The Newsletter, vol. 9 no. 410

SOCIALIST Saturday, September II, 1965 THE END THE annual report for the Labour Party Conferenc which opens on Septembe 27, contains amendments which will put an end to the Young Socialists as a national youth organisation. It is exactly ten years since the abour Party Conference a Margate took a similar de cision. Between then and 960 Labour's youth move ment almost withered awas decided for purely cactoral national form rovide some of organisafion that membership again non mar membersno asant Dicked un. tis membership swung sharply to the left and gradually became identified with the policies of Marxism, overwhelming majority members adhering policy of the roth paper Keep Left'.

1968 and 1964, the k op Left' WOL a decisive maronity born on Donci questions and in elections to the National Committee e Youn Socialists. This as too much for the rig wing Wilson leadership who have no belief whatsoever ir сетостасу and democratic decisions. They • immeciate v began to expel the leaders of the National Committee Thes Cominte tuted the Young Socialists as an açer and so vi organisanon uver dererates attended its conference a Morecambe early this year handful of centrists, supported 'Tribune', organised themselves 1964 behind a "Save the Young Socialists' campaign to try and persuade the right-wing hand over leadership them against 'Keep Left", these amendments now effectively remove them from the scene. By crawling to the right-wing they gained absolutely nothing except the contempt of other Young About 150 gathered together at a rather dismal meetin last Sunday, and decided t nain, as centrists alw , undecided about t future. By Keep Let thon a deine Left' won a decisive najority for what is now progressive about the undeclared war raging between India and Pakistan. It is a reactionary war and a continuation of the religiocommunal politics of the Hindu and Moslem ruling classes which led to the bloody partition of India in 1947 — and the creation of the Kashmir problem.

The working class and the toiling peasantry, already groaning under the many burdens imposed upon them by their rulers in Delhi and Rawalpindi, have everything to lose and nothing at all to gain from this war. It is a war in the interests of imperialism in which Kashmir plays the same role as little Belgium' and Finland played in the first and second world wars.

Don't care

Neither Ayub Khan nor Shastri give a tinker's cuss for the Kashmiri people, for their culture, for their standard of life or for their destiny.

Both governments want to annex this territory, regardless of the feelings and aspirations of the Kashmiri people.

Both Ayub Khan and Shastri are guilty of lying and misrepresentation. Truth, as usual, is the first casualty in this war.

The Indian capitalist class wants war for two reasons. Firstly, in order to distract the starving millions of India's urban and rural poor from the real problems of landlessness, indebtedness, hunger, misery and exploitation.

Secondly, in order to expand their territory and markets and secure themselves militarily and strategically against China. •Suddenly we're rich enough to go Party and Revolutionary Socialist Party for the sake of defending the so-called national interests of India, meant, in practice, the betrayal of the working class, a strengthening of capitalist reaction, and an unprecedented resurgence of Hindu-Moslem hatred.

The Indian Pabloites, led by Kolpe, by their wretched and unprincipled manoeuvres inside the Revolutionary Communist Party and their concessions to social-patriotism during the Sino-Indian dispute, as well as their failure to build an independent revolutionary party, have renounced all claim to leadership of the Indian socialist revolution.

A large part of the responsibility for this betrayal rests with the Soviet leaders who actively supported the Indian government and supplied it with arms and aeroplanes. The full fruits of this counterrevolutionary policy are being gathered in Punjab and Kashmir today.

Socialism is irreconcilably opposed to the national state and private ownership of the means of production. The defence of the capitalist nation state, particularly the aborted capitalist states of India and Pakistan, which are mere appendages of Anglo-U.S. imperialism, is in every way a reactionary and retrogressive task.

Unification

The real task facing the Indian working class is NOT the perpetuation of frontiers forcibly imposed by imperialism, but the tearing down of these same frontiers and the revolutionary unification of India. This task can, and will, be carried out only AFTER the overthrow of the capitalist states in Pakistan and India.

The Chinese Communist Party leaders by their fulsome support of Pakistan have not only betrayed the real interests of the Kashmiri people, but, to war' ourtesy 'The Guardian' and Papas.

more important, they have explicitly recognised and accepted imperialist vivisection of India and the perpetuation of the Hindu-Moslem antagonism.

Their standpoint is doubly reactionary.

The attitude of the British Labour leaders is no better and, if anything, worse than the Chinese.

The present war is, after all, the product of Labour's policy in 1947, which was to grant formal independence to the Indian capitalists on condition that India was first partitioned.

Mr. Wilson has no moral or political right to complain about Indian aggression, when his own record on U.S. aggression in Vietnam stinks in the nostrils of every self-respecting socialist and freedom-loving Asian.

The Labour government has given political, military and financial assistance to the Shastri government in the fervent hope that it would 1 le a mittee of the National Amalgamated Stevedores and Dockers - the 'Blue Union'.

Chairman Jim Benbow opened the meeting by reading out circulars from Dick Barrett, general secretary of the union, declaring a ban on recruitment to the union in the north.

Giving his reply, he questioned the validity of the ban and asked if the ban was applicable in London. Why had the membership not been consulted? He ended by stating that the national executive's actions were tantamount to a sell-out.

Not new Bert Aylward told the meeting that Devlin's attack on unofficial movements and militants as 'wreckers' was no new phenomenon.

He recalled being on an unofficial strike committee as far back as 1923 and it was the unofficial committees and militants who had advanced conditions on the docks.

'Devlin says that officials of the 'Blue Union' have only been the mouthpiece of the men. That's true, and you want to keep it that way', he added.

Aylward proposed that groups of dockers should get together and study the Devlin report. 'Place our Resolution carried dockers' meeting.

We accept the principle that all dockworkers should have security and permanency of employment with a guaranteed basic minimum wage equal to the present national average.

We reject as a means of achieving this that the industry and the docker should be handed back to monopolies of port employers.

We are convinced that genuine permanency and benefits to the docker and the community will only be achieved through the nationalisation of the port transport industry, under workers' control.

We support the call from our Hull brothers for a mass lobby of dockers nationally to the Labour Party Conference delegates on September 26 to demand that the Labour government immediately nationalise the port transport industry under workers' control.

We call for unity of 'Blue' and White', for 100 per cent trade unionism on the docks with freedom of choice and the building of strong organisation to defeat the employers' plans.

perience of the employers and we can only draw the conclusion that we should nationalise the industry'.

"The dockers have been under more microscopes than pasteurised milk', said Peter Kerrigan, acting secretary of the Merseyside Area of the 'Blue Union'.

'After strikes in London against the use of unregistered labour and after a tally clerks' strike, Cousins and Creighton - the port employers' representative - sought a way out by decasualisation proposals. Out of that came the 'new deal' on Merseyside.

'At that time, for f9 9s. guarantee, the Transport and General Workers Union leadership would have sold you out body and soul. We got £9 4s. soon after, without giving anything'.

Wedge

He spoke of the coming of the 'Blue Union' to the north as a wedge driven in between the alliance of the port employers and the Transport and General Workers' Union.

'Certainly we want 100 per cent trade unionism, said Kerrigan. 'We want it, however, to fight for the docker. We want it to fight for nationalisation.

unanimously at Liverpool

'democratic bulwark' Communism.

When Shastri's government arrested and imprisoned, without trial, thousands of Indian Communists, fired on food demonstrations, baton-charged hundreds of progressives protesting his linguistic policies, and harrassed trade unionists and peasant leaders with his infamous Defence of India Rules, did Mr. Wilson complain? Of course not.

But now that British investments in India and the stability of the pound are being threatened by the war, Mr. Wilson is outraged.

Once again, Mr. Wilson acts as the spokesman for the City of London. If the war has done nothing else, it has certainly exposed the charlatanry of British Fabianism!

There is no doubt that this war could not take place without the tacit sanction of American imperialism, which controls the purse strings of both India and Pakistan. The strange silence of Johnson can be explained by America's desire to weaken Britain in Asia and strengthen her own position through the instrumentality of the United Nations.

