The Newsletter, vol. 8 no. 354

ON DR. VICTOR LEONARD ALLEN, the 41-year-old Leeds University lecturer, who was arrested three weeks ago in Lagos, Nigeria, stood trial in Western Nigeria this week with two trade unionists and a teacher.

Allen and the three others, Sidi Khayam, Jonas Kiomasekenagh Abam and Olushgun Adebayo, have pleaded not guilty to a three-count charge of sedition.

Dr. Allen was arrested when he left a magistrates court in Lagos on July 1 after a charge against him of managing an unlawful society to averthrow the Nigerian government was withdrawn.

Now Allen and the others are accused of conspiring to overthrow the government by subversive means; drawing up plans for the same purpose, and having in their possession a seditious publication.

The case was still proceeding as we went to press.

DOCUMENTS

On Wednesday the prosecution read out documents which were alleged to have been taken from Adebayo's home. One was headlined 'Notes on a lecture on revolution No. 1' which stated that Nigeria is in the grip of a dictatorship masked in parliamentary democracy, and Nigerian Marxists had to appreciate the significance of revolution and prepare for it.

In opening the prosecution, Mr. Cecil Miller alleged that Dr. Allen made use of his "intellectual exuberance kindred fanatical inclination' when he joined the other three in Nigeria.

The Newsletter calls again on all British trade unionists and members of the labour movement to write to the Nigerian High Commissioner demanding the release of these political prisoners immediately.

FIDEL CASTRO, sellHeath and Mr. Jo Grimond on BBC television's 'Gallery' he repeated his Party's pitiable four-point nationalization plan put forward in the House of Commons a week earlier.

Labour would, if returned to power in October, nationalize steel, urban land "ripe for development' extend the operation of British Road Services, and the water undertakings.

Questioned by Mr. Heath about other industries such as chemicals, machine tools and the aircraft industry, Mr. Brown said 'No, no, no.' Completely ignoring the suggestions of further nationalization contained in 'Signposts for the Sixties', the programme drawn up during the Gaitskell period, commented.

"There is no other proposal than those I have already told you about? 'Commanding heights' At first Brown would not say what the Labour Party intended to nationalize, saying there was plenty of time later for revelations.

When he finally told the viewers (near the end of the programme so that he could not be pressed too hard on the question) Mr. Heath wanted to know Brown's reasons for nationalization.

All Brown could say was that it was the 'commanding heights' of the economy, to which Heath replied: 'Is water the commanding height of the economy?' The truth of the matter is that Brown doesn't want even these industries nationalized.

Brown exposed

Mr. Brown exposed himself completely when pressed by Mr. Heath who reminded him about the proposals of the Confederation of Shipbuilding and Engineering Unions for 'a large measure of public control and ownership' of the heavy electrical industry.

Said Mr. Brown: *Brother, I am talking to you about the Labour Party, and it is the Labour Party that will be opposing you at the General Election, not the Confederation.' What is going to happen after the election Mr. Brown?

As The Newsletter has constanțly pointed out, the Labour Party will come to power with absolutely no policies to solve the problems of the working class caused by automation, speed-up and unemployment.

Changing policy

Even the weak recommendations of the Confederation are ignoreu at this Stage by Brown, Wilson and the right wing of the Labour Party.

They want to carry even funther the actions that ended for a time with the death of Gaitskell—he was attempting to change the clause 4 policy of the Labour Party by completely doing away with nationalization.

He was stopped by the rank and file in the Labour Party who told him nationalization must stay.

It is high time they told 'Brother Brown' to get out.

The rank and file of the trade union and labour movement must unite now to force a Labour government to implement a socialist policy to fight the monopolies.

Chaabani caught COLONEL Mohammed Chaabani, the 35-year-old former commander of the Fourth Military Region, who started a counter-revolution in Algeria in June, was arrested on Wednesday.

Ben Bella's government has also taken action to prevent the government Opposition leader, M. Khider, from taking out the £15,000,000 deposited in his name when he was secretary-general of the FLN last year. • For more news on Algeria see page 3. on race

Castro prepares peace' deal with US styled Marxist-Leninist, is now openly attempting to make a deal with the United States. In an 18-hour interview with the 'New York Times' last week-end Castro offered to halt aid given to revolutionary movements in South America in exchange for a cessation of US subversion in Cuba.

He was prepared to discuss some international supervision of such an agreement. In any case, material assistance to Fidelist groups outside Cuba is reported to have dwindled in the past year.

Castro said that 'normal' relations with the United States would lead to the release of about 15,000 political prisoners held in Cuba.

Resumption of trade rela tions would make possible the in lemnification of American firms t aken over by the Cubans.

Diminishing tensions

It was made clear that the attempt to reach a settlement with Washington was prompted by Moscow.

"The spirit that has always been shown by the USSR has been to interest itself in the diminishing of tensions and the bettering of relations, said the Cuban leader.

Castro told his interviewer that the Cuban revolutionary regime would give way to a constitutional government before January 1969. This would be the 10th anniversary of the revolution.

Rumours have been circulating for some time about a rapprochment between Castro and the State Department. Recently, trouble at the Guantanamo naval base has diminished.

It was generally expected that Castro would wait for the US elections before making a move. The flight of his sister and the announcement in Washington that she had been an American agent for some years may be connected with the decision to start now to prepare for a deal.

Her flight poses important questions when one considers that she had been closely connected with the top leadership of the country and that Raoul, Castro's brother, is reported to have known about her activities for two years and knew of her intended escape. How and why did this man, leader of the Cuban army, allow this escape?

'Cut ties'

Official response in Washington on Monday was to demand that Cuba cut her 'ties of dependency' on the USSR before any negotiations could begin. However, no definition of such ties was given and it was agreed that no acts of 'subversion' had been backed by the Cuban government DESCRIBING the appalling conditions and unemployment suffered by Ceylon estate workers, S. Thondaman MP, leader of the 350,000-strong Ceylon 'Workers' Congress, stated recently that immediate steps must be taken to solve the problem.

In an indirect attack on the coalition government of Mrs. Bandaranaike, Thondaman said that while argument and polemic over the fate of 1,000,000 people -a tenth of the population— grow, the prodieu of tuman misery and frustration continued.

'Estate workers are excluded from all employment under government or in government corporations and are not permitted to obtain any land from government or settle down in colonisation schemes,' he added.

Plantation work

*Administrative pressure is brought to bear even on private concerns to ensure the nonemployment of these stateless workers.

"Thus, the only avenue of employment open to these estate workers are the plantations, though a handful may have managed to get work in domestic service.' The immediate task, said Thondaman, was to regain the human rights so far denied to these workers.

"The future is not hopeless as there are a number of progressive trade union organisations which are united with these workers,' he said.

Thondaman hoped that the government would restore all the fundamental human rights to the estate workers. (Most of these workers are third or fourth generation Tamil-speaking Indians.)

For a further article on Ceylon by G. Healy see page 2.

since last November.

The Newsletter, which has constantly supported the Cuban revolution against US imperialism since 1959, has also warned that the regime in Cuba does not constitute workers' power.

No substitute The Castro leadership is a petty-bourgeois nationalist group, pushed by the pressure of imperialism to nationalize foreign investment and to lean on the working class.

That this is no substitute for Marxism is now very clear. The victory of the Cuban working class depends on spreading the revolution to South America and to North America also.

Castro has now openly shown that, in order to maintain economic ties with Khrushchev, he will out of connections with • revolutionary struggle.

An international Marxist movement is the only hope for the Cuban revolution.

