The Newsletter, vol. 9 no. 395

WEEKLY ORGAN OF-THE=CENTRAL_COMMITTEE-OF-THE-SOCIABST ABOUR LEAGUE Vol. 9, No. 395 May 15, 1965 Price 6d.

U.S. troops move through Dominica past crudely drawn sign. clear! IN L.M...L armed intervention of U.S. imperialism in ›minica, under the sordid pretext of defendCANKEES The For further views on the Vietnam and Dominican affairs see American labour movement! Statement by the Political Committee of League (11/5/65)

EORGE BROWN's offer to the steelmasters White Paper has revealed to many trade unionists the real state of affairs in the Labour Party. movement!

lives of U.S. and other nationals, is another ing the reminder to the colonial peoples of the real brutal and aims of President Johnson's governnature ment.

For the Dominicans, this action will constitute neither disappointment nor surprise. In fact, it will confirm their belief indelibly imprinted in their memory since 1916 that U.S. imperialism, no matter what is says to the contrary, is hell-bent on establishing government by the marines, of the Dominicans, for the monopolists, at any cost.

Dominica's independence has always been more shadow than substance. Located on one of the chief sea routes between Europe and the Eastern part of America, it has been a target for continual imperialist plunder and occupation.

From 1900 onwards, the history of the island has been punctuated by officers' revolts, abortive dictatorships and frequent diplomatic intervention by the, USA. In 1914, President Woodrow Wilson threatened intervention and suppression of any revolt against the ruling power in Santo Domingo.

As the insolvency of the government grew, so did the meddlings of the USA. The State Department brazenly demanded control of expenditure and the collection of customs. This was refused.

BRUTAL SUPPRESSION Then, in 1916, marines landed, ostensibly to prevent another civil war in the island, but in fact to secure U.S. demands.

Once again, Wilson pressed the old claims on customs and expenditute and was refused, whereupon the U.S. declared military government and brutally suppressed native revolts in 1917 and 1918.

The occupation was lifted in 1924, but it took another 16 years before the island secured customs autonomy.

Six years and a few revolts after the marines left, Dominica was beset by a new scourge in the person • of Rafael Leonides • Trujillo Molina, Central America's most hated dictator and puppet of the USA.

Trujillo ruled Dominica for 31 years with a mixture of implacable terror, rigged elections and a one-party system.

UNIQUE APPARATUS His repressive apparatus was unique in Latin America. He amassed a massive fortune by his despotic rule. Sixty-five per cent of the country's sugar production and 35 per cent of the country's arable land belonged to the Trujillo family. In 1937, his army machine - gunned 15,000 Haitian squatters to death in a 36-hour bloodbath.

The fall of Trujillo coincided with the rise of Castro and the nationalization of U.S. property in Cuba. Naturally the U.S. regime began to fear for its interests in Dominica as the shadows of Castroism began to extend across the Caribbean.

When the 'middle-of-theroad' Juan Bosch was elected in 1962 as president, the U.S. decided the time had come to act. General Wessin y Wessin, a devoted Catholic and antiCommunist, threatened to revolt, U.S. warships made "precautionary' moves and, in 1963, Bosch went into exile.

President Kennedy immediately recognised the new military junta.

The overthrow of Trujillo, however, had irrevocably opened the sluice gates of revolt in Dominica. - Hatred of the dictatorship was fed by growing unemployment, land hunger, indebtedness and the falling price of sugar.

On April 24 this year, the revolt began with a purely military conspiracy against imperialism bares its fangs page President Cabral - Wessin's stooge - but soon developed into a genuine revolution when arms fell into the hands of workers, farmers and students.

Until this arming took place, the U.S. administration was not unduly worried.

It was reconciled possibly even to the return of Bosch. But the storming of the Ozama Fortress, the police headquarters, and the heavy casualties inflicted on General Wessin's forces by the guerillas changed the situation.

Even a ceasefire arranged by the Papal Nuncio had no effect. As the 'Time' magazine pointed out:

"The tragic fact was that no one seemed to be in real command anymore - not Bosch's people, not the remaining army rebels, not the Communists?

STEWART'S AID

Johnson's decision to intervene was meant in effect not to prevent the return of Bosch, but to stop the movement from transcending the limited and liberal aims of its original leaders who had by now abandoned it.

By summoning his Latin American puppets in the Organisation of American States to send a peace-keeping force to Dominica, Johnson hopes to avoid the stigma of unilateral intervention.

In this, he is aided by the clumsy contortions of Mr. Stewart who, in a reply to a Conservative MP, expressed his heartfelt 'gratitude' for the U.S. intervention in Dominica and also repeated the same glib fantasies about 'Communist conspiracy' in the Caribbean.

Labour must repudiate Stewart and demand an immediate withdrawal of the marines.

By JOHN ON Wednesday, the directors of the Fund authorised the payment of million) loan to the British government.

This money will be used mainly to repay credit facilities made at the time of the November sterling crisis. It is believed many of these were to have expired on May 24. There has been no large-scale return of confidence in the pound since the pre-Budget devaluation rumours, and the April gold reserves figures did little to inspire optimism in foreign investors. But the Wilson administration has convinced international financial circles that it intends to attack the living standards of the working class. On May 3 and 4, the Finance Ministers and heads of the central banks of the Common Market met in Cannes. Their approval was essential if the new IMF loan was to go through since a large part of it will come from European banks.

"Additional measures'

At the close of the meeting, the French Finance Minister, M. Giscard d'Estaing said:

The meeting has not only taken note of the British government's targets in the field of economic stabilisation, but also of its promise of additional measures, if there seemed any danger that these targets would not be met.' What 'additional measures' have Wilson and Callaghan promised to the bankers? Some indication of the nature of these came from the Bank of England in the previous week.

Instead of reducing the Bank Rate, as some 'experts' had expected at the end of April, the Bank announced that it was CRAWFORD International Monetary a $1,400 million (£500 calling in special deposits from the London clearing banks. These would comprise 1 per cent of their assets, amounting to some £95 million.

The total amount of lending a bank can make is limited to about 40 per cent (the liquidity ratio) of its available assets. So, Lord Cromer, Governor of the Bank of England, was reducing the extent of bank loans.

A few days later, in fact on the day the European Economic Community bankers began their Cannes meeting, he sent a directive to the banks clarifying this intention. It instructs them to limit the increase in loans in the year ending April 1966 over the previous year to 5 per cent.

Halt Loans But already, with only one month of that year gone, over half that rise in bank advances has taken place.

Moreover, since this is the total including bank charges, the increase in interest rates should be subtracted from the 5 per cent.

Cromer is therefore ellingshe banks to stop any appreciable rise in loans until next April. The effect of this move, undoubtedly undertaken with the agreement of Callaghan, is to cut down the expansion of industry and cause unemployment to rise.

Cromer's previous directive to the banks was contained in his letter in December. This called on banks to give priority to loans which would help export industries.

Comprehensive directive The phrasing of the present directive is much more comprehensive, taking in all types of loan.

The move will particularly affect small businesses, aggravating the tighter restriction placed on them by the new Finance Bill. Bankruptcies and take-overs by larger companies will result.

And so, the 'additional measures' which gladdened the hearts of the bankers on the Riviera will mean unemployment for many thousands of workers. The new turn of the credit screw, while not so widely publicised as Callaghan's Budget, can be an even greater threat to the labour movement.

