The Newsletter, vol. 9 no. 408

Wilson order THE Ford Motor Ced thay last week announced 10,000 would on a four-day Vauxfollowed with ment that some 8,000-10,000 employees would have time the vear motor facturers will undoubtedy follow FOur thousand workers at Hoovers will work only four weeks out of every five.

week a number business.

road-building schemes. lese results the credit squeeze one. Mr. Cyril Osborne M.P. for Louth, a stockbroker and right - winger, last welcomed the government propheemployed Christmas called upon to support the Wilson Cabinet. Luis saould leave no one in an' doubl about me nature oI tol babour overment.

Newsiette and the League, hile fighting for a Tory at the Brown and working-class supporters. interests of their rrank Cousi Anthony Cabias a sign character of the new government.

We warned that, on the contrary. it was only means of silencing potental critics.

As Wilson's policies have prepared the of the Torie working class places trust in leaders ike and does not break from him when he serves the bankers, then only defeats can follow. The return of the Tories, with a direct the workin 1: maority and a polic class, is being openly prepared by Wilson's policies But it an and must be prevented fighting back. Different sections of motor and component workers are constantly hammering the employers. Dockers are lining up for an all-ou fight against the employers plans' in the Devlin Report. alike 1931, the British working class today faces the employers with a generation of full employment intact trade Strike of 1926. hat is needed is a united move ment, behind socialist policies against the Wilson Cabinet High prices, unemployment, Soon all et the basie living standards of the workers, all anect the basic and these workers must be mobilised for action against government policy. le Labour Party Conference Wilson to account. His for the imperialist war in Vie conomic policy, his nam, and his racialist measures on immigration control, must be disowned by the Labour movement.

on and his Cabinet have I trated a fraud on the wol ing class. Every principle of socialism has been betraved. The first step to fight and prevent a Tory come-back is massive working-class support for the Young Socialist demonstration in Blackpool on Sunday, September 26. By W the international bankers and the big WILSON'S popularity is increasing-among monopolies. As unemployment rises and more firms go on to short-time working, the employers look forward to a period where they can discipline the workers.

As Mr. John Davies, of the Confederation of British Industry, said: 'I think that the period of stagnation— although I hope it will be as short as possible-will also allow the labour market to become that much easier to allow some chance for the prices and incomes policy to work'.

The 'flexibility' in the labour market, as the "Times' called it, is the result of deliberate policy by the so-called Labour government.

Elected on vague slogans about 'getting Britain moving', the Labour leaders have carried out all the measures the Tories would have liked but were not strong enough to do themselves.

Wilson, Brown and Callaghan are destroying the Labour Party, more surely than MacDonald damaged it in 1931. To 'save the pound' they sacrifice the interests of the 12 million workers who elected them.

Stagnation

Even these actions are unlikely to be sufficient to stop devaluation. The recession пого beginning, as the National Institute Economic Review indicates, is only the start of a long period of stagnation in British industry. In addition to its previous balance of payments difficulties, British capitalism has also to consider the repayment of the loans made by foreign bankers during the financial crisis.

The redundancies facing hundreds of thousands of workers this winter, and the difficulty school-leavers will have finding jobs, are the start of spells of chronic unemployment.

There is no way out for British capitalism, except to try to drive down living standards. This is the reason for the crisis of the Labour leaders who pretended they could make capitalism work and reconcile the needs of the bosses and the workers.

Brown's 'plan', which was supposed to show how everyone was going to be better off, can be seen as a great computerized hoax. Its projected rates of growth come from a statistical dream-world.

Contrast

But while jobs get scarcer, conditions worsen, and the housing situation reaches new depths, methods of production are developed which could end, not only poverty, but work itself. This contrast between automation and the dole queue lies at the heart of modern society.

The only way forward is through the working class taking the power internationally. A United Socialist States of Europe would provide the framework for tremendous economic advances.

The Wilsons and Browns stand in the way of such a developBelt up gents!

IS it not high time that the custodians of Tory policies within the trade unions and the Labour Party were told to shut Every time the various monopoly motor groups are faced with a strike, there is an immediate fraternity. The present strikes outcry from ims well-dressed at Halewood and South Wales are a case in point. JOHN CRAWFORD ment. A new Marxist leadership must be built which can clear this road in the course of the struggles now beginning.

The British working class must unite behind the demand of the Young Socialists — sack the right-wing leaders of the Labour movement - and join the demonstration organised by the National Committee of the Young Socialists at the Labour Party Conference in Blackpool on September 26.

Nationalisation of industry and a socialist-planned economy is the answer to chronic unemployment and misery under capitalism.

Brockway treads the Davies way of Harold Davies' mission to Hanoi, the Labour leaders have been hard put to cover their naked submission to Johnson with some kind of diplomatic fig leal.

They did not have long to wait. Very soon, the ageing centrist, Lord Brockway, ostensibly on a holiday in Moscow, turned up with something which, even if it did not look like the fig leaf Mr. Wilson had in mind, was a good distraction from the cruel war going on in South Vietnam.

The senselessness of the war was revealed when two drunken Marines were recently jailed and discharged from the Corps for having intended to bomb Hanoi, while President Johnson, ironically, was being applauded in the press for masterminding the bombing of all Vietnam!

NO ONE RULED OUT In the same week that Lord Brockway made his Moscow itinerary, the "Observer' revealed:

*President Johnson has ordered yet another intensification of the attempt to make diplomatic contact with North Vietnam and is apparently indifferent how this is done. No intermediary is now ruled out? (Our emphasis.)

Anyway, Brockway, after some hours with the North Vietnamese ambassador in Moscow elicited a plan which seemed a minor diplomatic triumph for Wilson.

• (Cont. back page, col. 1)

Woodcock, the General Secretary of the TUC, says the attitude of 'benevolent neutrality' towards the men on strike is 'diminishing'. Who does this so-called trade union chief represent - the workers or the employers?

George Brown, the Minister of Economic Affairs, can always be relied upon to 'do his nut' against any workers on strike at any time. He describes the strikes as 'disastrous' What is all this criticism of the strikes concerned in aid of?

Let Labour Lord Peddie speak: 'There is no doubt,. says this noble gent, 'that the lack of self-discipline in these matters has made a considerable con'd's four-day wr Liner trains READ REEALY ANKN A section of the large audience listening to speakers at the meeting. On the front of the platform is a portrait of Leon Trotsky.

Transport and General Workers Union broadsheet

By TOM HULl dockers, at a meeting called by local leaders of the Blue Union last Thursday, August 19, rejected decisively the Devlin report.

The main speaker, Peter Once Devlin had his way, meetings of this kind would no longer be possible, he said.

The Devlin Report, said Kerrigan, proposed to hand the industry entirely over to the port employers. The boss class was in a crisis. It needed to modernise the docks and speed up the inflow and outflow of goods, and to do this had to get complete control of the dock labour force.

Up and down the country dockers were saying wait and see. They felt strong, but complacency was dangerous.

Take offensive

Dockers themselves must take the offensive, not wait for the employers' attack. Profits should be used to pay better wages to the docker and provide better services in the docks. There was no need for the employers at all on the docks.

The Transport and General Workers' Union, according to its Constitution, stood for the taking over of industry by the workers. By concurring with Devlin, it was proposing to hand the industry over to the employers in delance of its own constitution.

tribution to our present economic difficulties.' Speaking to a meeting of Rotherham miners last Wednesday, our Labour Lord Peddie hinted that his fellow Labour leaders were considering a parliamentary legislated 'wage freeze'. so this is what it is all about. They scream their heads off attacking strikers in order to justify smuggling in a legal 'wage freeze'.