THE HEATH - BROWN CONFRONTATION LABOUR's deputy leader, George Brown, again• showed his contempt of the working class when, last week in a discussion with Mr. Edward to criticises THE €30,000,000 Ford factory at Halewood on Merseyside came to a standstill after the management locked-out 7,000 day and night shift workers this week. The lock-out took place after production lines became entangled as night shift workers took action against the excessive speeds of the belts in the factory.

Shop stewards and workers in the trim shops told a meeting of all on Wednesday morning in the Liverpool Stadium how the dispute had begun.

They complained that for two years, workers at the Halewood plant had created the rod breaking their own backs by attempting to keep up with the speeds of the belts arbitrarily fixed by Ford work-study experts.

To keep to these speeds men literally had to run and jump in and out of moving lines, constantly exceeding their stations. This had to be done for eight and a half and 10-hour shifts said the stewards.

Lately workers have found that even under these conditions it has been impossible to keep up with the belt, so they have been starting before the time signals and running over after the finishing bell.

On top of this, foremen, who are paid to supervise, have also been working flat out as production line workers.

Finally, last week, workers in the trim shop on the night shift decided to ask the management to reduce the work load. This was refused, so the men decided to work normally-to run no more and to begin and finish on time.

CHAOS

Ford claim that this resulted in the production dropping last Monday from 36 cars in the first hour to 14 in the third. This eventually affected other pants of the factory and things became chaotic. The firm refused to reduce the speed of the belts and had to send the night shift home.

On Tuesday the day shift.also. ground to a halt and the men were sent home.

At the mass meeting Wednesday many speakers manded the workers take a stand now to settle a national agreement on line speeds throughout the motor industry.

ACTION

Speaking for the Transport and General Workers' Union, Mr. Sam Glasstone was loudly applauded when he said: 'It is obvious that to settle these problems caused by automation more than industrial action is required —political action is needed.

•With Fords we are dealing with the toughest employer not only in England, but in the world. I know what I would like to do to Fords, but unfortunately, it is not yet part of the Labour Party programme.

I hope everyone here will decide to do something about that in the autumn and in the months after the election.' It was decided to resume work immediately on condition that:

There will be no running to keep up with the belts;

That no man will start before time or finish after time;

That no man will leave his station limits: and That formen will not work on the production lines.

The men intimated that the decision on this question and the question of line speeds must be received by Monday.

It looks as though a major struggle with Fords is inevitable, since the firm has consistently stated to union officials that line speeds and work loads are not, and never will be, the subject of negotiations.

7,000 presses for union with Greece 1 Girivas to Cyprus eras return of General made him the effective leader of the Greek nationalist forces on the island. In his 'triumphal' journey from Nicosia to ramagusta and when addressing mass rallies, he openly declared the need for Enosis. union with Greece.

He repeated this call when he spoke to a special session of the Cyprus House of Representatives on Monday. He demanded that the House itself declare its support for Enosis.

The former BOKA leader said he had returned to Cyprus, not as a politician, but as 'an apostle of the national ideal'. He urged that 'ideological differences with communism' be set aside 'for the sake of the national ideal.

'We should all march hand in hand for the realisation of Enosis,' he said.

Applauded

This means that he is prepared to look for Soviet support against the British base in Cyprus. However this may be applauded by AKEL, the Cypriot Communist Party, it does not make Grivas any less of a danger to the Cypriot workers.

Before his career as the leader of Cypriot nationalist guerrilla forces, Grivas was an extreine reactionary politician in Greece.

Party, hobnobbed with the aristocracy and leading Tories of Britain-Princess Marina, Lady Churchill and Dr. Beeching of railway fame—one week-end. And, seven days later he was discussing with a close friend the possibility of ending the ITV workers' strike-again watching a game of tennis at Wimbledon.

After discussing with a Mr. X, who was later found to be a certain solicitor, Mr. Arnold Goodman, Wilson took what he called 'a small part' in the negotiations which resulted in ending the strike.

A spokesman for the Technicians' Union said that all demands and offers were being withdrawn and fresh talks with the employers will begin. This can hardly be seen as a victory for the television workers. They are back at the starting post as far as negotiations are concerned.

NEGOTIATIONS

The 3,500 men who came out on strike for a 25 per cent wage increase and a shorter working week, are not likely to get anything out of the so-called 'realistic negotiations' that the management talk of.

Wilson earlier this year intervened in the strike of workers at the Steel Company of Wales and called for a court of SPECIAL OFFER TWO WEEKS TO GO The Newsletter's special offer to new subscribers is open for another two weeks. Fill in the subscribtion form on page 4 NOW and receive your Newsletter in the post at the old rate of 7s. for 12 issues.

We still appeal to all our readers and subscribers to increase their orders of the recently enlarged Newsletter. inquiry, the results of which were published last week.

The men at SCOW gained nothing from the inquiry. They were merely told that there would be no wage rise because the company could not afford it.

Afraid that his public election image might be spoiled by workers who are fighting for wage increases and better working conditions, Wilson intervened again this week.

His friend Mr. Goodman is legal adviser to Television Wales and West and is known to have many connections in the television industry, according to the national press.

On Thursday, July 2, Wilson attended a press showing of a film on Aneurin Bevan as guest of Jack Hylton, the impressario.

BUSY

According to the "Telegraph' (July 7) Wilson met Goodman at the film show and there was considerable discussion on the strike which had then reached deadlock.

In the following days Wilson was no doubt very busy pulling strings and making the way clear for his spectacular strikebreaking effort.

In line with the big television bosses, Wilson helped to get the men back to work and betray their interests.

Such a strike could have been successful but Wilson prefers to keep well in with his wealthy friends.

No doubt Lady Churchill and Princess Marina will loudly applaud his action but the working class will certainly not do so.

His private army formed in 1943, was more concerned with killing Communist Party members than with liberating Greece from German occupation.

Instead of developing a united working class struggle in Cyprus with a socialist programme, AKEL has trailed behind Makarios, hoping to turn him towards Moscow.

In this way they have allowed the nationalists to divide Greek and Turkish workers and peasants.

They have also prepared the way for men like Grivas to take over and to crush the working class movement, especially AKEL itself. offer LOSTMASTER - General Bevins made an offer te the postmen this week of a miserable 4 per cent wage increase — virtually the same as the offer turned down earlier this year in February.

Because of their poor wages and bad working conditions the postmen decided on a one-day strike and an overtime ban.

At the last minute the men were persuaded by union leader Ron Smith to drop all militant action and put the claims to a committee of enquiry.

The results of the enquiryon which Bevins made his offer to the union-have proved to be a farce.

Representatives of the union met Bevins on Wednesday and turned down his offer. Smith said he would report to his union executive but would not recommend acceptance. ! Postmen will have learned that men like Bevins do not hand out wage increases unless forced to do so through mitant action by workers.

Postmen, who are among the most poorly paid workers, will have to fight for their original demands.

THE EWSLETTER reforms which will help root out some of the worst evils of the existing system. By a more sympathetic attitude to labour as against the employers win the confidence of the workers and be able to harness them for the next stage in our attainment of power.' No basic The LSSP revolutionary wing and the degeneration Pabloism One cannot separ: oblems of the LSSP ›nary wing from this tion. These comra vare that a lot of di is to take place abo ippened in the inter ovement since 1953. Apart from a fer ritten words and od ›out international wo: is been absolutely no scussion in the LSSP 'oblems for almost te lany comrades who sur inority are only now ng to realise the tween the internatio stional degeneration ourth International fou rotsky in 1938.

The future of the rem y wing depends mai son a serious study lationship. was taken at the LSSP ConferJuly 1 Pabloism..

Tween the leaders of •HE relationship bethe Lanka Sama Samaja Party (Ceylon) and the Pabloite international centre in Europe was a marriage of political convenience.

