The Newsletter, vol. 9 no. 418

the Ministry, the 'Daily Mirror', and the employers' organisations, on how to deal with the trade unions and discipline the workers.

As The Newsletter pointed out last week, the press offensive, overtly supported by Heath and covertly backed by the Labour government, is symptomatic of the present , period. To save itself, big business is determined to attack the trade unions and the principles and traditions of collective bargaining, since these things stand between it and the lush profits which it so desperately needs.

This is, of course, where the Ministry comes in. Where the 'Mirror' rushes in 'Gung-Ho'-style and demagogically tries to discredit trade union practices, the Ministry uses a more subtle and insidious approach.

The evidence to the Commission concentrates on the 'unofficial' strike. Ninety to 95 per cent of all strikes are unofficial it declares.

Some people would like to illegalise unofficial strikes: this says the Ministry, is not wrong, but "impracticable' (!)

•. it is not practicable, nor would it be conducive to good industrial relations, to try and put a large number of people in jail.' Should the unions be fined? Obviously not yet. Yet, if says the Ministry, it is in the national interest [our emphasis] that there should be powerful and responsible trade unions, any proposal that might lead to the crippling of certain trade unions in circumstances where it might well be that there was little or nothing that the union itself could do it was clearly unacceptable'.

WORRIED ABOUT BUREAUCRACY That the Ministry is seriously worried about e status and role of the trade union bureauacy in the present period is clearly revealed the following sentence:

'Moreover, given such a situation, unions would be compelled in their own interests, to call official many strikes which now remain unofficial? (our emphasis 'Unofficial' strikers please note.

The way out of their dilemma constitutes the practical plan of attack of the Ministry. First, penalise the union involved, then set up new bodies with state backing if necessary to settle labour disputes: a form of compulsory arbitration.

•.. disputes to be referred quickly to some sort of local tribunal or labour court, either set up by the government, under statutory powers. or set up by the two sides of industry themselves, under voluntary agreements.' This does not by any means exhaust the gamut of anti-union devices contemplated by Gunter and his friends in the Ministry. There, are plenty more. But it is enough. The Ministry has spoken not only for itself, but, in tact, IoI the government as well. Trade unionists! You have been warned. The basis of trade unions is being threatened..

The employers' offensive must-and will-be defeated. Already the Lambeth Trades Council has given a lead by calling a demonstration and lobby against anti-trade union, anti-strike legislation (see report this page). This is the only sort of policy that will help defeat Gunter and his big business friends.

¡Saturday, November 6, 1965 'As for the proposed earlywarning legislation itself, it is as well to be clear about the origins of this. It was, quite simply, the conditions laid down by the international monetary authorities, and in particular by the United States Secretary of State for the Treasury, Mr. Fowler, for the September support operations for sterling. Hence Mr. Brown's unexpected dash to Brighton to see the TUC.

(Financial Times, WHO does Mr. James Callaghan represent? This Labour Chancellor of the Exchequer (known affectionately in the capitalist press, and also on the Stock Exchange as 'Our Jim')

made a very frank declaration over last week-end.

As Cabinet Minister in a government notorious for its broken promises to the workers who elected it, Mr. Callaghan ex)ressec his determination to ‹eep one promise at least Speaking to a Labour Party rally in Hamilton, Lanarkshire, he said:

I have given an undertaking to the International Monetary Fund that we shall be in balance by the end of 1966. I dependence by the Smith government.

Deadlock over the terms of reference for an independence scheme, which the Commission can consider putting before the Rhodesian people, remains at the time of writing. And domination of the whites on behalf of imperialism also remains.

Africans betrayed Wilson has served his business masters well. In doing so, he has betrayed the British as well as the African workers.

Last week's discussion about whether the British government would use force in the event of a UDI in defence of African rights is preposterous and the "Daily Worker' support for it extremely dangerous.

The fight against imperialism is a class fight.

The task of a socialist government in the present circumstances is clear and mandatory: it must suspend the 1961 Consever the arteries of Rhodesian Mr. Wilson, however, Will not dare do this because he and his and U.S. big business.

Followed Tories In his speech to parliament he said that 'the Labour government has consistently followed the principles laid down by the previous government and sought to give effect to them.

Wilson's statement was an essay in deception, designed to placate Tories.

But what of the brave men of Labour's left?

Their silence was eventually broken by 11 MPs, led by David Ennals, who made demands for freedom of banned parties and their leaders. These demands were made only in the context of aiding the Commission.

Yet, even experienced friends of imperialism like Nyerere and • Nkrumah could not swallow Wilson's canary and called it a 'betrayal'.

What was especially repugnant in Wilson's Callaghan keeps his promise intend to keep that promise if is at all possible to do so.' Labour voters will note Callaghan's diligence in keeping his promises to international finance capital.

How will he do it? He made that very clear also.

He told his audience that wages were going up about three times faster than they should: *Despite the intentions and despite the signatures on the Declaration of Intent ito apply the incomes policy], earnings are still going up much faster than productivity. 'In the first eight months of this year, they went up by 8 per it is bound to result in to ind crease in prices. 'We have tried to tackle it at its roots. Legislation we are proposing for wage increases and prices will give us an opportunity to have them examined.' In other words, the workers have Pressed and won their increases many cases, despite. the willingness of their tame leaders to collaborate with the employers. We respectfully remind Mr. Callaghan, Sir William Carron and others that we told them at the time that the only Declaration of Intent, package not consulted for the deal and other beautiful modern Magna Cartas were the workers themselves.

Callaghan's reference to legislation as the way to stop this rise in wages confirms everyLAR. ALARUMO big business. obviously opposed to government are bound to British Wage a combined fight against imperialism! Commission. posals?

B/OSL FILE statement was not his refusal military force in Rhodesia, but his desire to make the African nationalists work the Constitution.

The 1961 Constitution, which restricted the vote to a handful of 'qualified' Africans, was boycotted, even by this handful.

Is it too much then to ask the left MPs to protest and vote against Wilson's treacherous proCombined fight All over Atrica, an imperialist counter-offensive is pushing back the liberation struggles.

To achieve a real independence, and even • to achieve a . vote in Rhodesia, the African people need a working - class leadership.

They must join hands with the working - class movement in Britain and wage a combined fight against imperialism. thing we have said about the Labour government's proposed measures serving the interests of capital.

In point of fact, big business itself is very clear about the relation between these things. Callaghan himself pointed the way to attacks on the workers, with the dockers the first victims, with these remarks: 'Every time an export order does not arrive on the day it is promised, every time a price goes beyond the price quoted, and every time there is trouble in the docks, it is a thrust to the heart of confidence in Britain.' Tow just what does this 'confidence' mean? • Does it mean 'confidence' of the international bankers that the Labour government will discipline the working class? For an answer turn to the 'Financial Times' of October 6 (see quote above). he conditions laid down, says the 'Financial Times'. • But didn't Mr. Harold Wilson insist at the Labour Party Conference that no political conditions whatsoever had been attached to any of the loans given to his government?

Was this not a as thi was the financial Times misinformed?.

Callaghan and Wilson should be made to answer and must be rejected by the whole labour movement for what they are, servants of monopoly capitalism. SLL PUBLIC MERTING - SHEFFIELD CALL FOR TRADES COUNCIL LAUNCHES CAMPAIGN FOR JANUARY 26th LAMBETH, London, Trades Council is to launch a campaign against the anti-trade union legislation proposed by the Wilson government.

At its meeting on Monday this week, the Council carried a resolution from an affiliated Electrical Trades Union branch calling for trade unionists and Labour Party members to campaign for the cessation of payment of affiliation fees to the Labour Party unless the National Executive Committee gives a guarantee that Nhile Wilson vas making his suggestion to African rationalist, Joshua Nkomo, o 'work the Constitution', white police were using logs on komo s apporters, who are UDI, and to the Royal • the Labour government will not introduce the threatened legislation.