We say to all those right-wing trade union leaders who regularly fall asleep at their own conferences-watch out. So far as the working class is concerned — you're not on. TUC delegates please take note. Tell them 'to belt up' REJECT REPORT KEMP 'But we dockers are a body quite capable of organising our methods of work. This has al. ready been proved,' he said.

HULL DOCKERS PASSED the docker.

THE FOLLOWING RESOLUTION "This mass meeting of Hull dockers supports the right and scurryings hurryings principle of 100 per cent per- leaders his future is assured. manency for all dock workers.

But we reject and campaign for ending the against the Devlin Committee directive that to achieve this the dockers should be handed back to monopolies of private employers.

We are of the opinion that genuine permanency and benefits to the docker and the community can only be achieved by the nationalization of the port transport industry.

We urge all rank-and-file dockers to support this policy and pledge to campaign inside that struggle. and outside the trade unions and plan a lobby of dockers nationally to the Labour Party Conference on Sunday, September 26, to demand that the Labour government immediately nationalize the port trans- canteen: port industry under workers' washing changing control? appalling.

broadsheet to N.A.S. & D. STILL THINKING ABOUT DEVLIN Dick Barratt told a 'Daily Express' reporter on Monday, August 23, that: 'No decision has been reached yet. It will need several more meetings, he said, 'before we are able to the TGWU showt are on finalise our decision. Even candere is mined hat then a mass meeting of members will have to be called to discuss it.

THIS WEEK The Press and the Caxton Hall on Friday, August 20, to commemorate the 25th anniversary of the assassination of Leon Trotsky.

Young Socialists and trade unionists predominated in the audience, which responded enthusiastically to the confident speeches from the platform "The importance of Trotskyism for the Young Socialists' was the theme of the meeting, which took place against a backcloth with the words: LEON TROTSKY'S LAST WORDS ...l am sure... of the victory... of the Fourth International ... Go forward' This means-forward to the daily Trotskyist newspaper.

What stood out from the meeting was the burning relevance of Trotsky's fight to build the Fourth International to the urgent problems crowding in upon the working class since the election of the Wilson government.

The speakers showed that these problems could be solved only in the context of the mounting revolutionary struggles of workers all over the world. This had been Trotsky's message for the future.

The response to this meeting is an augury for the political future in Britain. Many thousands of workers are discovering in their own experience the truth of Trotsky's assertion in the Transitional Programme: the workers * TAM SURE... OF THE VICTORI. HE FOURTH INTERNATH GO FORWARD ThES PORT TROTSKYISANE hands of their traditional leaderships; only the banner of the Fourth International remains unstained.

It is this banner of Trotskyism which is today carried forward by the Socialist Labour League and thousands of revolutionary youth who support its policies in the Young Socialists.

Editor of The Newsletter, Mike Banda, chairman, opened the meeting by stressing the solemnity and importance of the 25th anniversary of Trotsky's assassination by an agent of Stalin's GPU (secret police).

Trotsky was not the first, nor the last, victim of Stalin's terror against the working class. But he was certainly the most important, he said.

We remember Trotsky and cherish his memory as the theoretician and propagandist of international Communism, as a man who fought throughout his entire conscious life for the dictatorship of the working class and the overthrow of capitalism, not only in Russia but throughout the world.

The strategy of this struggle is contained in the theory of the Permanent Revolution and the organisation for leading this struggle is the Fourth International, which Trotsky founded in 1938 after the degeneration of the Third International under Stalin.

For other speeches see pages 2 and 3

A likely to be achieved and the status of the dock worke I long last the dreams of our forefathers on dockland are properly recognised.' This is the prospect which is held up to the docker by Harry Nicholas, acting general secretary of the Transport and General Workers' Union in a two-colour broadsheet, distributed last week to put the Devlin Report across to This broadsheet adds to the men. ballyhoo in the press. The docker, But the so-called negotiating goes the chorus, is entering the committee, which all the press is milienium. All he has to do is to noW calling the modernising content himself that out of the committee, will 'Beeching-ise' the docks. The aim is to drive toLabour Ministers and trade union ward a big increase in productivity. Evening the evils ore casual The first step is to place the (Cont. back page, col. 1)

Jabour; everybody is for better Was all that was needed a committee, aided by union evidence,

YOUNG workers and students joined in a "Victory to the Vietcong" demonstration in Birmingham last Sunday. The march, unions, was made throug organised by the Birmingham Federation of Young Socialists, Few amenities was a lively affair with decorated vans, banners and posters, bearing slogans in support of the ame report dec struggle of the Vietcong, and in condemnation of U.S. military — res intervention and the Wilson government's backing of it.

Throughout the demonstration marchers shouted slogans which showed their understanding of the fact that the struggle of kers' Union in the docks indus Vietnamese workers against the war of the American bosses, and What sort of power is this that the struggle of British workers cannot force the employers te against wage-freeze and rising provide amenity like hot water to wary prices, are both part of the same world-wide struggle of the working-class against the ruling-class. Their slogans included not only 'U.S. Imperialists - Out!

Out! Out!' but 'Wage Freeze -Out! Out! Out!' and 'Nationalization — In! In! In!' The march ended with a meeting at Speakers' Corner in the future, say the have made Bull Ring, where YS speakers attracted listeners from passing declaratio modernisation will not lead to the discharge of groups of young people.

August 28, 1965 August Below we print excerpts from the speeches of the four main speakers at the Commemoration meeting held in the Caxton Hall, London, on August 20 — the 25th anniversary of the assassination of Leon Trotsky.

The theme of the meeting was 'The Importance of Trotskyism for the

INHE fight in the Young • Socialists would nave been impossible without Trotsky.

Now, on the 25th anniversary of Trotsky's death, I can say to all those on the rightwing of the Labour Party who accused myself and others of being Trotskyists whenever we expressed ourselves in favour of socialist policies — yes, l was always a Trotskyist.

How did the position stand? Between the old right-wing reformist politics and the fake left on the one hand, and Trotskyism on the other there can be no compromise. Only the most irreconcilable struggle.

We went into the Young Socialists deliberately to wage that struggle; not to argue with the right-wing, but to build a movement that would defeat and reject them and their policies. We had no other purpose.

MARXISM

The theory that guided our work inside the Young Socialists was the theory of Marxism-the mobilisation of the working class for the overthrow of capitalism, the destruction of its state machine, the taking of power by the working class, the dictatorship of the proletariat, the reconstruction of society on socialist foundations, the freeing of mankind from all evil, violence and aggression, the opening up of a new chapter in human history in which all will be free to develop the rich human potential which capitalism suppresses and degrades.

Trotsky taught that this task was impossible today without a struggle to defeat those bureaucracies which dominated over the working class.

NOT A DEBATE If we did not openly announce ourselves as Trotskyists when the Young Socialists was part of the Labour Party, that was because we saw Trotskyism not as debate but as a struggle to build a movement.

In point of fact we hid nothing. We fought for a Trotskyist policy, never toned down our policy, and we continuously turned outwards to attract fresh forces for this policy.

The outcome of this struggle was the Morecambe conference this year, which was the most democratic Y.S. conference ever, with delegates from every branch, resolutions and full discussion.

The rump conference of the Labour Party Young Socialists has no political resolutions, and no nominations for national committee. Delegates are not elected by their Young Socialist branches. The rightwing is hostile to the youth, who know that reformism is bankrupt. Transport House tries to exclude young people Fourth International Volume Two Numbers One and Two ements of the International Committee of the International on Algeria and Vietnam Fourth International and the Socialist Worker:

Documents covering the period 1953-1963 Resolution of the International Committee Cuba: Marxism and the Revolution Struggle for Marxism in the Ill American Trotskyism with A discussion with Trotsky - Stenogra report dated 12-15 June, 1940 Price: Three shillings each. Obtainable from: NEW PARK PUBLICATIONS LTD., "The theory that guided our work inside the Young Socialists was the theory of Marxism-the mobilization of the working class or the overthrow of capitalism? from politics.

