The Newsletter, vol. 6 no. 255

EDITORIAL US Defence Secretary Robert MacNamara's speech has been welcomed by 'Tribune' Hugh Gaitskell and Lady Violet Bonham-Carter. They were all delighted to hear that 'limited nuclear capabilities, operating independently, are dangerous, expensive, prone to obsolesence and lacking in credibility as a deterrent'. 'Tribune' was glad to know that the Pentagon wanted to aim nuclear weapons at military targets. acmillan and de Gaulle, however, were less pleased. Secretary of State Dean Rusk has been visiting the capitals of America's European allies, explaining just what was meant by MacNamara's statement. itting through all the diplomatic double talk, what is involved here is a struggle for economic and political power within the western alliance. H-bombs, which could destroy millions of human beings, are merely pawns in the intercontinental chess game of the monopolies. : course, the capitalist groups are united by their hostility to the USSR and the colonial liberation movements. This is as true today as at any time since 1917.

It in a period of mounting economic crisis, they manoeuvre for favourable positions. The dominant power, America, is afraid of the reemergence of Germany as am economic and military rival. hen Aneurin Bevan, in 1957 opposed the Norwood resolution for unilateral nuclear disarmament at the Labour Party conference, he spoke of the danger of 'going naked into the conference chambers of the world'. His thoughts are now echoed by German, French and British statesmen. le development of a French nuclear weapon will inevitably be followed by the Germans. Washington, intent on keeping control of the Western military machine, tries to forestall this move with proposals for a single NATO bomb. ne reason for the American anxiety that this country should join the European Common Market as soon as possible is that they want Britain to act as a counterweight to the Germans. Socialists must beware of getting drawn into these inter-capitalist quarrels or side-tracked from our main tasks. These divisions should be seen as opportunities for the working 1 02200 class to rid the world of capitalism and its bomb. Press Statement

By Our Political Correspondent \HE National Executive Committee of the Labour Party has decided to take no action in the case of the four members who are said to be sponsors of the Moscow Congress of the World Peace Council which is proscribed by the Labour Party. This is a powerful blow against the rightwing witch-hunters, Gaitskell and Brown.

Mr. A. L. Williams, secretary of the Labour Party, in making the announcement to an amused press conference, said that 'Lord Chorley had made it nlain that he was not a sponsor. Canon Collins and Lady Wootton had explained why they had agreed to support the Congress and Lord Russell offered no explanation."

Whilst the NEC, he said, very much regrets these decisions it considers them as isolated cases and intends to 'take no action'.

The section of the constitution dealing with proscribed organizations would be reviewed in order to avoid such confusion in the future.

Powerful Blow The nation-wide protest from Labour Party members and trade unionists forced the hand of the Right wing, who were prepared to expel the sponsors of the Congress. This is the first time in the history of the movement that such a powerful blow has been struck against bans and proscriptions. Canon Collins, Lord Russell and Lady Wootton can sponsor the Moscow Peace Congress and still remain members of the Labour Party.

The organization sub-committee, which at the same time as it was investigating the case of the four has also been carrying out witch-hunt against the Young Socialists, is revealed as an irresponsible body whose role is nothing more Brown: a discredit

Gaitskell: 'witch-hunter'

than disruption of the Party.

Just as the election tide is turning in Labour's favour, George Brown and his colleagues on this committee made the Labour Party the laughingstock of the country. If ever there was a case for people to be disciplined, then the case has now been clearly proved against the Organizational sub-committee.

Of course, nothing will be done about this body. Instead, the same National Executive Committee which climbed down over the peace congress sponsorship, decided to step up its witch-hunt against the Young Socialists.

Further investigation Action on the proscription of the Young Socialist paper, 'Keep Left', is now being made retrospective. Four out of 11 members of the National Committee of Young Socialists have been suspended from this body and are to face further investigation by Brown and his organization sub-committee. Yet there were no charges made against the paper that it had violated the policy of the party conferences or the constitution.

Two other members of the National Committee of Young Socialists who support the paper 'Young Guard', , and who were also interviewed have been asked to give written assurances that they will not engage in factional activities. Another member, it was said, had already given such an assurance.