The resolution also called for a march and lobby of Parliament on January 26.

The campaign to make a demonstration on January 26 even more successful than the demonstration against unemployment held in March 1963 will begin at once.

1.292 * has deciced to set up a spee Frand and collections will be organised in union branches and in factories and sites in the area.

A special meeting of the Coun cil's executive committee will discuss detailed plans for the campaign and will invite other labour organisations in the area to help in the campaign.

MAXIMUM TURN-OUT Delegates undertook at the meeting to campaign for the demonstration in their branches and on their jobs to get the maximum turnout on January 26.

One of the main tasks of the officers and delegates during the next three months will be to encourage other trades councils to support the demonstration and take part in the campaign. This will be done through affiliated branches.

The Lambeth Trades Council is one of the largest in London with an affiliated membership of over 11,000.

The Socialist Labour League, which is itself carrying on a campaign of public meetings against trade union legislation, welcomes this great step forward by the Lambeth Trades Council on behalf of the working class.

THE shop stewards' committee at Bristol Siddeley Engines (Ansty) Ltd., Coventry, have passed resolution opposing any legislation against the trade union movement.

IEETINGS BIRMINGHAM 7.30 p.m., Sunday November 21 Digbeth Civic Hall, Digbeth Speakers:

Aileen Jennings, Editor, 'Keep Left' Mike Banda, Editor, Newsletter Jack Gale, Central Committee Member, SLL LIVERPOOL 8 p.m., Sunday, November 21 Lecture Room, Walker Art Gallery, William Brown Street Speakers: 7. Healy, National Secretary, SLL Cliff Slaughter, Editor, 'Fourth International' Peter Kerrigan, Liverpool docker NEWCASTLE 1.30 p.m.,Sunday, November 28 Bridge Hotel, Castle Square Speakers:

Cliff Slaughter, Editor, 'Fourth International' Jack Gale, Central Committee Member, SLL Chairman: J. Willamson, Young Socialists National Committee

press. 'Legislation!' bellow the bosses.

Yes, the facade of impartiality behind T is no wonder that every capitalist paper welcomed Wilson's agreement for a Royal Commission on Rhodesia.

This time-honoured trick for shelving difficult questions avoids, for the time being, the upheaval of a unilateral declaration of in-

iT Sunday the campaign Newsletter Correspondent Laws on compulsory LAST Sunday the campaign of the Socialist Labour League and the Young Socialists against the proposed anti-trade union • legislation was taken to Sheffield.

At a well-attended public meeting in this centre of engineering and steel, well-known for the militancy and high level of organisation of its workers over many years, SLL Central Committee member, Cliff Slaughter, called for an immediate counter-attack by the working-class movement against the government's pro-employer policies.

Slaughter condemned the 'Daily Mirror's attacks on trade unions and militant workers as a berate blow worsensen p the working class in preparation for laws against their rights to organise.

British capitalism, he said, now found it necessary to change the legal basis of bargaining with the working class. To keep in business on world markets, they were determined to raise more profits from the backs of the workers.

Only in this way could they accumulate enough capital for "modernisation'.

Legislation on wages and prices was intended to make this increased exploitation a great possible. There was danger, Slaughter said, that trade unionRELEASE IRA Newsletter Correspondent TWO Iranians, Ahmad Mansouri and Ahmad Kamanari, appealing against a death sentence imposed by a Persian military court.

The sentences followed a monthlong trial of 14 young Iranians who are alleged to have belonged to the outlawed Communist Party.

Mansouri and Kamanari and two others were also alleged to have Possed toat mo sarch of the the rich state. ists, even militant ones, were underestimating the importance of legislation.

It was not a question, he said, of disciplinary powers being handed over to the executive of the Labour Party, but to the established state machine of the ruling class, a ruling class which had a tradition of bloody violence in the suppression of subject peoples throughout its imperialist history.

RIGHT TO UNIONS

For a century and a half, organised workers had fought in Britain for independence of their organisations from the state, tor the right to have trade unions, for the right to administer and control their funds, to protect their officials and representatives, to organise in dispute against employers.

Ever since the Taff Vale judgment, the employers had tried to make a come-back, notably with the Trades Dispute Act, immediately after the defeat of the General Strike in 1926.

And now a Labour government was doing the job for them!

Gunter, himself for years a railway union official, had said last year that if the unions did not toe the line, then state intervention to enforce settlements might become necessary 'in seven to ten years' time'. This same Gunter now proposed legislation almost immediately.

Laws on compulsory wage settlements and the law to enforce the Devlin Report would ahead, though they were not in Labour's election programme. But steel nationalization, promised in last year's Queen's speech, would certainly be missing this year.

Why? Because, said Slaughter, the proposed anti-trade union legislation was one of those things which would give 'confidence' in Wilson's government to the bankers whose loans were keeping it in power.

In this, as in all other matters, Wilson's Cabinet was carrying out capitalist policies. It was the PUBLIC LEGISLATION AGAINST THE TRADE UNIONS! CLEAR OUT THE WILSONMACDONALD TRAITORSI FIGHT FOR SOCIALIST POLICIES!

NOTTINGHAM

30р.m., Sunday, November The Black Boy Hotel, Long Row Speakers:

Jack Gale, Central Committe Member, SLL Barrie Evans, Young Socialist National Committee BELFAST 7.30 p.m., Sunday, Nov.

International Hotel, Donegall Square South Speaker:

National Secretary,

Car industry servant of big business against working class.

All Socialists must make their minds up to fight now against the Wilson government, by supporting and joining the Socialist Labour League and the Young Socialists.

It was highly dangerous to wait for the new laws to go through with the complacent assumption that the workers would make their implementation impossible.

This was a mood which enabled 'left' MPs and others to get away without a fight now.

These MPs should threaten to bring down the government on every issue in parliament until Wilson, Gunter and Brown withdrew the threat of legislation.

KEEP SEATS

Instead, they were going to keep their comfortable parliamentary seats, and encourage workers to risk imprisonment and heavy fines after the law was passed.

Of course, it was true that it would be impossible to lock up hundreds of thousands of strikers, but the law would intimidate and inhibit workers' organisation, and strengthen bureaucracy against the membership.

The time to fight was now, said Slaughter. It was no good relying on any of the traditional leaders like Woodcock or their half-hearted opponents in some union elections, the Communist farty. Their reply to the 'Daily Mirror' amounted to a capitulation.

Woodcock, interviewed on television about the 'Mirror's attack on 'selfish' workers, had this to say i phere is too much truth for my comfort. I think, like most general statements, it is an exaggeration, perhaps even a gross exaggeration. But I am bound to confess that there is enough truth in it to give me a great deal of uneasiness.

He was echoed by Arthur Horner, for his whole life a member of the Communist Party, now retired from the secretaryship of the National Union of Mineworkers:

I believe that underneath the skin of the working man is the same solidarity as revealed itself in the General Strike. But there is, in the meantime, a lot of selfishness, ideas you can advance yourself without regard to anybody else.' Slaughter said Jack Dash, victim of a vicious attack by the 'Mirror' for his statements against shift work and long hours, had proved utterly incapable of defending himself or anyone else.

In Friday's 'Daily Worker' he managed to write a full-length article without ever once mentioning the predominant point that the anti-trade union laws would be carried through by a Labour government.

Dash had ended his article with the following assertion:

I am confident that trade unionists with their years experience, backed virile union leadership. will not be kidded by the Mirror-HeathGeorge Brown alliance to make the unions the tame followers of government policies in the interests of monopoly?

