The Newsletter, vol. 2 no. 44

. HIS is an historic meeting. This isthe first time we have had in London such a big gathering of building workers round a dispute. It should settle the argument . whether we want a rank-and-file committee to organize ourselves:and struggle: against ‘the employers." ~*~ McAlpine does not want a works committee on the Shell-Mex site, because a works committee would represent a united trade union movement at site level.

This is not the first occasion that Sir Robert McAlpine has done this. On the Isle of Grain McAlpine persistently refused to accept normal trade unionism on his job. If McAlpine is the enemy of the trade union movement, then the official trade union movement should declare war on McAlpine.

Because unemployment is developing in the building industry these employers cannot get back quickly enough to the ‘good old days’*when you drank your tea out of a dirty mug and had no cantéen.

(Continued overleaf) (In a speech to last Tuesday’s demonstration of central London building workers)

Rocket Bases Campaign Forges Ahead ‘BLACK THE SITES’—N. LONDON ENGINEERS London (North) district committee of the Amalgamated Engineering Union is to send a resolution to the AEU executive asking it to use all power at its disposal against rocket bases, even to declaring work on them black.

Cambridge no. 2 branch of the Amalgamated Society of

One thousand building workers employed by Sir Robert McAlpine and Sons Ltd on the Shell Mex site, South Bank, have been on strike since February 28.

In the twelve months since work began on what is the largest building site in Europe the management has constantly tried to whittle away normal negotiating rights and to. impede working agreements. In particular the workers make the following complaints:

4) McAlpines have refused proper negotiations with site representatives over site welfare and conditions, 2) Without consultation (i.e., contrary to procedure) a notice was pinned wp announcing that holidays would be taken from April 2 to April 10—from the middle of one week to the middle of the next. This is a breach of the agreement in the industry that holidays will comprise six consecutive working days.

3) A large ‘redundancy’ occurs each week. Then more ~ ‘labour is taken.on. Those stood off are union members; those taken on are preferably non-unionists.

4) The management insists on the men working 56 hours a week.on days,.70:.hours: a- week on mnighis; and apparently denies the men’s right not to work overtime.

5) Site conditions are very poor. The lavatories are inadequate,. and ‘the: washitig-up arrangements for cups’ consist of one bath of water used by hundreds of men.

At Tuesday’s demonstration hundreds of workers from jobs ali over the City of London made their way toa mass. meeting, addressed by. stewards from various jobs (including Abbey Wood, where 150: carpenters are on ‘strike) who pledged solidarity with the McAlpine men, and agreed to the setting up of a solidarity committee. The workers then marched to the Amalgamated Society — of Woodworkers head office to demand that the strike be officially recognized,

Woodworkers has called on its executive committee to instruct members not to work on rocket sites. The resolution will be ‘circulated to all branches through the union journal.

Management committee of Cambridge Labour Party has unanimously gone on record against British manufacture of the H-bomb and against the construction of rocket bases in Britain.

Cambridge Trades Council wants the ‘ending of H-bomb tests and the grounding of American H-bombers in Britain.

AND LAMBETH WORKERS SAY ‘BLACK THEM’

Lambeth Trades Council has passed a resolution asking the Trades Union Congress to declare all. work on rocket sites black. - The resolution was submitted by Brixton branch of ‘the Electrical Trades Union.

.

Manchester branch of the National Union of Sheet Metal Workers and Braziers has submitted a resolution to the -.union’s annual conferencé on the blacking of rocket bases.

It_ calls on the executive to propose to the ‘Trades Union Congress and to the Confederation of Shipbuilding and Engineering Unions that all work on the construction or maintenance of rocket bases be declared black.

_ Out of 70 motions on the preliminary agenda of the Boilermakers’ Society’s annual conference (to be held in Scarborough on June 3 6), 24 refer to nuclear-weapons and rocket bases. © - Glasgow no. 11 branch believes that ‘Britain should— unilaterally, if _necessary—renounce the ‘use of nuclear weapons’ and ‘advocate the destruction. of existing stock piles of these weapons’.

“47

A STORY is circulating—and there is good reason SOUTH BANK STRIKE (Continued from front page)

We should.congratulate the men on the Minter site on their successful go-slow which got back the shilling that was knocked off their bonus.

co accept it as authentic—that at last week’s meeting of the Labour Party and Trades Union Congress international committees, which issued a milk-and-water statement on nuclear weapons, Bevan proposed a pledge that the next Labour Government would never use them. The proposal was rejected. Seven years ago Bevan resigned office over something much less important than the H-bomb. Today, seeing the growth of public feeling against the. bomb<and the rise of a Labour Left that "Yefies the efforts of the most charitable interpreter independent of his, influence;..be-makes,. first-a:.speech:

to grasp his position, and now a feeble attempt to ride two horses at once.

_ The H-bomb is tearing to shreds the reputations of reformists of all shades. It-is the supreme touchstone by reference to which social and political trends are being judged. The dangers involved in the continued manufacture of this weapon are so appalling to contemplate that the workers have the right to put to every public ‘figure, every party and every movement the simple question: ‘Are you for or against British manufacture of the bomb?’ To support British manufacture means to support a. weapon being in the hands of men who (a) cannot foresee more than the immediate, short-term effects of its testing and use; and (b) are imperialists -who hate Soviet Russia and for forty years have itched to destroy it.. This weapon would bring incalculable --harmand_suffering to the Russian people and would make life in Britain at the least a misery and very likely impossible.

