The Newsletter, vol. 8 no. 333

struggle A great start but - your great help help is still needed WERE off to a splendid start! Sales figures of the new paper topped the 10,000 mark and our appeal tor 2200 a month Fighting Fund has so far netted f40 in monthly bankers orders. We still need £160 a month and as our sales creep up week by week we are now thinking in terms of 15,000 copies a week by mid-summer.

We say a big thank you to the members and sympathisers of the Socialist Labour League who are working round the clock so The Newsletter can gain a lead that will take it up to the same circulation figures of other leading Labour journals in the country.

The future of The Newsletter depends upon the growth and development of the Socialist Labour League. It is an open secret that our membership includes a high percentage of young people. In this respect, we are the most fortunate organisation on the left. Our members are not just people who pay dues and do nothing else until the collector calls, weeks, months or a year later. We aim for 100 per cent activity, both politically and practically, and what is more, we get it.

The Newsletter is still in a transitional stage of development. Our aim is a daily sometime in the next three to five years. We are now training and building up a team of labour journalists who will be able to produce a modern daily newspaper. From the funds supplied by readers we are installing the most modern equipment for those now working on the paper.

A special sub-committee is constantly studying new technical processes which are now emerging inside the printing industry so that we can have an idea of the most suitable machinery to produce a daily paper. Plans are already pasi the blueprint stage and we are in constant touch with one of the largest manufacturers of printing machinery in the world.

We cannot, of course, promise immediate success. much depends upon you, the reader. Every one of you play an important part in speeding the publication date our daily.

A big headache, of course, is circulation. We are limited only by the numerical weakness of our forces. Will you help us with this work? Our canvassing returns make exciting reading. Follow-up sales transform into regular readers an average of 80 per cent of those who bought the paper in the first place.

Form readers' groups Much remains to be done in organising new readers into some form of activity around the paper. Readers groups should be formed to meet once a week or month to discuss the contents of the paper. The use of Fighting Fund collecting cards on the canvasses is a very important way to help us meet our monthly fund target.

If you would like to form a readers group or help by taking a collectors card, all you have to do is to write in to us and we will reply at once. If you would like to give us a bankers order for a regular monthly sum we will have pleasure in sending you one by return of post. If you would like to join our canvassing teams in the various industrial centres, even though you are not a member of the SLL, we will wish you a warm welcome and put you in touch with the organiser responsible in your area.

You, as a reader of The Newsletter, are one of the most important people on the political scene. We want to keep regularly in touch with you because it is your verdict on the contents, lay-out and readability of the paper which will in the long run prove decisive, for the realisation of all our plans. Don't forget. We We still need f160 a month. We anxiously still need £160 a await your answer in the coming days.

Pub colour THE LABOUR MOVEMENT has won another victory in South London against a public house colour bar..

On Friday, February 7, Mr. Chapman, licensee of the "Cedars', a Battersea public house, gave an assurance to the Wandsworth Licencing Sessions justices that he would not practice racial discrimination in his saloon bar. This assurance came after the renewal of his licence had been challenged.

Mr. Chapman refused for weeks to sell beer to coloured people who entered his public house. Members of the labour movement heard of this and a week before the court hearing the South-west London FederaNo. EDITORIAL HUV LIUA sales neures or the nev - a daily So can for tion of Young Socialists held meeting outside the pub.

The police broke the meeting up but afterwards, when white and coloured people went to "test' the colour bar, everyone was served.

Chapman's assurance to the court was in contradiction to the statement by the South London Licenced Victuallers' Association that they would back him should any attempt be made to interefere with his business or take away his licence, in order to make him lift the colour bar.

But his statement also points to the fact that the labour movement has great strength in its fight against racial discrimination.

February Irn-ol on lobby EARLY 2,000 young people poured into London on Tuesday for the most successful demonstration against unemployment in the history of the Labour youth movement.

This was in spite of continuous attempts by Transport House officials to 'play down' the Young Socialists National Committee's efforts to face MPs with this urgent problem.

Young Socialists and unemployed youth from Northern Ireland, Scotland, north-west England, the North-east, the Midlands, and London and the South congregated at Hyde Park.

Not invited Closely watched by a large force of police and Labour Party officials, they stood for nearly an hour to listen to Bessie Braddock, chairman of the 'youth' sub-committee, lan Mikardo, Barbara Castle and Reg Underhill, the National Youth Organiser.

Young Socialist National Committee members were not invited to speak from the platform.

'You can put your point of view at the marathon meeting this afternoon, was Bessie Braddock's generous offer.

Sarcastic cheers greeted her when she announced: "The National Executive have been very anxious that the Young Socialists should have a mass demonstration against youth unemployment.' She omitted to mention the fact that, along with a number of other rightwingers, in the initial stages she repeatedly tried to block the organisation of the rally.

Shattered

The march took contingents along Oxford Street, Marylebone Street, Edgware Road and back to Hyde Park.

Shouts of Out with the Tories, 'Labour to Power', 'Out with unemployment' and 'Labour must nationalize' , shattered the usually sedate atmosphere of London's West End. Shocked faces peered out of Selfridges and businessmen taking a morning stroll wondered what to make of it all.

Marching behind the red banners of their YS branches the demonstrators carried posters pearing slogans against the Tories and putting forward the demand for an end to unemployment and 'dead-end jobs'.

'No work'

Many of the marchers had been unemployed for some time. Twenty-year-old Arthur Murphy of Glasgow-one of the 350-strong contingent from Scotland—told how he had been on the dole for the past eight months.

"There isn't any work for young unemployed people in Glasgow now. All we can do is go down to the Labour Excontinued on page OF THE SOCIALIST SOON Determined faces on the big march through London staged by the Young Socialists in protest at youth leader Fourpence unemployment and dead-end jobs. SALES OF Cecil King's weekend papers and Monday's 'Daily Mirror and Daily Herald' were affected by the overtime ban imposed by members of the paper worker's union in protest against threatened redundancy.

The ban on overtime started last week and at the weekend the 'Sunday Mirror' and the 'People' lost one million copies. The 'Daily Herald' and the 'Daily Mirror' have also been affected.

Members of the Central London branch of the National Union of Printing, Bookbinding and Paper Workers feel very strongly about sackings proposed by the International Publishing Corporation. So far the union leaders have not been satisfied by the assurances given.

ASSURED

Mr. Tom Smith, general secretary of the paper worker's union hastily assured the employers that he would make efforts to restore normal working after joint talks.

But so far he has not met with success. The men are determined to stick to their ban until they are sure there will be no sackings.

The dispute has arisen out of the IPC's plans to reorganise its printing works. As far as the union leaders were concerned the management were able to impose their wishes but rank and file members of the Tion rights union have refused to have redundancy 'at any time, any age or any place.

The IPC, has refused to give this guarantee. They say that no promises can be made to employ all of the staff in the future.

In a statement to the union the company admits that the reorganisation is to take place so that the company would "become more competitive. It is obvious that this will be done at the expense of the printing workers' jobs.