NEED OF THE DAY The alternative to this 'official' leadership was the real need the day, said Slaughter, declaring confidence that in the struggles to press wage claims and organise a political struggle against the Labour government's plans, this alternative would be built.

The Tories were having it both ways. They used the housing and mortgage situation to break voters trom the Labour Party, at the same time leaving Wilson in power to carry out laws against trade unions, laws which the Tories could not have carried through.

'We must change the alternatives before the working class, said Slaughter. "Appeals for loyalty to Labour are an abandonment of leadership. , Loyalty to Wilson must be broken and the leadership built for a new alternative, a Trotskyist alternative.

'In the struggle against legislation, and against the reactionary policies of Wilson on immigration, on Vietnam and every other bute, this leadership will be The audience expressed agreement with this prospect giving a collection of £21.

Five of the accused (12 of whom were convicted) were graduates from British universities. Like many others, they have returned to their country only to find their ideas suppressed by a dictatorship which takes full advantage of the backwardness of the thousands of workers and peasants.

The Newsletter calls on the British labour movement to demand the immediate • release of these 12 students, the withdrawal of any death sentences, and the release of all political prisoners in Persia.

This article, the first of two, is based on the main resolution to be presented for discussion at the sixth annual conference of the Young Socialists, to be held in Morecambe in April 1966. By that time, the Labour government will have already made the attempt to carry its betrayal of workers in this country to the utmost limit —it will have put before Parliament proposals for legislating against the trade unions. This fact alone is sufficient to invest the next annual conference of the Young Socialists with considerable importance. Young Socialists are opposed to any form of legislation intended to take away from the trades unions the right to strike. Its conference is assured of going on record to oppose such legislation. The Trades Union Congress and Labour Party Conference have voted in the main to accept such legislation. The Young Socialists Conference at Morecambe will, therefore, be more than a conference of youth: it will provide a rallying point for the struggle of all workers against the betravals of Wilson Page LBY DAVE ASHBY and TLS KEEP The first of articles Amber 6, 1965 committees of youth, working-class and popular cultural organisations. • The employers and their hirelings try to encourage racialist ideas in youth to

(National Secret and the right wing.

September 27, 1964, 3,000 Young Socialists took part in a pre - election demonstration against the Tories. The main theme of this demonstration was the defeat of Toryism for all time by the return of a Labour government pledged to socialist policies.

Those who marched to Trafalgar Square to attend the rally held after the demonstration made clear their attitude to Wilson and his friends. The Young Socialists would not give them uncritical support, but they would be loyal to a Labour government that was loyal to the working class.

This demonstration showea the determinatio. of the overwhelming majority of active Young Socialists to defy the vicious witch-hunt that has been launched against them by the rightwing Labourites.

After this demonstration there could have been no turning back: it was necessary to build the Young Socialists into a mass socialist youth movement independent of the bureaucracy.

All the pessimists and fakelefts around "Tribune' who at that time were calling for 'unity' behind Wilson and who were joining in the general appeal not to rock the boat', said that it would be impossible to build a socialist youth movement outside the Labour Party. They accused the Young Socialists of retreating into the poliSeptember 27, 1964: In Trafalgar Square 4,000 people made clear their attitude to Wilson and his friends tical wilderness.

All these prophets of doom who only a short time ago were intoxicated with visions of parliamentary power have been confounded by the events of the last 12 months.

Not only has the basic organisation of the Young Socialists been maintained and strengthened, but a high standard of campaigning activity has also been carried out to win support for the policies of the Young Socialists within the adult labour movement. The try of the Soclalists) main resolution for the next Young Socialist conference, 'Socialism and Youth', draws the balance sheet in this way:

"The rapid exposure of the Labour government as a government for the banks and monopolies, making the working class pay for the crisis of capitalism, throws the fakelefts and centrists into paralysis and confusion.

They have been unable to mount a single campaign to mobilise the working class against Wilson and the right wing. Their argument that the Labour government must be preserved at all costs has proved disastrous. It results in their support for the most reactionary policies.' The record of the Young Socialists has been entirely different. We alone campaigned against Wilson's betrayal of the old age pensioners.

We campaigned publicly against the Labour government's squalid support for the American war in Vietnam and raised the slogan-for full support to the Vietcong.

We organised the Morecambe conference of Young Socialists which called the working class to make a reckoning with Wilson and his gang of traitors.

We carried this policy into practice in the 2,000-strong demonstration at Blackpool on the eve of the Labour Party Conference by demanding fight against the Immigration Bill, the Vietnam policy and the trades union legislation. This has gained the support of large numbers of older workers in Britain.

Questions answered by resolution What has made possible this remarkable achievement? What has enabled the Young Socialists to consistently mobilise SERDEENA TOUNG SOCIALISTS EXILSAINS who were to form the next government.

large numbers of young workers to fight for socialist policies in opposition to Wilson and the right wing? What lessons can be drawn from this experience?

What is the relationship of the Young Socialists to all those adult workers and trade unionists who will be drawn into struggle against trade union legislation?

It is these questions and others that the resolution for the next Young Socialist conference attempts to answer. Fight for better future Throughout its history, the Young Socialist movement has always fought on behalf o: E all young people in Britain aga inst the constant attacks made • on their conditions of work and leisure by the employers and their agents.

This struggle to secure for the youth a better future, free on the one hand from boredom and frustration, and on the other from unemployment and war, can only be successful if it is made part of the struggle for the ending of capitalism in Britain.

For the last 50 years, British capitalism has been suffering from a state of chronic decline. All the chickens hatched in the hey-day of imperialism are coming home to roost.

Colonial possessions, which in an earlier period provided British big business with cheap sources of labour and raw materials, hang as a millstone around the necks of the ruling class today.

The amount of money spent on maintaining British troops to defend Malaysia exceeds by six times the money that returns in the form of profit on investment. What else can explain Enoch Powell's proposal to the Tory Party Conference that the 'East of Suez' policy be scrapped?

Successive governments in Whitehall cling desperately to the Empire in its new guise of the 'Commonwealth' in the face of the resistance of colonial workers and peasants.

The Empire, that once boasted of ruling the waves, now finds itself an overall debtor in world shipping. Britain's position as 'the world's banker, established in a period when the pound dominated world markets, can only be maintained today by constant 'rescue' operations accompanied by cuts in public expenditure, domestic sacrifice and attacks on wages, working conditions and trades union organisation—politely described as a policy of 'saving the pound' or 'paying our way'.

The pound sterling is backed today by a backward economy for its inefficiency, its antiquated structure, its obsolescent machinery and its inability to compete in world markets.

In this field, as in others, the very fact that Britain was first to introduce large-scale industry and modern machinery, now turns into its opposite.

This state of chronic decline is stamped on every aspect of life in Britain today. Nowhere is it more keenly and sensitively refleoted than in the youth.

In the age of automation, nuclear energy and space flights, millions of young workers have to spend their time in towns and cities which ought to be converted into museums of the industrial revolution.

Four years at the secondary modern school are for most young people a complete waste ot time. Only one in ten stay on at school after the age of 15. The opportunity of learning a trade is denied to four out of every five boys and the proportion is much worse for girls.

Hundreds of thousands of young people are compelled to work long hours in engineering sweat ishops or to take low paid jobs in the catering trade as the only alternative to life on the dole.