* Y think the building employers are e being encouraged by the Tories. But above all else they are being encouraged by our official trade union leadership.

This Amalgamated Society of Woodworkers with 200,000 members, this Transport and General Workers’ Union with over a-million members, have got the power to crush McAlpine tomorrow if they would use it.

.

The only serious struggle that the ASW has led in the. past five years has been a struggle as to who would bore a hole in a Merseyside ship. They called for union solidarity against another union.

These people are not fit to lead a trade union movement. In my opinion-they are traitors to.the class they represent. -We must say to them we want holés bored. in McAlpine!

That is what we want our trade union strength used for.

Fight the employers’ lackeys Don't become down-hearted and leave the unions. Remain within the unions and drive out those who are the lackeys of the employers.

If a rich man has a little dog he puts a band round his neck and inscribes it ‘Fido’ or “Tiddley’; There are many of our trade union leaders who are knights or MBEs.

In my opinion they are wearing the gold band of the employer. The sooner they get back to reality the better.

We should consider first of all a declaration of solidarity with the McAlpine men. We should send resolutions from our jobs and branches to the union executives asking them We should raise the utmost finance to send to these men to maintain them in their dispute. 1 would like to see a meeting of all the shop stewards who are here, plus the McAlpine stewards, so that we can plan a common struggle.

We-should_give_all_our_best wishes _to_the. McAlpine men.

and hope their victory will be one step towards the nationalization of our industry in a socialist manner, towards getting rid of these employers altogether.

~ By Coun. David R. Smith

The question to. ask, then, about last week’s Labour Party and TUC statement is: ‘Does it support unilateral renunciation?’ No, it does not, and only a shameless sophist or one utterly blind to the scientific, military, medical and political realities of the nuclear- world could welcome this statement. as a step forward. To postpone renunciation or. make it contingent on any conditions whatever is to enter. into a conspiracy with Ducan Sandys. If the leaders of the Labour movement do not come out. unreservedly -against.the bomb, then they are aiding and abetting a policy which could mean disaster for Britain. And the same goes for the leaders of the Communist..Party, who congratulate the Labour leaders on their temporizing statement,” and whovare™ therefore failing miserably to defend the Soviet Union against imperialism. Rank-and-file members of both the Labour Party and the Communist Party must speak out against their leaders’ policies before it is too late. On the H-bomb there can be no compromise. It is a filthy weapon. It is a boomerang. The British workers should have no part in it. They should declare all work on the bomb and the rocket bases ‘black’, appeal to the workers of other countries to follow their example, and fight these things with the same ardour and militancy they display in their struggle for jobs, wages and workshop rights. THIRTY delegates representing town councils, trade union branches, factory committees and tenants’ associations all over Scotland met the management of the Scottish Special Housing Association, which is trying to put rents up.

The management—the most hard-faced collection of business men I have yet encountered—sat in complete silence for two hours listening to delegate after delegate denouncing the proposed rent increases in the most militant terms. --—-~-—§hop stewards from the.Clyde shipyards and Rolls Royce factories made it quite clear that, with the rent increases coming on top of growing unemployment, they would be prepared to lead the workers into open struggle in the streets.

One housewife said how dependent she had been on her husband’s overtime—now that. had disappeared along with his job. She did not know how she. was going to pay the existing rent, let alone an increase of 7s. 6d.

Coun. Knox of Easthouses (Midlothian) said he did not suppose that one of the prosperous-looking gentlemen on: the’ other side of the table drew an income of less. than four figures.

Yet they were seeking to pass vicious measures against working men trying to raise a family on less than £10 a week.

Marcu 15, 1958

EATH of Walter Elliot left his wife Katie, who ‘would. like to keep [Kelvingrove]. as a kind of - memorial to her husband’ with the toughest battle of her career. If she manages to retain the seat as a monument it will rest on a large, hostile, but split anti-Tory vote.

The prevalent mood of the voters is one of fear and anger. Increased rents, probable evictions, rising unemployment and the hydrogen bomb are the dominant issues.

With an electorate of 40,000. Kelvingrove contains within its bounds the University, the ‘posh’ Park Ward (severely hit by the Rent Act), the ‘poor’ Anderston Ward (a sprawling mass of degrading slum tenements, . with their. ‘single-ends’. and outside lavatories) and ‘a_._from.Labour.-His-support-for--unilateral. action -on-the-heavy concentration of industry. Hotels, “hostels and ‘model’ lodging houses contain the floating voters.

FIRM ‘OFFICIAL’ LINE. ‘Follow Rochdale’, plead the Labour posters, and the candidate Mrs Mary McAlister tours the constituency on this platform. ‘Though supporting speakers demand the repeal of the Rent Act, local voters question the candidate’s admitted support for a ‘review’ of all rents by the Glasgow City. Council.

Declared support for the manufacture of the H-bomb, and firm support for the ‘official’ line, leave the impression. that if Labour wins it will be despite the candidate and despite policy statements.

Mrs. Elliot. has left her 5,000-acre farm on the Border GAAP A ASP ASP LDP PPD PIP LL LL LIL LL ILI III IL ILI PIII When I spoke I warned the management that the Dalkeith tenants would resist; that if new missives were served they would be destroyed; that if court action were attempted the town council would..consider_ giving financial, help_to the tenants from the Common Good Fund.