DICK

BARRETT of the 'Blue Union' on why his members oppose the Docks plan ON

A MOVE TO JAIL Mr. William Lindley, general secretary of the Watermen, Lightermen, Tugmen and Bargemen's Union for contempt of court was dismissed in court on Monday.

Mr. Justice Marshall heard in the High Court that the WLTBU has lifted its ban on barges belonging to J. Stratford and Co., a Woolwich firm.

Three thousand lightermen staged a token strike while the case was being heard, and many of them joined a deputation to accompany Mr. Lindley to court.

The ban, the court heard, was lifted the previous Wednesdaytwo days after Stratfords obtained an injunction against the union to lift the three-month-old ban on 10 barges.

Mr. Justice Marshall accepted that the ban was lifted two days after his judgment and commented: 'That is not a great affront to the court and I feel that in the interests of industrial peace the least said here the better.

I hope the parties will go forward in the belief in each other's good faith.' Said Mr. Lindley after the case: 'My conscience on this matter has been completely clear from the start. After all, my executive run the union and not I. They gave the orders for the ban some time ago and they have to give orders for it to be lifted '

NEVILLE ALLEN, the 19-yearold West Indian boy who was to have been deported for stealing bread and milk, is not to be sent home after all.

Trade unionists took up his case when they recognised the danger to the labour movement as a whole if deportations are to be carried out whenever magistrates decide to get rid of someone.

Neville's appeal against deportation was allowed immediately it was made clear a determined fight would be made on his behalf and a lawyer was hired for him. Neville was in court about five minutes before the magistrates quashed the recommendation.

He still has over a month of savage three-month sentence to serve for his 'crime, but afterwards he will be allowed to stay in England with his family, instead of being sent back to the West Indies where he has no relatives at all.

The Neville Allen case shows, as did that of Carmen Bryan, that something can be done. When enough people show themselves ready to raise a stink that will be smelt, in every part of the country, these cases can be won.

CORRECTION

THE introduction to last week's article on the history of The Newsletter (page 2) should have read Nearly seven years after it was first published, not 'six years.

ge

steps up AIMS OF INDUSTRY, which is already supported by over 4,000 companies, has recently sent out a letter to thousands more firms appealing for their support in a big campaign against the extension of nationalization.

The letter, signed Bridges Webb, one the directors, says:

... the present public apathy towards the dangers of nationalization and state control and the fact that this issue has been played down by the political parties, makes it essential that we undertake a major advertising campaign in the short time available to us.

*Protect assets' It is necessary for me to ask every company, directly or indirectly threatened by nationalization and state control, to support our efforts to protect their assets by giving a suitable donation to this advertising campaign, or _ by Calling all Merseyside readers Speakers:

Mike Banda-Newsletter Editor Healy—National Secretary, Socialist Labour From Our Paris Correspondent STALINISM was objectively criticised at an historically important meeting held recently in the Union of Communist Students headquarters in Paris.

Over 250 students crowded into the meeting to hear Marxist militant, Pierre Broue, well-known for his books on the history of the working class, explain the true history of the Bolshevik Party.

Many heard, for the first time, true aspects of Trotskyism, Which have been distorted by Communists and Pabloites.

As he described how the Soviet democracy "was smothered by Stalinist bureaucracy, leaders of the Communist Party, who had attempted to avoid this debate, remained silent.

Broue paid tribute to the Hungarian and Polish fighters of 1956 and denounced the counterrevolutionary actions of the post-Stalin bureaucracy, and revisionism of the present-day communist leaders.

Discussion on the need for an international revolutionary organisation was open and clear.

This meeting hammered yet another nail in the Stalinist coffin. It must be the starting point of the building of a revolutionary section of communist students in France.

Industry campaign letting us have a their advertising allocation.' Enclosed with the letter was a booklet which outlined. the work of Aims of Industry and its plans for the future. The famous 'Mr. Cube' campaign against the nationalization of sugar refining was led by them, together with the campaign against the nationalization of cement and for the de-nationalization of road haulage and iron and steel.

Final Stage Aims of Industry has also campaigned for the ending of government controls in marketing and in industry.

It is the final stage in the long process of preparing the Labour leadership for power. Wilson's retreat before the Steel Company of Wales and his failure to mention nationalization in any of his recent political speeches makes it clear that the employers threats are having the desired effect.

ETIN Sunday, March 1, 7.30 p.m. Walker Art Gallery, William Brown Street, Liverpool 13 portion of or poster

Cuba: an American tragedy R. Scheer and M. Zeitlin Penguin Books, 5s. IN this latest and very full revolution, the authors, apparently "left-wing' supporters of the American Democratic Party, see the Cuban situation as primarily a problem of American foreign policy.

They wish that the State Department had recognised in Castro a good democrat, an agrarian reformer and assisted him to make Cuba a model Latin American state. By too hastily condemning Castro as a 'communist, they say, he was driven to act like one.

At first Castro was ready to go along with the United States; he even hoped for economic assistance.

But as the new regime proceeded with land reform and came into collision with American imperialist interests, US policy rapidly adopted the view that there was a 'menace of communism' in the Western hemisphere.

CONNECTED

In this situation the influence of the Cuban communists, who had played little or no part in the overthrow of Batista, grew in the government and Castro proclaimed himself a 'MarxistLeninist' American propaganda adopted the theme that Castro had 'betrayed the revolution' In fact, American policy had forced Castro to take Scheer and Zeitlin wish to persuade American opinion that Castro's policy is one which is supported by millions in the under-developed countries. They hope, therefore, to see state Department policy shaped to come to terms with similar movements Cuba, for them is 'an American tragedy" because US policy is shown so sharply to be committed to holding down popular revolution by force.

It is quite ridiculous to suppose that a Democratic or Republican administration could boldly take sides against the corrupt military dictatorships and decrepit oligarchies which rule Latin America. It is through these governments, based on the landowning cliques and financial groups, that American investments are protected.

OPPOSE

Not a step can be taken in Latin America to carry out a genuine land reform, to promote economic progress or to diversify the economy without expropriating the local ruling class and the prosperity of the big American and other monopolies.

Because they begin with a liberal perspective, with much talk about "democracy' and "personal freedom' and faith in the United States' 'long written and oral tradition of commitment to such ideals' Scheer and Zeitlin find it some kind of paradox that American policy did not encourage Castro instead of setting out to destroy him.

In fact, they isolate Cuba from its true context, which is the Cold War and the revolution in Latin America. Over Cuba the real nature of American imperialism stands revealed-and so does the cynical nature of Moscow's foreign policy. Dick Barrett, this week outlined his executive's answer to decasualisation in an exclusive interview with The •As in many industries, big dock employers are doing their best to step up production and profits by 'modernisation' But these plans are strongly opposed by the National Amalgamated Stevedores and Dockers.

Efficiency

In their document the employers have made a number of suggestions designed at maximum efficiency with minimum labour force.