The former capitulated to the pressure of the capitalist politicians in Ceylon and eventually found their way into the coalition government, whilst the latter concentrated on the liquidation of the sections of the Fourth International founded by Trotsky in 1938.

In Britain it was Pablo who prepared the ground for John Lawrence and his group in 1954 to split away from our organisation and join the Communist Party. Right at the moment when Lawrence proposed to enter, Pablo drew back and criticised him.

From time to time we also read of criticisms which the centre in Paris made of the LSSP. All the while they boosted this party as the la gest Trotskyist organisation in the world. They maintained the friendliest relations with its leaders.

The Pabloites supported N. M. Perera Pablo, Frank and Germain were fully aware of the revisionist policy being pursued by N. M. Perera. After the 1960 election he wrote a lengthy resolution outlining his preparation for the coalition, which was forwarded to the centre in Paris. In this, he justified his policy along the lines of the 'entrist' policies pursued by the Pablo leadership.

The following sections reveal his ideas which were essentially in line with Pablo's policy of all-out support for "entrism' and for national capitalist Bala Tampoe, one of the leaders of the Revolutionary Section of the LSSP, which realises discussion must take place on events in the international movement parties and movements such as the FLN in Algeria.

'Concretely,' he said, 'the LSSP party will have to take the following steps. First of all enter into a no-contest pact to fight the forthcoming elections. In the campaign itself declare our readiness to support the formation of an SLFP [Sri Lanka Freedom Party] government. This must not be hedged about with conditions otherwise we will weaken the forces ready to OUT SOON-Order your copy now Fourth International incorporating (Summer issue) REVIEW Contents include:

Editorial—Ceylon Crisis of Post-War Capitalism-Peter •Jeffries Through What Stage Are We Passing—1924 speech Medical and Veterinary Workers Trends in Soviet Literature (Part II)-Jean Simon Germany 1921: 'The March Action'—Pierre Broué 52 pages. Illus. Price 2/6. Available from: New 186A Clapkam High Street, London, rally round alternative government.

Secondly, steps must be taken to bring about a pro-agreement with forming a Joint The pre-election resistance through fear of the disad La Marxist-SLFP obtain allel election. We will vermost Wald stand for, but a broad pro gressive programme should be nationalizaion of life insurance, but not L DanKS DUl not nationalizanon:

linports It is possible to denierate collaboration and condemn it out of hand. This charge is only tenable if the class character of the SLFP as a petty-bourgeois party is not accepted. In any case, such entrist tactics in respect of reformist ¡social-democratic parties are nothing new. Admittedly we are taking entrism a stage further by accepting oflice. But is this not the best way of taking the masses through the experience necessary to dispel their illusions, and creating confidence in our genuineness. A few bold progressive measures sponsored by us will enable them to learn more than years of propaganda by LIS. These measures should be such as to be in line with our socialist programme and such as would carry our socialist policies forward.

It is also possible to condemn this as parliamentarism. As I have already pointed out historical factors have pushed the party into the parliamentary struggle in a big way. And parliamentary struggle is also a struggle for power. Universal franchise does boost the parliamentary struggle. It is no accident of history that in no country where universal franchise obtains has there been a revolutionary overthrow of the capitalist class. Though mass struggles leading to the overthrow of capitalism are conceivable, in point of fact such situations have never yet arisen, because LABOUR Park the franchise has placed in the hands of the workers a vehicle for achieving power. Universal franchise one must admit has tended to blunt the edge of mass struggle. Militant working class actions will continue to occur, but they do not reach the heights necessary for wresting power.

It would be equally wrong to deny the dangers and pitfalls of such a policy of entrism, as I have advocated earlier. It may, specially at the outset, create more illusions in the progressive character of the SLEP. There are also the dangers inherent in taking office. LSSP ministers may have to take unpleasant decisions with regard to strikes, and the demands of the workers. We may not be able to eliminate these dangers, but we can minimise them (a) by activising our party organisation and by systematic propaganda through it of the true meaning and purpose of these entrist tactics. We should, if this work is properly carried out, succeed in infiltrating the SLFP branches and capturing the the more progressive minded youth of the rural areas; (b) by pushing through a comprehensive labour code obtain some very needed Ceylon Coalition A Betrayal of Trotskyism A STATEMENT BY THE INTERNATIONAL COMMITTEE OF THE STATEMENT BY THE INTERNATIONAL COMMITTEE OF THE FOURTH INTERNATIONAL IMPERIALISM can only retain its hold in Ceylon as in other colonial and semi-colonial countries through the medium of native "national' leaders.

In Ceylon the native capitalist parties are no longer able to govern alone; the economic and political crisis has raised the question of workers power, in alliance with the peasantry. Capitalist rule is being шалашки ошу vecause tut liaina vala. valaja maintainad onla hananca tha Tanta Cama Camaia Party, a workers' party, which has until now claimed membership of the Fourth International, has entered into a enalition with the canitalist Randaranaike government, with the purpose of disciplining the working class.

The programme of the Fourth International and of Trotskyism has been completely abandoned by the majority of the LSSP. Its leaders have deserted to the side of imperialism. The International Committee condemns them as traitors and enemies of the working class. It welcomes the decision of a minnnity to form the new ISSP Revolutionarv Section.

Since the split in the Fourth International, after which the International Committee was formed, the LSSP has adhered to the International Secretariat until recently led by M. Pablo. While the International Secretariat has acclaimed the LSSP as 'the only really mass Trotskyist party in the world, etc.' the opportunist and parliamentary degeneration of the LSSP went on behind its public adherence to the Fourth International.

Pabloism consists essentially of an abandonment of the perspective of constructing independent Marxist parties, relying instead on the inevitable 'left' Trotskyist movement. development of the petty-bourgeois revisionists and The procedure of unification without discussion of the Labour bureaucracies. This formed the flowed naturally from the Pabloite revisionism of 'theoretical' and political cover for the capitulation Marxism and the abandonment of the building of of N. M. Perera and the LSSP leaders.

After the LSSP entered the coalition, the Unified one year after the unification together with the Secretariat of the Pabloite revisionists expelled the suspension of Pablo has overwhelmingly confirmed difference between Pablo and Germain Significantly enough the recent timing of Pablo and his followers for their public pro-khrushchev activities coincides with the formation of the coalition government in Ceylon. Yet there is no basic difference in method between Frank and Germain, who are expelling Pablo, and N. M. Perera and his followers.

Indeed, over 'the past year Pablo has had no direct control or influence ever. what has gone on in Ceylon. All the decisions have been made by Germain, and Frank, supported by the Socialist Workers Party in the United States.

It is well known that Germain is at this moment engaged in building up a faction in Western Europe against the SWP. His immediate collaborators are those who are turning towards liquidation into the parties of social-democracy.

Recently, Germain described Mr. Joseph Hansen, who likes to be known as the secretary of the late Leon Trotsky, as 'an hysterical old woman, and the SWP as 'an opportunist party'. three ministers, Perera, Anil Moonesinghe and Cholmondely Goonewardene, and suspended the 504 delegates who voted for the coalition. These were the fruits in Ceylon of the 're-unification' of the Pabloites and others exactly one year ago. Pablo himself had been suspended from the Unified Secretariat along with his supporters on the Executive Committee a callel. In Committes aniv a fatu nApke aarliar In tha European sections of the Pabloite Fourth International new splits are on the way; Frank and Germain who led the susnension of Pahlo are openly going over to a programme of structural reforms which has developed in the 'left' social-democracy and the reformist Italian Communist Party.