Mr. Williams announced that

Keep Left has issued the following statement: "ROGER PROTZ, the 23-year-old editor of the Young Socialist paper Keep Left, has been expelled from the Labour Party by the General Management Committee of the St. Pancras North Constituency Labour Party because "he was unwilling to state whether or not he will continue to be editor of the paper". . The paper was proscribed by the National Executive Committee of the Labour Party in May.

' Roger Protz was secretary of Ward 3 of the St. Pancras North Labour Party and a delegate to the General Management Committee. He is a member of the National Union of Journalists.

'Since the proscription, the editorial board of Keep Left has been forced to dissolve and all the Young Socialist branches who supported it have withdrawn their sponsorship in order to comply with the conditions of Labour Party membership laid down by the National Executive Committee.

'At the time of his expulsion, no issue of the paper had appeared and Mr. Protz insisted that he had not violated the decision of the National Executive Committee.

'He now hopes to continue as editor and publisher of Keep Left provided there is sufficient the National Committee of the Young Socialists would meet shortly.

The stage managers of Transport House has so far avoided calling a meeting, although one should have been held immediately following the national conference at Easter. They now feel that with four young left-wingers removed from the Committee, the Right wing will have a majority with which it can elect suitable officers.

The Labour movement must be vigilant in the coming weeks and rally to the defence of the Young Socialists. If there is anyone bringing discredit to the Labour Party and the socialist movement it is Gaitskell and Brown.

A massive protest in defence of the Young Socialists could defeat the witch-hunters just as it had done in the case of Lord Russell and the other supporters of the Peace Congress. as issued the following stateme financial support forthcoming from its readers and supporters.

'The paper will advocate the same policy as before; that is support for the Scarborough conference decisions of 1960 for the abolition of the H-bomb, support for the implementation of Clause Four of the Labour Party's constitution through the introduction of large-scale nationalization policies by the next Labour government, support for the struggle of young people for better apprenticeship schemes, shorter hours and more wages.

'Keep Left will campaign for the recruitment of large numbers of young people to the Young Socialists for the purpose of building an alternative leadership to that of Mr. Gaitskell and Mr. Brown, who are opposed to socialist policies. 'Mr. Protz considers that although Keep Left is proscribed and he is expelled from the Labour Party, they are still part of the Labour movement and they will fight strenuously for the lifting of the ban on the paper and for his readmission into the Labour Party.

'He has written the National Executive Committee asking for the right to make an appeal to them.

27th June, 1962?

Brian Pollitt wins despite

MR. Brian Pollitt has achieved an outstanding success in his Tripos examinations at Cambridge; he has also been elected president of the Cambridge Union. The achievements are a forceful rejoinder to the gang of thugs who recently beat him up.

In this week's The falling rate of profit Spain, S.Africa P.3

The reason for the Pay Pause and the crisis of capitalism Tw HE Socialist Labour League conference stressed the importance of grasping the idea of the falling rate of profit if we were to understand fully the nature of the class struggles now sweeping Europe. A recent editorial in THe NEWSLETTER repeated the same theme.

What does the falling rate of profit mean and how does it work? Perhaps we can best illustrate what is happening by taking the case of a motor car firm and applying a few simple figures to it. These are very simple figures, it must be stressed, and are only used to give a rough idea of the way things work; a number of important assumptions have been dropped to make the matter clearer.

Let us assume that this car firm has a total capital investmeni : of £90 million in machinery, plant, raw materials, power supplies and so on; at the same time the annual wage bill to employ labour power on this capital comes to £10 million. Total capital is therefore £100 million of which (to use Marx's terms) £90 is constant capital and £10 million is variable capital.

But the company does not make cars for fun. The shareholders who have invested money in the company demand a dividend of at least 7½ per cent; if they don't get this they will switch their money to a more profitable enterprise.

But the company must also have the equivalent of 2t per cent of the total capital with which to buy new machinery and equipment if it is to keep up with its rivals (and in real life this figure would probably be a lot higher).

So to survive the firm must make a 10 per cent profit on its total capital invested. It needs to show a profit of £10 millon at the end of the year-10 per cent of £100 million in other words.

Where does this profit come from? The machines by themselves can produce no value at all. (Nothing is produced during a strike!) Only the men to sell, but doing this.

Looking at the firm's labour force as a whole and taking the full year into account, whereas the firm pays out only t10 million in wages, it gets f20 million worth of value from the workers.