Fairly high on the list is the question of strike action. The employers are most emphatic on this point:

'Any man taking part in a strike will forfeit all rights to further benefit under his contract, for so long as he withholds his labour. His contract may be cancelled depending on the circumstances of each incident,' it says.

Return

Answering this, Mr. Barrett and the union's executive council state that men should be returned to the Reserve Pool if strike action is taken. 'Suspension of contracts over such action is not recognised by the union, says their answer.

Absenteeism, according to the port bosses, will mean the automatic cancellation of a worker's contract. New contracts may only be entered into with the permission of the London Dock Labour Board.

No nonsense The employers are obviously not going to concern themselves with excuses. It will be 'down to work or out'.

On this question the NASD are going to stand no nonsense. They say that a man should be 'investigated' before

Castro: had illusions

more determined measures against American interests and their stooges in the Cuban ruling class. The American response to this forced him into economic dependence upon the Soviet Union.

Cuba became a chip in the long, drawn-out and still continuing poker game of 'peaceful co-existence' carried on between Washington and Moscow.

For a long time-perhaps still - Castro had illusions about the possibility of restoring friendly relations with the USA. This was apparent for instance, when Kennedy took over the presidency in January 1961 (despite his anti-Cuban speeches during the election campaign).

PLANS LAID

By early 1961, 'however, plans had already been laid by the Central Intelligence Agency to put paid to Castro's game.

Such hopes were defeated at the Bay of Pigs. Castro stayed, but he now faced a permanent military threat from American imperialism.

Like republican Spain, Castro's Cuba became dependent upon Soviet backing for survival. This was a great opportunity for the Khrushchev bureaucracy.

If they had been concerned with defence of the Cuban revolution and its extension into Latin America, the planting of missiles on Cuban soil in the autumn of 1962 would have been 'reckless responsibility'.

As it was, Khrushchev thought only of what concessions he could win from the Americans. He won very little. AS the Soviet Union completes its 11th year without Stalin, a stocktaking of economic performance shows how little Khrushchev has been able to depart from the track laid out by his predecessor.

The roots of his problems go back to the 1920s when Stalin raised the cry of "socialism in one country' and proceeded to silence and crush all those who disagreed with him.

Stalin represented the conservative forces in the party and state which formed a new, privileged layer and assumed political control. Resting as it did on the healthy social and economic basis established by the Revolution of 1917 it was bound, for its own survival, to develop the economy in its own way.

Concession

While fighting his Opposition critics in the 1920s, Stalin made concessions to the peasants and ridiculed those who wished to step up the tempo of industrial development.

At this time Russia was still overwhelmingly agrarian and backward. The industrial sector was small and only climbing with difficulty back to the pre1914 level of output.

After losing valuable time in the twenties, Stalin seized violently on items in the programme of his opponents and proceeded to press them through in a brutal and distorted form.

Driven

Peasants were driven into collective farms. Many did not understand the reason for the collectivisation drive. They slaughtered their cattle by the thousand and were met with force, or driven by the trainload to Siberia, where thousands perished. Agriculture suffered a blow from which it has still not recovered.

Khrushchev had to admit, in 1953, that the numbers of Russian livestock were still below the 1928 level. The way in which collectivisation was carried out left an enormous weight of resentment in the villages.

Collosal

Industry was built up in same heavy-handed way amid colossal mistakes avoidable human suffering.

At the same time the Revolution had freed Russia from the dead hand of landlords and capitalists. Despite their hardships the Russia workers, reenforced by huge new contingents from the countryside, believed they were working for their own future.

The nationalized base of the economy permitted large-scale planning and a tremendous rate of growth, despite the distortions and mistakes which resulted from bureaucratic blundering and the lack of effective control from below.

Severed

At the same time, the Russian economy was artificially severed from the world market. It was dependent mainly on its own resources.

Lenin had believed that the working class of advanced Europe would make their own revolutions and come to the aid of backward Russia.

Instead, the policies of the world communist movement were attuned, not to the needs of the international working class, but to the protection of the interests of the ruling caste in Russia.

'Socialism in country* the and and thus had its own logic. It meant no revolution outside Russia.

Inside Russia it meant the cowing of all opposition and the maintenance of a huge apparatus of police, purges and prisons. The inordinate powers of the secret police terrified even the members of the bureaucracy.

None of them could feel safe. In his report to the 20th Congress, Khrushchev depicted the atmosphere of terror in which they all lived.

Expanding

But, in the meantime, despite the colossal distortions and mistakes of the Stalin period, Russia had become a great and rapidly expanding industrial country.

The costs of Stalinism had been extremely high. The country was still isolated in 1939 and nearly crushed by the Nazi war machine. It suffered tremendous war losses. These can be put at the door of 'socialism in one country'.

The Stalinist betrayals in Germany, China, France and Spain directly weakened the Soviet Union and almost brought it to disaster. They also added up to major defeats for the working class, the effects of which are still being felt.

Co-operate

The Chinese, by posing revolutionary Stalin against the 'modern revisionist' Khrushchev, fail completely to read or understand the lessons of history. Khrushchev is Stalin's heir, if not his disciple.

During and after the war Stalin hoped to co-operate with the victorious imperialist coun tries. Anybody who wants a classic expression of 'peac ful co-existence' can find it in the Yalta and Potsdam agreem nts. Even Khrushchev has not yet been able to better them.

Threat

The capitalist countries had other thoughts. They saw the strength of the USSR as a threat to their own system. They measured its economic weight (together with that of still backward Eastern Europe, and then LENIN believed the European workers would make their own revolution China) against their own combined force, which remained greatly superior.

The ruling classes in these countries had never accepted the existence of the USSR as permanent. The Cc old War, begun in the late 1940: s, showed that opinions had not changed.

Problems

When Stalin died in 1953 the bureaucracy was faced with major problems. • The weight of secret police terror had become intolerable and they wished to relax it in their own interest and rule through more refined means.

The working class grown immensely in and social weight, as as education: there now a threat that it v demand the political F had size well was ould ›wer which had been filched away from by the bureaucracy.

The growing demand for more goods of better quality and in greater variety could no longer be resisted Resources The weaknesses in agriculture could no longer be concealed and major changes in policy were called for in that quarter. Industrial strength was no longer measured solely in tons of steel or coal; more resources had to be directed into industries based on the new technologies, in some of which the Soviet Union lagged badly behind. The heavy pressure from the hostile capitalist world still imposed an immense burden of armaments. In the same way, 'socialism in one country' cut the country off from the capitalist world and had even distorted relationships with the East European countries.

To counter imperialism, economic aid had to be extended to newly developing countries.

The planning system, backed under Stalin by secret police and forced labour, was no longer adequate to the needs for a more advanced economy. wiewed in this issue Colonialism Today f th r Pa Publications Ltd., 186A Clapham Higl SW4 Large parts of the economy still lagged seriously behind the advanced capitalist countries; Russia had not overcome all the problems of belated economic development.