It was, in fact, Trotsky who persuaded me to join the Young Socialists. I went to University from a working-class background and was drawn towards socialism.

For three years I was considering the different theories of socialism. This was at a time when, in 1960, Gaitskell was defeated at the Scarborough conference of the Labour Party on the question of the H-bomb, and the group around 'Tribune' climbed down and made a compromise with the right-wing.

CONTRADICTIONS

I considered the Young Communist League. But here the contradictions were even greater. Every effort was spent by these people to win the support of the liberal riff-raff.

I read Trotsky's History of the Russian Revolution' and the writings of Karl Marx. Trotsky's greatness did not lie in the fact that he was an individual with brilliant ideas. He began with the working class as a revolutionary class. As joint leader, with Lenin, of the revolution, and orga"ROTSKY's work proAugust 1965 28, 28, Gerry Healy

(National Secretary, Socialist since Comrade Trotdialectical materialist, consequenty. an Irreco clable atheist My Three

(National Secretary, Young • vides the key to the meaning of the political activity of working - class youth today: only the building of the Fourth International, of revolutionary parties in every country, can take the working class to victory and bring humanity through the crisis of capitalism.

The Young Socialists in Britain are part of a new revolutionary generation of the working class, from Vietnam to Los Angeles and Athens, from which the forces are coming to rebuild the Fourth International founded by Trotsky.

The socialist revolution "began in Russia, a backward Now available: Two issues of A journal of International Marxism NO. 1 NO. 2 Rebuilding the Fourth International United States Trotsky 186A Clapham High Street, S.W.4.

niser of the Red Army, Trotsky embodied the past experience of the working class.

Trotsky's fight against Stalin took place in a period of defeats for the working class, but he never deserted the basic standpoint of Marxism.

It was only the theory of Trotskyism that persuaded me to join the Young Socialists. At the time that I joined there was a turn to the youth through dances and social activities.

This turn to young workers became a struggle for socialist policies. The Young Socialists became an arena for class struggle, not debate.

RAN AWAY

Many of those who had claimed to be Marxists in a period when only discussion was involved, now ran away. They made excuses that the youth were non-political.

We did not turn to the youth as youth, but because"they were a section of the working class bearing the brunt of the effects of capitalism. The hostility of the right-wing to these youth was a class hostility, shared by the police.

1962 saw the ban on 'Keep 'Fourth THE VICTORY..

'The future of Marxism in the world today rests with the Fourth country. The international contradictions of the capitalist system were so concentrated in Russia that this country produced the most brilliant leadership of the working class. But Trotsky understood very well that the revolution, begun in Russia that this country pleted by the victory of the workers in the advanced centres of capitalism, "such as Britain.

Yet this old country had the nost conservative, slow-moving, anti-theoretical and muttonheaded working-class leaders to be found anywhere in the world, a problem often discussed by both Lenin and Trotsky.

WEAKEST LINK

The growth of the Trotskyist movement in the Socialist Labour League and the Young Socialists today puts an end to that state of affairs, and again, as in Russia, this is because of the international crisis of capitalism. The older countries, and Britain in particular, have become the 'weakest link in the chain of imperialism.

The battles now faced by the British working class Left' and the expulsion of members of the National Committee of the Young Socialists. The theory of the 'lefts' was that the bureaucracy could not be defeated.

But our campaign against unemployment in 1963 showed the strength of the youth. In the course of the struggle we were able to force the National Executive of the Labour Party to call an official lobby of Parliament on the question of unemployment.

At the annual conference of the Young Socialists, in Scarborough that same year, the youth inflicted heavy defeats on the right-wing.

VINDICATION

The experience in the Young Socialists has been a brilliant vindication of Trotskyism. It has shown that the right-wing cannot be defeated with arguments but only through struggle.

The youth have shown that they are prepared to fight even though in some cases they only have a glimmer of political understanding.

The Brighton conference of Young Socialists, in 1964, was a further victory for the youth, who had carried on a continuous struggle for Trotskyist policies. On September 27 last year the youth showed their understanding of the class character of the Labour leadership in a massive anti-Tory rally.

BASIS

The basis for an alternative leadership for the working class will come from the youth who have shown that they will respond to Marxist theory.

It was the youth who demonstrated on clear class lines on the question of Vietnam-for the victory of the peasants and workers - whilst the Communist Party called only for peace in Vietnam.

There are important lessons for the working class to be drawn from the struggles of the Young Socialists; the need to make a conscious break from social democracy.

For this task Trotsky's Transitional Programme is the only answer.)

International, founded by Trotsky!

require a development of Marxism, of Trotskyism, and young workers all over the world are looking to the British movement for a lead.

Thus the Young Socialists have a significance for Trotskyism, too. They are answering in action the great historical problem of our epoch: can the working class resolve its crisis of leadership, and so end the EXPERIENCE Most of those in the Young Socialists today have gone through the experience of struggle against the Labour Party leadership and bureaucracy. Trotsky's teachings provided an invaluable guide to the tactics of that struggle, just as Trotsky's own life was an inspiration to the determination of these Young Socialists.

But besides correct tactics and revolutionary will, the development of the scientific Marxist outlook is vitally necessary.

Trotskyism remains a force today because of the great strength in struggle of the working class and because of the power of Marxist theory, as developed by Trotsky.

His life was devoted bringing together these two things. This could only be done by the building of revolutionary parties.

When Khrushchev revealed in 1956 the depths of the degeneration of Stalin's rule, he said: 'Some may ask why we did not speak out against Stalin' He explained that they might have been killed if they had.

The politics of Trotsky are very different.

Knowing the risks faced by revolutionaries against Stalin's terror, Trotsky decided to hold high the banner of Marxism, confident that the workers in struggle would take up this banner and defeat the Stalinists, as well as the capitalists Who has been vindicated? Trotsky or Khrushchev? Trotsky is not just the tragic figure, exiled and assassinated. He represents Marxism and the revolution of our epoch.

BRILLIANT

Trotsky's writings on politics are certainly the most brilliant of our epoch, but Trotsky devoted himself, even in moments of the most hectic political struggle, to the application and development of Marxism in literature, poetry, the future of human culture, speaking out against all vulgarisation.

He wrote and lectured about psychology, about developments in natural science, the whole import of the conquest of nature.

He wrote about morality, but always against the moralising humbugs of the middle class. For him morality began and ended with the struggle of the working class to remove the bases from which sprang all murder, lying, exploitation of man by man, greed, prostitution and cowardice, and not with high-sounding judgments on the victims of the system.

LITERATURE

In the field of literature and the arts, Trotsky fought above all against the tendency to settle such questions by command from above, by laying down state and party authority. When the Stalinist gauleiters and party officials in charge of literature and the arts censored and suppressed works of art, they used the backwardness of the Russian peasants and workers, derived from lack of education and culture, in order to stop any originality of thought and creation, on the grounds that it was 'bourgeois culture'. These bureaucrats insisted that the workers (i.e., the party hacks) CAXTON HALL LONDON must create all culture afresh, with a clean proletarian sheet.

Helped by time-servers like Ilya Ehrenburg, they proceeded to stifle all independent writing in Russia for more than a generation. The faltering revival in Russia today is necessarily anti-Stalinist and anti-bureaucratic in tendency.

Young workers and students coming to the movement today must not neglect this side of Trotsky's work. The proletariat destroys the capitalist state in order to bring into the lives of all men, and not only an oppressive minority, all the cultural and scientific achievements of man throughout the history of class society.