Facilities for leisure and entertainment are almost nonexistent on the large industrial housing estates on which many of them live. If they rebel against these conditions they face victimisation and intimidation at the hands of the police, the law courts, the magistrates, borstal and prison. Demands of YS for youth The Young Socialists fight families; free access to for an immediate improvement science and culture for in this situation by formulating working - class youth, with the demands of youth and special arrangements for enorganising youth to campaign trance to universities and HANDS IGE -EEZE Carried policies through to September 26, 1965, demonstration in on them by class struggle methods. • For young workers engaged in production we demand a shorter working week, with ample opportunity for open-air sport and recreation; at least one month's paid holiday a year; the right to learn a trade; hours of training to be taken out of the working week; training courses at the bosses' expense and under workers' control; forbidding of all work not connected with apprenticeship; and the prohibition of all night work and arduous, unhealthy tasks. • On behalf of unemployed youth we campaign to unite them with employed workers by demanding: unemployment benefit paid at adult rates from the day of leaving school; the opening of technical re-education centres at the bosses' expense; a full programme of public works paid at trade union rates and under workers' management; work-sharing without loss of pay. • In the fieid of education we demand that the youth are prepared and equipped to face their future with confidence. We demand: abolition of the 'll-plus' examination; reorganise education in co-operation with the factory based on the main resolution to be presented to Sixth Annual Conference of the Young Socia —control by workers' organisations over technical education; raising of the school-leaving age to 16 with full grants to working-class MERSE 140Okra SOCIALIST Blackpool before the Labour Party Conference.

technical colleges; student status, with full maintenance grants, for all worker-students and those at school, from the age of 16.

The Young Socialists fights for basic political rights for youth by raising as the minimum demand: the right to vote at 18 in municipal and general elections.

• In the field of leisure and entertainment the Young Socialists lead youth in a fight to develop all its physical and mental powers for the struggle for socialism, by demanding: full recreational facilities for young workers; free access to the gymnasia, sports fields, clubs, swimming pools, cinemas and theatres; all youth centres to be placed under the control of the youth themselves;

premises to be made available to young workers where they can meet to discuss their problems and interests free from victimisation and intimidation by the police;

elected committees of young workers, trades unionists and tenants in conjunction with local trades councils, to investigate cases of police brutality against youth;

nationalization of the recording companies, dance halls, bowling alleys and cinemas under the control of turn their frustration against young immigrant workers. The Young Socialists conduct constant propaganda, rallies and campaigns against the open racialists and their parliamentary spokesmen. We demand: repeal the Immigration Act and withdraw the government White Paper; full rights for immigrant youth in relation to employment, education and leisure; outright opposition to any government plans to conscript youth to fight in imperialist wars; the organisation and training of British and immigrant youth, together with other organised workers, for the defence of their organisations against the fascists.

Finally, the Young Socialists make the following demands on behalf of young working-class families: 100 per cent mortgages to be paid back at reduced lates of interest; rents to be fixed at rates which young working-class families can afford; step up the house-building programme out of the profits of the insurance companies and building societies; nationalize land, the building and building supplies industry.

In leading the fight for these demands, linking them up at every level with the struggle of all workers for better wages and conditions, the Young Socialists demonstrate in action to thousands of young workers that capitalism admits not the slightest prospect of improving their lot.

Those young workers who join the Young Socialists learn to recognise through their own experience that the struggle for their own demands involves a struggle for working - class power. In this way it has been possible for the Young Socialists to build an organised movement of opposition to the Tories, the employers and their agents in the Labour government.

It was for this reason that the right wing in the Labour Party organised the witch-hunt against youth. The purpose behind the expulsions and proscriptions, which had the full support of the Tories and employers, was to exclude from politics all those young people whose own experience quickly teaches them that they can only solve their immediate problems by waging a struggle for the overthrow of capitalism.

The ruling class requires most of all that the youth be kept away from any contact with the organised labour movement and the theory of socialism. The biggest threat to the continued existence of capitalism is precisely when the youth begin to unite with older workers behind firm socialist policies.

Programme for Power The resolution for the sixt} annual conference of the Young Socialists therefore calls open!! for a programme for power. 6 Only a revolutionary programme for taking power from the capitalist class measures up to the courage, devotion and self-sacrifice of the young opponents of world capitalism. Only by building a socialist society on the basis of working-class power can the demands of youth be implemented.

Youth will have no truck with the double-talk of the reformists. They reject centrism and middle-of-theroad methods: reformism on behalf of capitalism against the working class; pacifism in service to imperialist wars of aggression; with all this past legacy of betrayal the youth will settle accounts, just as the Negro youth in the United States are forced to reject the Martin Luther Kings the minute the battle has begun. Duplicity and deceit are the stock-in-trade of those bound hand and foot to capitalist establishment. Youth provide the forces for parties of a new type, revolutionary parties which fight to abolish capitalism.

The Labour Party and Communist Party of Great Britain must be rejected as instruments for the taking of power. The entire activity of their leaders has been to act as horse-traders for imperialism. They are soiled and

November by

their actions they were guilty of "Trotskyism'. Identical charges were brought against those members who were expelled from the Young Communist League. On the question of "Trotskyism' there is complete unanimity between Gollan and Wilson. What is the reason for this unholy alliance?

Because it is precisely in the ranks the Fourth International, founded by Trotsky, that the youth will learn to wage class struggle for power against the betrayals of Ine social-democrats and Stalinists.

The Socialist Labour League, the British section of the Fourth International, has always fought to provide the working class with leadership in opposition to the betrayals of the Stalinists and social-democrats. It na. supported the Young Socialists throughout the past six years in its struggle against Wilson and the right wing. This is the reason for the alliance between Wilson and Gollan. This is also the reason for the support and solidarity which this Young Socialist Conference pledges to the Fourth International and the Socialist Labour League. 9 Next week's article will take up in more detail the importance of the theor! / of Marxism in developing the Young Socialists into and intensity.

In Selma, in Harlem, in Chicago, in Rochester, tens of thousands of young Negro workers have defied bull whips, tear-gas, fire hoses and police dogs to rebel against the established order. the summer of this year, thousands of young Negroes, urged on by cheering adults, staged an insurrection in Watts, Los Angeles, against the intolerable living conditions imposed upon them. It took four days for 1,000 policemen and 15,000 troops to restore any kind of order.

In Spain young students unite with striking miners to defy the dictatorship of Franco. In Greece ten thousand angry demonstrators are dispersed only by armoured cars and rifles.

The youth in Aden who come out on to the streets to fight for their freedom fight against the common enemy, under the guise this time of the Labour government.

The Young Socialists has never based its work on narrow 'national' considerations. It views all its activities as part of the international upsurge of youth against world capitalism Those young workers in Britain who have joined the Young Socialists express in a different form the same hatred for the capitalist establishment as youth throughout the world.

mass revolutionary youth movement and the relationship of the Young Socialists to the coming battles over anti-trade union legislation. American household.

While this expansion of credit continues, the gold reserves dwindle to danger level with obvious results for the international financial system, which is pivoted on the dollar and the continued outflow of dollars into the world market.

What is at stake for the U.S. rulers, then, is far more than having a position of strength in relation to France or other capitalist rivals, or stemming the crisis in the colonial countries. Their main problems dre at home.

The most powerful industrial complex of all time, enjoying the most vigorous expansion in its history, rests on an increasingly precarious base and faces a working class which, if as yet politically unawakened, has an immense potential for struggle.

From the standpoint of the development of the crisis of imperialism, both the international liquidity problem and the agonies of the colonial countries are derivative, not central.

The Washington meeting, for all it was worthy of note and explanation, was only of relative importance; no solution of the basic problems of the world economy are conceivable through monetary manipulation.

To believe that it could have chosen a different course to that decided for it by the U.S. government would be utopian. There was no question of any alteration in the role of the dollar-that had been made clear months before and was never really on the agenda at Washington.