Pablo and his immediate clique are openly capitulating to Khrushchev, whilst Frank and Germain tag along with centrist currents in Western European social democracy and the Stalinist Parties. There is no hasic difference in revisionist method hetween Awwe ear ALT AAV SALAMA MAINT VULTINVIL the two groups. They both serve different wings of the corrupt bureaucracies of Stalinism and Social- Democracy.

When the Unified Secretariat, consisting of the Pabloite International Secretariat and some former members of the International Committee was formed in June 1963 with the support of the Socialist Workers Party of the United States, the International Committee opposed this unification. We insisted that unification without political discussion and agreement was unprincipled and would, in fact, only prepare future splits weakening and not strengthening the revolutionary parties. The betrayal in Ceylon only the ad tri WE an po The Unified Secretari e direction of Germ: rank, supported by th Ivocated support for ist wing of Leslie ardene and Colvin ( id the United Left ›licy right up until 1 The LSSP Revolutionary Section must find a road 1o constructing the revolutionary party with roots in ate the revoludegenedes are iscussion ut what national brief Id notes rk there • serious on such in years. pport the v beginrelations nal and of the inded by volutionnly now of this at under ain and re SWP, the cenGoonele Silva / Front the vote ence on June 7. Pierre Frank very reluctantly supported the revolutionary wing after they walked out.

They did not, in any way, support the revolutionary minority before the conference. Indeed, they endeavoured at all times to dampen down the internal struggle by pleas about unity and internal party peace.

The Unified Secretariat issued a bulletin in January 1964 which contained letters to the LSSP leadership about the United Left Front and the basis for the eventual agreement between them.

In the same bulletin they published a resolution from the minority. This resolution was submitted for discussion on July 7, 1963, but the Unified Secretariat did not make it known to their sections until early in 1964. This resolution warned the whole movement about the dangers of the United Left Front when it said:

*The working class and the broader revolutionary masses of tomorrow must not be led to believe that their salvation lies in putting a so-called "Left Front" in office, but in organising and uniting for direct mass action against the SLFP government and the other forces of capitalism in Ceylon, on the road to a Workers' and Peasants' Government?

This was reproduced without a single word of comment, either for or against by the Unified Secretariat. Such silence undoubtedly disorientated many comrades who could have been won to the minority.

Whilst behind the scenes some leaders of the Paris centre vaguely supported the leaders of the minority; in the public activity of the LSSP they came down heavily on the side of the centrists. This two-facedness is typical of the methods of the struggle of plantation workers like these our position. Discussion of differences was not permitted. Criticism of the LSSP or any other section was forbidden on the grounds that it would impede the unity of the Trotskyist movement. Pabloism thus consciously and directly prepared the betrayals of Perera and the LSSP majority. In the name of Trotskyism a defeat for the working class was organised.

In proposing a 'centre' resolution at the LSSP Conference based on the class collaborationist role of the CP and the MEP in the United Left Front a1 v the Unified Secretariat continued, in fact, to prepare for the defeat. Even now they do not expel the centre group of de Silva and Leslie Goonewardene, even though they remain in the same party as the traitor Perena.

The LSSP Revolutionary Section has taken the first necessary step a complete break from the opportunists. It must find a road to constructing the revolutionary party with roots in the struggles of the urban workers and the plantation workers, preparing not for parliamentary honours but for the revolutionary overthrow of the capitalist government.

The entry of the LSSP members into the Bandaranaike coalition marks the end of a whole epoch of the evolution of the Fourth International. It is in direct service to imperialism, in the preparation of a defeat for the working class that revisionism in the world Trotskyist movement has found its expression. The task of reconstructing the Fourth International must be undertaken from the firm basis of constructing revolutionary proletarian parties in every country in struggle against the bureaucratic and opportunist servants of imperialism and against their defenders the revisionists who usurp the name of Trotskyism and the Fourth International.

Even now when Leslie Goonewardene and Colvin de Silva with their supporters are actively behind N. M. Perera and the coalition government, the Unified Secretariat does not expel them. It is still hoping that it will be possible to bring them together with the revolutionary left, in an organisation where they will be able to manoeuvre between the left and right wings.

In eftect, the Unified Secretariat is extremely hostile to many of the leaders of the minority because they know that there is going to be a serious examination of the policies of the International Committee of the Fourth International.

After the coalition government was formed, a ferocious struggle between the two rival factions for power took place inside a number of unions. The tendency which gained most from this was undoubtedly the Chinese wing of the Communist Party led by Shanmugathasan, whom Pierre Frank had special discussions with whilst he was on the island.

Having staggered through the United Left Front, Frank is now looking for another alliance with a pro-Chinese tendency which • is extremely hostile to Trotskyism. At the same time as Frank was speaking to Shanmugathasan, the latter was taking full advantage of the formation of the coalition by insisting in the press that this was the direct outcome of Trotskyist policies.

The LSSP revolutionary wing has now the historic task of reconstructing the revolutionary party in Ceylon. They will do this all the better when they understand its relationship to the past and break completely from the Unified Secretariat in Paris. Their place is in the ranks of the International Committee of the Fourth International. 'he International Committee of th 'ourth International, July 5, 196

• Smith lines up with July 11 Page

law in Washington on Friday, July 3, the Southern States of America saw some of the most vicious attacks by white segregationists against Negroes.

Johnson may have signed the Bill, which now gives the coloured people the right to enter restaurants, hotels, shops, stores, and other public places where they have previously been barred, but this has not stopped the reactionary demonstrations of the Ku Klux Klan and its supporters.

All those religious do-gooders —black and white—who pin their hopes on acts of law and the so-called enlightenment of Johnson on the Negro question will have their dreams drastically shattered in the summer months.

Turned out In the 'Sunday Times' this week a photograph showed a young Negro demonstrator being turned out of a restaurant car park by two white men, one holding a gun and another wielding an axe handle.

At a rally supporting the traditional Southern line of: 'integration should be a matter for the individual states' , three young coloured boys were beaten up by a crowd of jeering Southerners.

When Negroes tried to eat in a restaurant at Selma, Alabama, four of them were arrested. Two white men and two Negroes were injured during a street fight when other Negroes tried, unsuccessfully, to enter a drive-in restaurant at Laurel, Mississippi.

Workers dead?

The three young 'civil rights workers' who went to Mississippi over a week ago are still missing and it is thought unlikely that they will now be found alive.

Johnson's move can only be seen as a piece of election propaganda aimed at attracting the Negro vote to the Democratic party at the forthcoming presidential election.

In its June 29 issue, "The Militant' the paper of the Socialist Workers' Party, naively called upon President Johnson to send the troops into Mississippi to stop the attacks on Negro freedom fighters.

'Jail cops' Clifton DeBerry, the Socialist Workers' Party candidate for President, who wrote the article, says: 'Occupation forces should arrest and throw every cop or other official in jail,' who were connected with the disappearance of the three Civil Rights fighters.

Such a proposition means nothing for the coloured people who are fighting for freedom. American troops are not fighting in South Vietnam or Laos on behalf of the American people and they will not do so when sent into Mississippi.

Johnson uses the army to back up American monopolists. Any restoration of law and order in Mississippi will only be done so that the bosses can carry on making their profits in a reasonably peaceful state.

To call for the troops to be sent into this state is to betray the interests of every single coloured worker inside the United States.

Face facts The SWP and its leadership will not face up to the fact that the only way to fight for the freedom of the Negro population is to link the fight with that of the thousands of unemployed white workers- on the dole queues in America.

Hansen and his colleagues will not face up to the building of a working class Marxist movement pledged to give leadership in the struggles of the workers in America. And, until such a leadership is built, the Negro fight will remain isolated. South Africa AN SMITH, prime minister of Southern Rhodesia, has • announced that new trade agreements will be negotiated with the South African government.

