Big lobby for £20 claim Dustmen are determined to win strike

CARDOWAN COLLIERY, near Steppes, Lanarkshire, is to close in December. The pit produces 650,000 tons of coking coal a year, which up to the present time has been consumed by Colvilles steel mills.

Exhibition

men threaten national strike EXHIBITION workers in many parts of Britain are threatening to stage a two-day unofficial strike on Monday and Tuesday over their deadlocked pay negotiations.

stand-fitting and electrical inasked for their basic rate to hour to 14s. The employers have offered Ils. 7d. (P.A.) CARDOWAN PIT TO CLOSE According to an official From Mickie Shaw They are to obtain coking coal from Yorkshire in future.

The whole idea is ludicrous as the coal can be obtained on Colvilles own doorstep.

It would be a simple enough matter for the National Coal Board to work out a compensating national price structure so that no section of miners is penalized through the differential of production costs.

Moreover, since steel is also a nationalized industry, the profits from steel should be set against any loss borne by the colliery supplying the coal required to fuel the mills.

Under socialist nationalization such integration would Laurence Harris, the 26-year- be entirely possible. arraigned before a special Customer tribunal in connection with events at the School last According to the NCB it is 'the customer who closes the Mr. Harris was the last of pit'. three staff members to appear What they mean, of course, After two earlier hearings is that if large profits cannot the governing body dismissed be extracted from the exploitNation of miners, then the men Nicholas Bateson on charges must join the army of unin connection with the same employed.

The choice allowed to ColAll three were accused of villes to obtain cheaper coal having taken part in or sup- from Yorkshire pits is not exported the students when they tended to the domestic contore down 'anti-riot' gates and sumer.

The housewife must meet The 'trials' followed an un- every increase in the price of precedented witch-hunt in the house coal—or go without.

The Socialist Labour No such ultimatum is made League's position in relation to Colvilles. to this question has always B-P boilermakers throw out to any restrictions on the political rights of students and The real 'crime of Blackburn and Bateson in the eyes of the governing body is that they supported the students RANK AND FILE pressure in opposition to the reaction- has forced the Amalgamated Society of Boilermakers leaders to withdraw from a opinions that were on trial.

productivity agreement Though we are opposed to signed for all trades at the the political position of the British - Petroleum site at ictimized lecturers, we sup Grangemouth. port unconditionall their When the boilermakers reright to propagate and fight fused to work to clauses in the July 1968 agreement The decision in the Harris which provide for produccase throws into question the tivity and interchangeability dismissal of his two colleagues. between trades, they were Students must nght tor the issued with a week's notice. inconditional reinstatement of At a mass meeting last Thursday the notices were They should be backed by withdrawn for further talks after the employers had This is the only way to rushed to Brighton to interdrive back the attack on poli- view Dan McGarvey, ASB tical rights in the universities. affects more than four million people.

In a militant lobby of Friday's Caxton Hall negotiations, about 600 strikers showed a clear determination to win.

'We're not going back' was the main slogan shouted. Another popular shout was We want five!' After the meeting, Mr Peter Evans, chairman of the union negotiating side, told the men that if the matter was not resolved satisfactorily at the next day's national negotiations the strike would be made official by the Transport and General Workers' Union.

Follow

Officers of the other unions involved-the National Union of Public Employees and the General and Municipal Workers' Union - indicated that their unions would follow suit.

Mr Evans, a T&GWU regional trade group secretary, said that the council employers had deplored the unofficial action and asked the unions to obtain a return to work.

Dustmen were incensed by the employers' assertion that they already operated an incentive bonus scheme paying £20 a week.

During the lobby I was shown pay slips on which the basic wages after stoppages came to less than £14.

Bonus tost

Bonus could not be counted on, the dustmen said. Overtime and early morning money lost during sickness and at holiday times.

One of the banners read : 'Basic wage £15 9s.: Rubbish'.

A lobbyist told me negotiations for an extra 18s. had dragged on since last July. diabolical over to made a offer of 10s.

'After 30 years on the council all I get is £13 17s. 8d. with four kids to bring up; he said.

There were immediate shouts of 'No! We work hard enough!' when Mr Evans reported after the meeting that the councils wanted more productivity.

All those Worker intered be the Press were quite adamant about rejecting any productivity deal.

They already work vehicles short-handed at certain times.

No deal As one dustman said: 'We just want a basic £20 and no productivity deals-these just cut our throats.

Other local authority workers are joining the strike.

Caretakers and porters from Tower Hamlets, on strike since Tuesday, joined Friday's lobby.

Evans' statement that the employers were being irresponsible' and did not reall understand the situation opens up big dangers for the strike.

The first is that the T&GWU's 'high wages, high productivity' policy paves the productivity deal To enable the ASB leaders to sell the agreement the employers offered a 3s. to 3s. 6d. an hour rise.

CHEQUE

This has the full support of the Department of Employment and Productivity, provided the productivity clauses are carried out in a normal 40-hour week.

Study of the agreement shows that if introduced the employers would be presented with a blank cheque.

Clause four cancels all previous agreements, clause that the agreement Dustmen voted to more this rubbish from Ridley Road tool Children! London, when it was declared a healet hazard to way for deals like the Lam- Labour government's wages beth dustmen's ' settlement policy. earlier this year.

Of course, the employers called for by Haringey council, do understand the situation— could well lead to attempts the Labour government will to engineer a sell-out through back them up to the hilt in productivity concessions in resisting the claim. Dustmen must prepare for This must be decisively rea political struggle against the jected.

ARMY BOTH SIDES remains in effect indefinitely.

It is clause six which has caused the main opposition since this provides for extensive inroads into trade union practices.

It requires interchangeability between all trades in the event of a labour shortage due to sickness, holidays, or any other abnormal job condition.

This could be an open door to strikebreaking when coupled with an anti-strike The agreement carries the Intervention by Mrs Castle, return for wage rises.

FASCIST CLAMP DOWN rectly be taken as a sign of weakness and only encourage the workers and students to fight even harder.

The Stalinist solution' 01 collaboration with the libas fraud and a death trap.

While the Spanish CommuParty leaders preach their policy of 'national reconcilation' with the ruling class, Franco and his big business backers prepare violent battles against the working class.

There can be no 'national reconcilation' with fascism any more than there can be 'peaceful co-existence' with imperialism.

THE Union of Post Office Workers (UPW) has put in a claim on behalf of its 195,000 members for a closed shop in post offices and telephone exchanges.

The claim follows the change in status of the Post Office from a government department to a nationalized industry, the new Post Office Corporation.

Mr. Tom Jackson, UPW general secretary, said that ASB general secretary.

Writing in the Morning Star last Tuesday, Chalmers said:

'Not least of all, one of our greatest problems these days is that of grappling with the saga of gigantic mergers, where we find the workers whom we seek to represent are at the heavy end of the stick?

When asked about the deal signed at Grangemouth Chalmers said he did not know what was going on, but he deals to the bill. productivity