'Lord Cromer's poodle', as his friends of 'The Economist' called Wilson, is even more firmly on his leash.

The votes of Woodrow Wyatt and Desmond Donnelly were not needed to win a government majority on the White Paper. But Brown had already agreed to make this public gesture to indicate that the Labour Cabinet would compromise with the steel bosses.

Wyatt, Donnelly, and possibly others, are now freed to vote against further stages of the Bill, and the steel bosses are handed the initiative. A hundred 'tough' TV speeches by Wilson will not alter this situation.

In order to try and get over the immediate crisis in the Parliamentary Labour Party, Wilson has let Brown carry the can, but Wilson himself is the supreme architect of the government's sell-out to big business.

Nationalization with very high compensation, as proposed in the White Paper, will not be opposed by many sections of big business.

Just as the steel owners make a good thing out of low-cost coal from a bureaucratically nationalized coal industry, so the engineering and chemical employers would like cheap and efficient steel production, with the government footing the bill for the next necessary phase of massive capital renewal in the steel industry.

Tactical victory

A few steel bosses prefer to keep things as they are, but if their millions spent on anti-nationalization advertising have brought the government to give them compensation terms raising the value of their holdings by tens of millions of pounds, they will have already achieved a tactical victory, whether nationalization goes through or not.

The present argument about steel nationalization and compensation is between different sections of big business and their political lackeys. But it Brown: carried the has re-awakened the labour movement and raised the whole question of socialist policies.

All trade unionists must demand an immediate emergency Labour Party conference; a programme must be carried of nationalizing all the major industries. On this basis the wealth of the country can be developed and used in a planned way under the control of the working class.

These socialist policies are the alternatives to the so-called 'incomes policy. There is no incomes control, except for workers' wages. There is a wage freeze. Prices and profits are uncontrolled. What is the answer?

Reject the wage freeze! Build up a wages movement against the emdators as the strongest backing for the campaign on socialist policies and an emergency Labour Party conference.

Final defeat

Gunter, who threatens both the independence of the workers' trade unions and the left in the Labour Party, must be thrown out by the Labour Party conference along with Wilson and Brown.

They have betrayed the labour movement. They must not be allowed to lead the working class into a crushing electoral defeat.

No election before a Labour conference!

Then a massive campaign for socialist policies and a final defeat for Toryism!

In foreign policy, the capitalist character of the government is just as blatantly displayed. Johnson's marines, 30,000-strong, are thrown into Republic to uphold a reactionary dictatorship which protects U.S. sugar interests.

Even liberal opinion all over the world has denounced the brutal U.S. action.

But the British government, a Labour government, endorses the action, and Labour Ministers assure Tory backbenchers that

war APPROXIMATELY half of the marchers in a demonstration through Leeds called by the Leeds University 'Peace in Vietnam' Committee were Marxist students and Young Socialists who marched behind the banner of the Socialist Labour League.

Pacifists and Communist Party students attempted to call off a meeting planned for the end of the march when they discovered that Socialist Labour League members intended to speak. They claimed that the police would not permit a meeting.

However, the Socialist Labour League and the Young Socialists went ahead with a meeting and most of the people from the march listened attentively while the pacifists and Stalinists folded up their banners and crept shamefacedly away.

Members of the Communist Party had no answer when they were challenged by the Young Socialists and accused of running away.

The Socialist Labour League, the Young Socialists and the University Marxist Society marched behind banners which pledged support for the Vietcong and the Vietnamese Revolution, and which condemned Wilson for his support of world imperialism.

After pointing out that youth in Britain were marching behind Marx, Engels, Lenin and Trotsky, speakers declared that the fight of the Vietnamese people was part of the struggle of • the world working class against imperialism, the first victory in which had been the Russian Revolution led by Lenin and Trotsky.

cleaners CARRYING mops and banners, 290 women cleaners employed by Stewarts and Lloyds marched through Corby new town, Northants, this week demanding the nationalization of the steel industry and an end of "scab' labour at the steel firm.

The women sang "The Red Flag', and 'We Ain't Got a Barrel of Money' as they marched through the town.

All of them are members of BISAKTA. Once again this union has continued its policy of failing to support its members and declared the strike unofficial.

Over a period the union has done more to disillusion workers and staff at the works than has the management.

Some. 12 months ago the clerical staff which refused to accept the weak leadership of BISAKTA, formed a branch of the Clerical and Administrative Workers' Union. Their biggest obstacle in forming the branch was the BISAKTA leadership. Although the CAWUmembership was 350, BISAKTA stubbornly claimed that only they had the right to recruit clerical staff and they asked the management not to recognise the union. They even refused to accept joint negotiating rights.

Consequently, staff workers became disillusioned and drifted away from union membership. So, when the women cleaners went on strike, it was easy for the management to use staff as 'scab' labour. This has happened on previous occasions in the past three years when staff clerks have been used as bricklayers and labourers.

However, an emergency meeting of the CAWU pledged full support for the cleaners in a resolution which also condemned the 'typical action of the management in once again using scab labour when involved in an industrial dispute' • The resolution called on all unions to support the cleaners. they have duly thanked the U.S. government for protecting the safety of British subjects in Dominica.

Subservient

In Vietnam, the same bloody repression goes on daily. Not a word of criticism from Wilson and Stewart. British 'Labour' policy is firmly behind the policies of bombing the North of Vietnam (policies advocated by Goldwater in the last presidential election campaign); South Vietnamese troops are trained among the 55,000 British forces just to the south in Malaysia.

There is no other government anywhere so abjectly subservient to American imperialism as Wilson's Labour government. The Labour movement must pronounce on these treacherous 'Labour' leaders.

Demand an Emergency Labour Party Conference now!

Nationalize Steel, Chemicals, Engineering, Building and Building Materials, and the Banks!

Withdraw all British

and U.S. troops from Vietnam, Malaysia and the Dominican Republic!

administration is now showing in practice what American understand by Kennedy's phrase 'defending the frontiers of After three months of ruthless bombing of North and South Vietnam, a popular and military revolt against a corrupt and reactionary U.S.-backed regime in the Dominican Republic has led to the sending in, within a few days, of 30,000 U.S. marines. There can be no pretence that this intervention was intended to save life or has saved any.

In fact, it has prolonged a civil war which might have quickly come to an end. U.S. IMPERIALISM THIEVES As for the 'Communist' Caamano, he comes from a conservative land-owning family and was given part of his advanced military training in the schools of the U.S. Marine Corps.

This intervention has led to an outcry from many supporters of U.S. policy round the world. Johnson has been accused of betraying the 'Western Alliance' and of playing Moscow's game. The use of armed force was so rapid, so blatant and so much in contradiction with all the pretentions of 'democracy' that U.S. policy now stands discredited Actually the Dominican affair cannot be separated from Vietnam. Both form part of a calculated drive to assert U.S. world mastery quite regardless of the effect on world opinion'. Tohnson is. however, only doing in a more open and determined way what the those, likě the spokesmen of the Communist Parties, who great victory for 'peace', now have some difficult questions a ge THE Johnson FAKE

Butler (US Marine CorpsRet.) said in 1935:

I spent thirty-three years in active service as a member of our country's most agile military force-the Marine Corps. I served in all commissioned ranks from second lieutenant to major-general. And during that period I spent most of my time being a high-class muscle-man for big business, for Wall Street, and for the bankers. In short, I was a racketeer for capitalism. ...