HERITAGE

The working class liberates itself and human society as a whole for the greatest freedom of creation in science, art and literature.

An important part of the heritage of Trotsky is this fight for a true understanding of culture. Man must conquer his past, not destroy it. Man is the product of his past and only by fully understanding this can he control the future through the struggles of today.

Above all, our duty is the fight for revolutionary consciousness; an important part of this fight is the confidence that man can reach the heights of achievement in every field of human endeavour.

The nonsense that everything can be started afresh, that it is all a matter of determination and hard work, is born of the vanity and exclusiveness, the unbridled power of the bureaucracy in backward Russia, and not of any 'pure', 'working-class' approach.

INDISPENSABLE

Students and intellectuals in their various fields therefore have an indispensable part in the revolutionary movement and the youth movement founded on Trotsky's programme.

Scientists, writers and artists are frustrated at every turn by the culture of decay which imperialism daily produces. Some of these will undoubtedly turn to the working-class movement as the only source of vitality and hope for the future of humanity.

But the condition of any success in their efforts is the building of a revolutionary international party of the working class. Marxism develops only if all these efforts take place in connection with the struggle to build this living movement.

Those whu like to forget Trotsky's politics and admire him as a literary critic or a great orator ignore the fact that behind all these achievements was one purpose — the devevelopment of the revolutionary movement which would destroy capitalism.

That is why Trotsky never ceased to characterise the alternatives before mankind as 'Socialism or Barbarism'.

DEVELOPMENT

In this context he found it necessary to carry out a constant struggle for the development of Marxist theory in many fields. Those who took only one part of Trotsky's outlook, such as his critique of Stalinism, eventually found themselves back in the camp of bourgeois ideology.

Since the days of Trotsky, the crisis of humanity has deepened, and the responsibility of working-class leadership increased. All the more urgent becomes the all-round development of Marxist theory.

One of the factors in the latest phase of capitalist development is the great might of U.S. capitalism.

But this economic domination carries with it the penalty of sensitivity to every conflict and contradiction within the world capitalist system.

CONTRADICTION

The explosion in Los Angeles must be understood not as a race riot, but as a manifestation of these international contradictions within American society itself. These Negro workers could no longer endure their conditions, and so they were prepared to fight to the death, like their brothers in Vietnam. Will Johnson call up Negroes from Los Angeles perhaps to fight in Vietnam?

The fact is, then, that the objective contradictions of capitalism continue all over the world, not least here in Britain, to provoke struggles which are held back from victory only by the treachery of working-class leadership.

From Hungary to the U.S. this is the situation in which the Fourth International will be built.

SIGNIFICANT

This is the significance of Trotsky and Trotskyism for the Young Socialists. Their future, the future of Marxism in the world today, rests with the Fourth International, founded by Trotsky. Upon the realisation of this rests the future of mankind. (Editor, 'Keep Left')

British socialist yout movement has been one of struggle against bureaucracy... All those young workers, apprentices, students and school-leavers who joined the Young Socialists fought a fierce battle for the right of youth to discuss and build a socialist youth organisation and the right to have a paper, written and produced by youth and expressing the problems of young people.

We did not want a paper just for a paper's sake, but one around which a struggle for socialist principles could be waged - that paper was the 'Keep Left'.

LEADERSHIP

The fight for the 'Keep Left' became the whole fight for the building of the Young Socialists as a leadership of the youth.

We carried on this struggle, in spite of the proscription of 'Keep Left' and expulsions, because we understood that the rightwing bureaucrats could not offer the youth a perspective of fighting for socialism.

The struggle for the paper was taken out amongst the unemployed youth in 1963, into the factories and on to the housing estates.

The success of our fight was proved at Brighton last year when we defeated the rightwing of the Labour Party, and this year, at Morecambe, when 1,000 Young Socialists attended our conference.

WARNED

Last year on one huge demonstration of thousands of Young Socialists, on September 27, we warned of the betrayals of Wilson and the rightwing in the future Labour government.

The actions of these people, who have attacked the working class through a wage freeze, speed-up and redundancies, in order to maintain monopoly capitalism, have shown that we were right.

Right from the very beginning of the Young Socialists we said: no compromise with the right-wing or with the leftwing fakers.

The Young Socialists conducted a fierce fight against the Stalinists of the British Communist Party, who advocated GI (Na sky somI now have ing mem not ‹ case why abol Du time, the fr and i strug as ti Wher of th again they follor Trots Marx In of hi: (his • shevi were Trots very said: 'Prei peace the r ment Th same ticula the f lists They witch Hous prise shoul over the 1 figl pri skj thi Sor SO:

its ant Tri his the In Socia I wa mem: Trots stand fight traya tion.

selve: skyis the t will capit

Rate all culture afresh, ean proletarian sheet. . by time-servers like nburg, they proceeded Il independent writing a for more than a n. The faltering reRussia today is necesti-Stalinist and antiatic in tendency. ng workers and is coming to the ent today must not : this side of Trotwork. The proledestroys the capistate in order to nto the lives of all and not only an sive minority, all Itural and scientific ements of man hout the history of ¡ciety.

HERITAGE orking class liberates 1 human society as a : the greatest freedom ›n in science, art and portant part of the if Trotsky is this fight ue understanding of Man must conquer his destroy it. Man is uct of his past and illy understanding this control the future he struggles of today. all, our duty is the • revolutionary cons; an important part ght is the confidence can reach the heights rement in every field . endeavour. ionsense that everyn be started afresh, all a matter of deterand hard work, is the vanity and excluthe unbridled power bureaucracy in backssia, and not of any orking-class' approach.

DISPENSABLE ts and intellectuals in rious fields therefore indispensable part in blutionary movement • youth movement on Trotsky's prosts, writers and artists rated at every turn by re of decay which imdaily produces. Some will undoubtedly turn irking-class movement nly source of vitality e for the future of le condition of any n their efforts is the of a revolutionary ›nal party of the class. Marxism only if all these efforts e in connection with gle to build this living Those whi like to forget Trotsky's politics and admire him as a literary critic or a great orator ignore the fact that behind all these achievements was one purpose - the devevelopment of the revolutionary movement which would destroy capitalism.

That is why Trotsky never ceased to characterise the alternatives before mankind as 'Socialism or Barbarism'.

DEVELOPMENT

In this context he found it necessary to carry out a constant struggle for the development of Marxist theory in many fields. Those who took only one part of Trotsky's outlook, such as his critique of Stalinism, eventually found themselves back in the camp of bourgeois ideology.

Since the days of Trotsky, the crisis of humanity has deepened, and the responsibility of working-class leadership increased. All the more urgent becomes the all-round development of Marxist theory.

One of the factors in the latest phase of capitalist development is the great might of U.S. capitalism.

But this economic domination carries with it the penalty of sensitivity to every conflict and contradiction within the world capitalist system.

CONTRADICTION

The explosion in Los Angeles must be understood not as a race riot, but as a manifestation of these international contradictions within American society itself. These Negro workers could no longer endure their conditions, and so they were prepared to fight to the death, like their brothers in Vietnam. Will Johnson call up Negroes from Los Angeles perhaps to fight in Vietnam?

The fact is, then, that the objective contradictions of capitalism continue all over the world, not least here in Britain, to provoke struggles which are held back from victory only by the treachery of working-class leadership.

From Hungary to the U.S. this is the situation in which the Fourth International will be built.

SIGNIFICANT

This is the significance of Trotsky and Trotskyism for the Young Socialists. Their future, the future of Marxism in the world today, rests with the Fourth International, founded by Trotsky. Upon the realisation of this rests the future of mankind. (Editor, 'Keep Left' sky died, there might be some in this audience who now ask why it is that we have come here this evening to commemorate the memory of this man. Is he not dead? And if that is the case, as it undoubtedly is, why should we be worried about what he had to say?