Frenzied action The frenzied activities of U Thant, who is nothing more than a glorified valet for Johnson, will not bring peace or communal harmony to this benighted land.

On the contrary, as in the Congo, such activity will lay the basis for an increased repression and exploitation of the multi-millioned toilers, Hindu and Moslem alike.

The only real beneficiary of this war is U.S. imperialism, which to the extent it is pushed out of Vietnam, tries all the more desperately to increase its penetration into the rest of Asia.

In this sense, there is a direct We want it to fight wage restraint. The T & G says it is against Brown's wage restraint. The rank and file should demand more than words'.

There was a big round plause as he continued: PI rusins off the government'.

Peter Kerrigan called for support of the demonstration in Blackpool on September 26, organised by the Young Socialists, and for a big contingent of dockers to march with other workers and with the Young Socialists.

'All go'

*Devlin says that 120 employers should go. Of course, they'll be nicely compensated. But if 120 can be got rid of then we can get rid of the lot. How we fight now can really decide whether we realise the dreams of the docker or whether we are tied up in an industrial Dartmoor with an alliance of employers, trade union leaders and the state sitting on top of us.

Arthur Cope, representing the Hull Area Committee of the union, said: 'You can have decasualisation as the T & G want it, which means handing everything over to the gaffers, or you can have decasualisation under nationalisation'.

thriving oung Social movement.

The Wilson amendments pro pose that local Federation be ruled wel Dolllical resolutions annual conference. future National Committee will not be elected by the Young Socialists conference but appointed by the extreme right-wing regional bodies over which usually presid he most bureaucratic full time agents. ith only local organisatio ind a hand-picked Nation Committee, Transport Hous believes that it will have safely strangled the Youn Socialists. We have nó doubt that this is so. But the way now is clearly opened up for the development of a real Young Socialists movement. Il Young Socialists, who have now passed through this experience, should immediately if they lave not already done so, hasten to join the official ung Socialists movem ich is the one they elec o fight for their policies the Easter Conference i Brighton in 1964.

e lesson should once agai be underlined for all centrists of the "Tribune' variety, That vou caln crawling before the rightwing. It is necessary to fight and convince the majorit o defeat the right-wing

Warning

Three years ago, a similar policy carried out against the Chinese Republic ended in a military disaster and public humiliation for the Indian ruling class.

At that time, "The Newsletter' warned the Indian working-class movement not to be deceived by the fraudulent propaganda of the Congress government, and its lackeys in the Communist and Socialist Parties. We urged Indian Marxists to utilize the war crisis in order to prosecute even more vigorously the class struggle against the landlordbureaucrat capitalist government of Nehru.

The defence of China was indissolubly bound up with struggle for the overthrow of the Congress regime. In fact, there could be no other kind of revolutionary defence of China. Repercussions Such a struggle would have had tremendous repercussions throughout Asia, particularly in East Pakistan where Ayub Khan's dictatorial regime was being seriously threatened by Bengali opposition.

The abandonment of such a policy by the Communist Party, Socialist ›uld mean jail for strikers Brighton, Thursday ELEGATES to this year's Trades Union Congress in Brighton yesterday passed, by a small majority, a report of their General Council which recommended the voluntary vetting' of all wage claims.

This plan, secretary of the TUC, George Woodcock claimed, would offset the government's intention to make decisions of the Incomes and Prices Board binding by law.

Today, George Brown, Minister for Economic Affairs, welcomed Woodcock's statement, but intimated that the government would go ahead with legislation —probably before Christmas.

And who should be surprised at this blatant attack on trade unionism? After Brown's visit to TUC leaders in Brighton last week, when some kind of agreement was claimed on an 'early warning' system for wage demands, Minister of Labour, Ray Gunter, still warned Congress on Monday:

"We desire to plan the economy to benefit all people.

We want greater social services and the elimination of all class barriers — all within the framework of a free society. Therefore, let us realise that a free society must have its disciplines. Unless these disciplines are forthcoming on a voluntary basis, unless society is underpinned by these disciplines, then the answer lies in more fundamental means' (our emphasis).

MEANING CLEAR

Several times the Minister referred to these vague 'fundamental means', but his meaning was quite clear, and he remained in Brighton, and on the TUC platform, as a constant reminder of it.

As the state of the Labour government, and the pound, becomes more critical, their betrayal becomes more open to the point of attacking, on behalf of capitalism, th organisations of their most stalwart supporters - the millions of trade unionists in Britain.

This attack is aimed at the wage packet of these workers and will even over-ride the interests of the right-wing leaders of the unions.

Joining them in this attack are George Woodcock and the more right-wing elements of the General Council of the TUC.

As the crisis of capitalism deepens, so the crisis of the rightwing bureaucrats in the Labour Party and trade union movement maunte intr daan enlite and ucop spas auu differences over their varying interests.

This is the reason for the small majority of 1,939,000 in the vote on 'voluntary vetting'.

Woodcock, for all his talk in an ever-broadening accent, about doing things 'with the lads', 'for the lads' even though, on the surface of things, they may appear to be opposed to the Labour government, created the diversion necessary for Congress to push through a critical motion recognising the desirability of a prices and incomes policy, and for the preparation of legislation against the unions.

On the other hand, Harry Nicholas, acting general secretary of the Transport and General Workers' Union, opposed the 'vetting' plan.

DAMOCLES' SWORD

"Legislation', he said, 'hangs like the sword of Damocles, suspended by the gossamer thread of Labour's majority'.

Quite correctly he said that such legislation would mean handing over to a Selwyn Lloyd powers and concessions which a Tory government could never hope to negotiate with the trades unions, concessions that were not even granted by the unions in wartime.

But, like many of the speakers at Congress, he spoke in terms of 'welcoming the opportunity of settling down with the government' to discuss increasing productivity.

Clive Jenkins, secretary of the Association of Supervisory Stafis, Executives and Technicians, said that statutory enforcement of wage levels in a society still dominated by big business was "sinister'.

Watermen's union secretary, Bill Lindley, said legislation meant using state power to maintain capitalism. He added that an 'early warning' system., would discourage unionısm ana also discourage affiliation of unions to могичноь ши ALAVAA the TUC. This would lead to a rash of unofficial strikes.

A move to refer the report of the General Council to a re-called conference of union executives was lost by 2,735,000 votes, and

N the name of the natal nerest", and saving the pound', the Wilson government has taken measures leading to the growth of short-time and unemployment. Rent and fare increases and rising prices combine with this loss of work to make real wage cuts for hundreds of thousands of workers. Page tember Sep

a resolution 'reaffirming support for an economy planned in the public interest based upon the public ownership of the basic industries and the land' and stating that 'collective bargaining backed by trade union organisation is the most effective way to secure improvements, and therefore opposed any form of wage restraint', was lost by 3,919,000 votes.

As reported in last week's 'Newsletter', the idea of legislation against the unions was put forward in newspaper articles by Labour's Desmond Donnelly, and industrialist, Sir Miles Thomas.

PRESS BUILD-UP

The idea has been given a strong press build-up and even on the first day of the Congress, when Gunter spoke, the 'Daily Mail' ran a front-page National Opinion Poll result on 'wild-cat' strikes, which claimed four out of five people thought that such strikes should be made illegal.

Such articles, and such Congresses of the TUC are now aiding the Labour government to dampen any spark of independence generated by the unions, which are permeated with the most servile bureaucratic leaderships.

They pave the way for tying the unions to the state machine under a Labour government or a Tory government - and for all the repercussions on workers and their families.

State intervention on the question of wages could mean workers being jailed.

Even George Woodcock was good enough to point out that the breaking of a law on wages — mainly through strikes - would mean being sent to prison. Like Bill Lindley and Harry Nicholas, he also • saw the 'seriousness of unofficial elements'. But, presumably, he hopes they can be dealt with in jail.

BUY EXTINGUISHERS Parry, from the Fire Brigades Union, advised delegates to buy fire extinguishers for Christmas, for his union is holding a special conference on wages and hours next month and if legislation is introduced before then, all his members 'will be in the nick'.