The Association chairman said no increase would be made until all views had been considered.

It is quite clear that the mass pressure since the Association first tried to increase. the rents last October has forced them to retreat. .

A liaison committee has been formed between the Dalkeith and the Easthouses tenants to co-ordinate activity.

Unfortunately the Labour-controlled Midlothian. County Council has increased its rents by 6s. a week, and in the absence of organization the tenants have signed the new missives.

A resolution condemning the increase was defeated, after a stormy three-hour debate, by the casting vote of the chairman at a special Labour Party conference. :

The Left is now charging the executive with manipulating the vote by unconstitutional means and is demanding another conference and another vote. and her fox-hunting to fight on a ‘Defend the Pound’ programme. To constituents faced with increasing local redundancy and ‘higher rents this offers little encouragement.

Tory meetings have been well attended, in the main by hostile audiences.

Vague warnings to landlords and evasive answers on the unemployment problem, even to. the extgnt of the candidate admitting that she was unaware that ships were lying idle in the Clyde, have failed to satisfy questioners.

Of the intruders into this battle, Mr William Park (Independent Labour Party), declaring himself to be the only socialist in the election, will take some votes H-bomb is the cornerstone of his campaign.

POSITIVE PROGRAMME NEEDED. The LiberalHome Rule candidate Mr David Murray is a man who has made a habit of standing under many banners. His entrance, after the announcement of television coverage of the by-election, will take a few. dissident Tory votes.

Committee ‘room reports: indicate that a high poll is to be expected in this first by-election on the Clyde since the Tory offensive got under way.

Whatever the result the reaction of the voters in the preliminary rounds shows: that.an anti-Tory platform is not enough. Labour must bring forward a positive alternative programme.

group, Mr Tom Cheney, the district organizer, Mr George Kelly, and the chairman of the Shop Stewards’ Council, Mr Bill Caldwell.

: :

They .offered an-immediate return to. work if-the fifteen sacked workers were reinstated and a disputes panel were set up to discuss alleged wrongful dismissals and the whole question of redundancy. The management rejected this offer.

‘The feeling of the workers is very strong. The solidarity is terrific, says Mr Caldwell, who is a Labour Party member and a former Councillor.

Men and women have turned out on the picket line in the bitter-cold. Neighbouring houses have. given them hot drinks.

‘We are fighting a return to the thirties,’ Dennis. Barker, secretary of the local branch of the National Union of Furniture Trade Operatives, told me.

There have been many expressions of sympathy from other trade unionists and Labour Party member in Bury, where there is increasing short time in the cotton and woollen mills, in the slipper works and engineering factories.

GEORGE MANN STEWARDS FIGHT FOR JOBS

Two Labour councillors have openly defied their group’s decision and. have lined themselves up with the Easthouses [INDUSTRY] NUFTO DECLARES BURY STRIKE OFFICIAL From Our Industrial Correspondent On Wednesday the strike against redundancy at E. Moorhouse (Apex) Ltd, Bury (Lancs) was declared official by the. National Union of Furniture Trade Operatives; the whole factory—about 200 workers—is now on strike.

This followed a meeting on Monday between the management and the national organizer of the NUFTO bedding By Stewards’ Convener J. Walls RECENT months have shown how disastrous Tory financial policy has been in restricting industrial production, Credit restrictions themselves very much reduced the amount of orders on the books of engineering firms.

Together with the lift in the Bank Rate, the result was that workshops began to look as bare as Old Mother Hubbard’s cupboard.

It was soon apparent that the employers meant to break down the shop floor organizations.

It was these organizations that had built up. earnings in excess of negotiations at national level and needed fo be . curbed. :

.

Part of the plan was, of course, to make jobs scarce in order to’ spread real fear of unemployment.

Men would not be prepared to “fight so much if it meant “being out of work--or so the. bosses think.

In the face of many attacks that are being made and will . be made, the massive strength. of the trade union movement must therefore consolidate itself.in preparation for struggle.

This is why the shop: stewards’ committee at George Mann’s -(Leeds) unanimously passed. the following resolution:

‘We feel: the Cohen report, presents a determined attack on the workers of many industries and as such stands to be - condemned.

‘It becomes more apparent that the intention is to create further unemployment and also to reduce earnings by various “means which at all costs must be opposed.

‘At this stage the miners are in the forefront with their wages claim and therefore will need: the full co-operation of the whole of the trade union movement.

+ - ‘The constant attacks that. are being made.on-the miners are a deliberate attempt to break down the benefits obtained under nationalization and it is highly necessary that the claim they are pursuing be secured. It can be if. other unions pledge their support to them.’

Marcnw 15, 1958 one groomed’. But they will not back Behan, who ‘is standing —their policy in this election is to ‘let sleeping dogs' lic’, Voting takes place in June:

BIGGEST * economy’ drive sincé nationalization is under way in the Lancashire coalfield.

Pt officials have been told that no overtime must be worked unless ‘absolutely necessary’, and one of the first steps : will probably be to abolish the ‘voluntary’ Saturday shift.

All this clearly means .a big reduction in the earnings of day-wage men, whose claim for an increase of 10s. per week has just been turned down. by the Coal Board.