Pressure

These were the main problems facing Khrushchev when he took over power in 1955. Faced with a tremendous pressure on resources and an explosive international situation and challenged from within by the working class—which reached a STALIN represented the conservative forces in the party and the state climax in the Hungarian Kevolution of 1956-the bureaucracy sought desperately to find new measures which could enable it to retain its privileged position.

Hence the remedies with which Khrushchev's name is particularly associated and the new approach to imperialism, representing the continuance of 'socialism in one country, which goes under the name of "peaceful co-existence' This is the first of a series of articles on the economic crisis in the Soviet Union. pamphlet are available, price 2s. Ad.

February Page T

CUBA: A being reported to the LDLB. The rest of the clause referring to permission for new contracts should be deleted Describing the role of the Dock Labour Board, Dick Barrett commented: It is the servant of the industry and more than that you cannot say?

As far as a real fight for higher wages is concerned the NASD is the only union facing up to a struggle with the port employers.

'Our union has been accused of misleading its members by the employers and the leaders of the Transport and General Workers' Union, but we have proved these allegations to be quite wrong,' said Mr. Barrett.

"The men have got to value the proposals against their own future on the docks. I think most of them feel they cannot possibly accept the terms laid down.

'No one is against a little bit - of modernisation. But when it begins to affect the men's jobs then we must think again about decasualisation. The bosses make great play of this modernisation but they don't think ineral Secretary of the National Amalgamated evedores & Dockers, in an exclusive interview about those who may be affected by it on the docks.' Mr. Barrett maintains that the TGWU has backed down in not 'sticking out for £15 7s. 1d.'-the figure asked for by the NASD.

Changed

'The TGWU have now changed their minds. Originally they were asking for £15 -now they have lowered it to £12, only f3 above the wages offered by the bosses for the dockers in London.' In the TGWU magazine 'Record', March 1962, they say that it is difficult to live on £15. The article enumerates the several items of expenditure incurred during the week and concludes: 'There is not much left of that £15 7s. ld., and what there is goes on food, fuel, lighting and clothing. Holidays are necessary and somehow materialise.

'It's a dull sort of life and the only thing that can be said of it is that it could be worse.' Recognition In a little under two years the TGWU has changed its mind to the tune of about three pounds.

I don't know how the officials of that union can possibly reconcile their present position with the one they had in early 1962; was Mr. Barrett's comment.

'What we want is official recognition of our union in the northern ports so that we can draw more men into our union and make it a strong, fighting unit on all the docks I have been told that there are more than 6,000 men walking around with no union cards in and around Liverpool docks. ' We want men to go out and bring them into the union so that we can fight for better standards that the TGWU are not bothering about now.' fight So far the TGWU have fallen in very cosily with the plans of the Rochdale Committee of Inquiry into Britain's port industry. If it should come to a head-on collision with the bosses Mr. Barrett and his members can expect very little support from TGWU leaders.

Big business has made a large amount of money out of London and Liverpool docks and with the help of such leaders they will make even more.

But with a big effort for the Blue Union policies, dockers can wage a fight against the port employers.

G the Ble Union, Mr. of action Hu dockers are well aware of the implications of decasualisation and are following the Liverpool struggle with close attention.

Decasualisation has been a constant subject for discussion in the News of the Blues'— broadsheet of the Humber area of the Blue Union.

They regard it as a complete handover to the bosses and they have no illusions about the employers' professed desire to give the docker a guaranteed living. They know that mechanisation, for example, will not introduced by the employers to ease the dockers' toil but to reduce the cost of labour.

Among other things, the Hull dockers say, this would enable the boss to weed out the men who speak up at strike meetings, to get quicker loading and discharge, to transfer a gang on completion of its hatch to another hatch immediately or to another ship, to transter a gang to another hatch at any time or onto storage on the same ship (including double banking), and to transfer labour between employers in a four-hour period.

Hull dockers recognise the significance of the difference in the offers to London and Merseyside dockers. They say the employers are trying to split the dockers by getting each port to negotiate its own terms on decasualisation.

Accordingly, Hull dockers are keen on unity between ports. They are calling for this issue to be settled on a national front in order that the best conditions can be procurred and the employers prevented from dragging down conditions in the best-paid ports.

And one issue of 'News of the Blues' carries a clear political demand, which must be supported by all dockers: The only answer, it says, "is full nationalization of docks, railways, road transport, shipping and insurance, etc., run by the proper people and not saboteurs.

Amounts in Cyprus WHILE NEGOTIATIONS between government representatives drag on and proposals for the future of Cyprus are thrown into the waste-paper basket, tension on the island mounts.

Caught up in the strategic needs of imperialism, the Cypriot workers and peasants are victims of British 'divideand-rule' colonial policies.

The various proposals for "international' forces to be stationed in Cyprus, whether with a NATO or UNO label, are reflections of the British effort to get US aid in policing their main Middle East base. The Americans, however, are not at all eager to become involved in an affair from which they have little to gain.

Protect

British imperialism took control of Cyprus in 1878 as a move to protect the link with the Indian Empire. As with Egypt, sovereignty officially remained Turkish until 1914, but the so-called government of Cyprus was run directly from London.

To maintain this state of affairs, a conflict between the 20 per cent Turkish-speaking minority and the majority of Greek Cypriots was essential. The demand for Enosis—-union with Greece-could then be countered by the need to protect the Turks.

Then, in 1959, after a series of abortive attempts, a precarious compromise was worked out. The Greek Cypriot leaders, with Makarios at their head, were prepared to drop Enosis and allow the British base to remain, in return for a form of independence.

Juggling

But the problems caused by the years of colonial rule could not be wiped out by a bit of constitutional juggling. The London and Zurich agreements, with their elaborately formulated 'safeguards' for Turkish rights, could not possibly last. An explosion of events was inevitable.

There was no real conflict of interest between Turkish and Greek farmers and workers. The bitterness and strife carefully nurtured by the colonial office was reinforced from time to time by the Greek and Turkish ruling groups, when they needed to distract their own masses from difficulties at home.

This was the role of EOKA leader Grivas, now a right-wing politician in Athens.

Various gimmicks for UN intervention are being peddled by do-gooders as well as the Communist Party. But they are merely means of keeping Cyprus within the imperialist camp.

Colonialism

An international force run by the Security Council could no more bring peace to Cyprus than the British nuclear bombers which are stationed there. British troops must be withdrawn from the island instead of bringing Greek, Turkish, American and other NATO forces in.

As in the Congo, imperialist policy has led Cyprus to internal struggle. The United Nations would be as effective in that country as they were in the Congo-introducing new forms of colonialism. Mass boycott shuts down N. York classes NEW YORK was the scene of a huge demonstration against segregation in schools last week.

It was organised in the form of a boycott of classes by teachers and pupils. They were protesting at the slowness of integration of all nationalities into public schools.

On February 3, more than 100 policemen were assigned to the downtown Brooklyn area where the demonstration was climaxed by a mass rally at the Board of Education headquarters.