Almost in desperation, Danny McGarvey, of the Boilermakers' Union, who moved the resolution opposing wage restraint, told delegates: 'Go back to your areas and report what you have done here'. He added, sarcastically ... and the best of luck!' He was referring to the tremendous rank-and-file opposition to wage restraint and legislation. This strong pressure resulted in the small majority of the vote for the General Council's proposal:

For, 5,251,000; Against, 312,000.

As 'The Guardian' day:

"The opposition was nearly double the opposition to the original incomes policy at the conference of union executives last April'.

ALTERNATIVE

George Woodcock, in presenting the report, said that General Council's 'vetting' scheme was an alternative to the government's proposed legislation, and must be fought for, before legislation is introduced, to defend the unions.

But how will the working class defend itself against capitalism, against ideas of legislation, and the tying of the unions to the state?

Desmond Donnelly, who put forward the idea of legislation two weeks ago in the 'Sunday Telegraph', also said that the Devlin Report on the docks was the beginning of what the government would have to do for other industries.

But it is precisely the dockers, the men bearing the brunt of this offensive by the capitalist class's Labour servants, who are making a start to the defence of their conditions, and the defence of the working class. Such a defence could never be mounted by the TUC.

STAND

These dockers, as reported in this paper, took a stand in Liverpool last week-end against the plans of the Devlin Report and the Labour government.

They also agreed to join with the Young Socialists in their demonstration at the Labour Party Conference in Blackpool on September 26.

Trade unionists throughout the country should join in this demonstration against the betrayals of the Wilson government.

This betrayal directly affects trade unionists and, in the new year, could mean jail for them when they strike.

The Young Socialists are fighting now for an alternative leadership to the right-wing Labourites.

This is also a fight against those trade union leaders who join the Labour government to attack workers through legislation.

Join this fight now. Join the Young Socialists' demonstration in Blackpool on September 26.

Registered at the G.P.O. as a newspaper Published by The Newsletter.

186A Clapham High Street, London, S.W.4 Printed by Plough Press 180 Clapham High Street, London,

ON Sunday morning, September 26, the Young into poverty. Socialists have called for a demonstration in Blackpool. On the afternoon of the same day, another march has been organised by the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament.

But what a gulf lies between these events. The Young Socialists denounce the Tory line followed by Wilson as a betrayal of 12,000,000 Labour voters. They demand the removal of the leaders of the Labour Party, who are preparing the way for a return of the policy. Tories.

CND, however, is asking for amendments to be made to Wilson's foreign policy, and in fact welcomes some aspects of it.

Writing in "Tribune' of September 3, Peggy Duff, CND secretary, says: We shall be ment must reject these plans. marching in favour of a nonproliferation treaty and to welcome the first signs of British independence of America in Geneva'.

Obscure

She is referring to a front-page article in the previous issue of "Tribune' , which supported an obscure British manoeuvre in the age-old nuclear disarmament talks between the big powers.

This reported a Russian proposal that the British and American governments agree to drop the idea of the so-called 'Multilateral Force' , as part of a treaty preventing other powers from getting nuclear weapons.

Duff goes on: 'But we shall be marching for other things as well: For a dissociation from American action in Vietnam ... really drastic cuts in defence costs ... We want to see Mr. Wilson going to the UN and offering to hand our bases over to them'.

What is left of the anti- last year. H-bomb movement which attracted thousands of young people on huge demonstrations?

in the Labour Cabinet.

Giving advice

Then, the march was aimed at stopping the British government from preparing for nuclear war on the Soviet at the election. Union and China.

Now, when new war dangers arise, CND confines itself to mildly giving advice to the ruling class and its servant the labour force. Wilson about how a nuclear strategy should be operated.

Pacifism disarms, not those who prepare for war, but the working-class movement which alone can stop capitalism.

The CND leaders entangled the campaign in the careers of 'left' parliamentarians like Greenwood and Silverman. With the advent of the Wilson government the movement was paralysed.

to enforce it along the following lines.

Coasted along

Foot, Mikardo and their like, having coasted along on the CND bandwagon, steered it away from class action, which would have clashed with Wilson's desire to serve im- ENT perialism. ACT.

Wilson works for the same objects as the Tories — and the Attlee government before them.

Committed to run capitalism at home, he organises the defence of its interests abroad.

All those who want to fight the danger of nuclear war must join the Young Socialists and the Socialist Labour League in mobilising the whole labour movement to throw out Wilson and his kind.

READ 'The Death Agony of Capitalism and the Tasks of the Fourth International' (The Transitional Programme of the Fourth International)

Price Is. avallable from NEW PARK PUBLICATIONS LID., 186A Clapham High Street, London S. W.4 and just financial economy.

out their employers, or from the press.

class. business secrets.

secret kept from the workers workers are asked to accept because the easy profits. trade unions be suspended.

Backe Front n Londe marting те EMPTY

September September aving taken : and э real rkers.

and the banks. On March 26, 1963 Young Socialists and trade unionists marched in their thousands to the House of Commons to demonstrate against Independence from the state The workers and their trade union organisations must retain complete independence from the state. There must be absolute rejection of all attempts to place legal restrictions on the freedom of action of trade unions. Within the unions, there must be a fight for the maximum workers' democracy. No outside interference in the trade unions from the government, from the The organised workers are not responsible for the the contrary, they are its victims, and they will fight it, by an attack on those who are really responsible, the 2 all employers must be compelled to pay cost-of-living Sliding scale of wages: Over and above all wage settlements, bonuses to ensure that wages are not left behind by prices. This policy, backed up by the strength of the organised workers in the trade unions themselves, is the only way to solve the 'prices' question in the interests of the working class. Committees of consumers, along with the trade unions, must be responsible for deciding a realistic cost-of-living index.

Pensioners and those living on unemployment benefit National Assistance must be granted the same rights, over above increases which are won by working-class action. Can the money be found? Can the money be found? How can full employment and a rising standard of living be ensured if the economy is in crisis? The fact is that fabulous profits are being made by a handful of banks and large business companies. They must pay, and if their system cannot find all that is required, then we must make changes in the system itself. It is necessary to abolish Workers' supervision and control The first demand is therefore workers' supervision and control of business. 'Modernisation' and automation, and the transfer of labour, as in the mines, railways, other public services and manufacturing industry, must be taken out of the hands of the big banks and monopolies.

In the nationalised industries, a start can be made immediately. In coalmining, productivity has increased at a far faster rate than wages, and thousands of men have left the industry. Not only do wages lag behind but prices to the consumer are often twice the pithead price or the price to the owners of private industries. Distribution and sale of coal are still in private hands and All this, together with the manufacture of mining machinery and all profitable contracting in the industry in the control of private merchants, must be nationalized, and an immediate enquiry made into the relations between the mines, private industry and the banks. All interest payments to ex-owners must Similarly, on the railways, the liner trains and o tion schemes must be introduced under the cont 1957 ARR VIRE 4570 homess 1 RY 2100 or 10.G GOUTI HOUS while POLICY YOuR LISK 20 20 prop flies UNITY ACTION unemployment. This was only the beginning of the British working class showing its strength.

crisis. On to resolve employing Sliding scale of wages At the moment, the actual wealth of industry and finance is a who actually produce it. Now these unemployment to save the wealth. enormous profits are being made.

Other modernisarol of workers' Many working-class families like this one are condemned to live in one or two rooms with ceilin. that leak.

They are forced to pay extortionate rents to landlords who make millions of pounds profit out of such dwellings. committees, which ensure the sharing of all work, no unemployment, re-training at full pay.

These committees will represent all grades of railway workers and employees who, in fact, understand and run the industry every day, but are stifled and exploited by the top administrators, linked with private industry and government. They will immediately enquire into all relations between private industry, the banks and the nationalised industry.

The boards of these industries, national and local, must be purged of all enemies of labour and friends of the employing class. No more milking of the nationalised industries by private enterprise. The interests of the workers come first.

Similar measures are necessary in the aircraft industry, where nationalisation must be applied to all the giant companies.