This was the first time since Vesting Day that a wage-claim has been turned down flat with no compromise offer.

Then came the statement that recruitment has been stopped ‘until it is sure that all the present labour force is efficiently In turning down, the pay claim NCB chairman Sir James - Bowman—he gets £7,500 a year—said the industry could not afford it, as it would cost £11 million a year.

Abolish this yearly ransom Miners contend that what the industry cannot afford i is the £14 million a-year compensation to ex-owners. If this yearly ransom was abolished the Board could give the miners the dncrease - they: need.

There is little doubt ‘that the claim will be turned down by the industry’s arbitration tribunal, and the miners. will expect action from the-National Union of Mineworkers, The policy of ‘No jobs here’ in place of ‘Make mining your -career’, along with the attempt to form absentee committees, makes it pretty clear that the Board intends to ‘discipline’ the miners.

- The. NCB would have preferred to do this in collaboration with the union. But there is no doubt that such collaboration will meet with. rank-and-file opposition, as. in Lancashire, Yorkshire and South Wales.

« But the Board: now feels strong enough to ‘discipline’:the miners without union help. The West Midlands area has announced that absentees will be warned once, then sacked. by the colliery manager. It is expected that all areas will follow this pattern,

The Communist Party, which is not ‘putting up its own candidate against a Right-wing candidate in an election for a seat on the Amalgamated Union of Building Trade Workers executive, is refusing to-support Brian Behan. ’ Behan, a well-known militant, used to be on the executive ‘of the Communist: Party.

Prominent communists in the building trade say they. are ‘not sponsoring a candidate of their own against the sitting member, Mr Alf. Thorne, MBE, because they ‘have not got This bulletin is circulated to employers, and the black-list intention is obvious.

There is also a story on The Newsletter, headed ‘The New Left Develops’, and stating that this paper devotes itself ‘to the joint tasks of industrial agitation and “gingering-up” the Left wing of the Labour party’.

Issue no. 56 of the Economic League Bulletin, dated. March 1958, calls the building workers’ movement ‘a new extremist organization’ and adds:

‘It is clear that at the moment this new organization is

not under party domination. Ex-members of the Communist Party, most of whom resigned over Hungary, played a big part in establishing the new set-up, and are now in control.

Indeed, some opposition to the new organization came from party members ....’

The Economic League forecasts that The Newsletter will be used to ‘convey directives’ (!) to similar movements in other industries, and promises that ‘in. future issues we will have more to say about the activities of ex-party members who are now banding together in groups for the purpose of conducting industrial agitation on exactly the same lines as the Communist Party itself’.

The Economic League’s ‘Two Minute News Review’ no. 142, dated March 10, 1958, quotes from the Newsletter pamphlet ‘Black the H- “bomb ‘and the Rocket Bases’.

Under the heading ‘Industrial Agitation and National Defence’, that passage is quoted which suggests an appeal by the British. Labour movement “to thé “workers “of ‘other - De, iA a: countries. to follow our example in blacking this kind of work. This internationalism seems to have outraged the Economic League.

Marcu 15, 1958 man in the lot. They probably think that workers are sexless, :

like worker bees.’

‘Young Jeannie, who is. politically undeveloped (I said politically), though very useful at manifesto-delivering time, murmured: “I don’t know—probably the girls of today are nicer to be with than their grandmothers were, just because of all these women’s papers.’

‘Why?’ we asked.

‘Because these papers nag at us to bath often, and wash our hair and use decdorants. Just imagine, the first Queen Elizabeth never...

‘Next business!’ we told her, firmly.

- The outcome of the discussion was that we wanted women’s papers which catered for real women, with real-life problems.

‘Woman’ has several million readers, and they can’t all marry advertising executives. Some must be. married to miners, or dockers, and work in factories and shops themSELVES ie Sr ne Some day, perhaps under socialism, women will have papers ne ce re whose interests are healthy and realistic, rather than falsely emotional. But then women’s whole lives will be different.

INCREASE in the amount of building which is being done for local authorities in Yorkshire by private contract was noted with concern by the annual conference of the Labour Party’s Yorkshire Regional Council.

The conference said this would be ‘neither in the interests of the ratepayer nor of the workers directly employed. by local. authorities’.

“It called on Labour-controlled authorities to reverse the process in their districts and wherever possible to use their own labour. workers has submitted a motion to the ASW annual confer- Leéds n6. 9: branch of the Amalgamated Society of -Wood-

- By Coun. Price Janes =~ IN a poll of. 1,200 Nottingham University students (about half the student population) taken in one day by about 100 members of the Labour, Liberal, Pacifist, Quaker and International societies, these results were obtained:

53 per cent. said. Britain’s possession of the H-bomb does NOT decrease the risk of total war.

58 per cent. said the argument that Britain’s possession of the bomb gives her greater influence in negotiation does NOT provide enough reason for indefinite retention of the bomb. 57 per cent. said Britain should press for agreement on nuclear disarmament without necessarily linking it with an agreement on general disarmament.

32 per cent. said Britain should stop H-bomb tests: unshould stop fests until new attempts have been made to reach agreement with the USSR. 31 per cent. said Britain should stop the establishment of missile bases on her territory unconditionally, and another 34 per cent. said she should do so until new attempts have been made to reach agreement with the USSR.