SCHEME MOOTED

Labour Minister, Ray Gunter, the employers, led by Lord Rootes, and leading union officials met last month when this scheme was mooted.

What then is the exact position of the British motor industry in relation to its international competitors, that it needs to take such drastic action against motor workers?

Despite the press about the 'supremacy closes its doors on the public, motor workers must view the main topics of the show as a warning to future events.

The most discussed item on this year's agenda was not how many cars have been sold, or even how many cars could be sold, but how much progress had been made in the behind-the-scenes negotiations between the employers, the government and the unions on how best to discipline the workers in the motor industry.

Britain's car workers must take warning that their employers want to fine them out of their pay packets each week if they take part in go-slows or unofficial strikes.

According to the 'Sunday Times', these negotiations have been going on for some time.

ballyhoo of British cars', and George Brown's speech about Britain being second in the export league, Britain's share of the world market has, in fact, dropped drastically since 1957.

In 1957, Britain's share of world exports was 30 per cent compared with Germany's 35 per cent.

In 1961, Britain's share had fallen to 20 per cent, whereas Germany's had risen to 45 per cent.

In the vital United States market, Britain's share has dropped by half between 1957 and 1964, whereas Germany has doubled her sales on the market in the same period and today sells more cars in the U.S. than all other foreign cars added together.

LOST STRONGHOLD The decline of British motors is perhaps shown by such markets at Latin America, which at one time was a British stronghold with Rovers and Standard owning factories there. Today there is no marketing arrangements for British cars—the Japanese took over the Rover factory and their sales are booming. The Standard factory stands almost idle.

This story may soon be repeated in the African market too where British sales are dropping rapidly in the face of German competition.

Strikes by car workers are blamed, of course, for such events, but the actual truth is that Britain's share of these markets, which is further split by the individual makers, Ford, BMC, Rootes, Vauxhall, StandardTriumph, etc., does not warrant the outlay required by each maker to build an adequate sales service network.

One good example of this is the Italian market where, in Rome, Volkswagen have 11 agents. Four British manufacturers share one agent!

Abroad then, British makers cannot compete with their foreign rivals. On the home market, perhaps the most sheltered market in the world, things are also toughening up.:

Credit restrictions, competition from firms like Volkswagen and the falling share of profits from the world markets have already caused a 10 per cent drop in car production so far this year and, in fact, the strikes that have taken place have prevented short-time working, rather than caused it.

STOCK-PILING?

As the winter approaches, leading manufacturers say that extensive short-time working is impossible without extensive stockpiling of cars. Their ability to do this depends in their assessment of future sales, but most manufacturers agree that it will not be at least until 1970 that the 1964 level of production will be reached.

Also competition has now come at this year's Motor Show from the Japanese, who exhibited for the first time.

Honda have already decided to make a major bid in Britain. Spurred on by their Mexican Grand Prix victory, they are bound to establish some foothold, and the Toyota company's Corona is also expected to do well in Britain.

This then is the prospect for the British motor industry, and also the reasons for the employers' suggestion of fines.

REPORT ON INDUSTRY Unable to compete in world trade with their rivals, they seek to attack their own workers to try and bridge the profit gap.

"Trouble-shooter', Jack Scamp's report on the motor industry can be expected to resemble the report of Devlin's Commission on the docks, of which Scamp was a member.

The task of the report team, headed by Scamp, a director of GEC, a Warwickshire county magistrate, is clear: to present a report that will advocate taking back from motor workers the wages and conditions that the employers can no longer afford to pay out with such a declining industry.

Scamp will be aided by such friends of the car workers as Mr. Blakeman of Ford (Dagenham shop stewards will remember Mr. Blakeman), Director of the Bank of England and AEU president, Sir William Carron, Les Kealey of the Transport and General Wor(Cont. back page)

Tense atmosphere in Eire Fou From BILL HUNTER SOUTHALL LP KEEPS TORY SUPPORTERS DUBLIN November 6, 196

compromised a thousand times over with the capitalist establishment. Such parties are incapable of winning the youth.

The right - wing Labour leaders have no monopoly on the question of the witchhunt against youth. The Young Communist League faces constant decline in its influence and support amongst young workers. Many of its members were expelled by the Party bureaucrats in King Street, without its last Congress being allowed to discuss these expulsions. Many of those expelled were demanding that the Party adopt a programme for power and scrap its enslavement to the 'parliamentary road'. The King Street bureaucrats stifled all discussion, let alone opposition.

The betrayals of the rightwing Labourites are matched at every turn by the betrayals of the Stalinists: leading Stalinists in the unions play the game of the opportunists. Their abdication of leadership at the Ford factory in Dagenham resulted in the sacking of 17 militant shop stewards. Paynter, the National Union of Miners' secretary, refuses to mobilise the miners against Robens. The tactics in the Electrical Trades Union handed the union over to the reactionary clique around Cannon. They attack militant dockers in the "Blue Union" who fight the Transport and General Workers' Union bureaucracy. Small wonder that they share with the right-wing Labourites a record of witch-hunting youth!

Our fight for socialism is as dangerous to the Stalinist bureaucracy in the Communist parties and the Soviet state as it is to the right-wing Labour leaders and their capitalist masters. We fight in solidarity with the young workers and students Russia and Eastern Europe to defend the gains of the October Revolution, and at the same time defeat the bureaucracy which collaborates with the imperialists.

The charge levelled against those members who were expelled from the Young Socialists was that in Fourth International progamme developed The struggles of the Young Socialists over the past six years is essentially a development of the programme of the Fourth International founded by Trotsky in 1938.

The Founding Conference called for the reconstruction of the international revolutionary movement after the betrayals of the Stalinists and social-democracy had left the working class leaderless. It was founded in a period of big defeats for the working class.

At the time the pessimists advised Trotsky not to go ahead with the founding of the Fourth International. They said it would inevitably flounder and that a new international could only be built in a period of working-class offensive against capitalism.

SOCIALIST WRENSE BICK PA T010V. IsTly reckoning with Wilson.

Trotsky's method had nothing in common with this kind of thinking.. Trotsky answered the pessimists by stressing that during the imminent world war and in its aftermath a new generation of young workers fresh from the defeats of the thirties would come forward to provide the forces for the reconstruction of a revolutionary Trotskyist International. This generation of young workers would fight under the banner of the Fourth International because capitalism and its Stalinist and social-democratic agents would offer it no future.

Trotsky's confidence in this perspective has been brilliantly confirmed 25 years after his death.

The struggle against world capitalism today finds a new generation of young workers in its front ranks. In Vietnam hundreds of thousands of youth have joined the Vietcong in order to wage to the bitter end the struggle against American imperialism.

In America itself the government has been unable to whip up a patriotic campaign behind the Vietnam war. Massive demonstrations of youth have lemanded: 'Get out of Vietnam.' The last 18 months have witnessed a series of militant actions in the very heart of world capitalism, which are unprecedented for their power Once more the If the article on the meeting of the International Monetary Fund (Newsletter, October 16) left the impression, as Peter Jeffries suggests, that 'no definite decisions were made that was certainly not its intention.

Those decisions were explained in the concluding section. What was said was 'that nothing new happened. Perhaps that was a badly chosen phrase. The point was that the American administration let it be known that it intended to continue on the course it had already decided upon.

The Washington meeting certainly had important implications for the underdeveloped countries who were represented there by opportunist members of the national bourgeoisie.

They had come to Washington with the illusion that the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank would provide them with some solution to their growing social crisis at home. They went away 'empty-handed' though, no doubt, still with illusions about future aid from that quarter.

The U.S. is obviously not going to help them until it comes to popular revolt or armed uprising and then it will be a job for the Marine Corps.