"Thus I helped make Mexico, and especially Tampico safe for American oil interests in 1914. 1 helped make Haiti and Cuba a decent place for the National City Bank boys to collect revenues in. ..'. I helped purify Nicaragua for the international banking house of Brown Brothers in 1909-1912. I brought light to the Dominican Republic for American sugar interests in 1916. I helped make Honduras "right" for American fruit companies in 1903. In China in 1927 I helped see to it that These extracts are taken from the statements of three professional militarists—not socialists—who loyally served U.S. imperialism on three continents and discovered by their own experience who the real beneficiaries of U.S. imperialist intervention were: the bankers, oil magnates and plantation barons who rule the U.s. and a good part of Latin America. These are the same people who are today regimenting American youth and directing them to kill, burn and loot in Dominica so that their profits can be increased. Standard Oil went its way unmolested.

'During those years I had, as the boys in the back room would say, a swell racket. I was rewarded with honours, medals, promotions. Looking back on it, I feel I might have given Al Capone a few hints. The best he could do was to operate in three cities. We Marines operated on three continents?

Brigadier General Evans F. Carisen (US Marine Corps), Commander of the famed GUNG-HO Second Marine Raider Battalion, World War II, said in 1945:

'My meagre experience with politics and politicians has convinced me of several things with regard to this country. (1) There is need for a political party which will truly represent the people and will have machinery which will permit the people to select individuals of their own choice for public office. Both existing major parties have too many self-seeking racketeers who don't care two cents about the people. (2) . • • The only hope for progress in America is a strong united labour movement. The bar to such a movement is the presence in the ranks of labour of many leaders who place their own selfish interests ahead of the welfare of the people; many of these leaders stand in the way of the education of union members which would give them the knowledge and understanding of democratic objectives and processes.

I burn up when I see people stupidly working against their own interests. I burn up, too, when I think of all the good guys who went out and got killed to protect the rights of a handful of S. O. B.'s to make more money for themselves? Brigadier General Herbert C. Holdridge (US Army-Ret.) in the 'Detroit News Letter Box' wrote on January 8, 1952:

'War IS America's business. "Murder Incorporated" has become our major industry, in which we are investing $100,000 million a year. . . . The 'invisible government" of Wall Street cartelists is growing richer and richer, with manufacturers vying for plush war contracts because without them the future holds only the threat of bankruptcy... Most of the American people—those who are eating regularly even moderately well—are eating because our boys are dying in Korea, a form of social cannibalism. Figuratively we eat our sons. This is not "Red" propaganda—this is the truth. The deceptive propaganda to which our people have been exposed is such false editorialising as your own and other organs, vainly attempting to bolster up our archaic immoral, bankrupt economic system, even at the cost of mass murder Labour leadership. At least

= Our own East African correspondent looks = Behind the mask of 'African socialism' May 1 french Socialist youth altacked by Stalinists on May Day Correspondent YOUNG workers and students, supporters of the paper 'Revoltes' were savagely attacked by stewards of the French Communist Party in the Paris May Day demonstrations.

The comrades around 'Revoltes' carried their banner inscribed With "Revoltes", for the unconditional withdrawal of American troops from Viet Nam' and 'All out with the Engineering workers'.

'UNITY CALL

They were almost immeNairobi JOMO KENYATTA'S Sessional Paper defining 'African Socialism' towards the end of April came in the midst of events which threw more light on the meaning of 'African Socialism' than Kenyatta's definition did.

These events showed that 'African Socialism' was but a mask to hide the ugly face of 'European' capitalism, which dominates the entire life of Kenya.

It is a disguise for 'neocolonialism'. Under cover of an appeal to 'Harambee', the spirit of mutual aid and operation of tribalism, 'African Socialism' showed itself to be cunning call for class-collaboration between the imperialists and the quislings serving them on the one side and, on the other side, the toiling workers and peasants of Kenya.

Bildad Kaggia, MP, and codetainee for nine years with ment that: Before the imperialists invaded Kenya to rule us, the various tribes had developed definite communal life which resulted in fair distribution of wealth and an intense co-operative or team spirit. But this spirit, suited for the development of socialism, had largely been broken down as a result of the introduction of the capitalist system and wage-economy WSLETTER really the political organisation of the African quislings serving imperialism in Kenya. He also did not declare himself clearly on the question of the smallholder's right to self-run farms except insofar as he stated that: 'After three years, a man who had been given land could gradually be made to pay for it' He did not explicitly reject 'African Socialism' as a fraud, but the implication of his privately-owned and wealthy East African Power and Lighting Company and the big coffee and tea estates (all owned by British capital, e.g., Brooke Bond).

South African boycott There had also been criticism of the government regarding the boycott of South Africa. In this connection it landless people:

'Work to improve the standard of living and save your money to educate the children.' At Maturu Kabras he asked the people to report to the police the trouble-makers and all those who are anxious to wreck the government', and at Kakamega he said:

'Many of you have refused to pay graduated personal tax and instead now look upon the government to give you free education, free medical service and free everything.' A week-end paper carried the banner headline: •President Warns Idlers'.

Kakamega, it should be said, is at the north-western end of the 'white' Highlands, whose owners still remain the rural backbone of the idlest group in all Africa: the 50,000 'white settlers' of Kenya who, though but 1/200th of the population, receive a quarter of Kenya's educational expenditure, control nearly its entire export and receive about a third of the national income.

Anti-strike Bill To insure these idlers Three No safeguard or miners lung on disease THE figures of lung disease amongst miners given in a recent Newsletter article (April 24, 1965) certainly reveal that no real safeguard for miners has yet been discovered. Nevertheless, it is possible that the problem is even more severe than these figures suggest.

At present a man claiming disablement for pneumoconiosis undergoes a chest Xray which is examined by a medical member of a pneumoconiosis medical panel. If the film discloses no evidence of pneumoconiosis, the claim is disallowed. Further examination is carried out if the miner appeals.

If the film shows the recognised pattern for pneumoconiosis agreed by the International Labour Organisation (1953) the miner is examined by a medical board of at least two doctors of a pneumoconiosis medical panel. The

with impunity against a state allied to the USSR and China.

The U.S. intervened to prevent its puppet regime in South Vietnam from being swept away by a victorious revolution which 20,000 advisers and massive military aid had been powerless to stop. The bombing was followed by the occupation of strategic points in South Vietnam by U.S. marines armed for all-out war.

These events show the determination of U.S. imperialism not to accept any change in the status quo likely to weaken its world position. It calculates that it can now • best do this by a demonstration of its military capacities without any regard for human life and with complete contempt for its 'liberal' friends.

The waging of war in Vietnam has less to do with U.S. investments in that country than with the world position of U.S.

imperialism.

The weapons employed are designed specifically to deal with guerilla and revolutionary movements.

They involve the virtual obliteration of human life over large areas with improved types of napalm, shrapnel bombs and infantry weapons, one bullet from which means almost certain death to the victim.

The U.S. is able to deal with Latin America througie airborne landings.

No pretence If the people dare to rise up against the corrupt and brutal stooges who rule in Brazil, Colombia, Bolivia, etc., the marines will arrive on a call from the U.S. ambassador or a local agent of the Central Intelligence Agency.