IMPRESSIVE

The Board said early in the day that the boycott was unsuccessful, but the numbers of police alone testified to the opposite.

In fact, the boycott surpassed the expectations of friends and foes alike. It was an impressive success.

464,000 pupils and 3,500 teachers stayed away from their classes. These were official figures declared by the Board of Education.

INTO ACTION

But in the south, racialists were once again moving into action against Negro schoolchildren.

In Tuskegee, Alabama, city officials defied a Federal court order on February 5 when they barred six Negroes from the previously all-white Notasulga High School.

Mayor James Rea stopped a school bus carrying six young Negroes and a Negro driver. Rea used a new city ordinance as his reason for this action, saying that fire and safety regulations prohibited the school from accepting any further students!

SCREAMED

As the bus turned back to Tuskegee, whites screamed abuse at the Negroes and cops brutally threw a press photographer from the moving vehicle.

In a nearby Tuskegee suburb six Negro children were admitted without incident to the previously segregated Shorter High School, where a Federal court order was obeyed.

Governor George Wallace, however, has encouraged white parents to withdraw their children from all schools which have been integrated by federal ruling. Governor Wallace came to prominence last year through his pronounced anti-Negro views and his refusal, except at gunpoint, to allow them to enter Alabama state schools.

SEPARATE

Federal pressure has achieved little. Officially a number of Alabama schools are now integrated, but in fact Negroes are taught in separate classrooms to white children.

Only decisive action by students and teachers, linked with the American labour movement, can defeat the racialists and segregationists. Federal authorities are content to achieve nominal integration which whitewashes their image but gains nothing for Negro schoolchildren.

APARTHEID: BRANDO ACTS BIG NAMES in the American, British and French theatre world are supporting a move by actor Marion Brando to ensure that his films will not be shown in segregated cinemas.

On Monday he spoke at an anti - apartheid meeting in Central Hall, Westminster, organised by Christian Action.

Producers and distributors will have to give in, he claimed, because of 'enormous economic penalties'. The mass rally at Brooklyn's Education Board HQ America rocked by Bobby Baker case THE BOBBY BAKER affair in the United States has quickly put paid to any idea that the Profumo scandal was something uniquely British.

The activities of 35-year-old Baker, former $19,600 a year Secretary for the Senate Majority until his forced resignation last year; have shown that the American ruling class and its functionaries know how to live it up on the profits made from the workers.

The Senate investigation has involved many leading politicians; President Johnson was a close friend of Baker and the preponderance of Democrats concerned gives weight to the theory that the Republicans are behind the exposure of Baker in an attempt to discredit their opponents during election year.

Baker, according to 'Time' magazine, had a 'high-flying circle of acquaintances'. They included Carole Tyler, 24, a Tennessee girl who won the title 'Miss Loudon County'; she became Baker's private secretary at a salary of $8,000 a year.

Carole shared house with the secretary of Democratic Baker and friend Senator George Smathers, but they were only tenants. Baker was the owner.

It cost him $28,000. Baker listed the girls as tenants and described Carole as his cousin.

The Senate investigators have before them a number of allegations that the house was used for a call-girl racket. Included in the list of attractions was Ellen Rometsch, former fashion model and wife of a West German sergeant, who left hurriedly for her home country last. August, Frau Rometsch was a hostess at the Quorum Club, a luxury establishment situated within panting distance of the Senate Office Building.

Baker helped organise the club which, according to its charter, was for the pursuit of 'literary purposes and promotion of social intercourse'.

Baker used the club as a springboard into the heady world of finance and big business. Astute deals, which left not a few impoverished and wiser citizens in their wake, pushed Baker's bank balance to around two million dollars.

This wealth enabled him buy a $125,000 house close Lyndon Johnson's home Washington's fashionable Spri Valley.

Typical of Baker's deals was the one concerning a ven‹ ling machine company. The pi esident of the company, whi › is suing Baker, claims that he got a fat contract through him but that Baker then put on the squeeze and demanded monthly cut for 'goodwill'.

Other deals were pushed through either without cash or with borrowed money. But it was Baker who made the profits and, in one case, a sucker who put up thousands of dollars so that Baker could build a smart motel ended up in severe financial difficulties and died of a heart attack.

But the motel duly opened in Ocean City. Two hundred top men journeyed in chartered buses to the special opening, among them Lyndon Johnson and his wife.

But the Johnson presidential crown seems safe. There is no doubt that the American financial top brass will, like their British counterparts, stick together.

But the revelations thrown up by the investigation will bring added awareness to the labour movement of their position in society and the high-life and squalid activities of those who live on their backs.

THE Colonialism Today COLONIALISM, which grew out of the capitalist system, enabled financiers, traders and manufacturers to arise as a class strong enough to overthrow the feudal system at home and achieve political power.

This is the theme of Nxele Afrika's pamphlet.

The author tells us that European capital broke out of the shackles of feudalism by dispossessing, ruining and turning the local serfs into workers and peasants, by subjecting the local market to their wares, by looking beyond municipal boundaries and wresting for national power.

Their plunder of the rest of the world began with the Crusades and continued with the aid of the feudal Church and monarchies.

The conquerors, slavetraffickers, slavers, soldiers, missionaries and traders gave these capitalists the conquered land, the raw materials, the precious metals and cheap labour, which they needed for primary accumulation of capital.

Nxele Afrika shows that it was during the plunder of the world that the vile ideology of racialism found its roots in the 'capitalist-colonial' system in order to enslave and exploit the colonial people.

Pledges support for Verwoerd OSWALD MOSLEY'S visit to South Africa, reported in last week's Newsletter, is to include 'courtesy calls' on members of the Cabinet.

He has stated publicly his support for Verwoerd's Nationalist Party, and that he will not form branches of his Union Movement in South Africa.

If any of his followers in Britain were emigrating to South Africa, he advised them to join the Nationalist Party, he told reporters last week.

Three British right-wing groups now have representatives looking for backing in South Africa. Chesterton, of the Empire Loyalists, has been joined by a Mr. Blyth Thompson who is trying to set up branches of his South Africa Society.

Refused

This London-based organisation stands for the "distinctive evolution' of different races. Thompson says he has been approached by the Mosley-ites for joint action in support of Verwoerd, but has refused the offer.

Verwoerd's connections with fascism are nothing new. As the editor of the paper 'Die Transvaler' he openly expressed admiration for Hitler in the Forties. During the war he lost a libel action against another Johannesburg paper which referred to his pro-Nazi policies.

The present Minister of Justice, Bathayar Vorster, was interned at that time as leader of the para-military fascist organisation, Ossewa Brandweg.

"Through missionaries, governments, schools, employers, "white" labour and the Quislings in their own midst, the colonial toilers were taught the slave mentality that they were inferior or different from their conquering master race. At the same time the "white" workers were taught that they were superior to or different from the "black" workers.' This concept of the superiority of the 'whites' and 'inferiority' of the 'blacks' has plagued the capitalist world ever since. Even the social-democrats and the Stalinists have often fallen foul of this vicious ideology.