The white supremacists of But Smith, backed by the rich Southern Rhodesia are aligning right-wing Tory farmers, grimly themselves with the apartheid hangs on to a power he does government of Verwoerd in not wish to relinquish and the South Africa. 'We are prob- British government flounders in ably closer to South Africa than a crisis of indecision. any other country in the world, Should Labour get in at the stated Smith. next election will they call upon This connection between the the aid of the United Nations vicious segregationist govern- to bring about a solution? The ments of the two countries is rank and file of the labour hardly surprising and if Smith movement must make sure that should announce independence they do not do so. for Southern Rhodesia under The Congo serves as a grim the white minority government, warning that imperialism still the African workers' plight will become even more desperate.

Sir Alec Douglas-Home and the Tories are, to say the least, in a quandary over the question of Southern Rhodesia. They know that Smith means what he says and it is only a matter of time before he puts his words into action.

On the other hand other African members of the Commonwealth, led by Ghana, have threatened to leave the Commonwealth if the British government does not make the position clear on the question of the relationship between South Africa and Southern Rhodesia.

It is significant that in Tuesday's issue of "The Times' Sir Edgar Whitehead, leader of the opposition in Southern Rhodesia, is reported to have said that he could find no fundamental difference between the policy of the Conservative Party and that of the Labour Party to his country.

Meanwhile, violence is on the increase. Affican workers, who have for many years slaved under the domination of the white settlers in Southern Rhodesia, are becoming frustrated by lack of decision on independence.

Not surprisingly one European has already been killed and others were injured in attacks over the week-end. keeps its hold on the African people through the UN.

Home and his colleagues hope to keep on stalling until after the election when a Wilson administration can take over the crisis. But as the Commonwealth prime ministers gathered for their meeting in London this week many seemed determined to put the Southern Rhodesian question high on the agenda.

ON ravda 30, tied an akace Pravda' carried an article by Lt.-General A. I. Cherepanov (a military adviser to the Kuomintang prior to 1927) commemorating the 8uth anniversary of Michael Borodin's birth. According to the author Borodin died in 1951, presumably in a concentration camp.

Born Grusenburg, in 1884, he was later to assume the name Borodin. His first experience of politics was in the Bund, a Jewish labour organisation.

Then, in 1903, he joined the Russian Social-Democracy as a Menshevik. In the 1905 revolution he was sent on a party assignment to Riga where he was arrested. Like thousands of others he fled the Czarist persecution and was in Chicago, USA, until 1918.

In August of that year, he returned to Russia where initially he played the role of go-between with the American working class movement for Lenin, transmitting Lenin's 'Letter to American Workers' to the USA.

In 1920, he participated as a representative of the Comintern on the abortive West European Bureau of the Comintern at Amsterdam which was broken up by the police.

Amongst other assignments he was a diplomat in Scandinavia, Spain and Mexico and chief representative at Kemal Attaturk's headquarters in Turkey.

He was soon turning his attention to the Communist Party of Great Britain, writing in the magazine of the Communist International criticising its sectarianism and failure to work in the mass labour movement.

In 1922, he arrived incognito in Glasgow and, under the name of George Brown, was able to advise in the drafting of the report commissioned by the 1922 Party conference on party structure and reorganisation.

Members of the commission were Harry Inkpin, Pollitt and Dutt.

Perhaps Dutt has banished this important event from his memory. The result of this work was to do away with the loose federal structure of the party and reorganise it on the basis of democratic centralism.

But Borodin was soon arrested, sentenced to six months' imprisonment and deported for fomenting revolution.

In the following year, 1923, he was to commence the most momentous episode of his career. arrived in Canton at Sun Yat Sen's headquarters at the head of a large Soviet mission.

The Chinese Revolution of 1911, whose architect was Sun Yat Sen, /was swiftly • transforming itself into one against imperialism and its native capitalist agents.

The mission set about organising, training and instructing not only the Kuomintang armies, but its party to the detriment of the Chinese Communist Party.

Sun Yat Sen (the leader of the Kuomintang) very shrewdly and hypocritically played up to the mission and the Soviet Union, affected all kinds of demagogic 'Bolshevik' poses much reminiscent of Castro's gestures, in order to obtain a practically uncritical support of the Comintern.

But on one point, like Castro, he was adamant. No united front with the CP. Either join the Kuomintang and subordinate itself totally to its discipline or clear out, a policy enforced with greater brutality but no less finesse by his successor Chiang Kai-shek. The Russians retrieved Sun's fortunes from imminent disaster.

After Sun's death, Chiang succeeded to the leadership but not without dissensions in the Kuomintang camp. The Communist Party had practically organised the successes of the Kuomintang and had led all the great anti-imperialist strike struggles.

In March 1926, Chiang staged a coup in Canton smashing the Communist Party and trade union organisation. Borodin and the Canton Communist Party wanted to fight out the issue there and then, but were prevailed upon by the Central Committee that they were not strong enough.

Chiang made it known that the violence was not his, but the handiwork of unruly subordinates! He swore eternal fealty to the Comintern, but went on to insist on the most humiliating conditions for the subservience of the Chinese Communist Party in the Kuomintang, one of which was to hand over membership lists.

The OCP rejected these terms and wanted to arm independently of the Kuomintang.

Chen du Tsiu, the leader of the CCP had many reservations on this kind of entrism acquiescing only in deference to the 'wisdom' of what he thought were Bolsheviks.

But the arms were exclusively for the Kuomintang and not for an independent Communist Party. They were advised of the necessity of doing cooly work for the Kuomintang at this stage of the revolution.

The reason for these suicidal policies lay in Moscow where Stalin with the support of the right wing of the Soviet bureaucracy staked everything on the alliance with the Chinese radical bourgeois. He had admitted the Kuomintang to membership of the Communist International in 1926.

The Russian Opposition was deliberately kept in the dark about developments in China. 'News' was falsified and actually fabricated to cover up one disaster after another.

The whole mass revolutionary movement was prostituted before Chiang's needs. A victorious rising on March 27 of the workers liberated Shanghai even before Chiang's northern expedition had reached its gates.

Paralysis ensued on the workers' commenced the wholesale slaught side. Three weeks later of the Shanghai proletariat.

Belatedly conceding treachery to Chiang, Stalin turned to the 'left' of the Kuomintang and involved the CP in the Wuhan adventure. Once again, the independent role of the working class and its party advocated by Trotsky was rejected for collaboration with the 'left' Wang Ching Wei.

By July 1927 the 'left' Kuomintang joined with Chiang to slaughter Hankow workers:

Borodin left China by the back door in July. Before he departed however, he advocated a retreat to the north-west of China (later implemented by Mao) in order to retrieve forces and return later.

He was succeeded by Neumann and Lominadze (who were to conclude this chapter with the bloody debacle of the Canton uprising of December 1927).

Borodin was quite logically made one of the scapegoats for Stalin's failures in China. However, he was made Commissar for Labour.

Later he was made deputy head of Tass and manager of the Soviet paper pulp industry. He became editor of the English Moscow 'Daily News'. As late as 1936 he was still being baited on account of his failure to criticise himself. During the war and after, he was chief editor of the Soviet Information Bureau.

He disappeared in 1949 either in connection with the antisemitic or anti-Tito purges. It appears that Borodin had the protection of the Chinese Communist Party, but it did not save him from this last twist in his fortune.

Industrial WSLETTER July

leader of the Katanga breakaway province, who has been in exile for a year, was asked on Monday, July 6, to form a government by President Kasavubu.