This is where the firm gets the extra £10 million which it must have in the year if it is to pay a satisfactory rate of profit; it gets it from the labour power which the owners buy and exploit for their own advantage.

This is what Marxists mean when they use the term 'exploitation'; for part of the day the worker has to work for the boss and the greater this period is in relation to the rest of the day the greater the rate of exploitation.

But this is not the end of the problem for the owners. For the capitalist, producing cars is a very tough business; he is faced by severe competition on all sides, both in Britain and abroad.

This fight will only grow more intense with entry into the Common Market. To survive he must constantly improve his machinery and equipment and, if possible, be one jump ahead of his rivals. In other words he must constantly invest more and more.

CONVERSATIONS WITH EW This the trend in all industry, but especially SO in motors; the amount of machinery per worker has been growing steadily since its beginning.

When the motor industry was first started individual craftsmen used to make the cars, largely by hand, in their own little workshops. Very little machinery was used. Such a situațion today would be impossible.

Let us look at our car manufacturer a few years later, when he has bought more capital equipment. His total plant and machinery is by now worth £180 million (an increase of £80 million) but his total wage bill remains the same at £10 million. In other words, the amount of machinery per worker has exactly doubled in the period.

But the shareholders still insist upon a minimum dividend of 7½ per cent on this increased capital. And in addition the company must still set aside the equivalent of 24 per cent of its capital for re-investment.

So now the amount of profit which the firm has to make has risen to £19 million—that is 10 per cent of the total capital of £190 million.

Let us assume that the total labour force is the same and that wages are still, on average, £20 per week. This same labour force must now produce for the bosses an extra £9 million compared to the first situation.

In other words they have to be exploited at nearly twice the rate if the rate of profit is to remain the same.

How will this be done? It means that the workers now have to produce the £20 which they are paid in wages in 2 hours of the 8-hour day instead of 4 as in the previous situation.

The management could try to achieve this position in a number of ways; they might try to speed up the work; or they could cut down on breaks during the day (as Fords did when they tried to abolish the tea break not so long ago); or they could try to increase the length of the working day. All these methods, if successful, would help to solve the problems for the owners and keep up the rate of profit.

But they might not be successful (because of resistance from the workers); the only alternatives left are to try and raise the price of cars and pass on the difficulties to the consumer or to try and cut wages.

We have assumed that the wages bill stands at £10 million. If this can be reduced by a couple of million pounds this money can be used to pass on to the shareholders or to buy even more machinery to increase efficiency in the constant battle with the other car firms.

This is what the pay pause is about.

Whichever method the car owners choose (and they will krobably pick a combination) the end result is going to be increased class struggle.

Unless the company can make this profit of £19 million out of its workers it will be in trouble.

The only 'solution' for the owners is to cut the standards of the workers; in this they will get all possible aid from a friendly Tory government and the Right wing in the Labour Party and trade union movement.

One final question: why should the problem of the falling rate of profit become so acute for the capitalist class in 1962?

Although the rate of profit shows a tendency to fall in the long run, this does not necessarily reveal itself at all times. So why now?

Basically because during the late '40s and '50s there has been a tremendous piling up of capital in many industries throughout Europe and North America, especially in motors, engineering, chemicals, oil and so on.

The capitalists have got to make a sufficient volume of profits to earn an adequate rate of profit on these massive investments; now that monopolist is eating monopolist (e.g., ICI V. Courtaulds) the volume of capital which it is now necessary to invest to stay in business is astronomical.

The problem has been intensified by the slow rate at which the world markets are expanding; in a period when these are getting "tighter' it is very difficult for the monopolists to solve their problems by increasing their prices to the public.

They have to face up to reality; only an increased rate of exploitation and a reduction in working-class living standards can solve the pressing problems for the European and American monopolists.

So for the employers and the working class no more compromises are possible; severe struggles are approaching.

The urgent task for the working class is to sweep away those false leaders who have betrayed them since 1945. If this is not done, grave and tragic defeats lie ahead.

and women who work for the car firm can produce this £10 million which the owners must have in this year if they are to keep things going.

How do the bosses get such a sum from the workers? In this way: let us assume that each worker in the factory gets £20 per week, that is f4 a day. And let us say that he works 8 hours a day. Not counting raw materials, etc., used up he produces f4 worth of goods in the first 4 hours of each working day.