The Devlin report has declared war on the dockers. It is the responsibility of the whole labour movement to defend the dockers from this first serious attempt at control of the workers by the capitalist state on behalf of the employers.

The dockers' own demands, trade union democracy and the right to join the union of their choice, security under nationalisation with workers' control, a guaranteed wage of £18 18s. weekly, are the answer to the chaos of a docks industry owned • by hundreds of separate employers. Here, as everywhere, 'modernisation', and 'mobility of labour' must be under the control of workers themselves, operated in their interests, not those of the and and employers. trains, shown here, can only be introduced to benefit th working class under control of workers' committees. Nationalized industries These measures in the nationalised industries can begin a real assault on the rising cost of living, which will be temporarily stabilised by the sliding scale of wages.

In private industry, as a first step to nationalisation, the workers' representatives, assisted by sympathetic accountants and technicians from the growing white-collar unions, must demand access to all accounts, order books and plans of the big monopolies such as in motor-cars, chemicals and building contracting.

Wages being assured, and full employment preserved, all the restrictions on consumption passed by the Wilson government must be revoked immediately. Hire purchase and mortgage facilities must be restored to the November 1964 position. No more increased taxes, except on luxury articles bought by the rich.

All business expense accounts to come under the supervision of workers' committees. The savings made to be diverted to funds covering work-sharing and social services.

These companies will complain that their plans have been restricted by the government's measures These restrictions must be removed.

Nationalize the banks But everybody knows that the purse-strings are really in the hands of the banks, finance companies, insurance companies and building societies. Pensions, housing, education, industrial expansion, all depend finally on the banks and the supply of credit. Nationalisation of the banks is an absolute necessity for any serious tackling of the economic crisis in Britain. The employees of these banks are perfectly capable of running the banks and revealing the exact position to the working class. Once the existing banks are centralised and amalgamated, the finance companies, insurance giants and building societies must compulsorily declare and amalgamate their assets. These must then be put to use in a planned expansion of all nationalised industries and public works, under workers' control.

Workers sign on at the dole during the 1962-63 period grour by ir have Im resto outlir cent: from societ Th intere As crisis all li over All 1964 repre Ex can F imple contr Na housi ing n must All given Racia Th imme comn natio in ac unior Bu and will ( Co plans LADY on al impo: this s ' Fr in st interr credi all bi staff Ex electi the c will indus movE stren helpi must for expansion to stop credit.

Briti: every and i in Bi to de taker scrap Ev the e dang Bi: and Chin

of the and just He had broken sue the usiness the last ip with behind, to pay nditure crifices' i, wage es, cuts es but pound, d. The i policy such ialist :, the is to : this On March 26, 1963 Young Socialists and trade unionists marched in their thousands to the House of Commons to demonstrate against easingly unemployment. This was only the beginning of the British working class showing its strength. • Party, esmond Independence from the state are told r rights The workers and their trade union organisations must enalties retain complete independence from the state. There must : movebe absolute rejection of all attempts to place legal restrictions on the freedom of action of trade unions. Within the unions, there nancial must be a fight for the maximum workers' democracy. No outside onomy. interference in the trade unions from the government, from the ut their employers, or from the press.

The organised workers are not responsible for the the contrary, they are its victims, and they will fight it, by an attack on those who are really responsible, the class.

Sliding scale of wages 2 all employers must be compelled to pay cost-of-living Sliding scale of wages: Over and above all wage settlements, bonuses to ensure that wages are not left behind by prices. This policy, backed up by the strength of the organised workers in the trade unions themselves, is the only way to solve the 'prices' question in the interests of the working class. Committees of consumers, along with the trade unions, must be responsible for deciding a realistic cost-of-living index.

Pensioners and those living on unemployment benefit National Assistance must be granted the same rights, over above increases which are won by working-class action. * n 1931

Housing and rents

Housing and rents. Local councils, including those controlled by Labour, have cut their house-building programmes and cancelled their mortgage schemes, on the grounds that the money is not available, and they are crippled by interest payments. Their road building and other schemes have been subjected to severe government restriction.

Immediately, house-building and other plans must be fully restored, and interest payments suspended until the measures outlined for the banks have been carried out. One hundred per cent mortgages must be made available. The funds will be found ACTION from the profits of the banks, insurance companies and building societies.

The housing of the people comes before the preservation of interest rates for a minority of parasites.

As an extra temporary measure to solve the urgent housing crisis, particularly in the London area, a survey must be made of all living accommodation, and space not fully occupied handed over at reasonable rents to those without houses.

All rents shall, for the time being, be fixed at the November 1964 level, and will be under the control of rents committees representing the tenants. No landlord will have the right to evict.

Existing tenants' organisations, well versed in housing problems, can provide the basis of these committees. These plans can implemented immediately on council estates where Labour is in control.

Nationalisation of the land is an obvious necessity for a planned housing programme. All land speculation and private office building must cease and the resources of the investment companies must be turned over to the nationalized banks.

All speculative building will thus be put aside and priority given to housing, schools, hospitals and other public works. committees, which ensure the sharing of all work, no unemployment, re-training at full pay.

These committees will represent all grades of railway workers and employees who, in fact, understand and run the industry every day, but are stifled and exploited by the top administrators, linked with private industry and government. They will immediately enquire into all relations between private industry, the banks and the nationalised industry.

The boards of these industries, national and local, must be crisis. On purged of all enemies of labour and friends of the employing to resolve class. No more milking of the nationalised industries by private employing enterprise. The interests of the workers come first.

Similar measures are necessary in the aircraft industry, where nationalisation must be applied to all the giant companies.

the Devlin report has declared war on the dockers. It is the responsibility of the whole labour movement to defend the dockers from this first serious attempt at control of the workers by the capitalist state on behalf of the employers.

The dockers' own demands, trade union democracy and the right to join the union of their choice, security under nationalisation with workers' control, a guaranteed wage of f18 18s. weekly, unions. are the answer to the chaos of a docks industry owned by hundreds of separate employers. Here, as everywhere, 'modernisation', and 'mobility of labour' must be under the control of will collaborate in these plans. workers themselves, operated in their interests, not those of the and and employers.

YOUNG SQUALISTS Comin stee on all public transport, and fares frozen. this step is taken now. trains, shown here, can only be introduced to benetti th working class under control of workers' committees.

Nationalized industries staff of these companies.

These measures in the nationalised industries can begin a real assault on the rising cost of living, which will be temporarily stabilised by the sliding scale of wages.

In private industry, as a first step to nationalisation, the workers' representatives, assisted by sympathetic accountants and technicians from the growing white-collar unions, must demand access to all accounts, order books and plans of the big monopolies such as in motor-cars, chemicals and building Wages being assured, and full employment preserved, all the restrictions on consumption passed by the Wilson government must be revoked immediately. Hire purchase and mortgage facilities must be restored to the November 1964 position. No more increased taxes, except on luxury articles bought by the All business expense accounts to come under the supervision of workers' committees. The savings made to be diverted to funds covering work-sharing and social services.

These companies will complain that their plans for expansion have been restricted by the government's measures to stop credit.

These restrictions must be removed.

Nationalize the banks But everybody knows that the purse-strings are really in the hands of the banks, finance companies, insurance companies and building societies. Pensions, housing, education, industrial expansion, all depend finally on the banks and the supply of credit. Nationalisation of the banks is an absolute necessity for any serious tackling of the economic crisis in Britain.

The employees of these banks are perfectly capable of running the banks and revealing the exact position to the working class.