Ever since he returned to the Congo, Tshombe has been talking of reuniting the country's left and right-wing forces. But only a day before he was asked to form a government five alleged members of the exiled Committee of Liberation were condemned to death in Leopoldville.

The five were accused of having grenades, explosives and detonators.

Tshombe's talk of uniting the various factions - the Committee of National Liberation, Pierre Mulele's supporters and the right-wing party of Mobutu —in a government is not through any particular love of peace.

Stop violence

He wishes to stop the unrest and violence which now tears the country apart so that the Congo's important mineral export trade with France and Belgium can continue unhindered.

Where Tshombe finds it expedient he will imprison such political opponents as the five who have been sentenced to death in Leopoldville, should anything stand in the way of his allegiance to certain imperialist countries.

Since the elections are only six months away, Tshombe wants to have a certain amount of support whilst he is in power. To get such support he is trying to buy off the leaders of the left-wing rebel forces.

His call for the release of pro-communist Antoine Gizenga can only be seen as a step towards bribing those in opposition to Adoula - Congo's present prime minister-to stop the fighting in Stanleyville and other parts of the Congo. Southern Rhodesia

over frigates deal ABOUR MPs will as • questions in the House ‹ Commons this week about the £14,000,000 frigates deal with Spain which the Tories claim broke down after Harold Wilson opposed the deal.

It is now very doubtful that the deal was anywhere near completion, but the Tories have jumped on Wilson's statement as a useful piece of pre-election propaganda.

Spain had also asked other countries to supply the frigates. Wilson knew this and it seems, timed his statement very well.

But after all the parliamentary hoo-ha has died down, members of the British labour movement will still remember that the Tories had considered supplying a mass murderer with weapons.

Home, Butler and all the other staunch Tories in the party were aiding Franco as early as 1936 when they pursued a policy of 'non-intervention' which enabled Hitler and Mussolini to supply the arms with which the fascists crushed the Spanish people.

In a press statement the National Confederation of Labour of Spain in Exile says that some people think Franco has changed.

Franco has 'changed' so much that he murders Julian Grimau, Granado and Delgado; persecutes workers and intellectuals and flings many into prison for political reasons.

Labour may claim a victory over the frigates, but at the same time the working class remembers visits to Spain by right-wing MPs and trade unionists.

The statement - and the Newsletter-calls on the labour movements of France, the United States and other countries approached by Franco, to oppose the manufacture and export of arms.

Your symbol of liberty?

great that several armed factions now live in the mountain regions of the country waiting for an opportune moment to pounce on Algiers.

The latest band to emerge is that belonging to the rebel commander of the Sahara Military Zone, Colonel Chaabani, a religious fanatic, who has taken 6,000 well-armed men into the Aurès mountains-the area where the FLN lived and operated during the French occupation of the country.

In Algiers itself the government has placed some 40 opposition leaders under arrest.

Mr. Hassani, the previous Minister of Posts, escaped this mass arrest and immediately took over another faction in the Constantine region. He has been joined by one-time cell mate of Ben Bella, Mr. Boudiaf.

GREED

There is now talk of a wide Opposition front being organised between the groups, but, as the 'Daily Telegraph' pointed out (July 3) 'the Opposition leaders have little in common... They accuse Mr. Ben Bella of greed for one-man power, which many would themselves relish... They contend that his too rapid socialisation is leading the republic to economic ruin, but few have concrete alternatives to offer,' It is not Ben Bella's "too rapid socialisation' that is ruining the country, but the 'socialism' with which he carries it out.

Playing an important role in this degeneration is Michel Pablo, a ministerial adviser to Ben Bella, and leader of a section of the Paris-based Unified Secretariat.

successor to Nehru as Indian prime minister, has received the expected 'all clear from the misnamed "Communist' Party of India. The leaders of this Party have assured him of support, provided he continues Nehru's policies in the field of foreign relations.

These policies include India's part in the international front of reaction against China. The border dispute of 1962 was used to consolidate American and British military support for Nehru against China, not to mention the direct support given by the Soviet Union.

BORDER DISPUTE

Since then, the build-up in Laos and South Vietnam has produced a situation where the American State • Department announced that it was ready for 'total war' if necessary.

In the course of the border dispute the majority of the leaders of the Indian Communist Party, including S. A. Dange, supported Nehru's action against the Chinese Peoples' Republic.

When a large number of pro-Chinese members of the Party were imprisoned by the government which the Party leaders supported, a crisis and a split inevitably developed in the Communist Party.

One of the episodes in this split is centred upon veteran trade union and Communist Party leader Dange.

Some months ago he was accused of having capitulated to the British when in prison in 1924. Letters in which he offers his services to the British Raj, It was this same section which paved the way for the complete degeneration of the Ceylon Lanka Sama Samaja Party, the leaders of which have just joined in a coalition government with Mrs. Sirimavo Bandaranaike's capitalist party, the Sri Lanka Freedom Party.

Pablo and several of his supporters have recently been suspended from committees of the United Secretariat for issuing a pro-Khrushchev line in a magazine.

This further example of downright revisionism shows yet again that the support of Pablo and his followers for what they call the Algerian 'revolution' and Ben Bella's 'socialism' is completely unfounded.

S.A. police raids

SOUTH African police raided hundreds of homes last weekend in an attempt to suppress further actions against the Verwoerd government.

Such activity on behalf of the South African government has been on the increase since the recent Rivonia trial when Nelson Mandela and seven other prominent leaders were sentenced to life imprisonment.

Included in those arrested, were several journalists. According to "The Guardian', July 4, the names of the people whose homes were searched were taken from a list in possession of a Communist.

The police, who claim that the raids have been successful, say that another Rivonia trial is likely in the near future. and whose existence he denies, were alleged to have been discovered in government archives.

Now other rumours are circulating. We quote from the Indian socialist magazine "The Call' for May 1964:

'Apart from the imputed letters, there have been references to certain objectionable financial operations conducted by Mr. Dange in respect of funds received by him from the World Federation of Trade Unions and other Communistsponsored international bodies.

The personal friendship of Mr.

Dange with certain industrialists connected with a leading cotton textile group in Bombay and also certain transactions by him for the purchase and sale of 'luxury flats' and cars are being used against him.

"The most damaging instance being cited is an alleged reference made by the Union Home Ministry in a letter addressed to the Chief Minister of a State that Mr. Dange had advised Government how to deal with some of the 'left' Communists detained following the IndiaChina border war. The insinuation is that Mr. Dange engineered the arrests of some of his political opponents.' SHUKAY AM The accusations against Dange are paralleled by the recent betrayals by British Communists in the ETU and the NUM and by the parliamentary and trade union 'Communists' in France and Italy.

Trained in the Stalinist school, Dange and those like him in other countries have abandoned the standpoint of the international working class, and have ended up in that mass of corruption known as 'the national political life' of their separate countries.

, dent of the Liverpool Federation of Building Trades Employers last week placed the blame for the recent wave of disputes in the industry on Trotskyists.

He claimed at the Federation's half-yearly meeting that Merseyside building workers were allowing themselves to be led or intimidated by Trotskyists and other agitators into taking unofficial strike action!

They were operating this way, according to Mr. Bird, in the hope that employers might be forced into making some additional payments outside the industry's working rule agreements.

But the reasons for the increased number of site disputes have nothing to do with "Trotskyitsts' or 'agitators' as he well knows.

Encouraged by the increase in construction work during the year, building workers are undoubtedly keen to make up for the long months they spent on the dole in 1962 and 1963.

Failure

At the same time, because of the failure of the building unions to secure an adequate increase on the basic rate last year, when the union leaders called off the national strike, they feel they have no alternative but to fight at site level either for a guaranteed increase to the basic rate or for higher bonus payments.

