THE UPTON STRIKE

By G. Gale.

Last week’s strike of 1,400 Upton miners was one of the most significant in the history of the Yorkshire coalfield, The system of an out-of-date price list made up to . a living wage by a complicated system of allowances makes it easy for the management to introduce disguised wage cuts. This happened at Upton, causing losses of between five and twelve shillings per shift.

Similar cuts have been occurring throughout the coalfield, so that here was a dispute that affected every pit in Yorkshire. :

The Upton men realized this. Angered—but not surprised—by the failure of the Yorkshire NUM officials at Barnsley to do anything about their complaint, and undeterred by recent NCB threats to close down Upton pit because of its militancy, they set out to create an all-Yorkshire strike.

The branch officials offered to resign because Barnsley’s inaction made it impossible to carry out their responsibilities to the men. The men refused these resignations and instead elected a strike committee, collected money to print leaflets and organized a fleet of cars to tour the coalfield. This got the NCB and NUM officials seriously worried.

Frequent short ‘rag-out’ strikes, first at one pit, then another —that’s all right. In fact, it’s a good way of sapping militant energy. But now the men had seen that this was the road to nowhere. United action was being developed. The strike had a programme—to end the dependence on allowances and create a new up-to-date price list.

Widespread support Markham Main (Armthorpe) joined the strike. So did Frickley. So did Askern. And South Elmsall. Men from Bentley and Kirkby stopped work.

The Barnsley big-wigs—so aloof earlier on—were only too anxious to come to Upton now.

Mr. Sam Bullough (Yorkshire NUM Vice-President), Mr. Sid Schofield (Compensation Agent and former Labour MP) and Mr. J. Stone (Area Agent) appealed to a strike meeting for a return to work, but got the rebuff they deserved.

The following day, these ‘workers’ representatives’ had a meeting with NCB officials about stopping the strike. They then called an emergency Delegate Council meeting at 24 hours’ notice, where they steamrollered a ‘return to work’ by 92 votes to 12.

Following this vote Armthorpe returned to work. It appears that leading CP spokesman Jock Kane told the men that Upton would now vote to go back.

Meanwhile, Right-wing officials all over Yorkshire worked desperately to stop the strike from spreading. At Brodsworth, Secretary Kelher and Chairman Marshall refused to allow men from Upton into a branch committee meeting. And at the branch meeting they refused discussion on a resolution for a strike because ‘it didn’t come through official channels’.

Kelher then posted a notice at the pit top saying that work would continue pending the decision of the Yorkshire Delegate meeting.

-The purpose of recent witch-hunting attacks by the Area NUM on Curly Owen and other Brodsworth militants is now clear. The aim was to try to isolate and discredit the more class-conscious workers in this vital pit, for precisely such an occasion as this.

In addition it was hoped to drive a wedge between militants at Brodsworth and militants at other pits.

For. instance, it appears that the Upton men at the delegate council meetings were told that the Brodsworth militants never suggested support for Upton, and never tried to get the Upton representatives into the Brodsworth committee meetings. These were deliberate lies.

The CP does nothing The Communist Party was remarkably quiet during this strike. Apart from Jock Kane bringing out the Armthorpe men—and taking them back again—the Party did nothing. There are three reasons for this:

1. The CP welcomes no industrial militancy that it does not control.

2. There was a danger of this struggle spreading—not only throughout Yorkshire—but beyond. This would have embarrassed ‘Communist’ Will Paynter—it would have shown up the fact that a Party member at the head of the Union has not benefited the working miner at all.

3. The tactic of the CP is not to wage a militant fight amongst miners but to jockey for positions in the NUM.

Thus all those vwho are afraid of real militancy ‘n the pits combined—actively or passively—to dampen down tunis strike. Under all these pressures, Upton returned to work.

What are the lessons of this strike?

First, the position of workers in a nationalized industry. The mines are run by highly paid Coal Board bureaucrats, many of whom have close connections with private industry. Introducticn