During the whole of his lifetime, Trotsky fought against the forces of world imperialism, and the fruits of this life-long struggle are just as green today as they were when he died. Whenever workers in any part of the world take up a struggle against capitalism, whether they recognise it or not, they follow in the footsteps of Trotsky and all those great Marxists who preceded him.

In one of the hardest periods of his life, when all his friends (his old comrades of the Bolshevik Party) and his family were being murdered by Stalin, Trotsky wrote the following very important passage. He said:

"For 43 years of my conscious life, I have remained a revolutionist; for 42 of them I have fought under the banner of Marxism. If I had to begin all over again I would, of course, try to avoid this or that mistake, but the main course of my life would remain unchanged.

I shall die a proletarian revolutionist, a Marxist, a the Communist future of mankind is not less ardent, my youth ...

future of all evil, full...

circumstances I shall die 1AIEI une communist future."

Now we are in 1965. Wi nave had 10 months of a Labour government in Britain, not the first, but the fifth. All the theories of the Fabian Society and the social democrats have been tested in practice. Every morning you can pick up your newspaper and the situation is plain enough for all to see. Capitalism still remains as firmly entrenched as ever. The right-wing of the Labour Party, and all thos who supported them, have betrayed working class this country and all over the world.

And yet, as Trotsky said, life could be joyful.

Since 1954, in the older capitalist countries, production has increased by 100 per cent. New machines and automated technique thus, it is possible techniques have been denow, with the application modern automawno say unis.

the B.B.C. made this very clearly ume waen man The day can be beings or nealth. al the and this planet.

sauc saaale ment carried That is ale we do not time the youth al set.

respecung modern MacDonalds."

"Get Britain moving again," said Wilson during the General Election last October. so he has appointed a special arms salesman to sell arms so people can shoot themselves all over the world "Get fair shares for the old folk," said Wilson so that old-age pensioners had to wait four long months until late in this cold spring before they could get hold of a few shillings which had by that time shrunk in value.

During those months, how many old people died through lack of nourishment under a Labour government?

The Daily so-called Party, published a their front page from the Labour Minister of Pensions, Margaret Herbison, telling them to take full advantage of the facilities of the National Assistance Board.

In other words, the rightwing are carrying out policies which have nothing to do with socialism, or even their own election promises; policies in the interests of the bankers and all that gang of lords in the City Loncon Let us tell "Tribune' and the New Statesman and Nation': the Tories are coming back. thanks you and Wilson. Ask any newly-married couple that want to get a house ...when we ammemorate Trotsky, we do so proudly. We bring many of our youth into this Hall.

Likewise, when we call on them to nonstrate Vietnam, hey do so proudly?

on mortgage. Ask any person who has been waiting for the implementation of the Rent Act. Ask any of those living in overcrowded conditions in the bedsitters.

HOW TO FIGHT

BUREAUCRACY The message which Trotsky brought clearly to the working. class movement all over the world was the message of how to fight bureaucracy. He was the great specialist in the struggle against bureaucracy. That is why the fight in Britain against the Labour bureaucracy is closely related to Trotsky's struggle against Stalin, who represented the Soviet bureauINTERA ME under the leadership of the so-called liberalisers. If the Soviet bureaucracy had to make some concessions about Stalin's crimes, they could not avoid it, they were forced to make them in order to continue to exist. Everyone knows that Stalin murdered Kirov and from then on people were framed and forced to confess.

Khrushchev admitted

that Stalin murdered Kirov, but remains silent about Trotsky, who was accused by Stalin at the time.

BUILDING THE PARTY Historians like Deutscher, who have no interest in building working-class parties, can write a biography in three The Socialist Labour League is part of that Party because it is affiliated to the Internationał Committee of the Fourth International.

We settled accounts with the right wing at Transport House before the General Election. We told the Young Socialists that these people would betray, that their counterparts in Germany murdered Liebknecht and Luxemburg.

The Social-Democrats led the working class into two major world wars under imperialism. There is nothing but one defeat after another for the working class under the Social-Democrats and rightwing Labour leaders. Our Young Socialists carry on the same kind of fight against the Labour bureaucracy as the Soviet Young Communist League did against Stalin.

HOW TO FIGHT

Critics told us not to rock the boat before the election. Had the youth fallen for this deception, there would not be a youth movement at all today.

You cannot fight bureaucracy by shutting your mouth. That is what Trotsky proved in struggle against Stalinism.

I remember the period of the '30s when people used to criticise Trotsky for writing articles and publishing them in the capitalist press.

He told them: "The international working-class movement is in great danger. I must put forward my ideas to the widest possible audience," but he never gave the slightest concession in principle to the capitalist press. Our advice to the Young Socialists before the election was that "the labour movement was in great Labour Party after another called in the police to throw the Young Socialists out.

The fake-left youth are primarily responsible for this disgraceful episode. In Labour council-controlled areas Young Socialists have been denied places to meet. It is one constant struggle to get a place in which they can meet and discuss.

We have files of evidence of Labour councillors who have gone out of their way to keep the Young Socialists out of halls. The right wing locked out the youth who disagreed with them.

The essential principle behind the struggle against the right wing is the construction of the revolutionary leadership. We must build a disciplined politically - minded force that studies Marxist philosophy, economics and history. Such a leadership is the only answer to the betrayal of Wilson and Co.

The youth in this hall tonight are the future leadership of our movement. The older generations, like myself, live politically only as we pass on experiences and Marxism to the youth. That is why, when we commemorate Trotsky, we do so proudly. We bring many of our youth into this hall. Likewise, when we call on them to demonstrate on Vietnam, they do so proudly.

They ask for unity with all those who want to fight on the basis of serious socialist policies. They do not create illusions. They are not looking for soft jobs as trade union officials. They want to be and

HE whole history of the British socialist vour movement has been one of struggle against bureaucracy. All those young workers, apprentices, students and school-leavers who joined the Young Socialists fought a fierce battle for the right of youth to discuss and build a socialist youth organisation and the right to have a paper, written and produced by youth and expressing the problems of young people.

We did not want a paper just for a paper's sake, but one around which a struggle for socialist principles could be waged - that paper was the 'Keep Left'.

LEADERSHIP

The fight for the 'Keep Left became the whole fight for the building of the Young Socialists as a leadership of the youth.

We carried on this struggle, in spite of the proscription of 'Keep Left' and expulsions, because we understood that the rightwing bureaucrats could not offer the youth a perspective of fighting for socialism.

The struggle for the paper was taken out amongst the unemployed youth in 1963, into the factories and on to the housing estates.

The success of our fight was proved at Brighton last year when we defeated the rightwing of the Labour Party, and this year, at Morecambe, when 1,000 Young Socialists attended our conference.

WARNED

Last year on one huge demonstration of thousands of Young Socialists, on September 27, we warned of the betrayals of Wilson and the rightwing in the future Labour government.

The actions of these people, who have attacked the working class through a wage freeze, speed-up and redundancies, in order to maintain monopoly capitalism, have shown that we were right.

Right from the very beginning of the Young Socialists we said: no compromise with the right-wing or with the leftwing fakers.

The Young Socialists conducted a fierce fight against the Stalinists of the British Communist Party, who advocated 'Prepare ... to give leadership.' peaceful co-existence with both the right-wing Labour government and capitalism.

These Stalinists are the same people who have a particularly shameful history in the fight of the Young Socialists against the right-wing. They gave support to the witch - hunts of Transport House, and it comes as no surprise to us now that they should help to try and gloss over the reactionary role of the Wilson government.