Once the existing banks are centralised and amalgamated, the danger of imperialist war. finance companies, insurance giants and building societies must compulsorily declare and amalgamate their assets. These must then be put to use in a planned expansion of all nationalised China, as a way out of economic difficulties. industries and public works, under workers' control.

out the Can the money be found? How can full employment and a ;. Since rising standard of living be ensured if the economy is in cumulacrisis? The fact is that fabulous profits are being made by t check a handful of banks and large business companies. They must pay, ugh the and if their system cannot find all that is required, then we must make changes in the system itself. It is necessary to abolish of their business secrets. lilst the At the moment, the actual rs must secret kept from the workers leaders workers are asked to accept leferred showed Workers' supervision and control e banks 1 power The first demand is therefore workers' supervision and control of business. 'Modernisation' and automation, and ur, 'the the transfer of labour, as in the mines, railways, other public services and manufacturing industry, must be taken out The real of the hands of the big banks and monopolies. ss while reduce In the nationalised industries, a start can be made immediately. In coalmining, productivity has increased at a far faster rate than wages, and thousands of men have left the industry. Not only use the profits. do wages lag behind but prices to the consumer are often twice the pithead price or the price to the owners of private industries. = unions Distribution and sale of coal are still in private hands and enormous profits are being made. nsible All this, together with the manufacture of mining machinery ' conand all profitable contracting in the industry in the control of icious private merchants, must be nationalized, and an immediate :1965 enquiry made into the relations between the mines, private industry and the banks. All interest payments to ex-owners must socialist ect, and be suspended. Similarly, on the railways, the liner trains and other modernisaemselves wealth of industry and finance is a who actually produce it. Now these unemployment to save the wealth. tion schemes must be introduced under the control of workers' contracting.

rich.

scrapped. Many working-class families like this one are condemned to live in ont or two rooms with ceilin that leak. They are forced to pay extortionate rents to landlords who make millions of pounds profit out of such dwellings.

'Easy on the mustard, Mac - IT'S INFLATIONARYI As the crisis gets worse imperialism increases the exploitation of the colonial peoples. The systematic robbery of the wealth and natural resources and the brutal suppression of the national liberation movements in such countries as South Arabia, Malaysia and the British Protectorates in South Africa show clearly that without its Empire the British ruling class and its Labourite lackeys could not exist. It is no accident that eleven out of the 21 largest monopolies in Britain operate almost exclusively in the Commonwealth. Without the cheap labour and the abundant raw materials of these countries the British ruling class could not have endured two world wars and a major economic crisis.

The millions of colonial slaves living at various levels of legal and cultural deprivation are today in revolt against this barbaric system. Their struggle is doubly progressive. They are striking powerful blows against imperialism—but without support and İeadership from the European working class they will either be defeated or diverted from their historic goals.

The Labour leaders have betrayed these struggles. The Socialist Labour League fights against these betrayals and demands the immediate and unconditional independence for all colonial territories and the withdrawal of all British armed forces from abroad. Not a man, not a penny, not a gun for the imperialist wars of repression in Malaysia and South Arabia.

Racialist slogans on the wall of an immigrant worker's home. Labour's support of the Immigration Act opens the door to the racialists.

The big building contracting monopolies will be subject to immediate enquiry into their accounts and profits by workers' committees. These committees will prepare plans for the nationalisation of these companies, and collaboration with and in accordance with the declared policy of the building trade Building workers, planners, designers, technicians, engineers and local government employees, through their trade unions, Councils of housewives and tenants will participate in these plans. Similar measures and control must immediately be placed Steel, the basis of the greater part of manufacturing industry, must be immediately nationalised, in accordance with the Labour Party's election programme. It is impossible to show the employers that we mean business unless From these positions of strength, with the organised workers in support, the economy can be run and controlled in the interests of the working class. These nationalised banks and credit institutions will then thoroughly investigate the affairs of all big companies, in co-operation with the workers and office Existing government contracts to the aircraft, armaments, electrical and computer industries will come immediately under the control of these committees and be subject to review. Plans will be set afoot immediately for the nationalisation of these industries, so vital to the whole future of the economy.

Repeal Immigration Act

The scandalous immigration restrictions of the Wilson government's White Paper are a return to the most rightwing Tory policies. This is an attempt to divert the labour movement from the real enemy, the capitalist system. It strengthens the racialists everywhere and is another step in helping a Tory government return to power. The White Paper must be withdrawn immediately, and the Immigration Act repealed.

Scrap Labour's foreign policy Finally, the foreign and 'defence' policy of the Labour government must be completely scrapped. Troops and arms in South East Asia and other parts of the exBritish Empire as well as in Germany, cost some £500 million every year. Not a penny of this is in the interests of workers and it is a crippling burden on any planned expansion of industry in Britain. The peoples of these colonial countries have the right to decide their own destinies. The armaments industry must be taken out of private hands, and the military budget immediately Every successful action by the working class in Britain against the employers and their government is a blow against the growing Big business, especially in the United States, is tempted more and more to escalate the Vietnam war and move to war against The seriousness of the world financial crisis, and the deterioratWorkers sign on at the dole during the 1962-63 period of unemployment of the Tory government's policy of 'stop-go' result by all: tionarie dead, w said, o harmle years al a Stalin is 'ado] politics thing T Old age pensioners joined with Young Socialists to demonstrate in Trots February 1965 for a pension increase backdated to November 1964. his earl ing position of US capital in face of Western Europe and Japan, his pol drives them in this direction. Yet, for this very reason, they do tion of not have the economic, let alone the political, reserves to sustain such a boom based on military expenditure. All the more dictator urgent is the decisive action of the working class internationally the de to defeat the plans of the capitalists to solve the crisis in their and cla way.

He 1 Above all, the United States war in Vietnam must have not an firmnes ounce of support. Britain must withdraw from the South East Asia Treaty Organisation and from NATO. U.S. bases in Britain with re HOMS ist mo must be closed down. of rigid This withdrawal of support will strengthen the anti war moveWoGS of rev‹ ment in the USA and help force Johnson to withdraw U.S. and the troops from Vietnam. At the same time, the labour movement the ver here should immediately begin negotiating terms of material movem assistance to the national liberation army in Vietnam. A workers' government in Britain will place proposals before the LA government of North Vietnam and China for strengthening the liberation armies and bringing a quick victory. With such a In B: policy the war will be ended very quickly. Support should also lack of be given to the demand of Latin American peoples for the witha hostil drawal of U.S. bases and the activities of U.S. Central Intelligence always socialis Agency in these countries. result A change to a socialist foreign policy would free large has alv resources for the planning of the British economy, and would by a l enable expansion to take place along with full employment, 'left' a shorter hours and an improved standard of living. differen adaptat rather princip been ti or left' Toda Steel ment, f of the movem as the capitali the tra disinteş system are ada Trot:

highl Men his revol is v ever PROI Trot about Europe great v the Fo world:

In tl a prof reform movem the off especia who r minds and re Amr newspa space politic: the eff decay-

None of these necessary measures can be carried out duct c so long as the machinery of business, government and Labour -the state remains in the hands of tried and trusted Leader servants of the ruling class. The Labour government has not dent L removed any of the permanent Civil Service, Diplomatic Service, Last and military chiefs who served the Tories. The boards of papers nationalised industries, national and local, are infested with the the friends of big business and the establishment. Trotsk The measures of workers' control, which we have put forward, they Il mean a purge of all these officials. ' Open enemies of the working mentic class must be removed. Those who remain in technical and writing administrative posts to sabotage the priorities of housing and tical tr living standards, must be removed and punished.

All the vested interests of capital and the banks are entrenched SQ in the machinery of government. Their attempts to place obstacles Afte in the way of the solution of the crisis, by defending the profit hardly system, must be answered forthrightly by the vigilance and he di strength of the workers' own organisations. "Trots] activit Sack the Wilson leadership same verdic Labou 12 which is preparing a severe defeat for the working The first task is to remove the present Labour leadership tions class. The Tories must not be allowed to return. Only squeez the working class and a planned socialist economy can solve the crisis. The labour movement must act now to remove the Wilson alw: leadership and adopt socialist policies. •Ind the ADOPTED BY THE CENTRAL COMMITTEE OF THE oftl SOCIALIST LABOUR LEAGUE Sunday, September 5, 1965

eptember Page Th

Housing and rents Housing and rents. Local councils, including those controlled by Labour, have cut their house-building programmes and cancelled their mortgage schemes, on the grounds that the money is not available, and they are crippled by interest payments. Their road building and other schemes have been subjected to severe government restriction.