But this does not mean that he can then go home after 'earning his wage' as it were! No, his boss has hired him for the full 8 hours.

During the remaining 4 hours, when he again produces £4 worth of goods, he works for his employer and receives no payment in return. During the whole week he produces £40 worth of goods for his employer STALIN, by Milovan Djilas. Published by Rupert Hart-Davis, price 16s.

THERE is no greater indictment of the Tito regime today than the persecution and imprisonment of Milovan Djilas for publishing his recollections of Stalin and other leaders of the Soviet bureaucracy.

'Conversations with Stalin' will remain his most important work, a satisfying historical document which fills a gap left by the many biographers (dead or living) of Stalin. It casts a new and different light on the immediate postwar situation in the Balkans. What he says about Stalin does not injure Tito, and his description of Khrushchev is not only fair but rather flattering.

Being a leading member of the YCP and a trusted confidante of Tito he was chosen to represent the insurgent republic in Moscow on many occasions and was able to gather at first hand his impressions of the Soviet people, their leaders and Stalin.

Stalin feared the extension of revolution more than he did Hitler's armies. The Yugoslav insurrection would be a potential danger to his authority.

The other serious difference was on the nature of the Partisan war; the Soviet leaders belittled the significance of the fighting ability of the Yugoslav partisans. It was only the undying loyalty and irrational devotion to Stalin of the Yugoslav party that prevented an earlier rupture of relations.

Djilas estimates realistically the impact of the war and the Yugoslav Revolution on the morale of the Soviet people and Red Army. To the latter he gives restrained praise to their fighting ability but criticises their behaviour in Yugoslavia, a prominent factor in the Soviet-Yugoslav dispute.

Time and again the author reveals Stalin's apprehension at the prospect of a social revolution in the Balkans and his attempts to prevent any leftward movements in the CPs (Dimitrov was not allowed to return home; Ukraine-East European relations were banned).

With the eruption of the social revolution in Greece-and the setting up of the Marshall plan— relations between the Yugoslavs and the Russians deteriorated rapidly. The Yugoslavs supported the Greeks, the soviet Union, however, kept discreetly quiet and sabotaged the war.

Stalin 'felt instinctively that the creation of revolutionary centres outside Moscow could endanger its supremacy in world communism ... That is why he helped revolutions up to a certain point-as long as he could control them—but he was always ready to leave them in the lurch whenever they slipped out of his grasp?

Many people have believed Yugoslavia was right and just in her dealing with Albania and that Stalin drove a wedge beween them in order to isolate Yugoslavia. This as Djilas proves is only part of the truth. This constitutes his main crime against the Yugoslav state.

The discussion on the Balkan Federation and how Stalin brutally strangled it at birth (a decision that his successors will regret now that the Common Market is being formed) is one of the redeeming features of the book.

The main weakness of Djilas is that he abstracts Stalin from the historical conditions. Djilas correctly identified Stalin with the needs and desires of the bureaucracy. But he is unable to explain the growth and continued existence of this parasitic stratum in Soviet society, and how the Soviet Union and Yugoslavia can be regenerated. He states that, the 'Soviet' economy can exist enclosed in its own empire and can absorb the losses caused by its separation from the world market. The language of a vintage Stalinist, although an inverted one.

Major class From A Spanish Correspondent

Middle of pril to thi staged tremen dou force government. This strike, Germany, France ne most crushed an working the prophets of doom: it was the harbinger for the future European re- campaign against the plan.