56 per cent. said Britain should suspend patrol flights of H-bomb-carrying aircraft over her territory, even at the risk of straining the Anglo-American alliance.

ence reaffirming belief in the principle of public ownership of the building and civil engineering industries, and instructing the executive to seek the co-operation of affiliated organizations in. the production of a pamphlet supporting this principle.

_THE ECONOMIC LEAGUE IS WATCHING US!

‘THe Economic. Jeague.is paying. a. great. deal of atterition to the building workers’ rank-and-file movement and to THE NEWSLETTER.

Issue no, 63 of the League’s ‘confidential’ bulletin, Spotlight on Subversion,. dated February 13, 1958, gives the list of speakers at. the building workers’ conference on January 19.

Right and Centre Labour MPs most like to see annoyed, has whistled-up his trade union bodyguard; it is a matter of great significance that they have immediately rallied, massed like so many Arthur Deakins, with their knobkerries at the ready.

‘And this has happened despite all the talk of supposed deDeakinization of the trade union leadership.

‘Mr Cousins has not yet said a word.’

—(The Economist, March 8, 1958)

THIS YEAR PLL STAND AGAINST THE BOMB~ In his lJetter'to his constituents announcing his retirement, MouniciPaL Elections approach us fast and I, as a candidate, have to write a letter to the electors in my ward, telling them why they should vote for me.

As I have already told you, mine is a Tory ward; so, whatever I write about, we are not likely to win. This is why I am tempted to change tactics this year and measure our strength on a different battleground.

Instead of the old arguments—‘Labour built more old people’s homes’, ‘Labour empties more dustbins’, and so forth, T shall invite all those who want to abolish the H- bomb terror in our country and those who want to oppose rocket bases, to vote for me.

T. believe that, even in a Tory stronghold, there are thoughtful. people who feel that this is the most important problem confronting our generation.

They are denied the right to question the actions of the Tory government in building rocket stations without a mandate from the country, and there is no way for them to expreés ‘their’ ‘profound ° fear of:a future haunted by’ the H-bomb. Would it be a good idea for all Labour candidatés in i Tory strongholds to do the same? If the response is as great as I believe it can be, no government can be ignorant of the people’s will.

* * * Our women’s section had a discussion on ‘The Women’s Press’ at its last meeting. Members had been looking at the latest glamour-glossy, Woman’s Realm.

Opinions varied, of course. Mrs. Hill, forthright matron that she is, said: ‘Terrible tripe. Everyone marries young advertising executives or commercial artists. Never a working

‘Mr Gaitskell, in order to harry those Left-wingers whom Sik HARTLEY SHAWCROSS'S decision to resign from This parliamentary seat will be received with a sigh of telief throughout the Labour Party.

As a Member of Parliament, Sir Hartley has scarcely functioned for years. He made his last speech in the Commons.in May 1954.

It is outside Parliament that he has made those anti-socialist speeches which endeared him to the capitalist Press.

Sir Hartley wrote: ‘I still believe as strongly as before in the basic principles which led me to join the party 40 years ago.’

Was Sir Hartley ever aware of these basic principles? In the same letter he refers to his much-publicized differences with the party over fundamental issues such as nationalization, foreign policy, defence and education.

Surely a lawyer of Sir Hartley’s eminence must know that the common ownership of the means of production, distribution and exchange is enshrined inthe Labour Party consti-tution and that from this ‘basic principle’ should flow the party’s policy on foreign affairs, defence, education and so.

on.

Just which of the basic principles of socialism does Sir Hartley still believe in? And how wilt he serve those principles as legal adviser to the Shell combine or on the board of Ford’s?.

SAUCE FOR THE GOOSE ‘Hugh’ Gaitskell said last’ week that there was always room in the’ party for differences of opinion, though members were expected to abide by party decisions.

Up to now the leadership has shown great tolerance of differences expressed from the Right but has come down heavily on any criticisms from the Left.

Witness the immunity of Sir Hartley Shawcross despite his oft-declared differences with official party policy; and compare this with the threats Nye Bevan was subjected to when he still led the Left wing, and the attitude taken up by the national executive to those MPs associated with Victory for No one on the NEC contested Sir Hartley’s right to represent Labour in Parliament—but Tom Braddock, fifty years a member of the party, has been vetoed once again, though - 81

‘nominated by a constituency Labour Party (Kingston-uponThames) as its prospective candidate.

:

Fhe Labour Party, we boast, is the party which stands ‘for equality of opportunity. Let’s have some of it inside the party, too!

: -:

MARCH ‘15, 1958 lehem Steel is operating only twelve of its thirty-five open hearth furnaces. Republic Steel is down to two out of its nine.

In New. York over 340,000 people draw unemployment benefit each week. Less than half the insured unemployed get the maximum compensation. benefit of 36 dollars a week.

G IGNIFICANTLY, it is the Liberal newspapers, the Manchester Guardian and (still more) the News Chronicle, that have shouted loudest and-longest about the so-called split in the Labour Party.

» These papers know very well that a victory for the Left within. the Labour Party would spell the end of the muchboosted Ljberal revival.