Immediately, house-building and other plans must be fully restored, and interest payments suspended until the measures outlined for the banks have been carried out. One hundred per cent mortgages must be made available. The funds will be found from the profits of the banks, insurance companies and building societies. The housing of the people comes before the preservation of interest rates for a minority of parasites.

As an extra temporary measure to solve the urgent housing crisis, particularly in the London area, a survey must be made of all living accommodation, and space not fully occupied handed over at reasonable rents to those without houses.

All rents shall, for the time being, be fixed at the November 1964 level, and will be under the control of rents committees representing the tenants. No landlord will have the right to evict.

Existing tenants' organisations, well versed in housing problems, can provide the basis of these committees. These plans can be implemented immediately on council estates where Labour is in control.

Nationalisation of the land is an obvious necessity for a planned housing programme. All land speculation and private office building must cease and the resources of the investment companies must be turned over to the nationalized banks.

All speculative building will thus be put aside and priority given to housing, schools, hospitals and other public works. oyHOME Wors be ing ate Racialist slogans on the wall of an immigrant worker's home. Labour's the support of the Immigration Act opens the door to the racialists. the The big building contracting monopolies will be subject to ers immediate enquiry into their accounts and profits by workers' committees. These committees will prepare plans for the the nationalisation of these companies, and collaboration with and isain accordance with the declared policy of the building trade dy, unions. by Building workers, planners, designers, technicians, engineers isaand local government employees, through their trade unions, of will collaborate in these plans. the Councils of housewives and tenants will participate in these plans. Similar measures and control must immediately be placed on all public transport, and fares frozen.

Steel Steel, the basis of the greater part of manufacturing industry, must be immediately nationalised, in accordance with the Labour Party's election programme. It is impossible to show the employers that we mean business unless this step is taken now. 'From these positions of strength, with the organised workers in support, the economy can be run and controlled in the interests of the working class. These nationalised banks and credit institutions will then thoroughly investigate the affairs of all big companies, in co-operation with the workers and office staff of these companies. Existing government contracts to the aircraft, armaments, be electrical and computer industries will come immediately under the control of these committees and be subject to review. Plans the will be set afoot immediately for the nationalisation of these ints industries, so vital to the whole future of the economy. iust big ling Repeal Immigration Act the The scandalous immigration restrictions of the Wilson government's White Paper are a return to the most rightent wing Tory policies. This is an attempt to divert the labour age No movement from the real enemy, the capitalist system. It the strengthens the racialists everywhere and is another step in helping a Tory government return to power. The White Paper must be withdrawn immediately, and the Immigration Act repealed. ion nds Scrap Labour's foreign policy ion dit.

Finally, the foreign and 'defence' policy of the Labour government must be completely scrapped. Troops and arms in South East Asia and other parts of the exBritish Empire as well as in Germany; cost some £500 million every year. Not a penny of this is in the interests of workers • in and it is a crippling burden on any planned expansion of industry in Britain. The peoples of these colonial countries have the right to decide their own destinies. The armaments industry must be taken out of private hands, and the military budget immediately Every successful action by the working class in Britain against the employers and their government is a blow against the growing Big business, especially in the United States, is tempted more and more to escalate the Vietnam war and move to war against China, as a way out of economic difficulties.

The seriousness of the world financial crisis, and the deteriorati of unemployment-a result of the Tory government's policy of 'stop-go'. YOUNG SCUMLISTS Comm tee Old age pensioners joined with Young Socialists to demonstrate in February 1965 for a pension increase backdated to November 1964. ing position of US capital in face of Western Europe and Japan, drives them in this direction. Yet, for this very reason, they do not have the economic, let alone the political, reserves to sustain such a boom based on military expenditure. All the more urgent is the decisive action of the working class internationally to defeat the plans of the capitalists to solve the crisis in their Above all, the United States war in Vietnam must have not an ounce of support. Britain must withdraw from the South East Asia Treaty Organisation and from NATO. U.S. bases in Britain This withdrawal of support will strengthen the anti war movement in the USA and help force Johnson to withdraw U.S. troops from Vietnam. At the same time, the labour movement here should immediately begin negotiating terms of material assistance to the national liberation army in Vietnam. A workers' government in Britain will place proposals before the government of North Vietnam and China for strengthening the liberation armies and bringing a quick victory. With such a policy the war will be ended very quickly. Support should also be given to the demand of Latin American peoples for the withdrawal of U.S. bases and the activities of U.S. Central Intelligence change to a socialist foreign policy would free large resources for the planning of the British economy, and would enable expansion to take place along with full employment, shorter hours and an improved standard of living.

As the crisis gets worse imperialism increases the exploitation of the colonial peoples. The systematic robbery of the wealth and natural resources and the brutal suppression of the national liberation movements in such countries as South Arabia, Malaysia and the British Protectorates in South Africa show clearly that without its Empire the British ruling class and its Labourite lackeys could not exist. It is no accident that eleven out of the 21 largest monopolies in Britain operate almost exclusively in the Commonwealth. Without the cheap labour and the abundant raw materials of these countries the British ruling class could not have endured two world wars and a major The millions of colonial slaves living at various levels of legal and cultural deprivation are today in revolt against this barbaric system. Their struggle is doubly progressive. They are striking powerful blows against imperialism—but without support and İeadership from the European working class they will either be defeated or diverted from their historic goals.

The Labour leaders have betrayed these struggles. The Socialist Labour League fights against these betrayals and demands the immediate and unconditional independence for all colonial territories and the withdrawal of all British armed forces from abroad. Not a man, not a penny, not a gun for the imperialist wars of repression in Malaysia and South Arabia. and the

Once Icaand lute scrapped. ain.

Ling 'ass. the danger of imperialist war. lust lust ised JUST as Karl Mars ras praised for his brilliance' by all manner of anti-revolutionaries, once he was long dead, with the intention, Lenin said, of turning him into a 'harmless ikon', so today 25 years after his assassination by a Stalinist agent, Leon Trotsky is 'adopted' by people whose politics are a denial of everything Trotsky fought for.

Trotsky was a Marxist from his early youth. He fought all his political life for a revolution of the working class, the dictatorship of the proletariat, the defeat of all reformism and class collaboration. way.

He learned from Lenin that firmness in dealing politically with revisionists in the socialmust be closed down. ist movement was not a sign of rigidity and dogmatism, but of revolutionary intransigence and the defence of principles as the very basis of the Marxist movement.

LACK OF THEORY

In Britain, it is precisely the lack of Marxist theory, indeed a hostility to theory, which has always characterised the Agency in these countries. socialist movement. As a result the British movement has always been characterised by a vague division between 'left' and 'right, based upon different versions of reformist adaptation to bourgeois society rather than on any theory or principle. Marxism has not been the basis of either 'right' or 'left'.

Today the Trotskyist movement, founded on the struggles of the international Marxist movement, is making big gains as the crisis of the British capitalist system deepens, and ALARIES the traditional 'left' groupings disintegrate along with the system of rule to which they are adapted.

Twenty-five years after

Trotsky's death, as the 'Easy on the mustard, Mac - IT'S INFLATIONARY!' highly successful Trotsky Memorial Meeting showed, his internationalist and revolutionary programme is vindicated more than ever before.

PROFOUND CONTEMPT Trotsky wrote a great deal about Britain and other West European countries, for his great work was the building of economic crisis. the Fourth International, the world revolutionary movement.

In these writings he showed a profound contempt for the reformists of the British labour movement, not only those of the official Fabian' brand, but especially the 'centrists', those who could not make their minds up between reformist and revolutionary politics.

