workers press

The Socialist Labour League's press: The Newsletter, Workers Press, Labour Review and Fourth International, 1952–1973. A searchable archive of the scans

Big response to return of UCS £100

By Ian Yeats

Workers Press no. 735, 10 April 1972 · scan page 12

Topics: Shipbuilding and UCS, Ireland, Tory government

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CHEERING broke out at the Young Socialists' Scarborough conference when John Barrie, leader of the Scottish Right - to - Work march, announced that £100 donated by the shop stewards' co-ordinating committee at Upper Clyde Ship builders had been returned last Friday.

Advertisements placed by the committee in both the 'Morning Star' and "Tribune' subsequent to the donation had told 'blatant lies', comrade Barrie said. They had implied the YS 'conned' the money from the shop stewards.

He went on: 'It gives me great pleasure to announce that we have given back the £100. We have given back the dirty money. This was a decision taken by all the marchers at the Wembley rally?

John's voice was then drowned by a chorus of cheers and clapping.

Explained comrade Barrie: *By putting these advertisements in the press, the Stalinist-dominated co-ordinating committee stabbed in the back . the Right-to-Work marchers and the Aight for jobs by the unemployed youth.

They lined up with the enemies of the working class.' David Barclay, delegate from Glasgow YS, said the UCS Stalinists had consistently tried to sabotage the struggle for jobs on the Clyde.

"They have flown on planes chartered by the "Daily Express" to have tea and biscuits with Scottish millionaires. They have split the unity of the four yards. They have continually retreated before John Davies, Edward Heath and the liquidator.

'Is this the way to fight unemployment? We say "No, this is not the way." The right to work can only be fought for by staging a real occupainto a movement which unites tens of thousands of youth to provide the basis for transforming the Socialist Labour League into the revolutionary party, to defend the basic rights of the working class through the revolutionary overthrow of the capitalist system and its replacement by a socialist society.' Speakers from all the marches joined in the discussion.

Les Pankhurst, leader of the Kent march, said that since his contingent had returned home they had continued their fight against the Tories armed with all that they learned on the march.

'We have started a fight that we will not give up when the going gets rough, , he said. 'We will fight to the final victory of the working class against the capitalists of this country.' The leader of the Liverpool march, Christine Smith, said the main fight during the march had not been against blisters and physical tiredness but against the right-wing Labourites.

She said that at one town the marchers were denied facilities because a Labour candidate suddenly withdrew his support on the grounds he 'had his career to think of. And she pointed out that the 'Militant' group who run the Labour Party YS had totally opposed the marchers on the Liverpool trades council.

Mary Houlihan, of Brixton YS, said: "The right to work is really the most basic right which the working class has ever won.

'But as a result of its own JOHN BARRIE tion of the yards and a campaign to mobilize the working class in action to bring down the Tory government. • 'Everyone knows that the co-ordinating committee wasn't conned into donating £100 to our fund.

"The real con has been that carried out by the Stalinists who have been given thousands of pounds by the working class. Workers expected a fight which the Communist Party had no intention of carrying out.

'It's no coincidence that on the day the Right-to-Work marchers gave them back their £100, all of the speakers at the mass meeting - except the CPers James Reid and James Airlie-spoke out against the release of ships from the yards and against further concessions to the Tories.

In • launching a conference collection, Sarah Hannigan, London YS regional secretary, called on the delegates and visitors to raise the £100 'to show the Stalinists that they can keep their money'.

A big collection, she said, would demonstrate that the working class completely disowned the Stalinist stab in the back.

After only a few minutes, the total rose over the £100mark. The final figure was £306.18.

economic crisis, capitalism is taking away this right. To take away the right to work is really to take away the right to live.' Colum Brennan, for the Irish YS in Dublin, told the conference he had recently been made redundant by the local subsidiary of Raleigh Industries, Nottingham. He said workers in Ireland were being put out of work on a scale perhaps even bigger than *I support the Irish YS and their campaign for Irish and British workers to unite against the common enemy, the Tory government. Your right to work is our right to work.' Alan Stanley, a shop steward from Vauxhall Motors, Liverpool, said the dollar decisions taken by US President Nixon on August 15 meant that things could never be as they were before.

'There can be no going back to when everything was as good as gold,' he said. 'Today there is no confidence in paper money.' Chris Wright, Doncaster YS, said the miners' strike wasn't a complete victory. 'The only real victory is the defeat of the Tory government,' he explained.

The miners'-union leaders had avoided the fight against the government not because they feared the Tories but because they feared the working class. thought comrade Wright.

He said: 'The only way to achieve socialism is through revolution. That is why we must go forward to build a revolutionary party.' end'. If more people spoke out against the terrorists they could be isolated and beaten.

And Social Democratic and Labour Party MP Mr John Hume said in the same programme that he thought the majority of his Creggan and Bogside constituents wanted to see the Tory proposals given a chance.

In Catholic churches throughout Ulster yesterday priests appealed to the IRA to end it's terror campaign.

Identical prepared statements read from every pulpit said: "Those who want Irish unity should be working hard to persuade the Protestant people that in any future arrangement they will enjoy their full rights.

"Those assurances will never be conveyed by killing and destruction. Such measures only divide Protestant from Catholic, they lead to division between Catholics themselves.' Meanwhile a Dublin conference of delegates from the 32 counties of Ireland summoned political arm of the Provisional IRA, to test Catholic republican opinion, called for 'the people's resistance to British rule to go on'.

Following last week's 'fight on' pledge by the Provisional IRA the Derry command has said it will hold a 'general election' in Free Derry to obtain a mandate for its policies.

Right-wing Protestant leader Mr William Craig has said it is the duty of loyalists to overthrow the Whitelaw administration and restore Stormont. Engineers ca for district THE policy-making body of Britain's main engineering union will face a demand to extend the Manchester pay battle to other areas when it meets next week.

The two Greater Manchester delegates to the policy-making National Committee of the Amalgamated Union of Engineering Workers are expected to call for district-wide action over the engineers' pay claim throughout the union's divisions.

They will not, however, be asking the National Committee to instruct the executive of the union to initiate national strike action over the claim abandoned at national level last year.

Tomorrow we will publish an interview with one of the Manchester delegates, Bill Anten, convenor at Hawker Siddeley's Woodford plant which was occupied by its 1,000 employees last week.

Mr Anten explains in his interview why the Manchester delegation is likely to adopt this strategy.

APRIL FUND £197.23 GREAT success of the Young Socialists conference at Scarborough indicates the growing feeling amongst the mass of working-class youth for the fight against the Tories.

Help us reach out to new layers of young workers everywhere. Extend the sales of effort for our April Fund. Post every donation immediately to:

April Appeal Fund 186a Clapham High St London SW4 7UG.

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