The real sacrifice of the volution. industrialization is borne on the The strike began in the backs of the working class. Asturian mines where workers Only 42.8 per cent of the receive a basic wage of 4s. 10d. national income goes in wages, a day. 40,000 were soon on the lowest in Europe. strike south of Oviedo. By The first act in the solution of May 9, 25,000 joined the strike these grave problems was taken in Bilbao and from then on it by the Spanish workers in May. spread all over Spain, 60,000 But they must be on their on the 21st, 75,000 on the guard. The Spanish ruling class 22nd, 100,000 on the 24th. is in severe economic crisis: it In Barcelona, trolley buses cannot afford such increases. It proceeded at walking pace and vill try to pay them out of a queues piled up in the banks. higher cost of living as in 1957. Students in Madrid organized The working class must presolidarity demonstrations on pare political action to overMay 5 and May Heavily throw Franco. armed police moved in, demon- Throughout the strike the strators were beaten up with social democrats protested that rubber truncheons and 50 were they did not wish to overthrow jailed. Franco, and the Stalinists have A state of emergency was called for the return of the declared in the provinces of democratic republic, the republic Asturias, Guipuzcoa and Vis- which saw the parasitic bourcaya; officials were sacked. On geoisie at its zenith. May 7 the governor of Asturias The only solution for the promised wage increases, but Spanish working class is the the miners stood firm for written construction of a Marxist guarantees. leadership in the finest of their On May 22 the Minister of revolutionary traditions, the Labour, Solis, agreed to a 60 traditions of the struggle of the pesetas price over ton increase in the rank and file of the Labour coz a cove wage movement in the civil war increases; two days later, with against their own leaderships. 100,000 workers on strike, this which kow-towed to bourgeois went up to 75 pesetas. democracy and Stalin, and for The 'hiccup' strikes in Barce- working class power. lona brought rapid capitulation and bank workers gained ' TO CONSIDER in the light of HE any le reserves the chiefs now depend solely on the police and army to keep them in In tl r. In the towns the nationalist movements have been driven underground by heavy powi raids How success of policies of the Verwoerd government depends on the absence of the massive policy of repression has continued for more than a year.

opposition.

and thousands of arrests.

- I1 support to Verwoerd. The englisn-speaking inaustrialsts who control 75 per cent of the country's economy have seen the policy succeeding and have given their support.

The Afrikaaner farmers and skilled working class, who are bitterly racialist, support the Robert Oppenheimer 'colons' of South Africa Verwoerd to the hilt.

The only real opposition to fascism in South Africa comes from the African working class.

There will be no change in the political situation in the country until the African working class participates in the struggle by means of mass movements. For this there are can the opposition to the fascist regime two basic essentials: a revolutionary Marxist leadership and a correct policy which expresses working class aspirations.

Both of these are lacking. The South African Communist Party has recently re-emerged into underground activity after ten years of virtual non-existence. But they have followed a wildly opportunist policy of support for so-called 'democratic' demands for the Christian pacifist chief Luthuli, and even for progressive capitalists, like Oppenheimer.

The African National Congress banned in South Africa, but in Second of two arti an illegal leaflet issued there recently and in a recent press conference in London of some of its exiled leaders, it appears that a national liberation campaign is being planned on the lines of the FLN.

The leaflet, distributed in April, was headed 'War Preparations', and called on the African people to 'mobilise on a scale yet unprecedented and to be ready for sharp conflicts.

It called, too, for a 'radical change in outlook and style of work'. Talk of sacrifice has a real and grim meaning today, it went on. 'The transfer of real political power must now be demanded and fought for in every village and location, in every hospital and compound. This is by develop? The white minority has given the only way of averting the disaster and suffering which a military white dictatorship will bring to the country.' At their Press Conference in London, Oliver Tambo and Robert Respa spoke of 'a major catastrophe in the making in South Africa. More and more people back in South Africa and in Britain have come to accept the inevitability of a violent showdown between the African masses and the white dictatorship.

This is counsel of despair. Unless present deficiencies in organization and leadership are es by James Baker overcome, the African workers and peasants will be cut to pieces by Verwoerd's trucks and planes. And the final result will be a victory for imperialism.

The pacifists and the fake Lefts, the humanitarians and the opportunists in the British Labour movement, as well as the petty-bourgeois nationalists in Africa, have all promoted themselves to the position of paternalist advisers to the African working class. Together with the Stalinists they have provided them with the worst possible advice.

The fake Lefts like Barbara Castle (President of the Anti-Apartheid Movement), Mr. Anthony Wedgwood-Benn and Mr. Fenner Brockway talk a lot about democracy in South Africa, but they passively allow Gaitskell to stamp on the Left wing in the Labour Party.

They stand not for the working class movement in Britain giving direct support to the working class in South Africa, but for pressure • the imperialists to impose economic and trade sanctions on South Africa.

They stand also for action through that notorious imperialist agency, the United Nations Organisation. South African Nationalist leaders echo these sentiments.