It is difficult to agree with Jeffries that the Washington decisions made the plight of the under-developed countries worse or in any way different.

To suggest this may imply that decisions could have been taken which would have alleviated their position, which was precisely what the nationalist leaders were hoping for.

The central concern of the American government is to safeguard the dollar and this does, it is true, mean a continued worsening of the position of the position of the under-developed countries.

- The fundamental problems of world capitalism today take their origin, however, in the advanced countries and particularly in the United States. The weakness of the dollar arises from the геproduction cycle of American capitalism and its relation to the world market.

In a nutshell, this means that it has become impossible to have boom in the USA and a strong dollar abroad.

The present expansion of U.S. capitalism, and its ability to go on extending its control over the industries of the other advanced countries, is based primarily upon a massive build-up of public and private debt.

This requires a continuous flow of new credit which is pumped in via the Federal Réserve Board in association with the administration. Any interruption of this flow of credit threatens the whole pyramia of debt, which extenas, via instalment selling, into every IN every aspect of its policy, the Labour government of Harold Wilson is carrying out the wishes of big business, on an international as well as national scale.

The war in Vietnam, the suppression of all liberties in Aden, the pitiful temporising with lan Smith, underneath which a more 'rational' exploitation and repression of population of planned, and measures on control, make trayal clear to At home, legislation on wages and trade unions, and the dropping of steel nationalization are also a direct response to the needs of capital. The international banks, as well as British big business, require that the working class shall be disciplined.

To the discipline of unemployment, resulting from Callaghan's cuts, will be added legislation.

In such a situation, the decisive question for the working class is alternative leadership. The Tories are hoping that once Labour has done the job of 'taming' the organised workers, then an election will bring a resounding Tory victory, as it did in 1931.

No alternative The left' in the Labour Party is not capable of giving the alternative leadership. They place a block in the path of those workers who seek to struggle for such an alternative, by constantly repeating the 'lesser evil' theory.

'Yes,' they say, 'Wilson is bad, but Heath (or even Brown) would be even worse?

So long as there is not a break from the old 'Loyalty to Labour, whatever the cost', then the 'left' is, in fact, helping Wilson.

They helped him last year by encouraging the belief that he was some sort of 'left-winger' because of his past associations with the Bevanite movement.

They welcomed his incorporation of ex-"Tribune'-ites and ex-CNDers like Castle, Greenwood and Cousins into the government alongside, let it be said, Alice Bacon, Robert Mellish and various others).

These 'left-wingers' last year condemned the leaders of the Young Socialists for persisting in an all-out principled struggle for socialist policies against Wilson, eventually leading to the creation of an independent revolutionary youth movement.

Now these 'left-wingers' are turned into a left 'cover' for a government of open service to monopoly capitalism.

The interesting journal in this connection is the duplicated 'The Week', whose list of sponsors includes, Frank Allaun, MP, Perry Anderson THE MOTOR INDUSTRY the 'African' Rhodesia is the racialist immigration Wilson's be-all socialists. the proposed of 'New Left Review, Michael Barratt Brown, Norman Buchan, MP, Neil Carmichael, MP, Henry Collins, Lawrence Daly, Eric Hefter, MP, Jim Mortimer, Stan Newens, MP, John Rex, E. P. Thompson, William Warbey, MP, Bert Wynn, K. Zilliacus, MP, Ken Coates, Eric Varley, MP, Earl Russell, OM (I), a recent recruit, and others.

The Blackpool conference of the Labour Party has produced great agitation among the authors and sponsors of this weekly. They put themselves forward as the focus of a revived 'left' in the Labour Party and trade unions.

As The Newsletter pointed out two weeks ago, the prospect is excluded by two important considerations.

In the first place, there is a great danger if the existing oppositionists and doubters are 'brought together' without any clarification of political line.

All this does is to make confusion worse.

Secondly, the line of "The Week' itself is certain to mislead and disorientate any who follow it.

In 'The Week' for October 14, one 'Unitas' in a discussion article writes:

"The task of socialists in the Labour Party is to bring the government round to their point of view.

Pressurize Labour This anonymous 'socialist' joes on to say that campaigns or the 'removal' of Wilson are futile':

*As long as he is at the helm, Wilson will steer the ship whichever way the wind is blowing, and its up to us to see that it is blowing from the left.?

Here it is in a nutshell!

Go ahead with left-wing propaganda to "pressure' the Labour leadership to the left, but on no account fight to defeat the present leadership.

Thus, the 'left' socialists of "The Week' remain exactly where they were last year, before the election.

This same writer thinks (or says) that at the Labour Party Conference a well-planned campaign on steel' succeeded in bringing about a situation which 'is going to make it very difficult for the government to omit the nationalization of steel from the Queen's Speech'.

Bigger 'difficulties' than this have not prevented Wilson and Brown from serving big business, as 'Unitas' will discover.

Walter Kendall, on an inside page of the same issue, vies with Ken Coates in assessing Blackpool. Kendall says, in effect, 'never mind the defeats':

What is surprising aboli.

Blackpool 1965 is not that the platform has carried the day.

Rather it is that, despite the postvictory euphoria, the influence of the left upon the course of events is so great."

The evidence of this remarkable 'influence' is naturally not supplied. Mr. Kendall has more words of wisdom:

'Every delegate who is disappointed with the results of the conference should realise that if the left has not succeeded at the conference, this is because the left is not strong enough to do better.' Such powers of analysis will surely help "The Week' to provide the incisive leadership to achieve the 'unity, co-operation and common purpose' that Kendall concludes we need (he missed his way; he should have been a speech-writer for Harold Wilson).

Moral campaign

Mr. Ken Coates, another 'centrist', wants us to 'save our movement from the shameful effects' of Labour's conference decisions. It will all be done in a great moral campaign of protest.

Coates lashes out at the 'infamous debates on immigration, foreign policy (Vietnam), the incomes policy and continues:

'But you cannot make such inroads as these into the consciences of men without creating a reaction.' That is very true, but there are different reactions.

Without a clear class line, a Marxist alternative, the reaction is predominantly to contorm, to be impressed by the strength of the right.

And the second type of reaction, given the absence of Marxism, is one of confused 'moral' wailings and protests.

provide a focus for all this moralising confusion.

At this time in the development of the class struggle and the betrayals of social-democracy, such a role is a reactionary one. It provides the ruling class and their Labour agents with a breathing space while the militant workers and the youth have to painfully cut their path through the hogwash of middle-class 'conscience' and outdated 'loyalty.

Coates and "The Week', in fact, play the role of slowing down the only effective opposition to Wilson, which must be the building of alternative revolutionary leadership, starting from a class characterisation of Wilson and his government.

Indeed of this, Coates whistles in the dark:

'From the grass roots in the constituencies and the union branches, up to parliament itselt, the left moves over to defiance.' Coates rightly says that no socialist can support government policies, but he gives his readers only the perspective of a steady process of reform inside the Labour Party.

We must associate ourself again, on a clear basis of policy, to ensure that no M.P. who violates these basic moral criteria is ever selected to fight again for Labour.?

So far embedded in the Labour Party machine are these "left-wingers' that they cannot even begin to weigh the significance of Wilson's betrayals, his open attacks on the working class. Instead, they advocate a campaign to select future MPs, on the basis of 'moral criteria'!

Coates ends:

'Our aim is to stop the ConLab coalition, to turn Labour once again towards honest radical policies, and to save our movement from the shameful effects of this week's decisions.' Travesty What a travesty! Honest radical policies! In this day and age?

Coates and his associates are moving not to the left, but to the right. This is not because of any deliberate intention, but because of the refusal-to be expected of centrists—-to base themselves on the building of an alternative revolutionary party, the Socialist Labour League.