It is only because the Labour Party fails.to offer a con- . structive socialist alternative that. those disillusioned with Toryism turn to the politically bankrupt Liberal Party. :-~ A strong lead from Labour. on those issues which millions ‘of men and women are worrying about today—the H-bomb, missile sites, rents and the spreading unemployment, would put an_end for all time to Liberal hopes of forming an alternative capitalist government: . From Seymour Papert

APE TOWN’S Road Transportation .Board is insisting that before permits are granted for undertakers’ cars to carry mourners to the cemetery and- home again certain cars have to be set-aside for Europeans only and others for nonEuropeans.

Even in death the South African Herrenvolk must-not get their lily-white bodies contaminated.

:

~~ FLOUR AND DRIED MiiK HAND-OUTS FOR Bevanism_without_the LabourParty.

~ AMERICA’S JOBLESS”

From Our New York Correspondent -Despite the’ Administration’s efforts to cushion the ‘blow, the news that unemployment in the USA has risen to the alarming figure of 5,173,000, highest since Pearl Harbour, has hit the American people’s confi‘dence hard.

This is particularly so since the Government statistics are doctored to. bolster. confidence.

Unofficial estimates put- the figure at,well over six million.; Nor is this all. Millions are working part time. And millions more live in daily dread of. lay-offs. Eisenhower’s muchboosted. unemployment relief -plan,’ extending unemployment benefits by another thirteen weeks, cannot do more than Scratch ‘the surface of the problem.

Here are on-the-spot reports from four major American . Cities.

In Detroit 134 per. cent. of the labour force is out of work, - -Tens of thousands are working three-day or four-day weeks ~ or. less.

. : : “TI used to run an ad for a typist for a whole week before ..

I could fill the job with a girl who. could type 50 words per minute,’ said a compensation office personnel manager.

. “We ran the ad ‘two days this week and got 75 applicants for the. job.’

‘In Pittsburgh each unemployed man-and each. dependant is to-receive free once a month out-of federal surplus food stocks the following: 4lb. of flour and llb. each of cheese, corn meal, rice and dried milk. Total value: one ‘dollar. Number of applicants expected: 160,000. - - _— -In Buffalo steel production has dropped to. 37- per cent. of moe normal, -and about -5,000 motor-car workers -are jobless. Beth(like many in the British youth sections) are looking for something very different from what this leadership offers.

Though most of them would find it hard to formulate just what they do want, this shows itself.in a willingness in the branches to hear and discuss a more radical and coherent socialist outlook.

A particular feature of PUGS policy which is. bound to lead to conflicts is its refusal to take up any stand on. the question of industrial organization.

In a situation where the problem of bureaucracy and conservatism in the unions is very. much more acute than in Britain this is enough to explain the inability of PUGS to get an effective working-class base.

On the other hand the question is already being raised within the party by rank-and-filers who are concerned by this inability, and who are more interested in the. evolution of the working class than in the building of a new -parliamentary party for its own sake. ae poe ee Closely related to this is the question of working-class action on political issues. :

The fact that the Communist Party deliberately squashed a large-scale wave of spontaneous workers’ action against the Algerian war only two years ago shows that the problem is a live one.

Marcu 15, 1958 But the PUGS leadership has had nothing to say and would not be able to say much without provoking serious internal dissensions. , An idea of the limitations of PUGS and of the reason for its ability to attract serious young socialists is given by a comparison between. the election slogans put out for the forthcoming Paris by-election by it and by the Communist Party.

On Algeria the PUGS demands peace ‘by negotiation with a free and independent. Algerian people’. The Communist Party candidate refers to Algeria only in the following terms: “To end the war in. Algeria will. contribute to world peace and restore France to the rank of a Great Nation.’ (Notice the very typical appeal to chauvinism.)

On economic questions PUGS demands wage increases, nationalization of big industry and tax reduction (in that Order), The Communist Party confines itself to the remark that a policy of peace will be beneficial to workers crushed by the high cost of. living.

It will be interesting to see whether the presence of PUGS forces the Communist Party to put up some facade of a socialist programme in the future.

_ Paris THE significant fact about the Party of Socialist Left Unity (PUGS) is that it is growing.

It-is not going -to get big enough io win elections in the foreseeable future, but it has proved itself capable of attracting large numbers of the sort of people who in England would. be active in the constituency parties, the youth sections, Victory for Socialism and so on.

In social composition it is largely intellectual and white collar: industrial workers make up 10 per cent. of its membership at the very most.

The creation of the new party last December by the merger . .of Claude Bourdet’s.New Left with a number of other Left‘wing groupings reflects the impetus given to French political life-by the Hungarian Revolution, the continuation of the Algerian war and: the consequent cuts. in the standard of living.

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Many who had put their faith in Mendés-France or Mollet were. brought to realize that these men offered no solution to the social problems.

Many who had drifted’ into political apathy were brought back to life and, perhaps most important of all, many young people were jolted into thinking politically for the first time.

For a British reader the best characterization of PUGS is:

Like Bevan at his best The leadership of PUGS adopts ‘a political position essentially similar to that of Bevan at his best: Welfare State, nationalization, colonial independence on a not very clearly defined basis and so on.

Claude Bourdet boldly takes the Left wing of the Parliamentary Labour. Party as his ‘model.

But this position is one side of a contradiction which will ‘sooner or later burst PUGS or profoundly change it. The other side-is that the young people who come to the organization » GAILLARD HITS AT LEFT-WING PRESS ' France’s police government again hit out at Press.

freedom last week in an effort to silence its critics and » Fuin their Press financially, © -In addition to action against the Sartre pamphlet ‘La. ;

Victoire’, ‘the Mendésist _L’Express, the Communist _ » Party’s La ‘France Nouvelle. and—for the second week running—France-Observateur were seized.