No pretence now about using nationals of the country concerned as with the Bay of Pigs attack on Cuba. The Dominican exercise can be seen as a rehearsal for future interventions by U.S. troops, should the need arise.

In other parts of the world, giant aircraft carriers, which have little meaning in terms of a major war, plough the seas equipped with the striking power of whole armies of the old type. These, too, are an essential part of the counterrevolutionary strategic preparation of U.S. imperialism. violence and terror, or their threat, have become the main means for maintaining its world position.

The Johnson administration, Rusk, McNamara, McNaughton and the Pentagon generals are unlikely to be diverted from their course by the cries of horror and protest rising from liberal and pacifist critics and friends abroad.

Cynical

They know that every bomb dropped in Vietnam and every marine in the Dominican Republic makes it more difficult for their supporters among the national bourgeoisie to defend U.S. policy . They act with complete cynicism, convinced that this is the only way of keeping the world safe for capitalism.

Some of Johnson's critics in Europe, especially in France, have gone a long way in their opposition. The French press, for example, is now quite remarkable for its frank and lucid analysis of the situation in Vietnam and Latin America.

It shows very clearly exactly what Johnson is trying to do and the cynical means he is employing.

Like the theologians

who can unmask the falsehoods of every religion but their own, those who adapt themselves to de Gaulle overlook the similarities between French and American methods.

In Black Africa, for instance, a whole series of nominally independent states depend directly upon French military and financial support and are no less reactionary and corrupt than the American satellites in Latin America.

These governments employ rigorous repressive measures by TOM KEMI Napalm victim in Vietnam against their own people in At the moment however, order to defend the French Johnson has no need to coninvestment interests, whose ceive of such an eventuality: guarantors they are. De Gaulle's policy gives nothing in cynicism and realism to Johnson's; it is simply determined by the needs of a different ruling class.

A great. smokescreen has been blown about, concerning the danger of 'escalation' into nuclear war, to the alarm of many well-meaning people. He is reaping the fruits of 'peaceful co-existence' while the people of Dominica and Vietnam today, and of all Latin America and Africa tomorrow, drink its bitter dregs.

The Soviet bureaucracy's betrayal of the colonial peoples in struggle against imperialism has now reached monstrous has built a huge arms bill into proportions.

its modern economy, it no Acting on the basis of a longer has any great need for division of spheres of interest with imperialism, it really capital from the metropolitan accepted that within its own sphere imperialism could act as it pleased. It gave no more than nominal support to struggles where they took place, backed nationalist bourgeois to what Lenin suggested. regimes, which had no intention of breaking with im- the nature of the underperialism, and prevented the developed countries and their imperialist movement in the development of an anti- relationship to imperialism and the world market. Whereas advanced countries.

these countries were merely The defence of the Soviet appendages of the leading capiUnion became dependent on talist powers, this again is now nuclear power alone, in which it has become progressively Kidron. outclassed. So, when the U.S. probes into its weaknesses as imperialism from these areas it did over Cuba and now over Vietnam, it can make no reply.

But North Vietnam, which now suffers daily industrial monopolies who bombing, is not at all within the sphere of interest of imperialism. ment and economic activity in Penetration into the so- these areas.

called 'socialist states' has into independent, if weak, now become the order of centres of capital.

the day, in Eastern Europe by economic means, in Vietnam by armed force.

leading metropolitan countries China is in a not very different position. Not only does China not possess an dogma, Kidron would have us armoury of weapons in any believe. way comparable to that of the SHALLOW ANALYSIS United States, but it is doubtful whether the Chinese Communists can furnish more effective aid to Vietnam in the face of threatened air attack.

The British Labour Party, and the social-democratic movement generally, have sided with the Johnson policy.

Blatantly The servility of Harold Wilson is not to be wondered at; it is entirely in line with the previous professions and actions of the right-wing

imperialists the free world'. throughout Latin America.

Kennedy administration did. All saw in the return of Johnson a to answer.

Vietnam showed that the U.S. could send its bombers HE'S THREATENINE Look - . OUR -KEEP Gary of 'International Socialism'.

Luxemburg and other Marx. ists. it now appears more blatant than before in its hypocrisy and its concealment of the kind of facts which can be read every day even in the international bourgeois press.

The Pax Americana is now based on the calculated daily use of armed force and the were eliminated. threat of nuclear war. The peace it brings is that which enables the strong to exploit the weak on pain of being Africans, the voters' list gives subdued by the callous use of the vote to 90,000 whites and the new technical methods of only to 13,000 Africans. extermination at present being tried out in Vietnam.

Pacifism, the United ing to his extremist policies Nations, the routine of resolutions and protests farmers and businessmen who to the U.S. embassythese are ways of despair cheap African labour.

in the present circumstances. The Johnson administration is openly contemptuous of people who hope to turn the tide of history by these means.

dent of Britain.

The answer to Johnson cannot be found along these lines, nor in hoping for new explosions of the colonial revolution. Unless the latter is accompanied by the building of a Marxist working-class leadership in the advanced countries and in Eastern Europe and Russia, such movements will be condemned to defeat. 'IMPERIALISM no longer exists. This is the conclusion • of Mr, Michael Kidron, leading 'theoretician' of the 'state capitalist grouping in this country, writing in the current issue The 'permanent arms economy' has, we are informed, replaced imperialism as understood by Lenin, Hilferding, held in common by all imperialisms to date— Roman, Tsarist or British—was their direct control of the state in Because modern capitalism subject territories.' In this way the author tries to equate the Marxist view of imperialism with political conthe colonies; the export of trol: a cheap and shoddy device used by all opponents countries (France, Germany, of Marxism who wish to try USA, Britain, etc.) is, as a and show that imperialism result, no longer of great im- with all its brutality and portance, and industry now violence is a thing of the past. dominates the banks, contrary On the contrary, Lenin and others demonstrated that imKidron also argues about perialism arose as a result of the contradictions within the capitalist system which forced capital to seek outlets abroad in an attempt to overcome these contradictions: whether this expansion of capital overseas was accompanied by an outdated idea, argues political control was not the central question.

Rather, the withdrawal of 'NOT CAPITALS' (India, Africa, Latin America, etc.) has rescued the national The central point about bourgeoisie from oblivion'. It imperialism was that it represented the highest point now plays much more the role reached by capitalism and of equal partner with the giant ushered in a whole epoch of wars and revolutions during control much of the investwhich the fate of humanity would be determined by The ex-colonies are evolving the struggle of the working class to take power.

Kidron, of course, denies To speak of imperialism as that imperialism represents the a system dominated by the final stage of capitalism. A banks and industries of a few large arms bill can bring stability to capitalism. Does operating from Europe and the arms industry overcome North America is so much old the contradictions of capitalism?

No Marxist would deny the importance of the huge arms industry for modern capitalism:

What are we to make of in some periods it can allow these ideas? From the accumulation to carry on withpoint of view of method, out the problem of the sale of Kidron has absolutely no goods on the market which claim to the label 'Marxist'. result from this accumulation.

In the usual way associated But a huge arms bill can also with this tendency we are impose an enormous strain on treated to a superficial, capitalism, bringing with it Shallow, arrogant 'analysis' balance of payments, monetary of modern capitalism with and inflationary crises.

a series of ill-digested and And what about the export assorted facts drawn from of capital? Is this of any periodicals the world over. importance? Kidron says 'no'.