From the standpoint of Marxism, questions of tactics and alliances are secondary to this construction of the revolutionary party.

To Coates and "The Week', tactics and alliances have been put first. In adapting themselves to their 'middle-of-theroad' allies they have become more and more like them.

Indeed, 'The Week' has become, instead of a leadership, only a mouthpiece of the middle-class liberal' opposition to especially 'disturbing' aspects of Harold Wilson's policy.

Midlands Correspondent

AST week every docker receive L post a copy of the first 'Docks Bulletin' issued week every docker received through the by the National Modernisation Committee, set up as a result of the proposals of the Devlin Inquiry.

Merseyside dockers, asked for their comments, were not impressed. The general reaction of the men on the docks was that the Modernisation Committee could have saved the postage.

The bulletin declares its and his family informed of progress of the Committee's work.

But the docker can get very little fresh information from its general statements. Most of it consists of a repetition of the committee's aims which have already appeared in its previous propaganda.

Again dockers are told that the scheme is. to give them 100 per cent permanency, that the dock that ur boards art gements wil bat the not lead to the discharge of men from the industry, either initially or as the result of abolition of restrictive practices, or of increased efficiency'.

The trade union leaders, government representatives and employers on the modernisation committee must rate the gullibility of the dockers at a high level.

Reorganisation of the docks under the Devlin Commission proposals will enormously increase the amount of work turned out by the dockers, rationalising production with less employers, cutting down manning scales, abolishing defensive agreements leading to complete mobility of labour and mechanisation unhindered by any rights from the workers' side. Amalgamation Already there are reperts from London and Merseyside of the beginnings of amalgamation of the employers leading to redundancy among the clerical staff.

The Bulletin does contain once again the ominous warning: "Those restrictive practices which are a direct result of the present system of casual employment will be abolished when the casual system is replaced by regular employment.' By 'restrictive practices' the Committee surely means any agreement or custom which prevents the employer from the full untrammelled use of labour exactly as he wishes. The Comaim to the dockworker will be an offer minimum pay.

The Bulletin reports with studied vagueness that 'active negotiations about this are taking place'.

What is almost certainly being discussed is the best way to tie up a package for the docker, made to look as though he is getting something but, in fact, blowing up all his hard-won rights.

'Sell soul'

As one Merseyside 'Blue Union' area committee man told the Newsletter: "They could come out with an increase in the national minimum pay, but in return the docker would have to sell his soul' 'Selling his soul' means fewer dockers tightly controlled by more powerful employers and their collaborationist servants among the trade union leaders.

Local Modernisation Committees are now to be set up in each port. Once these are set up and the National Committee has gone further with its discussion on amalgamations of employers and the future role of the Dock Labour Board, then it will pass over to the 'second stage of modernisation'.

This, says the Bulletin, will 'consist of the abolition of other restrictions on the effective utilisation of manpower and facilities, including the fullest possible use of mechanical aids'.

Now, the stage having been set, will come the direct attack on customs like the 'welt, on manning scales, etc. This is the real purpose of the local modernisation committee—so much for any illusions by any dockers that they have anything at all to gain by being represented on them.

The Bulletin says here quite clearly that 'the abolition of restrictive practices which are a feature of the casual method of employment is essential in the national interest, but clearly the way of doing this is largely a matter of local arrangement'. After Longbridge victory Demand for 38-hr week THE mini shift struggle has now come down to factory level in many Birmingham car and components firms.

The workers' victory of October 25, which breached the 'package deal' agreement on night working, and permitted four-night shifts to be worked by agreement in each company or factory, is meeting with resistance from certain managements.

At the giant Austin factory, Longbridge, BMC bosses are insisting on a 40-hour week spread over four nights of 10 hours each. Workers press for a 38-hour week to bring them into line with 4,000 other night workers at Longbridge who have had a 38-hour, fournight week under a special arrangement since 1957.

HARMFUL

When the Longbridge management were trying to force workers to report for the Friday night mini-shift, their chief argument was that four shifts of 10 hours was harmful to workers' health and increased the risk of accidents. Workers are now using this as a strong reason in favour of the 38-hour week.

There is to be a further delay while a local conference on the subject is called at Longbridge. No date has yet been fixed for this. Meantime most workers are working a 36-hour week, four shifts of 9 hours.

At the BMC factory of Fisher and Ludlow, Erdington, a fournight week of 10-hour shifts has been agreed, If, however, workers win a 38-hour week at Longbridge, pressure will be on at Erdington for a similar agreement.

NO MINI-SHIFT One thousand night workers at the Lucas component factory, Shaftmoor Lane, refused to work the mini-shift last Friday.

At another Lucas factory in Great Hampton Street workers say they will join the mini-shift ban this week-end.

Workers can win this struggle at local level, just as they won at national level, by their own determination and solidarity.

The claim for the 38-hour week, worked in four 94-hour shifts, should be pressed home without delay. spreads THE Southall Labour Party has voted almost two to one against expelling the four councillors who with two others voted with the Tories to make immigrants wait 15 years to go on the council's housing list.

At the recent meeting, according to a local paper, 'the majority were in sympathy with the stand made by the rebels'.

This situation is a direct result of the strengthening by the Labour Party of the Immigration Act, and aids the fascists and racialists in Southall.

The fascists recently broke up a Young Socialists dance. The local Ealing Council have, as a result of the fight at the dance, stopped the YS from having any more halls or rooms for meetings.

The 1/680 branch of the Transport and General Workers' Union has already condemned the council for its action against immigrants, and should be followed by all trade union branches into the area. They should also support a YS public meeting on November 26 for unity of the labour movement to fight against racialism and to drive out the fascists. SAVAGE action againsa Dublin has created a the Irish Republic.

Two members of the Irish Telephonists' Association, imprisoned in Mountjoy Jail, Dublin, after disobeying a High Court order forbidding the picketing of Post Office premises have been on hunger strike since Wednesday '(October 27).

In addition, six other members of the Association have been fined f10 under the Offences Against the State Act for picketing the Dail (parliament).

The Association is striking for recognition from the government the employers in this dispute.

Two protest marches-both involving several hundred workers -have taken place.

Amongst the marchers were large groups of dockers, busmen and factory workers. A significant feature also, was the number of youth taking part-75 girl operators from two telephone exchanges, members of the Post Office Workers' Union, walked out of their jobs on Saturday to join one of the marches.

Busmen and dockers are considering strike action in support of the Irish Telephonists' Association and resolutions condemning the government have been passed by trade union branches throughout the 26 counties.

BATON CHARGE

During last Saturday's protest march the police made a sudden, unprovoked and savage baton charge on the marchers. Naturally, feeling against the police is now running very high.

The militancy of the workers stands in stark contrast to the treacherous attitude of the trade union bosses and of the Labour Party.

Leaders of the Post Office Workers' Union (from which the Association is a breakaway, refuse to support the Association at all.

The Labour Party's attitude is exemplified by the action of one official who, instead of aiding the fight against the government, restricted himself to fostering the illusion that the basis of the strike was an inter-union dispute between the Post Office Workers' Union and the Irish Telephonists' Association.

In response to this, the Association has stated categorically • SLL PUBLIC MEETING our Dublin Correspondent strikers and demonstrators in tense political atmosphere in that it is in dispute with the employers, not the POWU.

The government, in its turn, has issued a press statement in which it claims that it is unable to enter into negotiations with the Association owing to the long-standing agreement with the POWU.

The jailing of strikers and the police attack on demonstrators shows clearly the role of the capitalist state machine.

POLITICAL DEMANDS The struggle of the Dublin workers highlights the need to transform consciously industrial demands into political demands for the overthrow of the capitalist government of Sean Lamass and for the formation of a working-class government.