Standpoint of the offending article in. the latter journal ; ‘2. was. Hiberalism and enlightened self-interest. There is “noi a word of criticism-of French colonialism in it, nor does it mention the tortures carried out by the paratroop ‘pacifiers’ in Algeria.

The author, André Philip, a university teacher of Imoderate. socialist views, fears. however that-a mnilitary- -.

fascist .anti-American movement -will push the weak Gaillard Government aside and seize power without the .

working-class movement being able to do anything about it, © ;

Church and State

In the February issue of New Hungary, organ of the British-Hungarian Friendship Society, a report of a discussion in the Hungarian National Assembly includes the following:

‘Chancellor Janos Mate, a Catholic priest, spoke appreciatively of improved relations between Church and State.

“The counter-revolutionaries damaged. .and. . destroyed churches, while the revolutionary workers’ and peasants’

government is restoring them”, he said.’

Well, there it is. You may have thought hitherto that the Hungarian rebels were a lot of Catholic Action boys, rarin’ to put Cardinal Mindszenty in power.

But it turns out that more probably they were Spanish-type : anarchists, intent on church-burning.

Whichever way. you slice this stuff, it’s still boloney. -Dr Kettle’s advice ‘The people of Hungary live to fight another day,’ writes Arnold Kettle in the March Marxism Today. But he doesn’t mean what you and I mean; for he goes on to tell us that ‘at a grim. cost the socialist. revolution has been saved’.

In the same article, by the way, he makes a mysterious teference to some recent British ex-Stalinist having made ‘a passage from communism. to open bourgeois. liberalism via Trotskyism’. No name, of course.

Incidentally, I hear that Dr Kettle recently shouted to a friend who was offered a Newsletter leaflet: ‘Don’t read it— it’s Trot stuff!’

One. wonders. if he has. applied this. principle to what some ; : consider a major Marxist: contribution to his own subject— ‘Literature and Revolution’, by L. D. Trotsky. (What -prospects, by the way, of a review in Marxism Today of the recent teprint of that remarkable book?)

Lenin on the Jews Hyman Levy’s study of the Jewish question reminds me of a-once-famous statement. of Lenin’s, made -in a lecture he gave in Switzerland .on.the Russian revolution of 1905: -Bo ae ‘The Jews provided a particularly. high percentage (compared with the total Jewish population) of leaders of the revolutionary movement. In. passing, it should be said to their credit that today the Jews provide a relatively high percentage of representatives of internationalism compared with other nations.’

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This statement, though included in the useful pamphlet “What Lenin Said about the Jews’, compiled by R. F. Andrews (Andrew Rothstein) and published by the Communist Party in 1936, practically disappeared from circulation in Stalinist literature after 1937. .

It had. become one of those items from what were still called “the immortal writings of great Lenin’ which it was not done to publicize, because they reflécted too sharply upon the practice of would-be-great Stalin.

Worker’s Notebook chaavinism

In the same connexion, I note that Walter Holmes, in his “Worker’s Notebook’ in the Daily Worker of February 28, refers to the economist Paul Einzig as ‘the Transylvanian oracle. of the Financial Times’.

That Einzig is an enemy of the working class is undoubted, but to use his. national -origins against him is tog much like the Mosleyite approach to politics, which would make the most significant thing about the Cohen Council the name of its chairman.

Chauvinism of this sort; previously anathema, began to be injected into the British Communist Party in 1935, and de-veloped rapidly in the years immediately following.

Challenge, the organ of the Young Communist League, used to refer to Franco’s soldiers from Morocco as ‘black troops’ and publish ‘anti-wog* type cartoons about them. :

That Franco was able to use these Moorish regiments at all was, of-course, a result of the Spanish-communists’ refusal to call for recognition of the right of Morocco to. self-determination, ‘in order not to antagonize’ the Spanish (an€ French) bourgeoisie. : :

William Paul’s best-seller’

WittiaM Paul, a. famous communist propagandist of the 1920s, has died. The Daily Worker of March 11 recalled that ‘his book on the State... was a. best-. sellér towards the end of the first: world war’.

It was indeed, and ‘The State, Its Origin and. Function’ makes good: reading even today. Thus: ‘The revolutionary socialist denies that State ownership can end in anything other than a bureaucratic despotism .. . Industry can only

‘be democratically owned and controlled by the workers electing directly from their own ranks industrial administrative committees.’ :

: -_ Another famous. work of Paul’s was ‘Communism and Society’, published in 1922. Communist Party branches now discussing ‘The British Road to Socialism’ would. find it stimulating. For example:

La ‘If the communists did get a majority in -the House of Commons they would destroy the political power -of capitalism and hand over all governmental functions to the new industrial. government. that would have its being in the local and national administrative committees’ created and built up by the working class...’ .

Rothstein and Ulbricht

THE recent troubles in Ulbrichtland ‘remind. me of- a curious incident at the ‘brains trust’ held by the’ BritishSoviet Friendship Society’in London’s Conway. Hall, . shortly after the Twentieth. Congress of the Soviet Communist. Party. , :

Pat Sloan, John Platts-Mills. and Andrew Rothstein disgraced. themselves by the frivolity and evasiveness of their replies to questions; the only. member of -the- panel. who seemed to appreciate the seriousness of the occasion was the Rev. Stanley. Evans.

