EEC anxiety over $ crisis

deputy head of the Common Market Commission, has warned it would be dangerous to assume the December 18 international deal on currency realignment will establish monetary equilibrium.

Three points must be tackled immediately, he says, if another crisis is to be averted. • The need for some form of dollar convertibility to ensure the normal functioning of the International Monetary Fund. • The question of the American payments deficit. This was unlikely to be eliminated by the currency realignments and was likely to re-emerge in the next few months. forwarded the resolution , to the Sunderland Trades Council and DATAs NE district committee.

Sunderland bas the highest youth unemployment in the country.

"AUEW No I' branch' in South Shields has passed a resolution of support for the "Right-to-Work' campaign, and has called the local trades council and Tyne AUEW district committee to give the march full support both financially and to join delegations to welcome the marchers.

The Newcastle East ETU has also pledged its support.

In Middlesex, the Houns low Trades Council has past for the campaign and passed a resolution : of supvoted send a donation.

Forty night-shift workers at Power Brakes, Ports mouth, have voted to levy theil the end of We Right to-Work' marches in support of the campaign.

The factory has just been put onto a four-day week because of falling demand for commercial vehicle brake bodies.

Students too are raising support and finance.

In N London the College of Further Education has raised £10.

The London Film School has voted its full support and is organizing a fundraising event this week.

SOCIALISTS

Organized 1 • The speculative movement of capital, a problem he says must be tackled on a global scale if further monetary disruptions were to be avoided.

These points only emphasize the impossibility of agreement among the capitalist powers to 'solve' the présent crisis.

Dollar convertibility ended on August 15, when President Nixon stopped selling gold to foreign central banks.

America's gold stock

covers only about a quarter of the total dollar holdings of foreign central banks. This situation will not be radically altered if the price of gold is raised as proposed by $3 to $38 an ounce.

The end of convertibility is already interfering with IMF which can no longer accept dollar payments as an alternative to gold.

The Fund itself was the main international regulating body established to police the 1944 Bretton Woods system.

The recent currency alignments will certainly not eliminate America's balance of of payments deficit. To do this Washington must bankrupt Europe and Japan.

Currently they are demanding that Europe break down its tariff walls and open its markets to US goods.

With Common Market industry already feeling the cold wind of recession, the W European employers are in no mood to make further concessions.

The next step could well be an even larger devaluation of the dollar, aimed at undercutting America's competitors.

Barre's third proposal, for 'global' action to tackle movements of speculative capital, is equally Utopian.

What he terms 'speculation' is only the operation of one of the basic tendencies of capitalism, in which each capitalist seeks the most profitable outlet for his funds.

Various national economies, despite a plethora of exchange controls and barriers, are entirely at the mercy of these ALL BUT a couple of internees at the newly-opened Magilligan internment camp are teenagers-and some are as TheN ireland Civil Rights i as 16.

Association has issued details of the camp which they say can accommodate up to 240 people.

Huts are smaller than those in Long Kesh and have 20 single bunks in each.

Heating consists of one pot boiler stove in the centre of each hut and the light switches are outside the hut. There is only one entrance. Each hut has a toilet at the field end.

The only other facilities in each cage are washrooms and toilets. Like Long Kesh, the camp is watched over by four gun towers with searchlights.