Under the colonialist system, capitalist Europe advanced at the expense of the indigenous 'colonial-capitalists, by sheer robbery and parasitism. As a result we find today that the bulk of the people in the colonies and neo-colonies are serfs, labourers and peasants, while a very small minority belong to the merchant, landowning and professional classes.

It is this fact which has ensured the 'underdeveloped' status of the colonies and neocolonies by their heavy reliance on 'capitalist -colonialism'. Besides, the lack of a strong indigenous capitalist class which could bribe the workers from profits derived locally as well as granting them the luxury of capitalist 'democracy, has led to the establishment of dictatorial At the time when right-wing groups in this country are preparing to expand their activities, backing from a government such as Verwoerd's can be of considerable importance. Mosley is determined to encourage this by pledging his support to the Nationalist government.

By lining up with Verwoerd, Mosley also supports the brutal security laws which Vorster had to admit, when questioned in parliament by Mrs. Helen Suzman recently, were used to detain over 3,300 people last year.

Arrested

Nearly 2,200 of these were detained under five security Acts - excluding the 90-day detainee clause.

The Suppression of Communism Act landed 1,213 and 64 juveniles in police and prison cells, and 500 adults and 43 juveniles were arrested under the Unlawful Organisation Act.

Nine hundred and twenty-two have been convicted in court, others are still awaiting trail and 1,447 have been released without a trial.

Many have been brought to trial within 48 hours, but some detainees have had to wait seven months.

Vorster has said that it is not his intention to break people mentally, but Mrs. Suzman had an affidavit from a priest who visited a detainee in a hospital. 'My general impression was of a mental and physical wreck,' it read.

NST COLON regimes in most of the capitalist states of Asia, Africa and Latin America, on their being granted 'independence'.

However, capitalism developed and became indigenous only in those countries where the capitalists established large settler colonies, in countries like South Africa, Australia, New Zealand and North America.

Even these settler colonies developed at the expense of colonial workers in their midst, or at the expense of colonies which gave them a continuous supply of raw materials.

•Colonialism derived super profits from the super exploitation of the colonial resources. Parts of these profits were diverted to bribe the 'white' workers at home by way of higher wages and the granting of the luxury known as 'capitalist democracy:

From this fact the author deduces, incorrectly, that workers in the advanced capitalist states have become 'bourgeoisified'.

However, one has only to look around to see the numerous struggles being waged by the 'bourgeoisified' workers of Europe and North America against their employers in the factories (e.g., the recent strike of the steel workers of Wales and the armed miners of Kentucky in the USA, the numerous strikes in France) for higher wages and better conditions, the battles of the tenants against landlords in many parts of Britain, the struggle of the London transport workers, to point out a few, are expressions of class struggle and class consciousness among the workers.

When the author calls them 'bourgeoisified' he tends, in effect, to write them off as allies of the colonial working class.

But from a Marxist position we contend that the struggle of the advanced workers is closely related with the struggles of the colonial masses, against the common enemy, imperialism.

In other words, the crisis of imperialism stems not only from the advent of the colonial revolution but also from the struggles of workers in the imperialist states.

It is for these. reasons that Marxists lay a great stress on the need of the working classes of both the imperialist countries and the colonial countries to build revolutionary parties that will be able to intervene successfully on behalf of workers of all lands to make world socialism a reality.

Despite the failure of the author to see the workers of Europe and North America as allies of the colonial toilers, it must be stressed that his work 'Colonialism Today' comes at a time when the crisis of capitalism is deepening on all fronts.

His contribution to the revolutionary movement is welcome because it helps to throw more light on the nature of this crisis.

Page TH NEWSLETTER

TWO WEEKS after a polite, almost respectable civil trial of 33 socialists in Madrid, SpanishCuban trade is announced.

Five Spanish ships are under charter to Fidel Castro's government and Iberia, the Spanish airline, provides the only West European air link with Cuba.

The trial of the socialists, including one of their leaders Antonio Amat Maiz, was a quiet affair in which the defence conducted their case with confidence—defendents even admitted their activities and spoke openly against totalitarianism.

All the socialists have been set free. Although the leaders were sentenced, these were waived.

It is obvious that Franco, who has made several "liberal" declarations in the past year, had the trial played down because of interests elsewhere. He has an eye towards more trade with Europe and now comes the news of the deal with Castro.

This move must be worth Franco's while for under the American Assistance Act, 1963, economic aid paid by the US to Spain could be withdrawn.

A Ministry of Information magazine, 'El Espanol', even goes to the extent of printing a "defence' of Spain's actions, quoting indirect American dollar aid to Cuba and Britain's bus deal with Castro.

EXTRADITION

The Committee of Action against neo-colonialism and fascism is still fighting to save a 25-year-old militant, Abarca, from extradition to Switzerland, where he will face a charge of trying to set fire to a Spanish plane. He denies the charge, although the organisation to which he belongs, the Iberian Liberation Council admits similar acts in Geneva, Frankfurt and London.

Abarca was a political refugee in France until the police began taking action against Spanish 'libertarians' last September. Then he moved to Belgium.

The committee of action claim that the action by the French police was prompted by the country's alliance with the Spanish authorities, and the demand for extradition by Switzerland 'is an attempt to involve Belgium directly in an act of International police solidarity with the Franco police' ALISM

GARMENT WORKERS' UNION officials say a 'happy atmosphere' has to be created at Truline Bras, Sheffield, before seven sacked girls can be reinstated.

It is obvious they hope to prolong the dispute, which began when 13 girls were dismissed a week after a union was formed at the factory, so everyone will lose interest in it.

MEETING

But union members in the firm refuse to let this happen. They finally persuaded the officials to attend a meeting of all union members-they have persistently refused to do so in the past. But even when faced with the rank and file they avoided giving any clear account of their negotiations with the management.

They refused to say why they ignored a request that the sacked girls be represented at a meeting with the management, but maintained the girls were interfering in negotiations.

Attacks were also made on the young workers for making statements to the press and for circularising other unions in Sheffield about their case.

DETERMINED

No one was fooled by the officials assertion that there would negulated ipeacir it way.

negouated in tner own way.

They have consistently urged the sacked girls to get other jobs and refused appeals to "black' the firm's suppliers. They wanted the dispute to end leaving the girls no nearer effective union rights or a minimum wage.

Union members are determined to carry on the fight. Each week they make collections in the factory, despite low wages, to finance the girls.

Please send your donations to Mrs. D. Bland, 43 Hartley Brook Road, Sheffield, 5.

Pressed Steel strike bonus cut ONE THOUSAND night shift workers at the Pressed Steel factory, Linwood, Scotland, held a token strike last Friday in protest against a reduction in their monthly bonus payments.

The bonus is based on sales and for the past month it has been reduced because production of the Hillman Imp bodies at the factory has been higher than the number which could be absorbed by the neighbouring Rootes factory.