It is this growing confidence of building workers which is causing alarm in the employers' organisations.

Over the past two years they have conducted a sustained campaign throughout the industry for increased efficiency and higher productivity.

This has resulted in a rapid extension of mechanisation, particularly on the bigger contracts and the more recent large-scale development of prefabricated building.

Although Mr. Geoffrey Rippon was able to report only last month that productivity within the industry has increased since last year by 9 per cent, it is clear that the building employers are worried that the militancy now being shown by building workers will halt this trend as workers demand a bigger share in the profits now being made.

What would be worse for the employers is that the building workers might break through the 'long-term' agreement which the unions signed after the dispute last year and demand a higher basic rate now.

Crisis

Whilst the employers had obviously hoped for a period where unemployment would enable them to push forward the reorganisation of the industry with little opposition from a docile labour force, the Tories, faced with a crisis in their own ranks and a loss of popularity after the Profumo and Rachman scandals, embarked on a pre-election boom in the hope that sections of the working class and their middle class supporters would swing back to them in the coming general election.

But this is where the Tories made their greatest miscalculation. The fragile boom they deliberately created has not at all led to apathy in the working class.

The attack on "Trotskyism' and 'agitators' by Mr. Bird shows how uneasy the employers are about the future.

What they fear is that workers determined to fight for wages and working conditions will turn to the Socialist Labour League and The Newsletter for support and away from the reformist road of the trade union and Labour Party leaders, and towards revolutionary solutions to the problems they face.

Registered at the G.P.O. as & newspaper Published by The Newsletter, Printed 1 Printed by Plough Press Lid. ). To.

180 Clapham High Street, London, S.W.4 the main contractor, Taylor Woodrow.

During the long winter months, with the vast flat site by the estuary to the Mersey River, a sea of mud, under atrocious working conditions, building workers on the site have fought tenaciously to establish a trade union organisation.

At every step they have met with opposition from the firm. Struggles have been waged over extra payments for the filthy working conditions, for adequate wet weather clothing, for correct bonus rates, and against the frequent sacking of workers and shop stewards which has been the norm, not the exception.

After a sustained work-to-rule and long negotiations, the workers on the site recently won a five-day working week. No sooner was this won than strike action was taken in an effort to secure the reinstatement of six women canteen workers who were dismissed.

When this was taken to arbitration two weeks ago, the strike was terminated, but the canteen was declared "black' by all workers on the site.

Taken stand

Now Taylor Woodrow have taken a stand which can mean only one thing - they are determined to smash the shop stewards' committee on the site. They have sacked 350 carpenters, carpenters' mates, bricklayers and their labourers, and scaffolders on the site and most of the shop stewards.

The trouble started on Friday, June 26, when two carpenters waiting for concrete to be poured into shuttering were approached by the labour officer who expressed annoyance because they were standing still. The carpenters replied that this only proved that the shuttering they had erected was competently constructed since their job now was to be available should No discussion McKay's on reinstatement AT its meeting last week the executive council of the Amalgamated Engineering Union agreed to pay strike benefit of £2 10s. per week to the Remington Rand workers who were on strike for five weeks against the sacking of their convenor, Calum McKay.

Dispute pay was also to be paid to Mr. McKay, backdated to March 23, the date on which Remington's dispensed with his services.

The question of taking up the fight for McKay's reinstatement, however, was not discussed by the executive council.

This underlines the comments in The Newsletter last week that the initiative must be taken by the Paisley district committee. Unless the district committee is prepared to take up the fight now, Calum McKay will face the same situation as the men who were sacked from Fords.

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The carpenters also expressed some remarks about the dust storm under which they were working since mud has dried under the sun and the whole site turned into a dust bowl.

Thirty minutes later one of the carpenters was handed his cards for allegediy swearing at the labour officer. At a meeting later that afternoon, shop stewards for the men's union, the Amalgamated Society of Woodworkers, reported that the firm refused to withdraw the sackings and allow the matter to be referred to the disputes panel which is the procedure agreed by the National Joint Council for this type of issue.

Fired

The carpenters faced with this attitude immediately struck work. Within half an hour the 65 mates were handed their cards and told they were fired. On the Monday (June 29) the carpenters were given their cards as well.

The shop stewards claim that this proves that Taylor Woodrow were preparing a showdown on the site, since all wages and employment cards are made up and kept in the firm's central office in Middlesex.

Following the dismissal of the carpenters on the Monday, the bricklayers and the scaffolders held meetings on the site and decided to come out in sympathy with those sacked. The same afternoon they too were handed their cards.

At subsequent meetings between the union officials and contractors, attempts have been made by the unions to get the dismissals lifted and all workers reinstated without victimisation and to take the case of the carpenter originally sacked through the disputes panel.

Taylor Woodrow have refused this request.

They claim that hold-ups on the site and other technical problems have necessitated the complete reorganisation of the contract and that they can no longer tolerate a position where the progress of the job is being continually undermined by unofficial action.

Enquiry

The unions have since pressed that an enquiry should

many years. LA week ther Pressed Steel Company announced its monthly 'Emerson' bonus as 3}d. in the fand the Rootes Company restarted the last of the 270 assembly line men who had been sacked following a dispute over bonus payments.

Rootes claim that work is back to normal on the Imp line and that peak production of 2,800 cars per week is being achieved.

Rootes workers say this is a publicity build-up and that conditions in the factory are worse than before.

Men restarted on the assemIbly line are now expected to 'double up' on operations in addition to those they did before the lock-out.

There is now no relief provided for track men for tea or toilet purposes and these must be taken if and when a few minutes can be snatched. A relief man is provided on the track only for the purpose of dealing with 'snags' in car assembly.

There is talk again at Rootes of the introduction of a bonus scheme after the holidays. Meanwhile the assembly line workers who were paid off face real hardship when the factory shuts down in two weeks for the summer break.

HOLIDAY PAY

These men received their holiday pay when they were 'sacked' by the company during the dispute. They will, therefore, receive no pay during the two weeks' holiday.

Some hope to receive money from the National Assistance Board but in Paisley this body fully co-operated with Rootes when confronted with requests for aid during the lock-out.

In most cases assistance was refused on the grounds that the men had received holiday pay The announcement of the 3{d. June bonus at Pressed Steel was not made until the day shift on Friday had finished and the night shift were safely inside the factory.

Workers on the production line have shown an increasing willingness to stop work in protest against Emerson methods of factory management. The bonus scheme is now maintained by a combination of management trickery helped out by the collaboration of a section of the shop stewards.

Stewards are coming into open conflict with workers on the track. In one case a shop steward who 'in the interests of bonus' (production) started to go up and down the track to urge the men to more effort was warned to stop such tactics or be removed.

The leadership of the shop stewards in the factory are nevertheless determined to push the scheme through again when it comes up for review in September. They hope to be assisted in this by the annual hand-out from the bonus 'reserve pool' which will take place prior to the annual holidays.

This will amount to no more than 7s. or 8s. per week over the period of the operation of the scheme.

GAIN

A factory leadership which fought for and obtained a good basic minimum wage at parity with the average earned in the car industry nationally would show a much bigger gain than that.

The shop stewards are divided into two sections-Amalgamated Engineering Union and National Union of Vehicle Builders. The Emerson bonus scheme has never been explained and discussed before a joint mass meeting of these two sections and its further acceptance can only be assured if this split in the factory is continued.

At Rootes and Pressed Steel the leadership of the shop stewards appears to have abandoned all idea of a unified factory struggle and a unity of all car workers.

The cutting out of track relief at Rootes is a step back.