‘One persistent questioner: Rept. demanding to know what-the . - : : ‘brains’ thought of the statement then just. made by Ulbricht that ‘Stalin had done a lot of harm to the Soviet Union’.

At length Rothstein replied: ‘Yes, Ulbricht was reported as saying that, and you, being a Trotskyist, agree with him.’ ’ The Reasoner pamphlet by Joseph Redman on the changes in the British Communist Party in 1929. and how they were made contains. the probable reason why Rothstein was so ‘bitter against Ulbricht. What a whiff from the Stalinist snakepit!

Too : - :

On workers’ councils ..periences of. Hungary, Poland and: Yugoslavia in recent years, would be a useful contribution to the literature of the movement just now. I wonder if anybody is writing one? — Looking through a file of. the Daily Worker recently I noticed a letter in the issue of September 28, 1936, from Pat oan:

; ‘For the purposes of a book which I am writing on “Soviets”, I want all thé material I can get on Soviets outside Russia—dealing with Germany in 1918, the Hungarian and Bavarian Soviet Republics, the occupation of the factories in Italy in the autumn of 1920 and Saxony in 1923, and anything that has been published on Soviets “in Cuba in- 1933-34 and Asturias in 1934.’

This book appears never to have been completed. © Presumably developments in Spain made Sloan realize that ‘to be keen on ‘Soviets’ was ndéw ‘anti-Soviet’—so instead he gave us, in May 1937, his book ‘Soviet Democracy’ in praise of the Stalin. Constitution which — had liquidated the last vestiges of the original Soviet system in Russia!

.— BRIAN PEARCE — Marcu 15, 1958 To. this is now added our opposition to the establishment of bases anywhere in this country and support for the blacking of the bases.

: - The issue. of the bomb and the bases is not a question of . national salvation alone, but a -question of action by the British working-class movement, linked with their comrades all over the --world in the fight against the threat of war. A National. Anti-H-Bomb Week, if it puts forward such a policy, can be a powerful weapon in our fight against the Tories.

London, S.E.27 Vivienne Mendelson

How welcome is The Newsletter’s call for a National AntiH-bomb Week. Many Labour Parties arid trade unionists are ‘engaged in local campaigns against the bomb and they can become disheartened if their call for a socialist policy to get rid of the bomb and the Tories is not taken up nationally. -’ he. Labour Party to which I belong, Norwood, is - itself waging a campaign against the rocket bases and the H-bomb. Our policy is as it was at Brighton—for a lead by the British Labour movement in unilaterally stopping tests and manufacture.

Your open letter; appearing in last week’s issue, should be sent to all constituency Labour Parties and ‘trade union Branches in the country:

. Reports. from. meetings in every. town. indicate. the overwhelming .support for a positive policy to meet the H-bomb “menace.What is lacking is a decisive lead. . Demonstrations, poster parades and petitions are useful expressions of opinion, but they must be linked with direct measures of industrial action if the Tory. Government is to be defeated ‘in its war preparations.

_ A National Anti-H-Bomb Week, in which every form’ of protest would be brought into play, could be decisive in this struggle.

A week. in. which mass meetings were backed ‘by strike ; actions could bring down the Tory Government and return a Labour administration under conditions in which it would be forced to take a positive lead on both the H-bomb and rocket bases. .

- Ac BeOK: about-werkers’-couricils= incorporating the~ex-- ~ pest tadio-and.was_in-Budapést throughout the-RevoluLETTERS Dora ScarLett, who worked for three years on Budation, has written a book on the uprising and the events which Jed up.to it.

_ . ;Though Dora Scarlett spoke Hungarian and has inside . : . knowledge which makes her evidence especially valuable, she has been unable to find a publisher, since the market for books on Hungary was glutted by the time she had finished hers.

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If she can obtain enough orders, she will have the book produced herself. Entitled ‘Window on Hungary’, it will make a 240-page volume, with map and index, costing 8s. 6d. in paper covers or 10s. in stiff covers.

Many readers will have heard Dora Scarlett lecture _ at socialist forums or elsewhere, or will have read the section she contributed to ‘Hungary and the Communist Party’, by Peter Fryer. They will undoubtedly find her book a valuable document. .

Orders should go to Miss D. Scarlett, 41. Denman Drive North, London, N.W.11. It- is important to order as quickly -as possible, since Miss Scarlett has: only a limited time in which to let the printers know whether it is worth-while to produce the. book.

FRIENDSHIP

‘At the invitation of the Minister, members of the [British Hungarian Friendship] Society went to the Legation in Eaton Place, S.W.1, at the close of the meeting.

“There, they were entertained to an excellent buffet supper which included Hungarian goulash, salami -and poppy. seed pastry. ;

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“Many toasts to lasting friendship between the British and Hungarian. peoples were drunk in Tokaj and Balaton wines, spirits and other drinks.’ .

SU : —(Report of British Hungarian Friendship Society’s annual general meeting, Diplomatic Bulletin, February 15, 1958)

Published by Peter Fryer, 180, Clapham High St., London, S.W.4. Printed . by the Plough Press Ltd. (T.U.), ro. 180 Clapham Higk St.. London SW4,