As an example: at one point But if not, why does not the Kidron states: "The one feature ELECTION FARCE IN SOUTHERN RHODESIA Southern Rhodesia, won all 50 seats in the farce which is called an election in that country. All the 'moderate' parties Although the population of Southern Rhodesia is overwhelmingly made up of vestments in Rhodesia to live in great luxury.

It should also be clear that he does not have much Hence, all that the vote objection to racialism, as he is means is that Smith is attract- seeking for closer co-operation with South Africa. the great majority of the white' Throughout this, Wilson has remained silent. His White are fearful of losing their Paper pointing out to Smith that 'independence' is meanSmith, who last summer ingless economically, merely said that 'Southern Rhodesia is follows the same policy as probably closer to South the Tories had last summer. Africa than to any other country, has threatened to Big businessmen in the City of London are worried that declare the country indepenSmith's extreme actions might After the elections, he lead them to lose their investments in Rhodesia. Wilson's stated that he would only do this if 'it is clear that we are actions towards Smith are going to lose our civilisation dominated by this fear, not by to the forces of Communism any solidarity with the Rhodeassisted by extreme racialism'. sian workers.

Smith means by 'civilisation' As on the questions of steel, the very harsh exploitation of the pensions and the wage millions of African workers freeze, Wilson's policies tothat enables both the white wards Rhodesia reveal him as settlers in Rhodesia and the the direct servant of the monoBritish businessmen with in- polies.

ruling class in this country adopt the solution of the Communist Party to the present economic crisis and cut the export of capital abroad?

Such a demand ignores the fact that capital only goes abroad to seek a higher rate of profit and because profits are munited ' in the domestic economy.

Although capital exports from a country such as Britain may be lower than before the war they still retain great importance for the stability of the whole economy; they have fallen in relative importance only because the conditions generated by the post-war expansionary phase of capitalism made for higher profit rates at home.

To take Kidron's assertion that the colonial bourgeoisie has now gained some independence of finance capital in the metropolitan countries.

He brings forward no evidence, either political or Militant to Trades Councils was Bath, Sunday

diately approached by Stalinist stewards who told them to withdraw their banner as 'the police do not like it'.

'Revoltes' refused to withdraw the banner, and a group of Stalinist thugs tried to tear it away from them. The 'Revoltes' comrades began to shout 'unity', and this was taken up by other workers on the demonstration, forcing the Stalinists to withdraw.

But ten minutes before the meeting was due to end, the stewards received orders from the platform to deal with the 'Revoltes' banner.

It was obvious that Frachon, secretary of the CGT (General Confederation of Labour), the Stalinist-led trade union federation, and Waldeck Rochet, secretary of the French Communist Party, found the slogans embarrassing. In view of the failure of both the Soviet and the Chinese bureaucracies to do anything to aid the Vietcong, they were especially embarrassed by the demand for the withdrawal of American troops.

BRUTALLY BEATEN A large number of Stalinist thugs moved in and managed to grab the banner. They then turned on the young comrades and brutally beat them. Three of them were injured, one of them seriously (with a dislocated shoulder), and taken to hospital. A number of the Kenyatta, in his address to the Students' Union on April 14 at Nairobi University, described the workers and peasants as 'poor Africans, jobless Africans, and Africans who fought with tooth and nail for independence'.

Thus on May Day Kenyatta, in the name of African Socialism', called the workers to co-operate with their employers in the spirit of 'Harambee'. Earlier he had stated that since Kenya was now a socialist country there was no further need for the In his paper, he stated that 'African Socialism' accepted private property but did not exclude some nationalization (with full compensation, now guaranteed by law).

In Kenya, of course, most big business property is owned by British imperialism. "African Socialism', like its 'policy of non-alignment, is antl.

socialist and pro-imperialist. This judgment is not harsh. It is only true. Kenyatta-Kaggia feud On April 11, in Kandara, Kaggia's own constituency, Kenyatta publicly accused Kaggia of being the leader of those who want 'free land and free everything'.

Having only recently had Under cover of pretending to defend the small farmer's right to his land, Kiano went on to defend private property in land in general as against 'communal land ownership'.

On April 21 Kaggia replied to Kiano and defended his demand for free land and nationalization, saying: 'We were struggling to regain our own lands which were stolen by the British colonial government. We were not fighting for the right to buy our own land' He also attacked the government for not providing free schooling and medical treatment, stating that these had been obtained in Tanzania. (School fees, in particular, are a crushing burden on 'African' parents, whose children, in addition, have to suffer under a system-still hardly changed —of inferior racially segregated 'African' schools dominated by colonialist missionaries, management and, in the case of secondary schools, teachers recruited by the colonialist Department of Technical CoOperation, American Peace Corps, etc.)

In his statements, Kaggia declared himself still loyal to KANU (Kenya African National Union) although it is attack on the 'policy' was taken up in the last week of April by the students of the (Soviet-bloc granted) Lumumba Institute who ridiculed 'African Socialism' and demanded nationalization of the big estates, the banks, heavy industry and large foreign firms.

Take-over

Through a Bill in Parliament the government promptly transferred the Institute to the Ministry of Education. This Ministry, carefully groomed and trained by British imperialism before independence, is still 'advised' by old colonial servants.

It had previously rejected trade union demands that it take over the mainly European' schools, which / openly practice racialism and retain colonialist names such as Duke of York, Delamere and Prince of Wales.

Before the take-over of the Lumumba Institute (whose Board of Governors is still, at the time of writing, under the chairmanship of Kaggia), the British and settler-controlled press had agitated for this take-over and the students, knowing the Ministry of Education for what it is, had protested that the government should rather take over the is worthwhile pointing out that in Nairobi and other towns there are powerful monopolies whose financial heart is in South Africa but, who, for convenience, have head offices in London. Among these are a large South African Insurance Society, the Standard Bank (which has now been extended to Ghana-boycott or no boycott!) and the Union Castle shipping line.

The mighty South Africanbased Oppenheimer group, it might be added, has big interests in neighbouring Tanzania, not to mention Zambia, which is its virtual semicolony.

Almost daily flights continue to take place via Nairobi to Johannesburg from Israel, Western Europe and Britain.

The Organisation for African Unity (OAU), presided over by Kenyatta during the course of the recent sell-out to Tshombe, has fared no differently on the issue of South Africa and earned itself the title: Organisation of African Underlings (of imperialism).

Kenyatta, worthy product and expression of African nationalism, rounded off a hectic April with a tour of the Western Province. Speaking at Broderick Falls on April 24, he told the jobless, starving, against the other 'idlers' the Kenyatta regime has now before Parliament an anti-strike bill which came after the railway and bank strikes of last month.

The unions are divided on the issue, partly because of the American-backed leaders of the Kenya Federation of Labour and partly because of the confusion of the trade unionists who have not broken from African Nationalism or from the Kenya African National Union and are asking for a government-backed mass union, which has proved so disastrous already in Tanzania (where the Minister of Labour is also head of the one and only trade union in the country).

