of the persecution of those fighting for Basque autonomy. •The Basques have their own dialect and culture, which have been brutally repressed by the fascists.

TACK deems this impractical, in which case men will be redeployed?

Work-study and methodstudy would be accepted onto the docks under the deal.

Both supervisors and dockers themselves would be sent to work-measurement courses, paid at their basic rate.

Splitting

These screws would • be tightened by splitting the men into 'A' and 'B' grades, with those in the 'A' grade classed fit for any duty they may be called on to perform.

'B' grade dockers would have certain light duties, but if they refused or were unable to do any, it is thought they would quickly find themselves surplus to requirements.

If a man or group of men refused work under the deal, it lays down that "(a) replacements may be put in if necessary and available;

'(b) the remaining men will work' 'When an employee regularly fails to work at the accepted speed, the deal also states, 'he will be subject to the disciplinary provisions of the Dockworkers' Regulation of Employment (Amendment) Order, 1967:

This provides, of course, for periods of suspension and ultimately for sackings.

In return for this, the employers are refusing to raise their pay offer from the £33 10s. for 'A' men and £25 for men at which they stuck some months ago.

Union representatives, while By our own correspondent These sporting emissaries of Vorster's racialist regime flew into Heathrow airport, contemptuously dismissed an anti-apartheid demonstration, and remarked :

'We have come to play rugby and not worry about These sentiments will no doubt be endorsed by every sports lover from the Tory backwoodsmen to the Labour leadership.

After all, why should the brutal repression of millions of coloured workers in South Africa and Southern Rhodesia be allowed to interfere with a chap's sport (or his profits)?

No objection At a press conference at their London hotel, the team's manager, C. A. J. Bornman, reassured all concerned that they had not the slightest ob jection to playing against teams containing coloured players, nor to mixing with coloured people, 'provided that they are Rugby players'.

*reassurances, openly racialist only serve to emphasise the real relationship between both Labourites and Tories and the governments of Vorster and Smith.

While Wilson and company reassure the Tories and Smith that the farce of sanctions will continue, the Tories reassure the racialists that it will be 'business as usual' as soon as they return to power in Britain.

Stooges

The working class can assure the capitalists and their political stooges of one thing.

It is now on the offensive in every part of the world and will develop revolutionary parties in every country to defeat the rule of capital.

The blows being struck by the British working class against the employers and the Labour government strengthens the struggle of the African masses.

Keep the Tory racialists out by building the socialist alternative in Britain!

Arm the African workers —for the overthrow of the Smith and Vorster regimes.