While car bodies are stockpiled workers have to wait for their bonus until the cars are actually sold to Rootes.

Loss

This has meant a cut in the monthly bonus from 3s. 4d. in the pound to 1s. 8d., resulting in a total loss of payments of nearly f5 in some cases.

This bonus scheme, known as the Scanlon Plan, was imported from America by the steel company last autumn against plenty of opposition from the workers. Now it is proving to be a source of trouble.

A number of shop stewards in the factory now recognise that the bonus scheme can only work to the benefit of the management. It has been introduced for the purpose of speeding up production and obtaining a higher output with fewer men.

Yet, on January 31, Mr. C. Tonge, managing director of Hay's, who also runs a building company and transport concern, said there were no plans for the wharves.

This dangerous precedent could be taken up by other companies on the river. They could easily follow Hay's example and take unregistered labour from the Labour Exchanges instead of the Dock Labour Pool, saying they are carrying out different work.

Important

What rate are these men getting for carrying out virtually the same work as dockers? How organised are they? Have they a union to fight for their rights?

These are important questions in a period when employers are faced with strong opposition to their decasualisation scheme.

In a letter to the South London Press, shop steward, Mr. F. J. Wright, who worked on Pickford Wharf, said: 'We cannot, and never will, object to the right of an employer to close his premises. But what we do object to is the closing and re-opening of these premises to subsidiary companies of Hay's Wharf to do dock work, which we claim the right to handle as registered dock workers.' Support Over 1,000 men in Tooley Street came out on strike on January 24 for a week-end to support 50 permanent men who were employed at the closed wharves. But their own position is precarious.

On Thursday a three-man committee with representatives of the Transport and General Workers' Union, a Hay's representative and one from the Port Employers Association met to consider unregistered labour on Pickford Wharf. Dockers heard a report back on Friday.

But how hard will the union fight for its rights? There is a lot of feeling against the TGWU. 'It needs shaking up a bit,' an East London docker told The 'We are all scattered into little branches and we don't know what's going on, he added.

Explain

In fact, out of Tooley Street it seems the word has not got around. And the union have not done much about it.

Officials should explain the Tooley Street trouble to all their members in the London Pool. They would have more strength with which to fight Hay's and stop the company from making the first move in what could be an all-out attack on unionism in the docks.

STEELMEN WANT

WAGE RISE THE Amalgamated Engineering Union has been mandated by its members to strike if demands for higher wages, put forward by ten unions representing 14,000 craftsmen in the steel industry, are not men by the Iron and Steel Trades Employers' Federation.

The Federation has promised a reply by March. The Steel Company of Wales are not directly concerned in the negotiations.

Industrial

WOLVERHAMPTON bus workers are giving the lead in canvassing support for a series of Saturday strikes by men employed by the Midland Red bus company. This follows the great success of last Saturday's unofficial one-day strike, in which Midland Red traffic was brought to a standstill in eight Midland counties.

Of 33 garages in the area, 31 were solid in support of the strike.

MOTORWAY

STOPPED These included Birmingham, the Black Country garages and those at Worcester, Leicester, Stafford, Nuneaton, Hereford, Wellington, Malvern and all the main centres in the Midlands. Only at Ludlow and Shrewsbury were the bus services running as usual.

Motorway express services to London, Coventry and Worcester were stopped; in all 5,000 bus workers were on strike.

Wolverhampton busmen have approached men at the other 32 garages with proposals to call further strikes on ensuing Saturdays until their claim for a substantial wage increase, a 40-hour week and 3 weeks' paid holiday is met by the company.

ban HULL DOCKERS are showing great solidarity in resisting the port employers' attempts to drive down rates for unloading packaged timber.

Last week 4,000 men twice came out on strike and they have now implemented an overtime ban.

Little packaged timber has come into Hull before, but a number of ships are expected from Canada.

Seldom have the employers shown themselves so tough in recent years, but it is apparent they have a long-term plan to push down dockers' standards. At a meeting last week they are even said to have expressed their readiness to take on a six-month strike if necessary.

TRUCKS

They need smaller gangs to handle the new type of cargo. With fork-lift trucks the timber is sent off immediately in lorries.

An offer of nine men and six shillings for cargoes consisting of more than two-thirds packaged timber has been rejected by the men who are pressing for eleven men gangs and seven and fourpence.

Hull dockers must remain firm in this dispute. A real trial of strength is in the offing and an employers' success could lead to further attacks.

WHEN THE Falkirk, Scotland, iron foundry owned by R. and A. Main Ltd. closes later this year, 650 men will lose their jobs.

The firm, which produces domestic appliances, is to transfer its total production to Edmonton, London.

Economical

Reasons given for the closure are that it is not economical to maintain a factory in Scotland which receives its raw materials from the Midlands and sells a large part of its goods south of the border.

As R. and A. Main made this decision, Burroughs Corporation, an American firm, announced their intention to concentrate their adding machine industry in Scotland.

The plan is to close the Detroit, US, works and move production to Strathleven where they already employ 1,500 workers. This time it will be the Detroit workers who lose their jobs.

Reason

Could the fact that production costs in Scotland are 40 per cent lower than in Detroit be the reason why American employers are so eager to move their industry to Scotland?

Cheap labour is a big attraction to the Americans, plus the fact that fringe benefits national insurance—amount to only 10 per cent of the total labour costs in Britain compared with 25 to 30 per cent in America.

Machines cheaply produced Strathleven will be shipped to the States for sale American market.

These are the methods of capitalist production. Workers in Detroit are thrown out of jobs because American employers can make fatter profits by using Scottish labour.

Pittance

Workers in Scotland walk the streets, made redundant by rationalisation and the transfer of industry to England. Workers at R. and A. Mains were paid a pittance, magnanimously des cribed as severance pay.

Those in work are constantly threatened by the employers with replacement from the undiminishing number of unemployed-100,000 in Scotland, nearly 400,000 in England and Wales and 4,600,000 in the United States.

JOINED UNION-SACKED AFTER workers at a Cricklewood warehouse decided to join the Transport and General Workers' Union this week, one man was dismissed and eight left in sympathy.

Ninety employees decided they wanted to join a union after meeting a TGWU official because conditions and wages were bad.

Mr. L. Ames, a director, held his own meeting on the shop floor where he said he did not want any organised labour in the warehouse.

IN next week's Newsletter our legal correspondent will discuss the implications of recent court cases for the trade union movement.

dockers.

registered labour.

REJECTION

OF CLAIM The strike was a protest against the employers' curt rejection of a national claim made by provincial busmen last November.

'One-day token strikes are useless, say the Wolverhampton men. 'For our complaint to be taken seriously we must go ahead with regular, Saturday strikes?

Mr. J. Morgan, chairman of the Wolverhampton branch of the TGWU, said that other garages were in favour of the Wolverhampton plan. After all the garages had been approached there would be an emergency meeting of the Wolverhampton branch to consider next steps.