VICTORY

The Young Socialists are fighting for the Marxist principles that Leon Trotsky fought for, and for this i reason the Young Socialists support the Socialist Labour League in its struggle to carry out and win the fight that Trotsky put foremost in his life — the victory of the working class.

In this struggle the Young Socialists have a special role I want to appeal to all Y.S. members to read the works of Trotsky and to try and understand his experiences in the fight against the Stalinist betrayal of the Russian revolution.

We have to prepare ourselves, as supporters of Trotskyism, to give leadership to the thousands of workers who will enter into struggles with capitalism in the period ahead.

The Socialist future lies in our hands. We have to fight to build the revolutionary party that will overthrow capitalism and build that future.9 cracy.

This fight against bureaucracy is a fight against a privileged layer of people in the working-class movement who have betrayed the principles of socialism by learning to compromise and exist with capitalism. Bureaucracy is essentially a capitulation to capitalism through learning to live peacefully with the enemy.

Trotsky started out this fight under conditions where the international working class were suffering heavy defeats following the First World War.

Despite these difficult conditions, his following came essentially from the youth. In all the great purges one group of leaders of the Soviet Young volumes of Trotsky, but in fact learn nothing from Trotsky. Trotsky essentially understood that you cannot defeat imperialism and capitalism by propaganda.

The working class require leadership and this must be built up consciously. The task has to be undertaken in the constant day-to-day struggle against all the enemies of the working class throughout the world. That is why Trotsky founded the Fourth International as the World Party of Socialist Revolution. danger". So we fought and organised them, and they learned something about the bureaucracy.

The bureaucracy called the police. The lying story went round that the Young Socialists were hooligans and all "responsible" centrist youth inside the Young Socialists said "that's right, Keep Left supporters are just a bunch of hooligans". And they forgot that the real perpetrators of violence were the police.

When Transport House called in the police they pushed and threw the youth violently about, and then one local are in the trade unions, whereever workers struggle against rent increases and colonial wars.

We have the youth, because the working class, as Marx and Engels long ago said, is a revolutionary class, and our youth are working-class youth. im Today, it is very much "politics to forget about the working class. The Members of Parliament think they are very important, and they forget about the working class who voted for them. The one great force in Britain today, which everyone forgets except the

Marxists, is the working class. The whole meaning of the present type of parliamentary politics is contempt for the working class.

To any young person coming into our movement today, we say: fight with the working class against the Tories. Only a programme for power is worthwhile. Any movement is doomed to defeat unless it can offer the youth perspectives leading to the road to power, that is why Marxism now is a major attraction for the youth.

You can only understand Trotsky's great work if you fight along the class lines Trotsky was fighting. It is only when you are firmly convinced of the class struggle, fighting capitalism in the factories and in your place of work, carrying out the hundred and one daily tasks to build the party, that you can understand what Trotsky fought for.

His work covered many experiences. He was a leader of the triumphant revolution, organiser and leader of the Red Army and then, because of Stalin, a'man without a visa. Trotsky was at his greatest during that time. He stood out when others capitulated and shut up. Trotsky spoke out; that is his greatness. In the struggle to overcome enormous difficulties we learn how to develop Marxism. That is what Trotsky taught us. 9 Registered at the G.P O. as a newspaper Punished hi The Newsletter. move to defend the jobs. It is a move of workers to stubbornly defend the conditions they have won through struggle. A Halewood convener told the 'Newsletter': 'We conceded mobility of labour on the promise that employment would be protected. On the first recession they haven't wasted one moment in cutting employment.

But the trade union leaders, the fake left Labour M.P's, and the Wilson government, Will not save workers from the dole. The stewards must campaign as they are discussing immediate meetings with Dagenham stewards and other motor industry stewards to oppose sackings. Fords must be made to accept a reduced working week without loss of pay.

The Newsletter says nationalise the motor-car industry without compensation.

AN agreement, described as 'unique' in a British shipyard, is to be signed between the Clyde Ship-

Communist League after another disappeared into Stalin's concentration camps. No organisation was purged more frequently than the When the official archives are opened, we shall discover a whole wealth of contribution to Marxist theory, thousands of documents written by these young leaders which were locked away in the 1930's.

Young people who join us inherit this great past. The Soviet youth fought and stood up against Stalin. If you want to understand what this means, study the activity of Trotsky's son, Sedov, who was banished from Russia with his father, went into politics and began to organise the Left Opposition in Western Europe.

He became the target of the Soviet Secret Police, was taken ill, and transported by them. where they murdered him.

We know who they are, the people who butchered him. They organised the removal of this sick boy and killed him. Imagine his thoughts when he knew he was captured.

We forget nothing, no crime that Stalinism committed will go without being exposed. We have a big balance sheet, and we are not impressed by Khrushchev's revelations.

We know what happened under Stalin and we know their friends in the British Communist Party.

D. N. Pritt will shortly be on his way to the Soviet Union on a "peace cruise", sailing in the state rooms of a luxury liner. He has just pub. lished his biography in which he said he stood by all he had written about the Zinoviev Trial in the 1930's.

This man is now Guest No.

of the Soviet bureaucracy PRESS comment on the Los Angeles rebellion has illustrated the bewilderment of those who take the present social order for granted when faced with revolutionary potentiality.

Almost without exception, the events are described as an outbreak of racial violence. Many commentators, even those who do not gloss over the terrible conditions of the Watts neighbourhood, fear that more intense racialist feeling will be induced in white Americans.

Most of them are quite without hope of avoiding repetitions of such happenings, and a number have discussed whether they could occur in Britain. Some use Los Angeles to justify the racialist immigration control measures recently introduced by the Labour government.

In the 'Sunday Times', the American correspondent Frederick Collins sees the Los Angeles riots as part of a general tendency towards violence against police and property.

'EXEMPT'

'There is a disturbingly large segment of American society, white and Negro, which has chosen to declare itself to be exempt from the rules of the game. . . . Somehow society itself must find means of disciplining these rebels without a cause, and it would be dishonest to suggest that I or anyone else knows at the moment how it can be done.' Collins asked why Irish, Jewish and Italian immigrants, who also met with discrimination on arriving in America, did not take to hurling Molotov cocktails.

His answer inhibited by their religious beliefs as well as by their institutions of communal self-help. He concludes that 'the construction of such institutions may be the greatest obligation lying upon the leaders of the Civil Rights movement.' The 'Daily Worker', friend of those leaders is, as may be expected, still more superficial. Their editorial of 16/8/65 tells us that 'the roots of the American clash are the poisonous racial discrimination practised against the Negroes' The solution proposed by these people is to reinforce Los Angeles police with Negro policemen!

REVOLUTIONARY

DEVELOPMENT The Militant', one-time Trotskyist paper, does talk about a 'social explosion' and an 'uprising'. But nowhere does it see anything more in the Los Angeles events than a racial struggle. The front-page article on 23/8/65 speaks of 'a racial oppression that subjects black people to daily humiliation by racist-minded whites.

Further on it says: 'And if whites are disturbed by the anti-white character of the outbreak, let them consider the responsibility of white society.' Neither 'capitalism' nor 'the working class appears in this article!

Martin Luther King is attacked for his backing of the police action, but not as a middle-class leader.

Seeing the Watts rebellion purely as a Negro movement makes it impossible to reach geles Crawford any real conclusions.

The 'Militant' article concludes: 'Out of the fires of the struggles, revolutionary leaders —like Malcolm X-will emerge to give the movement the necessary programme and direction and to channelise the revolutionary energy of the black ghettoes into an OIganised struggle to abolish racism and bring freedom, justice and equality for all!