There can be no substitute for revolutionary Marxist leaderships both in Britain and South Africa. Only the working class can solve the problem both of Britain and South Africa. The task is to create a leadership and revolutionary cadres.

Without these, and without a discussion of Marxist politics, no movement of any kind is possible. The fake Lefts, the petty-bourgeois nationalists, the pacifists and the Stalinists both in Africa and in Britain are objectively the tools of imperialism.

It is no good hoping to frighten the imperialists into making concessions by talk of a second Algeria in South Africa, as Tambo and Respa do.

The imperialists will welcome a second Algeria if they emerge with control of the gold mines, as the French now control the Sahara oil. What is wanted is not another sell-out to imperialism but workers' power in South Africa and in Britain.

immediate increases. There can be no doubt that there has been modern conditions and praca partial victory for the working tices, including the practice of class. take-over bids, what should be The effects of the civil war, the duties of directors and the despite a partial recovery during rights of shareholders, and World War 2, were still evident generally to recommend what in 1951 when Spain came out of changes in the law are desirable? isolation. With the help of Such were the terms of referAmerican aid and a number of ence of the Jenkins Company good harvests between 1951 and Law Committee, set up at the 1953, Spain began a programme time of the British Aluminium of industrialization. take-over and the Grunwald This was carried out under scandals.

INI, a national planning board In the event the recommendawhich in reality distributed tions of the Committee amount to monopoly positions to private a mandate for the take-over bidder, enterprise, operating a system of and if they are adopted, will make state capitalism. The keynote his task much easier. of the system was protection, Except for a suggestion that the the result was inflation. Board of Trade should make However, the increasing com- certain rules as to procedure (for which exemption can be granted petition for markets represented by the European Common in specific cases) there is nothing to prevent past history repeating Market meant that Spain had to itself, so the large operator may cut costs drastically if the continue to swallow up the small, econo The willing or unwilling. questi Indeed, there will be fresh consic fields for him to survey. The Worl Bank carried out an Committee recommends that all invest private companies-that is comA stabilization plan was put panies whose shares are not into quoted or transferable without pu blic the peseta restriction-should file their acwas credit counts at the Companies Office. restricted. There are some 400,000 such The companies, the vast majority being credit was suspended entirely 'one-man' efforts. The device of and the private limited company is necessary in this capitalist jungle hit 5 for the small trader, because if spend things go wrong, his liability is limited to the extent of the capital he has paid into the company— which can be as low as f2.

If he is obliged to file his accounts, his creditors will know his financial position and will take any measures necessary to safeguard their money, all of them involving an eventual closing of the business.

By the grace of the Committee, he would, however, be allowed to make his company one of unlimited liability so that personal bankruptcy would result if he Whitewash could not meet his liabilities.

Filing accounts will mean that the medium-sized firm will receive the attentions of his larger competitor. Such a firm would have to be taken over willingly but, in any event, the tendency will be for the successful medium firm to disappear, and the monopolists will be given further grist for their mill.

If implemented the recommendation that shares of no par value should be allowed will have the effect of obscuring the true return shareholders receive on their capital. At the moment dividends colin chance are expressed as a percentage the nominal paid-up capital.

When dividends of, say, 20 per cent are declared, workers are indignant at evidence of such blatant exploitation. This device will enable the dividend to be expressed in money values, and thus obscure the actual return on capital.

Legally, the ultimate control of a company is with the shareholders. In practice it is the board of directors who run a company. Interlocking directorships mean that a handful of men wield great power over a dominant section of industry.

In recent years there have been a growing number of concerns where voting shares are concentrated in the hands of directors and shareholders possess non-voting shares only, so that the directors legally control the company.

The Committee consider that there is no call to abolish nonvoting shares in spite of vociferous demands from 'liberal' elements.