There is considerable bitterness at the Birmingham Digbeth garage that their claims for better conditions have been turned down, while Corporation busmen have recently met with success in their own claim.

'Our wives have to shop at the same stores as their's, said one Midland Red driver.

During last Saturday's strike, pickets from Kidderminster met buses from the Ludlow garage at Bewdley and persuaded the drivers to turn back. Pickets from Worcester met Ludlow buses at Abberley and succeeded in turning these back too.

TURNED

BACK Walsall Corporation buses operating over Midland Red routes discharged their passengers and turned round after pickets had spoken to the crews.

Nursing staffs at hospitals in the Birmingham area were driven to work from their homes. Elderly and infirm persons on the buses turned back were also driven to the terminus in cars by strikers. LABOUR YOUTH'S GREAT LOBBY change every morning and then walk around for the rest of the day.

'It costs us a lot of bus fares to go to the exchange every day and I only get f3 2s. 6d. a week.

After I have paid for my board at home, there isn't much left for pocket money or to buy clothes with,' he added.

A 19-year-old Liverpool YS member explained how he had been in and out of poorly-paid jobs ever since he left school four years ago.

"They take you on for a short period when you leave school at 15 because they don't have to pay very much wages. When you get too old and want higher wages you just get the sack.

Then it's the dole office for the next few months.

*I have been in and out of work so much that I haven't got enough stamps to draw dole money. All I get is £2 3s. a week National Assistance along with many of the other 1,500 unemployed young people in Liverpool?

Redundant

Although unemployment in the north of England is not as bad as in the really black areas 16-year-old Barry Robinson who was among the 150 people from Leeds maintained that it had increased a lot during the last year.

After leaving school a year ago Barry became a chair-maker but was later declared redundant.

'Since then I have had a number of jobs in between being on the dole,' he explained.

I draw about £3 10s. and out of it I sometimes have 10s. pocket money, which doesn't seem to go very far.' Provocation After a long and enthusiastic march the demonstrators made their way to Westminster to see their MPs.

They were met by a strong force of police. But in spite of some provocation the youth queued up in a disciplined manenr, determined to see their representatives and explain the problems of youth unemployment.

'I am going to give my Tory MP a piece of my mind,' was the comment of young miner John Devlin of Glasgow. I am not unemployed yet but I soon will be when they close my pit in a few months' time. I won't REASONS for the attempted union-smashing at Denby's dyeworks, near Bradford, became clearer this week when the company installed the second of two highly mechanised drying machines.

With these t50,000 'Bruckner' machines, the drying process is done much quicker and with less labour—it needs only three operators.

It was quite obvious to the management that any suggestion of redundancy would be firmly rejected by the 100 per cent union shop.

Some other method of reducing their labour force, but still keeping skilled workers, had to be found.

Many of the 250 workers, now in their 16th week of lock-out, say the strike was a culmination of a whole period of petty disputes and increasing tension at the works.

Deliberate

Others are sure the strike was deliberately provoked in order that employees could be sacked.

The fact that letters, telling them they could return to work on the basis of an open shop, were in their hands within hours of the strike being called, indicates that the management were prepared in advance and certainly gives weight to this argument.

Union officials continue to give their members a weekly report. But it is always the same story. -'The situation is delicate,' or "certain negotiations which canbe the only one either, there are 180 threatened with the sack.' 180 threatened with the sack.

Going to see MPs-Tory and Labour-provided a big lesson for the youngsters.

It became obvious that the Tories were just not going to do anything to get them jobs and that unless the Labour Party adopts a clear policy there will be no end to unemployment.

"They're ALL a shower,' was the general comment after coming out of the Houses of Parliament.

Sleep

Things were not much better at the Central Hall, Westminster, where over 20 Labour MPs sent the audience to sleep for five and a half hours.

All of them described the terrible hardships suffered by the unemployed-facts which many members of the audience could have told them from harsh experiences—but, apart from the now well-worn solution of direction of industry, no answer to unemployment was posed by Brum motor workers fight for higher wages WORKERS at the Fisher and this bears no relation Ludlow factory in Birmingham increased effort. have started a work-to-rule in a A Fisher and Ludlow managefight for higher wages. Recently the factory, which relied on a lot of overtime. makes car bodies for the British Motor Corporation, installed a completely automatic paintspraying and drying shop. This led to a speeding-up of car body production.

Coupled with the parallel developments of automatic machinery at Austins and new factories in Scotland this technique laid the basis for the big boost in car production in 1963.

Extra work

The effect of the increased production on day workers is that they are forced to handle ever-increasing quantities of finished components.

At Fisher's some workers are doing extra work without having any increase in wages because they are day workers and not on piece rate.

Although there is supposed to be some sort of output bonus for British Motor Corporation day workers they complain that not be disclosed are takin place. In reality, the dispute no nearer to a settlement thi it ever was.

A demand for a strike in every dyeworks in Yorkshire and Lancashire has been put forward.

The union executive met last Saturday to consider this demand and later issued a statement through Mr. Leonard Sharpe, general secretary of the GWU. This said the union would not withdraw labour from other firms because 'the union is not in dispute with any other firm and such action would constitute a breach of agreement in the industry to which the union is a party. It would not contribute towards a settlement of the dispute'.

Contempt

Their failure to fight and the complete contempt for their members displayed throughout the dispute by the union leadership has resulted in frustration. This has led to 'guerilla warfare' against scabs.

Some have been beaten up, windows in their homes smashed and cars and vans attacked. To many this seems the only way to fight back.

But this kind of action alone can in no way solve the problem that confronts the Denby men.

Only concerted working class action, including the spreading of the strike, can bring victory to these courageous workers who have stood completely solid throughout the whole of the winter months.

these fakers.

A question from a London A question from a London YS member, asking what the Labour Party would do about nationalization as an answer to unemployment when it came into power received very few replies from the platform.

Bessie Braddock, the chairman, hastily leapt to the defence of the party's present nationalization policy. 'It's a question of priorities,' she announced.

Insist

Most important speech of the evening was given by a National Committee member who said that the Young Socialist movement was taking the question of youth unemployment very seriously. It was necessary for the Labour Party to insist that young people could draw dole immediately they left school if they could not find jobs.

The NC member said: 'This demonstration today is a hallmark in the advance of the Young Socialists in its fight for policies against the Tories.' ment official admitted to the local press that the company 'We have to overlap shifts which we cannot do with the work-to-rule in progress,' he said.

'This move by the day workers has cut production by about two-thirds.' Cheap labour These statements clearly show that in order to make their profit the BMC bosses rely on the day workers to put in plenty of overtime. By keeping the wages down the employers are getting labour 'on the cheap'.

To fight this position in the factory shop stewards must show the urgent need for joint action between the day and piece workers otherwise BMC bosses will not be slow in driving down the standards of all sections in the company.

Registered at the G.P.O. as a newspaper Published by The Newsletter, 186A Clapham High Street, London, S.W.4 rinted by Plough Press Ltd. (LU), 80 Clapham High Street. London. S.W.4