Can there be 'freedom and equality' or 'the abolition of racism' except by the working class taking power and smashing capitalism throughout the world?

Can such a movement be completed by the Negro workers alone? Does not the whole of twentieth century history demonstrate that, to accomplish this task, an international Marxist leadership is an essential pre-requisite?

'SOCIAL EXPLOSION'

The Los Angeles uprising was an action by a section of the working class against the capitalist state. It represented a stage in the development of the American revolution.

The 'Militant' long ago ceased to worry about such questions. That is why it sees nothing in Los Angeles but a black rebellion, having nothing to do with the development of revolutionary leadership which can unite every section of the American working class.

But perhaps the cleverest and most characteristic comment on Los Angeles came in last week's "Tribune'. It didn't say a word about it!

employer well in control through so-called permanency. Only fool will believe that mechanisathe break-up of defensive traditions and customs, the lowering of manning scales, will mean that the employers will continue with the same labour force.

The Transport Union leaders try to assure the docker that the Dock Labour Scheme will be protected. It quotes the Devlin Report to show that the Board will still hold the power of dismissals.

In line, however, with its one-sided selection of quotations it does not stress that for a docker to be sacked from an employer means, in effect, that he is out of the scheme. Neither does it report that the disciplinary powers of the employer are to be increased apart from the direct power to sack.

The most demagogic promise in the brochure is in the implication that there will be a new democracy in the union.

The Devlin report makes it very clear that the reorganisation of the docks and the dockers, which is planned, can only take place by tightening the contro. of the union officialdom over their members.

The TGWU is forced to say that it stands for a 'major extension of public ownership' which it says it will campaign for 'alongside our approach to the Devlin Report. things are incompatible. The mention of 'public ownership' is put in as a sop to the srong feelings along the watertront I0I nationalization.

The rank-and-file docker has yet to speak out in force. The reality of struggle on the docks will be more compelling than any pretty brochure. That is what will break through just as it broke through all the efforts of the gloss and gimmick that tried to put over the 'new deal' on Merseyside at the beginning of last year. • Brockway

According to Brockway, the North Vietnamese government was prepared to concede two points:

(a) that Hanoi did not stipulate withdrawal of U.S.

troops as a condition for cease-fire or peace talks.

(b) that Hanoi was reconciled to a separate government for South Vietnam.

So it seemed that the persuasive genius of Lord Brockway has done what thousands of tons of napalm, rockets, bombs and shells could not: make Hanoi relent.

Hardly had Lord Brockway made his statement than the North Vietnamese Embassy in Moscow issued a categoric denial of any such proposals. Was Brockway's imagination running amok? Who knows.

Like Davies' trip to Hanoi, Brockway's Moscow visit has yielded nothing. And deservedly so.

Devlin BILL "W THAT will the introduction of week for 10,000 workers at the Fo Companies plant at Dagenham and mean?' is the question now being asked sections of engineering workers.

The immediate reaction at stewards for a ban on overtime The responsibility for the present position at Fords rests squarely on Wilson and the Labour government. The 'Newsletter' has consistently warned that the economic measures of Callaghan, Wilson, Brown and Co. would result in recession, unemployment and a tightening of the screws on the working class. Their aim is to salvage British capitalism from its crisis.

On the same day that Ford's announcement was made, the unemployment figures for July showed an increase of 60,000 on the dole and the motorways reconstruction programme was cut by £25 million. Hoover had already announced a plan of short-time working and a number of other sections of the household goods industry are faced with the same decisions.

Illusions

Any illusions that Ford workers may have had, like those expressed after the shock announcement was made by the shop stewards committee at the Halewood plant on the Merseyside, that this was a move to discredit the Labour government and that Wilson would come to their aid, have since been blown sky high.

Local Labour M.P's from Liverpool who rushed in behind this statement of the Ford stewards trying their best to cover the responsibility of the Labour government for this situation had their eye wiped on Tuesday when the trade union leaders who sit on the Ford Joint Negotiating Committe, publicly accepted the reasons given by Ford for the cut-back. . Fords now claim that they will receive apologies as soon as an enquiry has been held.

Will employers in the motor industry use the present recession to attack wages, w orking conditions and shop floor organisation?

Instinctive

The action of the stewards in banning overtime is an instinctive four-day rd Motors Halewood by many Halewood TUESDAY'S meeting of the executive of the National Union By Robert James

'Unique' agreement to be signed builders' Association and the Electrical Trades Union, providing for 'dilution' of the 1,500 Clydeside electricians.

The agreement which is now under consideration by the union's executive committee was described by a union. representative as being a fair one.

The scheme provides for 20 to 25 per cent 'dilution' of timeserved electricians by the introduction of unskilled and semi-skilled workers. For every four or five tradesmen now working in the shipyards one unskilled or semi-skilled tradesmen will be brought in.

This will immediately in shipyards provide the Shipbuilders' Association with an additional 300 to 375 electrical workers who can immediately be trained for tradesmen's work and provide skilled and cheap labour for the new orders which have been recently won.

AGREEMENT

The two sides reached agreement after the Electrical Trades Union called out the electricians at one shipyard and put forward demands for increased wages. They also put forward proposals for the introduction of work-study and EALING'S LABOUR COUNCIL SPLITS SIX Labour councillors in Southall, Middlesex, have split and formed their own group in the Ealing Labour-controlled council on a platform of discrimination against immigrant workers. At a council meeting in June they voted with the Tories to make immigrants wait 15 years to go on the council's housing list.

One of them said: Immigrants are still coming into Southall. Something should be done at a national level to keep them away from places like Southall'.

Although their resolution was defeated, no fight has been waged against these councillors. They are still members of the Labour Party.

REGRET

At the Elthorne Ward Labour Party a councillor, who supports the majority of the Labour group, regretted that a resolution was passed by the Ward condemning the six. A leader of the Labour group now argues that if too bonus payments.

In payment for the introduction of dilution the electricians are to receive an increase in the region of 6d. per hour. The rates of the dilutees will also be raised but they will now be doing work previously paid at skilled rates. The way is now wide open for the breaking down of other trade union practices in the shipyards.

Any such action will be especially appreciated by the shipbuilding employers at this time. One firm announced last week that all its operat ons on the Clyde failed to ma ie a BISAKTA men ask support Newsletter Industrial Reporter AT a meeting in Cardiff this week, called by BISAKTA members in the cold roll mill of Guest Keen Nettlefold's Castle Works, an attempt was made to gain full trade union support at the works for their 11-week-old strike.

Action was taken by the men following the management's answer to their demand for a wage increase after several month's discussion. The management offered a slight increase with the introduction of conditions of labour, which were certain to lead to large-scale redundancies within the cold roll department.

Unsuccessful

Attempts were made in the first week of the strike to gain support from the other BISAKTA branches in the works, but these were unsuccessful and the strike was declared unofficial. It was stated that no further discussions on the dispute would take place until the men returned to work.

In fact, considerable support was gained by the strikers this week and their representatives are now to visit several union branches. In this way they hope to win further support, and with this solidarity, fight for higher pay and guaranteed jobs.

many immigrant workers go on the housing list then they will review the whole question!

Two of the six councillors work at AEC. The 1/680 branch of the Transport and General Workers Union, which represents many AEC workers, passed a resolution condemning these councillors.

WAITING

In Southall, with a population of 60,000, there are only 2,600 council houses in existence. During the next few months the council plans to build only a few more houses to accommodate 300 families. These new houses are being built by Laings, the gigantic building contractor. Slum areas, which were scheduled for redevelopment after the war, have not been touched. Many families have been on the waiting list for 10 or 15 years.