Amongst those political newspapers which provide space for the latter kind of Remove enemies of working class politics today—though with all the effects of 30 years of sheer decay-are "Tribune' (the proNone of these necessary measures can be carried out duct of a variegated group of so long as the machinery of business, government and Labour 'lefts') and the 'Socialist -the state remains in the hands of tried and trusted Leader' (organ of the Indepenservants of the ruling class. The Labour government has not dent Labour Party). removed any of the permanent Civil Service, Diplomatic Service, Last week-end both of these and military chiefs who served the Tories. The boards of papers belatedly commented on nationalised industries, national and local, are infested with the the 25th anniversary of friends of big business and the establishment. Trotsky's assassination. Wisely The measures of workers' control, which we have put forward, they refrained completely from mean a purge of all these officials. Open enemies of the working mentioning any of Trotsky's class must be removed. Those who remain in technical and writings about their own poliadministrative posts to sabotage the priorities of housing and tical trends. living standards, must be removed and punished.

All the vested interests of capital and the banks are entrenched SQUEEZED LEMONS in the machinery of government. Their attempts to place obstacles After all F. A. Ridley could in the way of the solution of the crisis, by defending the profit hardly have ended his article as system, must be answered forthrightly by the vigilance and he did, with reference to strength of the workers' own organisations. "Trotsky's own revolutionary activities and ours!' and at the same time quoted Trotsky's Sack the Wilson leadership verdict on the Independent Labour Party's world associa12 which is preparing a severe defeat for the working The first task is to remove the present Labour leadership tions as the 'International of squeezed lemons'.

class. The Tories must not be allowed to return. Only the working class and a planned socialist economy can solve the Like Lenin, Trotsky crisis. The labour movement must act now to remove the Wilson always added to the title leadership and adopt socialist policies. 'Independent Labour Party' ADOPTED BY THE CENTRAL COMMITTEE OF THE the words independent of the working class.

Fenner Brockway, once of the Independent Labour Party, but now Lord Brockway and 'a regular' in "Tribune', surely remembers the kind of thing Trotsky wrote about him.

Ridley waxes enthusiastic about Trotsky as a modern 'Leonardo da Vinci', ', 'a genius of the universal type' and refers to his role in building the Red Army, leading the Russian Revolution and in writing history.

But Trotsky himself described his later years of struggle to build the Fourth International as his most important work. About this Ridley can only scathingly comment that the parties of the Fourth International today have not made any revolutions.

'INDEPENDENT'

And yet he deliberately refuses to see what is going on under his very nose. He says that Trotsky is 'less known to this generation than a thirdrate film star or a pop singer consistently out of tune'.

Ridley's party is so 'independent' of the labour movement that he ignores the victorious struggle of the Trotskyists in the British Labour youth movement resulting in the most politically conscious and active youth organisation, the Young Socialists, ever known in Britain.

Trotsky's programme has been vindicated. From the workers of the advanced capitalist countries, real forces for the revolutionary party are now being produced and trained in the traditions of Lenin and Trotsky.

SECTARIANS

Ridley and those like him, incurable sectarians with narrow propagandist methods, prefer Trotsky 'the genius' on their shelves to the political continuation of Trotsky's work.

For this reason, Ridley feels obliged to echo Deutscher and other commentators in suggesting that Trotsky's 'personal weaknesses' contributed to the victory of Stalin.

Marx long ago, in his controversy with Proudhon, demolished this method of 'on the one hand ... on the other hand', so typical of the vacillating middle class.

Personal characteristics inevitably affect the form of every political struggle. But it was Trotsky's 'personal' role to be able to unite and lead all the revolutionary elements against Stalinism and the betrayal of the revolution.

Trotsky had absorbed

into his very life's blood the need for implacable struggle to develop Marxist theory and organisation on an international basis.

ROLE OF INDIVIDUAL Only from this point of view

Page September , 196

SOCIALIST LABOUR LEAGUE Sunday, September 5, 1965 can his role as an individual be understood. Ridley, standing outside such a concept of the relation between the individual and history, falls back on bourgeois conceptions of 'personal weakness' or 'contributory factors in the political Machiavellian conflict with Stalin.' He apparently thinks big political-historical questions of the class struggle are settled on the model of meetings of the editorial board of the 'Socialist Leader'.

'Tribune' can afford less space and makes the editorial comment that our Trotsky Memorial Meeting should not really have been our prerogative. That this was left to the Socialist Labour League was, they say, 'a reflection not only on so-called Trotskyism, but on the decay of the whole Labour movement'.

According to "Tribune', 'such a man belongs to international socialism and not to one or other of the minority sects' How strange that 'international socialism' did not conduct any meetings! Or is it?

Does 'international socialism' mean the official movement of social-democracy and of Stalinism? If international socialism includes Russia, Eastern Europe and China, as well as the British Labour Party, then in what sense does Trotsky belong to it?

Surely, only in the sense that the movement consists of two opposites; its working-class followers on the one hand, and its leaders, agents of capitalism, on the other.

Trotsky's life work was to fight out this contradiction; to defeat the bureaucracy in the labour movement, to resolve what we call 'the crisis of the working-class leadership'.

We must explain this to "Tribune' because it is the answer to their plaintive cry that only the Trotskyists commemorate Trotsky's death.

The fight remains the same; the class-collaborationist leaders, using the likes of "Tribune' for cover, on one side, the workers and the Marxist revolutionaries on the other.

This is the key to the second part of 'Tribune's attack. They say:

MAJORITY 'Our quarrel with those who call themselves Trotskyists is that they have used this name to dignify a trivial faction fight within the Young Socialist movement.

The position was that the Labour Party had a Young Socialists organisation. Socialist policies, under the leadership of supporters of Trotskyism, were victorious at three successive conferences of this organisation.

For two years, these Trotskyists were elected to majority leadership of the National Committee of the Young Socialists. Their purpose was —and who will now say they were misguided?-to defeat the traitors to the working class who led the Labour Party, and build an alternative leadership.

"Tribune' will have some difficulty in explaining how such an aim was incompatible with the teaching and practice of Trotsky! His whole purpose, as we have explained, was precisely to build an alternative leadership to the Harold Wilsons of this world.

CHALLENGE

"Tribune' supporters and inspirers were presented with the challenge in 1960 when Gaitskell lost the Labour Party Conference battle on the H-bomb.

They retreated shamefully, and were routed. In 1964, Mr. Michael Foot—no sectarian our Mickael!-—wrote a very nice biography of Mr. Harold Wilson, to help that gentleman's election campaign.

Please, you pathetic lapdogs in the "Tribune' office, don't tell us we don't carry forward Trotsky's teachings. Your real complaint against us is our success at the Trotsky Memorial Meeting and in the Young Socialists.

Were we a tiny propaganda and publishing society you would have a few soft words for us as well as for the myth of Trotsky which you like to remember.

REVOLUTIONARY

The real Trotsky, fighter against bureaucracy, merciless critic of centrism and opportunism, ruthless defender of the workers' dictatorship and above all defender and active revolutionary representative of Marxist theory, frightens you so much that you must pretend he never existed. But he did, and his work lives today in the Trotskyist movement.

THE ight against the threatened 30 per cent rent increases on Leicester council estates has Labour-controlled City Council.

Well attended protest meetings, most of them organised by the Young Socialists, have been held on nine estates, and tenants' associations have been formed.

At one of these meetings, the chairman of the housing committee was howled down by angry tenants. Since then • India connection between the bloody slaughter in Da Nang and the carnage in Sialkot.

It is the death agony of imperialism.

Even the holocaust of murder and arson which followed partition will pale into insignificance beside the destruction and desolation which the present war holds for the Indian peoples.

There is only one way out. That is. the road of class struggle, of revolutionary opposition to the war plans, and intrigues of the Hindu and Moslem capitalists and for the creation of a government of workers and peasants led by a revolutionary Marxist Party.

Down with Ayub Khan and Shastri!

For an autonomous Kashmir within a unified socialist India!

Down with the United Nations — tool of imperialism! Labour councillors have fused to show their faces front of the tenants.

In a press statement on Tuesday, the leader of the Labour group, Alderman Sir Mark Henig, stated: "The Labour group has come to the conclusion that the housing committee might be invited to review the whole question at their next meeting ... in the hope that they might be able to effect a substantial reduction on the amount of the increase they have proposed.

The campaign of the Young Socialists and the tenants against the threatened increases has provoked angry reaction from several quarters. The local press have not disguised their hostility to the Young Socialists and have constantly emphasised that the YS is 'disowned' by the Labour Party.