The Emerson bonus is no substitute for the winning of a national minimum of pay for car workers.

In both factories militants should begin to hammer out a programme of minimum conditions around which a struggle can be waged.

The drift from the unions must be stopped and strong factory committees built, combining workers on the track and on maintenance and machine shop work. Once this is begun new leaders will come forward ready to break with class collaboration schemes.

be conducted into the way the contract has been handled by the contractors, and the Civil Engineering Employers' Association have agreed that this shall take place this Friday (July 19). A mass meeting is to be held next Monday for all workers on the site to consider the findings of this enquiry.

The firmness with which the firm has acted in this dispute should make it clear to all workers on the site that they can expect very little from the negotiations or the enquiry on Friday.

If any agreements are reached it will undoubtedly be on the terms which the contractors are prepared to accept. Has there once over the past few years been an enquiry which has taken the side of workers in dispute?

To face up to this attack the shop stewards need to take steps which can prepare for the unsatisfactory reply from the enquiry. This must include the withdrawal of the general labourers which has so far not taken place.

If a speedy settlement of the dispute is to take place the full support of all Merseyside building workers will be needed.

On the other hand, a defeat, or a long drawn-out struggle, will strengthen the hand of other building employers in the area who are taking the same tough line that Taylor Woodrow have taken on this contract.

MIMPLOYERs at the fro • rectiles Engineering Com pany, Battersea, South London, have been trying to sugar the pill for 1,000 employees they will sack in the next 18 months.

The firm is to move to the North-east and in order to try and get the union to agree, the bosses have been busily "persuading' wives of the workers that the North-east is attractive.

Met by representatives of the National Economic Development Council, the employees were given a coach tour of the region. Some spent the night at Durham, which is the centre of a depressed area.

Walk-outs

Earlier this year Projectile workers staged several walk-outs and demonstrations protesting at the closure of the factory. Many workers have stated that they do not wish to move from London.

It is widely known that firms who move to areas of high unemployment are given large grants by the government.

Could this be why the management of Projeotiles is so keen to move out of London, where rates of pay are higher anyway?

What could be better than large labour force, now on t dole queues, which has not be organised by the union for long period of time?

And what will happen those workers who refuse move to the North-east?

Jobs in South London are becoming scarce as many other engineering firms are expected to close down.

Nationalize

Richard Marsh, Labour MP, speaking in London at a meeting of the Confederation of Shipbuilding. and Engineering Union's campaign sub-committee, which was set up because of redundancy threats, said he was against nationalization of the engineering industry.

Only 'key sectors' should be taken over, he added. He is wrong. Labour must nationalize.

Rank and file union members will never feel secure in their jobs as long as there is no planning in industry.

A Labour government must ensure that not only is there employment in the North-east, but that those workers in the South do not lose their jobs. There is no door to the cellar and the entrance is clutted up with rubble.

The adjacent building has been demolished and this has left the waste water pipe of 165 partially • exposed. The pipe is placed just above the cellar so that every time water is poured down the sink of one of the apartment houses it just gushes out into the cellar. Some of the Draughtsmen strike on Tyneside THE entire staff of 56 draughtsmen' are picketing the factory of the Caterpillar Tractor Company at Birtley, Co. Durham. They have been on strike since June 30, demanding a minimum rate of $20 10s. a week at the age of 30.

The strike began when workers were recruited at a lower rate than had already been negotiated.

Last week the strikers organised a march through Birtley.

Draughtsmen at Smith's Dock, South Bank, Middlesbrough, have also taken action for the minimum rate.

A recent one-day stoppage of draughtsmen at Vickers Armstrong on Tyneside forced the firm to negotiate and resulted in an increase in wages.

Still no action by authorities • a fight last April to get the Glasgow Corporation to take drastic measures to rehouse families living in appalling ratinfested slums continue to gain support from other parts of the Gorbals.

As more tenants join the campaign even worse conditions than those prevailing in he Vatlands district recently reported in The Newslette have come to light.

To describe as appalling the conditions which families in Camden Street, Gorbals, have to endure, is a gross understatement.

In this area, a number of tenements have been demolished land jutting bricks and rubble the the nants who remain there.

noccupied dwellings hav nicole as houses, dis u agoge once existed and where and in some Ha vc accumulated.

condemned above, below filthy holes. amount of ways with will eliminațe smell which Part kept wenty Shut.

those who are ett behind are not comforted by the thought that it will soon be their turn to be re-housed. Visits to the planning department and other corporation departments and officials bring no results. The answer invariably is: 'We don't know.' One housewife told The Newsletter reporter that on her last visit to the City Chambers to enquire when she would be re-housed she was told it woul be some time between 1966 anc 1980. Her story is typical of many Gorbals families.

As a child she lived with her parents and their two other children in a single tenement apartment. Her parents were not re-housed until she was 17 years old. Now she is compelled to bring up her own family in even worse conditions.

DERELICT

Conditions at No. 165 Camden Street are indescribable. The tenement stands next to an empty and derelict public house. The ground floor is also empty and derelict.

There is one toilet on each floor. One toilet window is completely missing and immediately next to it with barely two feet of wallspace in between is the living room window of one of the tenants.

Beneath the tenement is a dunny or cellar which stretches right underneath the road. tenants claim that it has reached a height of 4 feet.

A short time ago when the rubble at the entrance to the cellar caught fire the firemen also had to pump the water which had aocumulated from the waste pipe, out of the cellar.

In the disused ground floor apartment water is constantly spraying out from a broken water pipe.

Complaints about a lavatory cistern which was thought to be unsafe brought no action from the sanitary department. Two months ago the cistern came away from the wall and fell on a sevenyear-old boy The Newsleter was told.

RAT POISON

From time to time rat poison has been sprayed through the letter box of a house on an upper floor which is unoccupied, but the tenants claim that the house has never been opened up for inspection and any dead rats removed. • A tenant who has lived in the house for 40 years says it has not been painted since 1938.

But the most shocking thing about this property is the fact that for the last two years it has belonged to the Glasgow Corporation and tenants are actually being charged rent and rates.

Following the last meeting of the newly-formed tenants' association, a deputation of 12 went to see the Medical Officer of Health to get something done about this property.

DEPUTATION

Dr. Horne is reported to have refused to see them and referred them to the Sanitary Department. The deputation, however, refused to go to the Sanitary Department since they said they would get no satisfaction there. Finally, they were allowed to see the deputy M.O.H.

Corporation officials have since been seen looking around the property but they have not consulted with any of the tenants.

The only visible result of their "investigation' some new wooden boarding at the doorway of one of the unoccupied dwellings on the ground floor.

This obviously does not satisfy the tenants and further action will undoubtedly be decided upon at the association meeting this week.

14 men sacked at Walton hospital TWO stewards were among 14 men sacked by the contractors on the Walton hospital site, Liverpool. The strike by 90 men on the site, who came out in sympathy, is now entering its third week.

The employers want to take the dispute to a panel, but the workers refused this since they considered they would not get any satisfaction. They say they will continue the strike until the 14 men, who, the management claim, were sacked for bad timekeeping, are reinstated.

The men are attempting to get support from other sites and have asked the unions involved, the Transport and General Workers' Union, the Amalgamated Society of Woodworkers, and the Amalgamated Union of Building Trade Workers to declare the strike official.

Joiners' goes to arbitration NINETY joiners employed by Taylor Woodrow Ltd., who are building a new Catholic Cathedral in 1 Liverpool, will remain on strike over the sacking of two mates until Tuesday when the dispute will be referred to a panel.

The management sacked two joiners for being 'unproductive' The men claim they were given jobs which were impossible to do in the time they were allotted.