Yet, in Ealing, which is in the same local government area, €460,000 was paid out to purchase land for 200 flats. profit in 1964-65. Writing on the shipbuilding employers' dilemma, the 'Sunday Telegraph' pointed out that although vast new tonnage orders had been won, it was questionable whether any profit would be made out of the ships now being laid down.

CONFERENCE

The Scottish Trades Union Congress executive has announced that it is to call a conference of trade unions on September 15 to discuss relations between the employers and trade unions in the shipbuilding industry. THE movement in Leicester against the Labour Council's proposed 30 per cent rent increases is beginning to snowball. Following the successful tenants' meeting on the Cort trains Liverpool workers to be affected by closure Newsletter Correspondent TORE than 900 workers • will be affected when the Courtaulds monopoly closes one of its rayon plants, British Enka, at Aintree, Liverpool, at the end of August.

Only 250 employees are expected to be found jobs in other Courtauld plants in the area.

British Enka was part of a Dutch firm until it was taken over by Courtaulds, who cut production because the productive capacity of all their plants was greater than demand.

A young worker at the Furzebrook Knitting Co., on the same site, alleged:

"There are quite a number of older men who were kept on last time and will now find it harder than ever to get a job'.

Knitting

The other factory on the site is British Celon, which has just begun production and Will not be in full operation until next year. British Celon make nylon for knitting at the Furzebrook factory. This plant will take 150 workers from the Enka olosure.

A leading Liverpool Labour councillor stated in the 'Liverpool Echo' that he hoped the closure was only part of reorganisation, and that it did not arise from the general economic problems facing the country!

It is easy to see that the housing problem is caused by the banks and the Tories and that immigrants are exploited as part of the whole working class.

The actions of these councillors is the logical conclusion of the right-wing's support for the Immigration Act. The immigration policy and Callaghan's budget will have deep efiects on the class struggle in the area. Both immigrant workers and English workers in the area are prepared to fight. They showed this in the strike at Woolf's, Rockware and Durotube, and the struggles over bonus and hours at AEC and Walls.

DEMONSTRATION

The Middlesex Region of the Young Socialists is planning a demonstration through Southall on September 11. All young and adult members of the labour movement should join this demonstration and strike a blow against the landlords and profiteers.

It angrily denies that trade union leaders are obstructing the introduction of measures to break down restrictive practices.

The unions, it said, are 'keen to assist in making industry as competitive as possible' (!)

Electricians on the Clyde have no reason to love the leaderships of the Electrical Trades Union and Scottish Trades Union Congress. The witch-hunt conducted by the right wing against rank-and-file electricians in Clydebank and in Glasgow has been particularly harsh.

But it is now doubly clear what that fight is about and that it has to continue. A new leadership has to be built in the unions to remove the right wing and establish a socialist leadership. * Crescent estate, the Young Socialists have organised a meeting of 120 tenants from the Saffron Lane and Eyres Monsell estates.

At this meeting, the Young Socialists received a tremendous response from the tenants. As one speaker asked: 'What is the difference between an 8s. rent rise and an 8s. wage cut?' tenants called out 'None!' When asked what they would do if their wages were cut tenants shouted: 'We'd strike!' UNITED The Young Socialist speaker pointed out that if the tenants allowed themselves to be divided on the basis of colour or in any other way then they would be defeated. The slogan of 'United we stand! Divided we fall!' received applause from the tenants.

Those who first attempted to minimise the role of the Young Socialists now stated: "The Federation of Young Socialists will get a flea in its ear. from ratepayers who are not council house tenants and a deaf ear from sensible, reasonable tenants.' CLEAR It is very clear from the size of the meeting organised by the Young Socialists that others will get 'fleas in their ears'.

During this week further tenants meetings are being held on five other estates. On Saturday, September 11, an all-Leicester tenants' demonstration is being arranged.

Those few supporters of the Communist Party who have put forward the slogan: 'Keep politics out!' have been left far behind.

Tenants can see very clearly that it is the financial policies of the Labour government and the failure of Wilson to nationalize the banks, the land, the building and the building supplies industries, that is directly responsible for the increase in their rents. Islington tenants' committee meets NEWSLETTER REPORTER OVER 100 tenants at Sickert Court, Islington, attended a Tenants' Association meeting at the Community Centre on Thursday, August 19.

But all they heard from the Association's Committee was that Islington Council will discuss the possibility of staggerthe rent increases of up to 30s., which are due to become operative on September 6.

A report was given on a discussion with the Mayor and a Councillor, in which the Labour Council eloquently pleaded that it had to find the money to service 'spiralling debts' and interest charges on the housing revenue account.

Stagger

One tenant asked: Since the debt spirals every year, how is it possible to stagger the increases? It is all very well the Council saying where is the money coming from, where do they think ours is coming from?' The executive committee gave no lead on the question of the form sent out by the Council. These forms terminate the existing agreement between Council and tenant, but the EC recommended they be signed 'under protest' and that normal rents be paid 'until the issue is clear'.

Islington Labour councillors Robert Redrupp and Albert Ley have already resigned in protest against the proposed increases.

of Railwaymen rejected a recommendation of their negotiating committee that they accept liner-trains for a year's trial. They also rejected any form of operation of the scheme (an express freight service between specially constructed depots in Britain's major towns).

But railmen should not think that the matter is over, or that the executive will not change its mind.

The government and the British Railways Board are determined to go ahead with the scheme later this year, and will probably allow private hauliers to enter the liner-train depots — a blatant attack on the conception of a nationalised industry.

Such a step is necessary in the eyes of the capitalists and the Wilson government to aid the streamlining of the British transport system and the movement of imports and exports in an effort to save the pound.

'BAD THING

Already, according to the "Times', NUR Secretary, Mr. Sidney Greene, 'clearly feels personally that the union should accept the trains'!

'Mr. Greene ... said it would be a bad thing if they were put into operation, without any agreement with the union, because this would lead to confusion among the staff'.

But who is confusing who, when the matter is left in the air?

The union executive should be taking up some of the demands put forward by their district councils for a militant campaign on liner-trains, instead of waiting for 'further safeguards' from the railways board.

Certain assurances on redundancy and pay have been given by the British Railways Board, in connection with liner-trains, but the streamlining of any industry will eventually mean a diminishing labour force. The Board have, in any case, been pressing in several areas for single-manning of trains.

"CONDITIONS'

And surely the 'package deal' offer by the Board, of two threeper-cent wage increases this year and next year and a 40-hour week, will not be handed to the railmen on a plate. The 'conditions' in return must surely mean further streamlining of British Rail.

Any assurances of no redundancy under the liner-train scheme or the package deal are made to look ridiculous when one considers the case of one railman who was forced to move from Luton, in Bedfordshire, to Bury, in Lancashire, to assured of keeping a job in the industry.

How many others will leave the industry when offered jobs miles away from home?

The only way that railmen can safeguard their jobs and the industry is to join in the growing struggle of the workers in Fords, the dockers, tenants and youth against the Tory policies of the Wilson government and for socialist policies of nationalisation of the basic industries under workers' control.

Newcastle

dockers' strike NEWCASTLE dockers struck for three days last week in reply to a cut in tonnage rates. Employers cut the rate for nonpallertised cargo (not made up ready for fork-lift trucks) from 2s. to Is. 3d., which is the present pallertised cargo rate.

A stormy meeting was held at lunch-time on Thursday (August 19), atter many dockers found their pay packets were several pounds light, and the vote for strike action was almost unanimous. The quay was to stop until last Monday, when the men decided to return, pending negotiations.

The 9d. cut came shortly after the publication of the Devlin Report.

Local newspapers claimed that food was 'rotting on the quays' (it stood for two days), but failed to mention the . wage-cut which the dockers faced. for