'But,' says the Committee in its introduction to the Report, 'we share the views expressed ... as to the undesirability of imposing restrictions which would seriously hamper the activities of honest men ... and the importance of not placing unreasonable fetters upon business.' You're telling

June 30, 1962 ne

gaging new men as mates as This Paper is your Paper Weapon IN the fight for socialism, The Newsletter is playing a vital role. Do you get it regularly? Don't leave it to the chance encounter, fill in this form and send it to:

Subscription Department, The Newsletter, 186a Clapham High Street, London, S.W.4. 73. for 12 issues, or £l 8s. per year Name Address Registered at the G.P.O. as a newspaper Published by The Newsletter, Prin by Plough Press La. 0) a 180 Clapham High Street, London. S.W.4 From CONTINUING the fight for their wage demands, nurses from hospitals in Nottingham and district led an impressive demonstration here last Sunday. Uniformed nurses, male and female, carrying banners and slogans marched from the Trent embankment to the city square, supported by hundreds of trade unionists.

The banners of the National Union of Mineworkers, National Union of Public Employees, Amalgamated Engineering Union, Tobacco Workers' Union and several Young Socialists branches were carried high, a demonstration of solidarity with the nurses and implacable opposition to the Tory pay pause.

When the procession 1. Shaw old market square the ranks of the marchers were swelled by other trade unionists and Labour Party members as well as people not attached to the Labour movemen who wanted to express their disgust at the insulting offer of a 2t per cent increase which has been made to the nurses in line with government policy.

The feelings of all who joined this demonstration were summed up by a poster carried by one of the nurses which read: 'We suffer the hardship, you suffer the pain, Enoch for Minister, never again! ' The Newsletter pamphlet 'Plan to Beat the Tories' was warmly received. Several workers paid more than the cost of the pamphlet and one remarked as he contributed a tanner, 'It's worth a quid to help get rid of them, only I haven't got a quid.' show the Right wing that they can keep their house in order.

Such craven policies must be rejected by the membership with the disgust they deserve.

HISTORY

More and more CP members will be forced by actions like this to look back at the history of the Party to find out how this type of work originated.

Already many critical ETU Communist Party members who are beginning to forge a unity of the Left forces in the union to fight the Tories and the Right wing find that they receive no support from the Party leaders and are forced to work out their own policy, often with members of the Socialist Labour League.

That is the only way in which a drive to build a real communist leadership in the unions can begin. big monopolies to protect workers from the monopolies' attacks.

But, turns out Frank Cousins not himself over-optimistic about the NEDC either. 'I feel,' he said, 'that this body may well fall down when it comes to the basic question of issuing directives to industry.' But Mr. Cousins, what about solving the economic problems and the fight for your ideas on the NEDC?

If Frank Cousins is confused, and this is being very generous, then the Labour movement cannot afford to be.

'Advice' which is given by the TUC on such committees can only help to direct the attacks against the weakest sections of the working class.

9: 77

Industrial RESENTMENT is growing • drivers. The work is get low. Prior to 1956, 8-wheel and restricted to 20 m.p.h.

In 1956 the Use and Construction Act increased the weight to 16 tons. Then in 1960 — following intensive pressure from employers in the private sector-the speed limit was raised to 30 m.p.h.

Drivers in the private sector gained no corresponding increase in pay except in some individual cases due to militancy). BRS men did get a 15 per cent bonus when the speed limit was raised but at the same time the working day was reduced from 11 to 10 hours, which drastically reduced this increase.

" Bonus' — 4/9d.

For instance an average week's pay on a big vehicle (including overtime) might be about £15. Loss of 5 hours overtime at 7/- an hour would reduce this to £13 5s. Od. The 15 per cent bonus then brings this up to f15 4s. 9d. Thus the bonus-described by the union as a 'substantial increase'-amounts to precisely 4/9d.

No Mates And, of course, the shorter hours are not much of a gain since the increased speed limit means that drivers are doing the same amount of work-and sometimes moreonly in a shorter time.

Another grievance is the tendency which appears to be developing in BRS of not enlevysletter amongst BRS heavy goods lorry ting harder and the basic pay is vehicles were limited to 14 tons replacements for men who leave the industry. This makes a driver's job harder since he is now doing more work in less time and without a mate. (Except on scheduled night trunks, drivers unload and load their own lorries.)

Men at Water Lane BRS depot in Leeds are threatening not to shunt wagons which they consider require a mate, unless a mate is provided.

Excessive Hours Lorry driving is a hard, dangerous and responsible job. It is not made easier by the presence on the road of drivers employed by private firms being compelled to drive excessive hours.