Workers' and peasants' party In their witch-hunt against those who want 'free everything, it is very probable that Kenyatta and Co. (including Odinga, who is at present coolly balancing between Kenyatta and Kaggia) may drive the 'free land' groups into a firmer anti-imperialist stand, the political pre-requisite for which is: a clean break with African Nationalism, KANU and OAU and the formation of a Workers' and Peasants' Party. amount of compensation depends upon the severity of the disease.

TESTS INADEQUATE In the six years from 1956, a total of 81,079 miners applied for disablement benefit, and 48,247 were rejected on scrutiny of the film (59.5 per cent).

Yet a recent research paper (published in "The Lancet' in January this year)

suggests that the radiological test is inadequate for detection of disease in the lung. It points out that disability cannot be assessed on X-ray appearances and that a man may have severe disability with little or no radiological changes.

The paper quotes several sources to back up the claim that X-rays revealed neither the existence nor degree of focal emphysema (i.e., a gaseous distension of lung tissue).

This research paper was based on a study of 35 coal miners at Leeds General Infirmary.

Thirty-four of these men had worked at the coal face for 16 years or more and one had worked in South Wales coal mines for 12 years. All but three had applied for compensation and had been previously examined by a pneumoconiosis panel in Sheffield.

NEW TEST

young comrades, including girls, were thrown to the ground and trampled on.

A number of workers came to the defence of the young comrades around 'Revoltes' For example, a member of the Young Communist League shielded them, with an official YCL banner, from the attack of the stewards, until he himself was dealt with.

The branch officers of another Young Communist League branch also fought alongside 'Revoltes', suffering the same treatment as the others.

PROTESTS

Since the incident, several letters have been sent in to the leadership of the CGT protesting against the incident, including one from the SudAviation (the factory which builds the supersonic aircraft) branch of the Socialist trade union federation.

Readers of Newsletter will note the great similarity between the May Day events in France and in Britain, where the old-line Labour and Communist leaderships abandoned traditional working-class solidarity to attack the revolutionary youth.

encounter, fill in this form and send it to:

Name Address the Mau Mau Forest Fighters' leaders shot down beneath Mount Kenya, where once they had so heroically fought British rule, he now turned his attention to the largely selftaught Kaggia, whom he had previously dismissed from the post of Parliamentary Secretary for Education.

Kaggia replied in his speech to the University. He accused the government of a 'land policy which serves the interests of the capitalists and makes the poor even poorer'.

He demanded free land for the peasants and nationalization of the estates of the 'white' settlers and of rich 'African' landowners (it is said that Kenyatta has now become one of the big landowners in Kenya).

Kaggia called for public ownership of wealth and production and the organisation of the 'white' Highlands into state or collective farms.

In a childish reply to Kaggia the following day, Dr. Kiano, Minister for Commerce and Industry (big business in Kenya is 90 per cent colonialist-owned), accused Kaggia of wanting 'to eliminate the rich so that everybody can remain poor'.

He rejected Kaggia's stateTHE Pope last week called on the Jesuits* to carry out the battle against atheism 'with fresh ardour'. He also warned them against all 'new ideas' He warned the Jesuits that atheism often takes the disguise of 'progress, culture, economics, and social reforms' The Catholic Church has more than spiritual reasons for fearing the advance of materialist philosophy. A report in "The Economist' of March 27, this year, revealed some interesting figures on the financial backing of the organisation which tells its faithful that the 'meek shall inherit the earth'.

"The most conservative estimate, "The Economist' states, 'that it is reasonable to make, establishes the Vatican — or rather the Pope, for his rule is absolute -as far and away the world's largest shareholder, with a portfolio of quoted * The Jesuits (official name: Society of Jesus were founded in 1540 by St. Ignatius of Loyola. They became the main intellectual defenders of the Catholic Church both against Protestantism and atheism. Their role has always been to adapt the Catholic dogma to : new scientific discoveries. In the present epoch, their main field of study, of course, is in Marxism and they have been in the forefront of the struggle against the development of working-class theory.

Peter securities the world over totalling the equivalent of 2,000 million pounds?

This establishes the Vatican • a financial power with realisable assets equal to the official gold and foreign exchange reserves of France, or five times the dollar securities held by the British government.

Casino shares

These figures do not include the vast areas of land owned by the Vatican, or its priceless art treasures. Neither do they include the property of the various Catholic bishoprics, convents, colleges and so on, which are calculated entirely separately from the wealth of the Vatican itself.

The Vatican does not let any 'moral' nonsense interfere with the stern business of money making. For example, it has held shares in the San Remo Casino, one of the biggest gambling houses on the continent.

Neither does it allow the struggles between rival capitalist groups to interfere.

Pope Pius XII, who is accused of having had too much sympathy for the Nazis, atheism Arnold founded a bank called the 'Institute for Religious Works' ('Instituto per le Opere di Religione') in 1942.

This spiritual body was the only finance house which was able to move capital freely between the two imperialist blocs then at war. Naturally, Religious Works were very prosperous because of this privilege.

The Catholic Church also enjoys other privileges denied to ordinary business concerns. In 1962, for example, when the Italian goverment taxed dividends, a secret circular was sent to the big firms by the finance minister authorising them to pay tax free dividends on shares held by the Vatican. This was not mentioned in Parliament.

The exact figures for this wealth are almost impossible to give, as every employee of the Vatican is sworn, on pain of eternal damnation, to strict secrecy.

No check The Vatican finance houses are, of course, accountable to no government, and no check can be kept on the transfer of capital from one part of the world to another, because of the considerable diplomatic privileges enjoyed by the Catholic Church.

However, 'The Economist' goes out of its way to emphasise that, if anything, its figures underestimate the wealth of the Church.

As the world's biggest shareholder, the Catholic Church has good financial reasons for fearing any advances made by the working class.

The church holds the allegiance of many workers on the basis that it is a non-class organisation, yet these figures reveal it not only as a capitalist organisation, but as the biggest shareholder in the world!

'Honest' income?

Catholic workers should ask themselves how it is that the organisation which preaches about honesty, about the equality of man before God, about peace, morality and so on, can reconcile these preachings with an enormous income based upon the exploitation of workers in every corner of the world.

The Communist movement fights to free workers from both the 'spiritual' claptrap preached by the Catholic Church, and all other churches, and from the harsh exploitation that the claptrap is aimed to perpetuate.

The Pope was right to warn the Jesuits about atheism. He has a lot to lose.

The men were given a new test consisting of measuring lung volumes including vital capacity, residual volume, total lung capacity and the diffusing capacity (i.e., the rate of uptake of oxygen passing from lung tissue into the blood stream. The purpose of the lungs is to collect oxygen to absorb in the blood supply. Any damage to lung tissue through which blood capillaries pass, impairs the dissolving of oxygen in the blood, hence damaging the overall physiology of the body).

Through such clinical examination it was found that four cases had evidence of anthracosilicosis and focal emphysema although radiological appearance did not suggest this. Low diffusing capacities from 47 per cent to 67 per cent suggested damage to lung tissue.

CONCLUSIONS

The final conclusions of the paper were as follows: the 35 men were divided into four groups.

The first group contained six men of normal lung function, compensation had been awarded to four out of five claimants.

The second group consisted of 11 men with obstructive airway disease, compensation had been awarded to three out of ten claimants.

The third group consisted of 13 men with both airway disease and impaired diffusing capacity, compensation awarded three out of twelve claimants.

