Vital stage in fight against capitalism

THE initiative of the Kambeth calling a lobby of Parliament on January 26 against the proposed laws on wage control and trade unions is being acclaimed by trade unionists all over the country.

On Tuesday, November 30, the Sheffield District Committee of the Amalgamated Engineering Union voted unanimously to support the lobby and there are many militant engineers in that city who will work for a large delegation to back up this support.

During the 'fifties' ', when the Tories were in power and the economy was booming, factory workers were called out on one parliamentary lobby after another, usually under the leadership of Communist Party or 'left-wing Labour' (of the "Tribune' type) members and sympathisers.

UNEMPLOYMENT

In 1963, the first dose of unemployment for a generation, even though it remained at only one-quarter of the figure of the '30s, brought a new and immediate response.

On March 26, 1963, many thousands of workers responded to the call of the Trades Councils of the north-east region to lobby parliament.

It had been intended by those who called it that this lobby should be just another of the old type-a long queue outside the House of Commons and a few arguments, violent or otherwise, with MPs.

But changes had taken place in the working class.

Over 20 years of full employment, with no major defeat for the working class, meant that the workers had high expectations and were prepared to defend them.

Not only that: in the Young Socialists and the Socialist Labour League, with their papers 'Keep Left' and The Newsletter, there was being built a political leadership which was determined to fight in a revolutionary way, basing themselves on the ability of the working class to struggle.

In our epoch, the question of political power of the working class is raised by every clash with the employers.

It was this drive CLIFF SLAUGHTER The In I The The The ing-class power, the rejection of class-collaboration, which differentiated these non-political tendencies from both the Labour Party and the Communist Party, with its 10-year-long marriage to 'the parliamentary road to socialism'.

Into the middle of the protest lobby on unemployment, there(Cont. page 3, col. I)

Support lobby OTHER organisations which have added their support to the January 26 lobby, and have passed resolutions opposing legislation against the unions include:

the government.

The Clydebank No. 4 branch of the NUGMW which covers the majority of engineers in the Singer works; the North Glasgow branch EI; the Clydesdale Television Engineers' Works Committee, Edinburgh;

the Croydon, Surrey, Trades Council; the South-west London CAWU branch; the Loudon School of Economics Socialist Society; the Birkenhead No. 7 branch of the United Pattern Makers' Association.

Most union branches are sending further resolutions to their union executive committees and to local trades councils calling for support for the lobby.

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