Yet the basic rate for a BRS driver of an 8-wheel 24 ton gross vehicle is only f10 6s. 3d. (plus 15 per cent bonus). Drivers of smaller vehicles-6 and 4 wheels get substantially less than this.

When we struck work in 1960 at the time of the speed limit increase, we carried banners saying: 'More Work for Less Pay. That has been proved to be right.

Nationalization

The real answer is the renationalization of the whole of the Road Transport Industry. Meanwhile all lorry drivers— BRS and private sector-must unite to fight for better conditions on the roads.

OMMUNIST Party members are becoming angry and resentful at the expulsion from the Party of three Electrical Trades Union members, Jack Fraser, Pat O'Neil and Harry Wolf. The terse statement in the 'Daily Worker' charges them with activities detrimental to the interests of the Party'.

Rank-and-file members are demanding to activities are. According to reliable reports, given at a special meeting of ETU members called by the London District Committee of the Party.

One was in connection with the recent court case involving the Elecrical Trades Union. The second charge was that they continued organising a separate faction of ETU members to fight against the Right wing in the union in opposition to the official Party policy.

John Mahon, the London District Secretary, was contemptuously howled down at the meeting when the charges were made. So strongly did members feel against the expulsions that no decision could be taken at this meeting and Mahon judiciously refused to put the proposals to the vote.

The expulsions were carried out instead in the guarded enclave of the District Committee.

HYPOCRISY

For the leaders of the Communist Party to level these charges is the height of hypocrisy. The activities of Gollan, Mathews, Campbell and other Party leaders in covering up the crimes of Stalin have been far more detrimental to the Party than anything these three workers may have done.

The responsibility for the decimation of the Party's leadership in the ETU must rest squarely on the shoulders know what two reasons of Gollan, Kerrigan Mahon.

The methods of work carried out in that union are no different, in essence, from the methods of Stalinist trade union work in general. This method stems from a lack of confidence in the ability of the working class to fight the employing class and defeat it.

From this pessimism flows the intrigues and manoeuvres, sometimes based on tacit agreements with the Right wing, designed to maintain positions in the unions. These methods often fly in the face of rank and file requirements, and struggles undertaken by workers have often been sidetracked or callously betrayed when they appeared to jeopardise the immediate position of party trade union officials.

CYNICISM

These are the methods which Fraser, O'Neil and Wolf were trained in and staunchly defended in the Electrical Trades Union. Many Communist Party members are sickened by the cynicism with which these expulsions have been carried out by leaders like Peter Kerrigan, The members in the ETU see these expulsions as a concession to the Right wing in the union. Instead of rallying the Left in opposition to the Byrne-CannonChapple leadership around policies which will prepare the rank and file to fight the employers' and Tory attacks, the CP leaders here try to wriggle out of their responsibilities and The Curious Case of Mr. Cousins AT the Scottish Delegate Conference of the Transport and General Workers' Union, a delegate, Mr. I. McCrory, referred to the National Economic Development Council as a "Torysponsored body, which would promote practices hostile to the trade union movement.

He called for the immediate withdrawal of the TUC representatives from the NEDC. The council, said Mr. McCrory, was an attempt to cast a cloak of respectability over the pay pause and use trade union leaders for this purpose.

The motion was defeated after the intervention of Frank Cousins. He said the TUC representatives had no intention of becoming tools of the Tories'. Moreover, it was ridiculous for the delegates to imagine that they had the right to instruct the TUC what to do. 'The conference could not tell the TUC to get out of the NEDC?

Frank Cousins went on to say that the NEDC 'would be worse: without our influence'. . This is like the petrified rabbit which, as it disappears down the wolf's. jaws is heard to murmur, 'this animal would certainly be worse without my influence'.

Mr. Cousins would not even have us warn the rabbit of its. danger. In fact the wolf, he thinks, will respond to persuasion.

Frank Cousins' arguments turn out to be very confused. He said, 'We are not there as watch-dogs but as people with positive ideas of what should be done to solve economic problems.' What these ideas are he did not say. Nationalization? Even Gaitskell will not listen to argument about such policies. Does Mr. Cousins think that Macmillan's representatives are likely to be more attentive?

Moreover the economic problems of the employers and those of the members of Mr. Cousins' union have solutions which are diametrically opposed. The one means slashing wages in the interest of improving profits and the other means taking over the