Refused to attend

Labour councillors have refused to attend tenants' meetings on the grounds that they had been organised by the Young Socialists. The local Communist Party has accused the YS of 'taking the tenants' movement over'.

This accusation completely ignores the fact that it was the initiative of the Young Socialists which started the protest movement on • most of the estates. The few Communist Party members who attempted to mislead the fight have, in fact, been left far behind by the militancy of the tenants.

The fight has now reached a critical point. Tenants, Young Socialists and their supporters in the trade union and labour movement must now press on with their demands and campaign for support from the trade unions.

Demonstration

The Leicester Tenants' Committee has called an allLeicester demonstration for Saturday, September 18. It has also agreed to support the Young Socialists' demonstration at the Labour Party Conference in Blackpool, on Sunday, September 26. All trade unions have been asked to send delegations on both these demonstrations.

The march will assemble at 11 a.m. at Lee Circle and will be followed by a mass meeting at the Co-operative Hall, Belgrave Gate.

Manchester NEMPLOYMENT figures in the Manchester and Salford area have risen above the seasonal average and there is every indication that many more men will be out of jobs before the winter is out.

The effects of Callaghan's credit squeeze are already being felt by Manchester workers. Spokesmen have had to admit that the increase - from 3,888 in Manchester to 3,930 — is not due to seasonal moves.

A scheme to extend Manchester Airport's main runway may be held up because of the cuts in government spending.

An official of the local Trades Council however is curiously optimistic. The press quote him as saying: 'I don't think the area is in for a tough but his committee had decided that both the unions and the Brown commission would benetit equally trom consultation with his members' Although Jack Dash, the Communist Party and the 'Daily Worker' have not yet made a clear statement on the Devlin report, does this n 3WS item not show that they ac :ept it? The statement is a betr iyal of London dockers by the liaison committee.

Not bound It came immediately after the first meeting of the modernisation committee made absolutely plain that its union representatives were not going to be bound by any control from dockers.

The 'Daily Worker' itself reported last Saturday that at the first meeting of the committee it was agreed 'that information about the modernisation committee's work should remain - confidential until the committee agreed about its release ... • 'Misinterpretation of informal communication could seriously damage negotiations said the committee, the 'Daily Worker' reported.

No mandate The committee has decided that negotiations will be secret until everything can be cut and dried. Then the results will be placed before the docker.

In accordance with Devlin's recommendations the committee is laying it down that its members from the unions will not be put under mandate of their rank and file.

This is directed against the 'Blue Union' and its traditional democratic procedure.

Surely Jack Dash knows the nature of this committee? After all, we assume he reads the 'Daily Worker'.

Is he prepared to participate in a committee to rationalise the docks in the interests of RENT RISE IN LEEDS Yet another Labour-controlled council has raised the rents of its tenants. On Wednesday, Leeds City Council announced increases ranging from 4s. to 8s.

inemployment figures increase time economically'.

But taking into consideration the introduction of short-time at Ford's car factory, and the fact that the Labour government's plans are only designed to assist big business and not the working class, this official's words strike a hollow note.

"The solution in Manchester and Salford is diversification of industry. In the long run this will bring stability, he said.

This is exactly the solution offered by the leadership of the labour movement in the 196263 unemployment period, but it would not, of course, solve anything for the working class.

Callaghan's credit squeeze affects all industry — to talk of directing new industries into the Manchester area is quite ludicrous. note that this decision was taken just when the northern dockers - Merseyside, Manchester and Hull — were moving militantly against the Devlin proposals and for strong trade union organisation based on freedom of choice to join 'Blue' or 'White'. Strengthen bosses Taking note of that, London dockers can only conclude that a move to sit on the modernisation committee will strengthen right-wing trade union and labour leaders and the employers.

Does the Tilbury Liaison Committee support this? Only recently their press officer, Pat Hayes, told a meeting of Tilbury dockers: If the recommendations of the Devlin report are implemented in their entirity the employers and the Transport and General Workers' Union - which is an employers' mouthpiece anyway — will be able to wield the big stick'. nationalisation — on uneconomic grounds.

Not one mention of the increase of productivity by miners who work at the direct point of production - the coal-face - an increase of 33 per cent between 1959 and 1964. No mention of the cost of living index up 15 per cent during the same period, or the 1l per cent increase in wages which tried to catch the cost of living but failed.

Nor was there any mention of the increase in the dreaded dust disease, pneumoconiosis. Nearly one in eight of all miners examined by X-ray had some degree of pneumoconiosis.

He points to accidents in the pits and attributes them to absenteeism — this really sets miners' blood boiling. If through absenteeism one miner has been killed through an accident down the pits, hunIslington Robens' report will set the miners' blood boiling.

dreds have died through the lack of enforcing safety regulations by local Board officials in the drive for increased productivity.

His reference to strikes is pathetic. It goes as follows: 'Now I happen to have been a member of the Labour government that did so much after the war to improve the social services. And I, for one, never dreamt I would see the day when Britain's prosperity (who's prosperity?) would be threatened by the selfishness of a minority (which minority?) of her workpeople who would exploit those services'.

If any remark by me is eeded after that, it is this:

If men don't resort to fightig back the employer, who is Eter the maximum profit from leir labours - which means aying the least wages he can et away with - then the 'orkers of this country, like ther countries, will be beaten own to bare existence level.

I would like to ask Lord Robens this simple question: Would the workers of this country or any country have the standard of living they enjoy today if it were not for the unity of workers in struggle?

And we workers will still tight back with strike action against any threat to our standard of living today, even if your close associates in the Labour government pass laws to outlaw strikes. P.F.

'If there hadn't been any 'Blue Union' then you would have had this sort of decasualisation and you'd be working for buttons. The I & G leaders want democracy, where you say what you like as long as you do what they tell you.

•We want 100 per cent trade unionism, where ever man plays his part.

We should bring other union members into this fight we are in. It is their fight as well. We should get together and force the government to nationalise.

It's not just Cousins we should go after. What about the other so-called guardians of trade unionism??

The meeting unanimously carried a resolution from the area committee of the 'Blue Union' calling for nationalisation under workers' control. TUC

Two 'Newsletter' sellers were stopped in Islington, London, last week by representatives of the local council who claimed they had instructions not to let sellers of the paper into the estate with literature relating to the dispute between the landlord and the tenants.

Islington is one of the areas in London to be hit by the increase in rents recently, and "The Newsletter' has carried reports of how the tenants challenged the councillors outside the last council meeting.

Docks The council representatives said that it was a council rule that canvassing could not be done on the estates.

'Newsletter' sellers were told that if they went on canvassing, the police would be instructed to remove them from council property.

When asked whether the sale of the 'Daily Worker' 'Daily Telegraph' or 'Daily Mail' was counted, they did not reply. Permission was applied for, they said, to the town council in such cases.

Warning that the Devlin proposals were part of a whole plan to rationalise the whole transport industry at the expense of the workers, he said it was connected with the development of liner trains.

In the docks industry, small ports were being modernised already so that if there was any trouble, work could be directed there.

'No say'

'If there is going to be this type of modernisation then there'll be no room for you, he told his audience. 'It will be the blue eyes and the gaffers sons who will get the jobs. You won't have a say, either, as to how many men will be in a gang. It will be the man with the stop watch who will have the say.

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liaison committee..?

'The liaison committee's chairman, Jack Dash, said there was no question of campaigning against the unions, capitalism and to assist in destroying the dockers hard-won rights?

The London dockers should the Miners IN his article in the News of the World' last Sunday, on absenteeism in the mines, Alfred Robens tries to cover up the Coal Board's attempt (under pressure from the oil barons) to dictate when and where to close these (so-called) uneconomic pits.

In his article I didn't see one reference to the most uneconomic, corrupt practice in this crisis-ridden society, and that is the compensation payments to ex-coal-owners, who bled the coal industry white and the miners with it - and this is the biggest irony -continual payment for pits which have been closed since