The fourth group consisted of five men whose ventilation was normal but whose diffusing capacity was impaired: compensation awarded to two out of five claimants.

Turn to page

Clyde shipyards Page

economic, to support this contention. In fact in every case so-called 'neutral' countries remain firmly in the grip of the imperialist system; the vast majority of the capital in these areas is controlled from the cities of Europe and North America and the products of these countries-almost invariably raw materials or foodstuffs-are in the grip of the world market, which is exclusively controlled in the interests of the giant monopolists.

LIMITED

How can Kidron talk of 'limited independence' and the development of capitalism in Asia, Latin America or Africa, when the products of these areas have steadily fallen in price since the mid-'50s in comparison with the manufactured goods of the 'advanced' countries?

As Lenin and Trotsky showed at the start of this century, there is no possibility of the steady growth of capitalism in these areas of the world.

Kidron makes great play of the growth of synthetic substitutes for the products of these areas-fibres, rubber, oil, etc. This, he claims, underlines his point that the capitalists no longer have the same interests in the colonies as formerly.

But in fact all these developments, plus the exploitation of natural gas to replace oil, undermine the whole basis for Kidron's case.

In fact the development of these substitute commodities undermines the whole economic and social basis of the national bourgeoisie, in Asia, Africa, the Middle East and Latin America.

In turn it must throw those tendencies who rest on these sections — Pabloites, Stalinists and 'state capitalists'-into an equally profound crisis.

This latest attempt by the state capitalists to overthrow the work of Marx, Lenin and Trotsky is important in only one respect: it should provide the challenge for the Marxist movement to deepen its understanding of imperialism; this must be above all the responsibility of the growing number of students who are entering the ranks of revolutionary Marxism, attracted by the tremendous advances made by the Young Socialists under the leadership of the Socialist Labour League. No safeguard for miners this week.

Attacking the government's policy to introduce freight liner trains from London to Manchester, Liverpool and Glasgow, the resolution gave a reminder of the union's official policy on liner trains.

A co-ordinated and integrated transport system was the declared policy of the union, the resolution stated.

ANGRY

In a two-and-a-half-hour meeting angry delegates from Derbyshire, Nottinghamshire, Leicestershire, Stafiordshire and Northamptonshire agreed to support the union's national executive in its opposition to freight liner trains.

Midlands railwaymen join the many other rail workers who are expressing opposition to the 'liner' plan.

The introduction of liner trains would, say union spokesmen, mean accepting contracts from private hauliers in a system of 'open' rail terminals. This the railmen are firmly opposed to.

The strong militant wording of the Midlands resolution shows that unless the Labour government carries out the policies it was elected by workers to fight for, there will be big upheavals in the rail section of industry. Coventry motor workers return WORKERS at Motor Panels, Coventry, have been on strike for a week in protest against the dismissal of a shop steward.

On Wednesday this week, however, the 600 strikers returned to work having accepted an offer that the man should be re-employed in another part of the shop but not as a steward.

Congress, the conference passed a resolution calling for pensions to be increased to £5 per week.

Delegates from West Wales, Leeds, Lambeth, West Ham and Croydon condemned the government's failure to pay the 12s. 6d. before Christmas.

Peter Gibson (Croydon TC) moving the resolution, said the Labour government had betrayed the old age pensioners and those workers who had voted Labour last October. This retreat had been carried out on the orders of the international bankers.

Although a move to reject the TUC-government economic policy was lost by a 2-1 vote, a string of speakers condemned the Labour government's betrayal on steel nationalization compensation and wage freeze.

Peter Hendrie (Lambeth), said Labour had broken every election promise. The Labour government was seeking to solve the crisis of capitalism by placing the burden on the backs of the working class.

Rocking the boat

When he was accused by shouts from the floor of rocking the boat, he said: 'Yes, of course, I'm rocking the boat. To keep the boat steady we need an immediate conference of the Labour Party to make the Labour government do the job we put them there for, and not the job for the employers.' I. Dormer (West Ham), speaking about the engineering 'package deal' told delegates: 'My rent has just gone up 7s. 6d. and my Labour council is an important indicator of the opposition to the policies of Wilson, Brown and Woodcock inside the Labour Party and unions, and support for the policies the Socialist Labour League and The Newsletter have been putting forward.

Many of the delegates went out of the way to mention their long membership of the Labour Party before going on to attack Labour policy on pensions, steel and wages. Pensioners and busmen will suffer FROM May 16 old age pensioners in Glasgow will have to pay 2d. instead of 1d. when they travel on Corporation buses. This was decided on by a meeting of the Scottish Traffic Commissioners in Glasgow on May 6.

At the meeting the Glasgow Young Socialists submitted an objection to all fare increases and in particular to the increase in concessionary fares. Newsletter Correspondent 1S National Committee member Bob Hamilton spoke about the hardships the rising cost of living was already causing the old age pensioners.

He said the Young Socialists were opposed to the Glasgow Labour Corporation raising fares and that they were demanding that the fares be reduced.

Young Socialist branches circulated a petition against the fares increases throughout factories and trade unions in the area.

At a number of trade union branches full support was given to the campaign and some branches agreed to take part in lobbies of their councillors and MPs in support of the demand for backdating the pensions increase and against the raising of municipal fares.

The objection from the Young Socialists, however, was dismissed by the chairman of the Traffic Commissioners who is reported to have said: "The facts which impress us most are ... the financial position . _• • of ... the transport undertaking.' New fares come into operation from May 16 and are estimated to bring, in £1,000,000 yearly from pockets of workers who are already paying higher food prices and whose rents are being raised.

THREAT

Old age pensioners' concessionary fares increases . are intended to raise £90,000 yearly.

During the course of the hearing a big threat to the jobs of many Glasgow busmen became quite clear.

When the Transport Manager, Fitzpayne, was asked if increasing fares would not make more people find other ways of transport and thus add to Glasgow's traffic problem, he answered that this was true, but with fewer passengers he could 'eliminate more buses'.

He stated quite bluntly that they were 'considering a reduction in the services' and were 'employing efficiency consultants' for the job.

The attack which is looming up against the busmen, however, is two-sided—one side is the reduction in the number of buses and the other is the introduction of one-man buses in the city.

Fitzpayne said also that the £1,000,000 which the fares increases must realise to cover costs makes 'no allowances for increases in wages'. "We hope that the Labour government's incomes policy is successful?

Busmen must begin to organise at rank-and-file level in the garages around the demands for higher wages, shorter hours and in support of the YS campaign for lower fares.

PEAK

The peak was reached in 1920 when the Clyde produced over 650,000 tons of shipping. In 1923 it dropped to 150,000 tons, rising to 600,000 tons again in 1928.

During the depression years of the "30s it dropped to 50,000 tons but picked up in the war years to 550,000 in 1942.

The next high peak was 1955 with 500,000. Since then there has been a steady decline to 250,000 tons in 1963.

Twenty-five years ago the Clyde built one-quarter of all the ships launched in the world.

Now it builds only one-quarter of Britain's total and onethirtieth of the world's output.

The supreme position is held taking third place with 154,000. Britain (Figures are for 1963—from the Official Handbook and Industrial Survey for Glasgow.)

John Brown say they have no intention of closing down other yards by their expansion scheme. But Mr. John Rannie, the managing director of the Clydebank yard, stated that the scheme could be a co-operative effort with other shipbuilders.