A feature of the protest movement has been the role played by nationalist elements. This draws attention to a very serious threat facing the Irish working class.

With the trade union leaders and the Labour Party openly showing their complete. bankruptcy, Irish nationalism represents a very important weapon of the capitalist class.

It is, in fact, as great a danger for the Irish workers as racialism is for English workers.

The Irish Workers' (Communist) Party adds to the confusion. Instead of calling for independent action in the Irish Republic and for solidarity with workers of other lands, it seeks support by playing upon the prejudices of the most backward workers.

Its policy is one of extreme nationalism, often indistinguishable from that of the ultranationalist Sinn Fein.

What is needed today in the Irish Republic is the building of a new revolutionary, Marxist leadership against the capitalist state in a struggle for working-class power.

The hundreds of young workers now being brought into conflict with the capitalist state must be involved in the building of this new leadership. Such a task can only be undertaken successfully by the Fourth International.

kers' Union and, among others, Hugh Scanlon, supported by the left wing for AEU office.

In three month's time, this report will emerge. Like the Tory Party Conference, it Will almost certainly call for Labour courts, fines for going on unofficial strikes, reform of union laws to make official strikes virtually impossible — conditions that the German and Italian workers were forced to endure under fascism before the last war.

Official trade union leaders will put up no fight against such proposals.

T&GWU Midlands secretary, Harry Urwin, said quite emphatically in a 'Financial Times' interview on October 18 that he would like to see a labour court with an independent chairman.

But who can be independent of the employers' plans of speedup and sackings?

To fight against the offensive of the employers and their fines, motor workers must fight alongside the dockers in their resistance to the Devlin Report.

Like the dockers, they must call for the nationalization of their industry under workers' control.

Even with the present state of the industry, profits are still high. In 1946, BMC made £332 per employee, Ford £635 and Vauxhall £959.

Now is the time to fight to defeat the Devlin Report and the plans of the motor employers, and pave the way for a socialist tuture.

Registered al tho G.P.O. as a sorrepape 1861 Capiamo Mbas Dred Tlates, s.07.a Piod bo Po ta seron Le oe i

mittee's aim is to monopolise the docks, tie the docker to these big groups of employers and then launch into the restrictive practices'.

In order to prepare the ground for this final offensive it may very well be that there So, in Merseyside, for example, there will be another attempt to put forward a 'new deal', but this time the National Modernisation Committee hopes the dockers will have been thoroughly softened up.

The hard truth behind all the fluffy vagueness in the Bulletin is that the second stage, the direct attack on the dockers, is now moving up.

Militants on the docks have no time to lose in exposing this modernisation committee.

Trade union leaders who sit on these committees are not representing their members.

A real campaign for an increase in wages and nationalization of the industry would smoke out into the open the plans of the employers and all those union leaders who cover up for them by supporting the Devlin Commission proposals.

I WOULD like to take up a few points made in an article of 16.10.65 in The Newsletter on the Glasgow bus workers.

It is quite clear that the Tory press has attempted to mislead by headlines such as "Thugs attack busmen'.

The real question involved, as the article correctly pointed out, is the low wage rates, shift working and week-end working. Since the number of buses running per route has been cut, conductors are now working at nearly twice the rate of a year ago.

The Corporation has also introduced a large number of Atlantian 83-seater buses, thereby increasing the amount of work done per shift. Experiments are under way with one-man buses.

The point about the busmen's action is the role of the Transport and General Workers' Union officials, who have, busmen claim, now 'negotiated' the situation where conductors are instructed not to allow disorderly persons on the vehicles.

Busmen in a number of garages are setting up a rank-and-file committee in opposition to these attacks, while retaining their Transport and General Workers' Union membership.

The responsibility for these attacks lie with the Wilson government. The recent increases in the bank rate, combined with

VER 1,500 tanker drivers at 25 Shell Mex-BP depots in the Midlands, Yorkshire, the North-West and South Wales came out on a 48-hour unofficial strike on Mondav and Tuesdav. in support of a pav and hours' claim.

--rr 100 per cent support was reported from all depots involved.

The strike was called by the unofficial action committee which, as revealed in The Newslettir last week, has been formed as the result of the initiative of the Black Country depot at Cakemore, Blackheath.

Drivers at this depot found, after a five-week strike last year, that they were completely isolated and unable to get contact with depots in other parts of the country. They contacted all other depots and refineries and an action committee was formed which, the workers claim, can 'work on its own unimpeded by any other organisation'.

Not official It is in no way connected with the men's union, the Transport and General Workers' Union. Leaders of the union in Birmingham disclaim all official knowledge of its existence.

The drivers' present basic pay is £13 for a 41-hour week. They are pressing a claim for £23 10s. for a 49-hour week, guaranteed for 52 weeks in the year. They say that at present, in order to get anything like a living wage, they have to work 20 hours' overtime each week.

Unless their claim succeeds the tankermen say there will be further lightning strikes. Their claim, put in over a month ago, has so far reached deadlock between the employers and the union.

There is to be another meeting of the conciliation committee in London on November 10.

The two-day strike has considerable impact.

| LETTERS | both represent the betrayal by middle-class Labour councillors of the mandate, on which they were elected, in order to curry favour with the Labour bureaucracy.

All these people must be removed. The only force to do this is the working class, campaigning on the socialist policies of the Socialist Labour League and Young Socialists. Newsletter Correspondent Busmen thwart T& GWU schedules meetings THE last of three meetings called by London District Secretary of the Transport and General Workers' Union, Larry Smith, to discuss the busmen's policy on winter schedules, was held last week.

Editor of rank-and-file paper "The Platform', which has called for all-out action on the issue, was not allowed to attend the meetings on the grounds that he is not a busman.

Some indication of the interest the union officials can generate is given by the fact that out of 30,000 busmen in the divisions, only 200 attended the meetings.

Only a handful were under 30, and not one coloured worker attended.

The busmen's union had previously called off strike action by busmen at the Hanwell garage against the winter schedules.

Smith condemned a Newsletter leaflet which linked up the fight against the London Transport Board with opposition to the Labour government's plans to legislate against the unions.

Chairman of the meetings, Bill Jones, known for his past militancy, defended Smith. At the first meeting, an old supporter of his called on him to refuse the chair at the other meetings, but to no effect. 45 hours nights, nine hours.

When the first reduction was won after the First World War, the day-shift hours were knocked down to 47, but nights remained at 45 hours, a difference of two hours.

The next reduction was won after the Second World War when both shifts had their hours reduced to 44 hours, the reduction to 42 and then 40 hours have

refusal to abolish Tory rent legislation (1957 Act), are placing local authorities deeper in debt.

Building programmes are being cut. In Glasgow 140 labourers in the direct-building scheme are to be laid off permanently this winter. In order to complete existing projects on inflated land values, local authority debts are shooting sky-high and interest on capital is accumulated.

The raising of rents (by 100 per cent in many cases) by the Glasgow Labour Corporation is the same as the attacking of transport workers' conditions: FOLLOWING on from your article on the fight for the fournight week, and now the campaign at Austin's for a 38-hour week for night-shift workers, it may be of interest to fellow workers to know something of the history of the fight for a shorter working week.

In 1910 the Coventry hours of work were 54 hours day shift and been equal on both shifts.

I think it can be clearly seen from this record that the general reduction in working hours has been won at the expense of nightshift workers.

To restore the balance of even 1910 conditions, the night shift would only be working 31 hours.

One might ask the question: at what price have our so-called official leaders achieved a shorter working week? A just demand would be at least a 30-hour week for night workers.

Coventry AEU shop steward