CLOSURES

He also pointed out that there were companies who were finding it extremely difficult to continue and the development could be tied up in a rationalisation scheme for the Clyde.

It is fairly obvious that expansion such as is envisaged by John Brown & Co. will leave little room for smaller shipbuilding firms on the Clyde, and any rationalisation measures will mean that many will cease to exist as independent establishments.

Mr. Rannie also stated that Brown's expected to double their present labour force of 6,000 men. Output per man would be much higher than at present.

At a press conference Mr.

Rannie is reported to have said that demarcation and restrictive practices were the outcome of fear and that in forward-looking schemes of this kind this fear would be eliminated.

In other words, rationalisation measures are to be applied to workers too and can only mean that more shipyard workers on the Clyde as a whole Will be out on the stones.

BIGGER

Brown's look forward to the realisation of their plan to reap bigger profits. The Secretary of State for Scotland says he is "impressed by the plan' and Mr. Roy Mason, Minister of State (Shipping), said he welcomed the company's initiative.

These right-wing Labour ministers are impressed by, and welcome, any scheme which brings more profits for the employers and strengthens capitalism in Britain.

If the jobs of shipyard workers are to be safeguarded in the drive for expansion and the introduction of new technical developments in the yards, this can only. be done by nationalizing the shipbuilding , industry under workers' control.

The industry could then be planned to benefit the working people, with no lay-offs as the result of closures and "takeovers'; with a shorter working week and higher wages as a result of the introduction of new technical developments.

Registered at the G.P.O. as a newspaper Printed by Plough Press Ltd. (TU). I.O. 180 Clapham High Street, London, S.W.4 Published by The Newsletter, 186A Clapham High Street. I ondon. S.W.4

One miner had cancer arising out of an area of active silicosis.

Supporters of the new form of test, claim that it reflects accurately the presence of pneumoconiosis and any other lung disease. Its use would certainly mean much more compensation being awarded to miners.

Nevertheless the use of this new test has been rejected by the Sheffield Medical Board.

by Midland " the Minister of Transport or any other Labour leader fails to carry out this accepted policy immediately we shall insist on their removal.' This was the text of a resolution passed by 50 delegates representing 18,000 Midland railwaymen at a meeting Loughran, a Romford, Essex, delegate at the annual conference of Trades Councils at Bath last week-end.

'In many areas,' he said, 'it who have organised the youth, and supported their struggle for better pay rates.

'With some cases the official pay rate is only fl 18s. to £2 5s. a week, no one can live on that.

'Many more young workers and apprentices must join their unions and fight against policies which lead to unions accepting such low rates for young workers and George Brown's 3 per cent,' he added.

Resolution

In spite of appeals on behalf of the Trades Union has been the Young Socialists joined them up in the unions, have promised that it will go up another 7s. 6d. within the year to £5 6s. a week.

"This is three times the increase I shall get, quite apart from any increase in the cost of living. This may be planning incomes, but it is not planning in the interests of the working class.' Indicator Although the conference of Trades Councils does not have the power of a union conference, it Newsletter Correspondent ONE of the largest shipbuilding firms on the Clyde, John Brown & Co. (Clydebank) Ltd., have announced plans for a vast expansion of their shipbuilding capacity.

If carried out, the scheme would cost something in the region of £25 million—£25,000 is being spent on a study of the project alone.

Once work on this project has been started, Brown's hope to complete the building of the new docks in about five years.

There is to be a new prefabrication shed, 1,000 feet long and 250 feet wide, costing about £l million, and eight cranes, each of 100-ton capacity.

When finished it is estimated that the yard will be capable of building ships of 260,000 tons deadweight.

Brown's hope to get the cooperation of other shipbuilding firms on the Clyde and possibly also government assistance for this venture, which is clearly aimed at restoring the dominant position once held by the Clyde yards in world shipbuilding.

IN spite of attempts by the management to weaken them, draughtsmen and technicians at the Colindale (Mid.. dlesex) factory of Frigidaire, one. of the General Motors group, are confident that their seven-week-old strike for a pay increase will be successful.

Eighteen months ago the 52 members of the Draughtsmen's and Allied Technicians' Association lodged a pay claim for a rise of between £100 and £150 per year according to grade; last Christmas the firm granted an increase ranging from f25 to £40.

FURTHER

The rise was accepted as most members expected a further increase to follow. However, by early February, when there were no signs of the rise, the Executive Committee of DATA was asked to declare an official strike which began seven weeks later.

Newsletter Reporter A small increase offered to 17 men three days before the strike was rejected by a meeting. This offer, they said, threatened solidarity.

Since the strike began, said one of the 40 members who are picketing the factory, six men have returned to work and some have left to take up jobs elsewhere, but the strikers are determined to win.

SUPPORT

Our correspondent was told that a supporting ban on overtime by members of the Electrical Trades Union, Amalgamated Engineering Union, Transport and General Workers' Union, and General and Municipal Workers' Union ended after six weeks, when the convenor was given to understand that an official meeting had been arranged between the firm and DATA. But this was, in fact, unofficial.

A meeting taking place on Thursday, May 13, between the personnel manager and the area official of DATA will be followed by discussion of the firm's proposals, with the strikers.

NO FURTHER If these are accepted, said a picket, the members will return to work so that negotiations can take place, but if rejected the strike will continue and no further meetings are likely.

It is expected that DATA will find the members employment in other firms and, said one picket, may possibly declare the factory 'black'.

In the Delco' factories of General Motors at Southampton and Liverpool, DATA members have submitted pay claims; at Liverpool technicians have been on strike for 13 weeks after the victimisation of two members who refused to work overtime.

The group's factory at Vauxhall, London, where DATA organisation is strong, has sent contributions to the Frigidaire strike committee.

By Sylvi whose move to buy houses in Marshall Street and let them to white families only was frustrated, recently tried out something new.

At the opening of a new 15-storey block of flats in the town, Councillor Ernest Gould, chairman of the Tory-controlled council's House Management Committee, announced that the flats would be allocated to white people only. "This,' he declared, 'is not a colour bar.' The flats are mainly for housing people from development areas. Of the 4,000 on the waiting list about 100 are immigrants.

A 'whites only' policy, it was explained, would be adopted in order to avoid protests if tenancies were allocated to immigrant families.

NO REPETITION Councillor Gould is reported as saying that the council wished to have no repetition of the troubles four years ago, when an immigrant family was given a flat in Price Street.

This was an incident in which there was a good deal of artificially-stimulated opposition to the allocation of the flat.

Leaflets issued by an organisation were pushed through letter-boxes in the other flats. 'Not only these groups, but some of the local Tories took a hand and exploited the fuss,' said a local worker, recalling the incident.

FIRMNESS

The council, then Labour-controlled, acted on that occasion with considerable firmness and the immigrant family was subsequently given a home in Price Street.

Though this family left Smethwick about 18 months ago to join relatives in Sheffield, according to the same worker this was not in any sense due to pressure or unfriendly treatment on the part of neighbours. About two months ago another Indian family moved into the Price Street flats, and their relations with their neighbours are also said to be harmonious.

Immigrants in Smethwick are saying that this vicious policy might lead to demands all over the town for Corporation houses and flats to be kept 'white'. They feel that the Tories are merely encouraging racial prejudice.